SKIP HOMEIER

(5 October 1930 - 25 June 2017)

Born George Vincent Homeier, US actor Skip Homeier, who has died aged 86 of spinal myelopathy, started out as a child actor on radio from the age of six. His early films saw him playing wild teenagers but he managed the change from child to adult actor quite seamlessly and, if never a big star, worked steadily for some forty years. His first film was Tomorrow, the World! (1944) in which he played a Nazi youth. Wedded to genre films, Homeier was seen in many a Western, war and crime picture. A lot were minor films or B-movies but there were some goodies, too, such as Henry King’s The Gunfighter with Gregory Peck, Lewis Milestone’s Halls of Montezuma with Richard Widmark, Sealed Cargo with Dana Andrews, Sam Fuller’s Fixed Bayonets, Douglas Sirk’s Has Anybody Seen My Gal?, Black Widow with Ginger Rogers and The Tall T, Ten Wanted Men and Comanche Station, all with Randolph Scott. Television always figured in his career, too, especially in the 1970s. Skip’s last film was Quell and Co (1982). After that Homeier retired (aged 52), refusing all interviews and festival or convention invitations. He was married twice and had two children.

MICHAEL DARVELL