THE MISFIT (REMEMBERING DONALD SUTHERLAND)
With a career as rich and prolific as Donald Sutherland's, it's remarkable that he never received an Oscar nomination.
The fact that he didn't would suggest Hollywood never really quite knew how to fully embrace an actor who revelled in quirky roles and built a career inside and outside the studio system.
During a diverse career spanning seven decades, the Canadian was honoured by the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.
He received an honorary award for his work in 2017 but while a retrospective award for a lifetime achievement is a fitting honour, it isn't quite the same as having a specific performance recognised by your peers.
Given his stunning performances in classics like 'MASH,' 'Klute,' 'Fellini's Casanova,' Don't Look Now,' and 'JFK,' the fact he was never in an Oscar race seems one hell of an oversight.
There's no doubt Sutherland turned out plenty of performances over the years that should have made various Oscar shortlists.
Born in St John in New Brunswick in Canada in 1935 with Scottish, English and German ancestry, Sutherland's father ran the local gas, electricity and bus company.
Donald was plagued with illness as a child, battling rheumatic fever, hepatitis and poliomyelitis but he managed to come through them.
As a teenager, he landed a part-time job after moving to Bridgewater in Nova Scotia, becoming a news correspondent for the local radio station CKBW at the age of 14.
After graduating from Bridgewater High School, he attended Victoria University, an affiliated college of the University of Toronto where he graduated with a double major in Engineering and Drama.
It was there where he met his first wife, Lois May Hardwick who he married in 1959 - the marriage lasted seven years.
Having developed a taste for acting, Sutherland went to England to learn his craft at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts whose alumni includes Richard Harris, John Lithgow, Brian Cox, Ruth Wilson, David Oyelowo, David Suchet, Rory Kinnear, Natascha McElhone, Jim Broadbent, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Kim Cattrall, Benedict Cumberbatch, Roshan Seth, Anthony Head, Jemma Redgrave, Malcolm McDowell Dominic Cooper, Stacy Keach and Diana Dors.
He cut his professional acting teeth in Scotland, spending a year and a half at the Perth Repertory Theatre.
During his time in the UK, Sutherland gained useful experience in film, making his screen debut in the BBC one-off play anthology 'Studio Four' in 1962 and also appearing as an unhelpful neighbour in the ITV photojournalist drama series 'Man of the World' with Craig Stevens.
His first appearance in a movie was in Wolf Rilla's 1963 drama 'The World Ten Times Over' with Sylvia Sims and June Ritchie in a small role as a tall man in a nightclub.
Sutherland also landed guest appearances in the Granada Television ITV police drama 'The Odd Man' and as a hotel clerk in ITV's 'The Sentimental Agent' - a spin-off of 'Man of the World'.
In the BBC's 1964 production 'Hamlet at Elsinore,' he joined a cast that included Christopher Plummer who was Emmy nominated for his depiction of the title role, Robert Shaw, June Tobin, Jo Maxwell Muller, Michael Caine and Roy Kinnear, playing Fortinbras in a production of Shakespeare's tragedy shot on location in Denmark by Philip Saville.
He would be given multiple roles as an old man, a witch and a Sergeant in Warren Keifer's hit 1964 Italian French Gothic horror picture 'Castle of the Living Dead' with Christopher Lee.
There was a guest appearance in an episode of the ITV series 'The Sullivan Brothers' in 1965 which starred Hugh Manning and Anthony Bate.
1965 saw him feature in three movies - Silvio Narizzaro's well regarded Hammer horror thriller 'Fanatic' with Tallulah Bankhead, Stefanie Powers and Peter Vaughan, Freddie Francis' horror anthology 'Dr Terror's House of Horrors' in which he had the main part of a newly wed in a vampire tale and James B Harris' Cold War thriller 'The Bedford Incident' with Sidney Poitier, Richard Widmark and Martin Balsam.
He made two appearances in different roles in 1965 and 1966 in the popular ITV espionage series 'The Saint' with Roger Moore.
In 1966, Sutherland married the Canadian actress Shirley Douglas, the daughter of the Social Democrat politician Tommy Douglas who was responsible for the country's universal healthcare system.
The couple had two children - Keifer, who would become a successful actor in his own right and was named after the director Warren Keifer who he had worked with on 'Castle of the Living Dead' and Rachel who were both twins.
His marriage to Shirley, however, lasted only four years.
The year he got married, he popped up as Sim in two episodes of an acclaimed ITV adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's 'A Farewell to Arms' with Vanessa Redgrave and George Hamilton.
In ITV and ABC's drama 'Court Martial,' Sutherland appeared as a Corporal in the military legal drama with Bradford Drillman and Peter Graves.
Alan Gibson directed him in 'Focus,' a BBC adaptation of an Arthur Miller novel for the anthology series 'Theatre 625' in which he appeared alongside Ray McAnally, Joss Ackland and Vivien Merchant.
He appeared again in the same BBC anthology series in 'On the March to the Sea' - another Gibson directed adaptation of a novel - this time by Gore Vidal - which featured Ackland, Tony Bill, Tessa Wyatt and Peter Madden.
In ITV's crime series 'Gideon's Way' with John Gregson, Sutherland appeared in a 1966 episode entitled 'The Millionaires' Daughter'.
Arthur Hiller directed him in a minor role in the Paramount Pictures romcom 'Promise Her Anything' with Warren Beatty, Leslie Caron and Bob Cummings which received mixed reviews in which he played an autograph hunter in a bookshop.
In 'Billion Dollar Brain,' Sutherland was directed by Ken Russell in a small role as a computer technician in an instalment of the Len Deighton espionage movie series built around Michael Caine's anti-hero Harry Palmer with Karl Malden, Ed Begley and Susan George.
However it was in Robert Aldrich's star studded 1967 war movie 'The Dirty Dozen' with Lee Marvin, Telly Savalas, John Cassavetes, Ernest Borgnine and Charles Bronson that he was to have his big breakthrough as the goofy, slow witted Vernon Pinkley.
That year he also had roles in David Greene's British horror film 'The Shuttered Room' with Gig Young, the same director's spy film 'Sebastian' with Dirk Bogarde, Susannah York and John Geilgud and Michael Sarne's Golden Globe nominated drama 'Joanna' with Genevieve Waite.
However it was playing Vernon Pinkley that made the most impression, turbo charging his career.
Firmly on the radar of casting directors in Britain, there were other guest roles in 1967 and 1968 in popular ITV series like 'The Avengers,' 'Man in the Suitcase' and 'The Champions' and in the US he also appeared on NBC's drama 'The Name of the Game'.
Joseph Sargent directed him in Universal Television's Cold War TV movie 'The Sunshine Patriot' with Cliff Robertson, Dina Merill and Wilfrid Hyde-White.
Sutherland played a marksman in Gordon Flemyng's 1968 star studded thriller 'The Split' with Jim Brown, Diahann Carroll, Ernest Borgnine, Gene Hackman, Jack Klugman and Warren Oates.
He joined Oskar Werner, Barbara Ferris and Virginia Maskell in Kevin Billington's British remake of Douglas Sirk's 1957 romantic drama 'Interlude' which also featured John Cleese and Derek Jacobi in minor roles.
Philip Saville directed him as the Leader of the Chorus in a movie of Sophocles' Greek tragedy 'Oedipus the King' with Christopher Plummer, Lilli Palmer and Orson Welles which didn't impress the critics.
However his next role as the insubordinate, womanising US Army medic Hawkeye Pierce in Robert Altman's 1970 Korean War black comedy 'MASH' alongside Elliot Gould's equally mischievous Trapper John McIntyre was to cement his standing in Hollywood as a character actor.
Altman's film with Sally Kellerman, Robert Duvall, Michael Murphy and Tom Skerritt not only burned up the box office to become the third most successful film that year but her earned him a Golden Globe nomination for Best Lead Actor in a Musical or Comedy and won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.
It would inspire an equally popular small screen version of 'MASH' on CBS with Alan Alda.as Hawkeye, Wayne Rogers, Loretta Swit, Larry Linville and Jamie Farr.
In Brian G Hutton's critically and commercially successful fusion of a heist and war movie 'Kelly's Heroes' about US troops who go AWOL to rob a bank behind Nazi lines, he memorably played the character Oddball among a cast that was led by Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Carroll O'Connor and Don Rickles.
There was a cheeky dual role with Gene Wilder as one of two sets of identical twins switched at birth in pre Revolutionary France in Bud Yorkin's tongue in cheek period comedy 'Start the Revolution Without Me'.
The film, which also starred Billie Whitelaw, Orson Welles, Victor Spinetti and Jack McGowran, divided critics.
Paul Mazursky cast him in the title role of the comedy drama 'Alex in Wonderland' in which he joined Ellen Burstyn and played a movie director agonising over his next project.
However it received mixed reviews.
In Paul Almond's well received Canadian drama 'Act of the Heart,' Sutherland played a priest who Genevieve Bujold's church choir member falls for.
1971 saw him under the direction of Alan Arkin, playing another man of the cloth in the enthusiastically received black comedy 'Little Murders' with Elliott Gould, Vincent Gardenia and Marcia Rodd.
Sutherland was Christ in Dalton Trumbo's cult anti-war film 'Johnny Got His Gun' with Timothy Bottoms, Marsha Hunt, Jason Robards, Kathy Fields and David Soul.
However his role as a Pennsylvania Detective John Klute in Alan J Pakuka's taut 1971 New York thriller 'Klute' with Jane Fonda was to earn him much praise.
While Fonda would capture a Best Actress Oscar for her performance as a prostitute who he initially spies on and becomes romantically involved with, the film yet again proved Sutherland could carry a movie as its lead and it fared well at the box office.
Just before filming, Fonda and Sutherland began an affair which effectively ended his marriage to Shirley Douglas.
He later told Rolling Stone in 2018: "We'd already been cast but had not started shooting.
"And one day, she made it very clear, via a somewhat provocative suggestion, that I should just come home with her. And I just said [pause]: 'OK'."
Both were politically active, campaigning against the Vietnam War.
Francine Parker's 1972 documentary 'FTA' followed Sutherland and Fonda as they toured an anti-war show that was a riposte to the US Army shows led by Bob Hope.
However the film's release coincided with Fonda's hugely controversial visit to Hanoi which resulted in movie theater owners pulling it from their schedules after a week of release.
It wasn't until 2009 that it found an audience again with a screening at the American Cinematheque in Los Angeles, after it was recovered by the filmmaker David Ziegler during the making of his 2005 documentary 'Sir! No Sir!' about GI resistance to the war.
Fonda and Sutherland moved in together but their whirlwind affair fell apart in Tokyo.
Nevertheless in subsequent years, they continued to speak affectionately about each other despite the swift disintegration of their relationship.
Classified documents released in 2017 would later reveal Sutherland was on a National Security Agency watchlist between 1971 and 1973 at the request of the CIA because of his anti-Vietnam War activities.
Before their break-up Fonda collaborated with Sutherland on Alan Myerson's 1973 comedy 'Steelyard Blues' with Peter Boyle in which he played an ex-con with an interest in demolition derbies
During the filming of 'Alien Thunder,' he met the French Canadian actress Francine Racette who he would wed in 1972 and remained married to for the rest of his life, residing in Georgeville in Quebec.
The couple would have three children - Rossif who also became an actor and was named after the French filmmaker Frederic Rossif, Angus Redford who became an actor and film producer who was named after the Hollywood actor director Robert Redford and Roeg who was named after the English director Nicolas Roeg.
Tom Gries directed him and Robert Duvall in the insurance investigator thriller 'Lady Ice' with Jennifer O'Neill and Robert Duvall.
English director Nicolas Roeg also delivered a Gothic horror classic 'Don't Look Now' in which he and Julie Christie memorably played a grieving couple in Venice after the death of their young daughter in a critically acclaimed adaptation of a Daphne du Maurier tale.
Roeg's film continues to influence subsequent generations of filmmakers.
'Alien Thunder' would secure a release in 1974, with Sutherland playing a Canadian Mountie involved in investigating his colleague's murder.
The film by Claude Fournier did not sway audiences or critics and it struggled at the international box office.
Sutherland was reunited with Elliott Gould on Irvin Kershner's 'S*P*Y*S' - a so so Cold War comedy that was screened at the Cannes Film Festival but not in competition and drew an indifferent response from the critics.
Most critics were impressed by his next project, John Schlesinger's 1975 Hollywood drama 'The Day of the Locust' in which he played an accountant called Homer Simpson fixated with Karen Black's actress.
In Maximilian Schell's critically lauded 'End of the Game,' Sutherland had a rather bizarre cameo as a German officer's corpse.
1976 saw Sutherland work with two of Italy's most respected auteurs - Bernardo Bertolucci and Federico Fellini.
In Bertolucci's five hour epic '1900' with Robert de Niro, Gerard Depardieu, Stefania Sandrelli and Burt Lancaster, Sutherland played a cruel Italian foreman with fascist beliefs.
The film about the rise of fascism in Italy was so long it was released in two parts in many countries and despite attracting mixed reviews initially, it has developed into a cult classic.
'Fellini's Casanova' saw Sutherland cast in the lead role of the womanising 18th Century Venetian adventurer Giacomo Casanova.
Robert Redford, Marcello Mastroianni, Jack Nicholson and Alberto Sordi had all been linked to the role in the Dino Di Laurentis movie which wowed critics and earned an Academy Award for Costume Design.
Sutherland also played an IRA man in John Sturges' successfully World War II thriller 'The Eagle Has Landed' with Michael Caine, Jenny Agutter, Donald Pleasance, Anthony Quayle, Larry Hagman and Robert Duvall about a Nazi plot to kidnap Winston Churchill in Norfolk.
In 1977, he made his first TV show since becoming an established name, playing the Canadian thoracic surgeon, Communist Party member and advocate of socialised medicine Norman Bethune in CICA/TV Ontario's revival of the series 'Witness to History'.
He also popped up in a cameo as a clumsy waiter in a spoof of disaster movies in John Landis' sketch comedy 'The Kentucky Fried Movie'.
His next film, Stuart Cooper's British Canadian thriller 'The Disappearance' with John Hurt, Francine Racette, David Hemmings, Virginia McKenna and David Warner, in which he played a contract killer whose wife goes missing, underperformed at the box office and drew critical brickbats.
Sutherland was made an Officer of the Order of Canada a year later - the second highest honour a Canadian could receive.
Another European cinematic great, the French director Claude Chabrol directed him in 'Blood Relatives' - an adaptation of an Ed McBain mystery set in Montreal and co-starring Donald Pleasance, Aude Landry, Stephane Audran and David Hemmings.
Akira Kurosawa would proclaim it to be the best of all the film adaptations of McBain's thrillers.
Sutherland was back working for John Landis, playing a Professor who has a fling with Karen Allen's student in the hit 1978 fraternity comedy 'National Lampoon's Animal House,' with John Belushi, Peter Reigert, Tom Hulce and Stephen Furst.
There was a memorable turn as a scientist in Philip Kaufman's 1978 remake of 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' - a hit with audiences and with critics like Pauline Kael, it was not without its detractors but has continued to grow in stature over the years.
There was a chance to feature in a Sherlock Holmes mystery in 1979's 'Murder By Decree,' with Christopher Plummer, James Mason, David Hemmings, Genevieve Bujold, Susan Clark, John Geilgud and Anthony Quayle, playing the real life Victorian spiritualist Robert Lees.
The Canadian British production took five gongs at Canada's Genie Awards and was a hit with critics.
Noel Black directed Sutherland, Brooke Adams and Paul Mazursky in the Vancouver comedy heist film 'A Man, A Woman and A Bank' which was made by Kirsty McNichol's production company.
Michael Crichton directed him, Sean Connery and Lesley Anne-Down in the critically and commercially successful 'The First Great Train Robbery' - a Victorian twist on the heist film.
The critics were less kind to Don Sharp's Anglo Canadian coproduction 'Bear Island,' a Polar thriller about a UN scientific expedition based on an Alistair MacLean story with Vanessa Redgrave, Richard Widmark, Christopher Lee and Lloyd Bridges.
The 1980s began in a blaze of Oscar glory for Robert Redford's family drama 'Ordinary People' with Mary Tyler Moore, Judd Hirsch and Timothy Hutton in which he played the father trying to keep the peace between a suicidal son and an angry wife in an Illinois family rocked by another son's death.
But while Sutherland picked up a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor in a Drama, he was snubbed at the Academy Awards where the film would go on to capture Best Picture.
There was a romcom role with Suzanne Somers in George Bloomfield's 'Nothing Personal' as a Professor protesting against the killing of baby seals and a Genie nominated performance in Richard Pearce's 1981 Canadian sci-fi drama 'Threshold' with Jeff Goldblum and Mare Winningham.
He played a character called Nick the Noz in Les Rose's 1981 Canadian comedy 'Gas' which was inspired by the energy crisis and featured Susan Anspach, Sterling Hayden, Helen Shaver and Howie Mandel.
In Richard Marquand's much admired 'Eye of the Needle' with Ian Bannen and Kate Nelligan, Sutherland played a Nazi sleeper agent in England who acquires advance information about the Allies' D Day invasion but is unable to pass it on to his spy masters and ends up on a Scottish island while failing to rendezvous with a German U-boat.
In 1983, Sutherland joined Jason Robards, Marsha Mason and newcomer Matthew Broderick in the Neil Simon scripted and Herbert Ross directed comedy drama 'Max Dugan Returns' which fared decently at the box office despite unenthusiastic reviews
In Warris Hussein's 1983 CBS TV movie adaptation of John Steinbeck's novel 'The Winter of Our Discontent' with Teri Garr, Tuesday Weld and Michael V Gazzo, he drew decent reviews for his portrayal of a grocery store clerk who realises the owner of the shop he used to own is an illegal immigrant.
He played a paleontologist drawn into a mystery about an address book in Desmond Davies' 1984 thriller 'Ordeal By Innocence' with Faye Dunaway, Sarah Miles and Christopher Plummer.
Louis Malle directed him that year on 'Crackers' with Jack Warden and Sean Penn as a group of unlucky robbers who break into a pawn shop.
However the remake of the 1954 Italian crime caper 'A Big Deal on Madonna Street' nosedived at the box office.
There was a much bigger box office flop on 1985 when he portrayed a British Sergeant Major in Hugh Hudson's historical drama 'Revolution' with Al Pacino, Nastassja Kinski and Joan Plowright in a film that met with critical disdain and commercial indifference.
His next role was in Michael Dinner's well observed HBO and TriStar Pictures comedy 'Catholic Boys' (or 'Heaven Help Us' in some territories) as a Monk heading up a Church run 1960s Brooklyn blue collar High School with Andrew McCarthy, Kevin Dillon, Mary Stuart Masterson, Wallace Shawn and John Heard.
A commercial disappointment, Dinner's movie divided audiences and critics, with those who loved the film becoming passionate advocates for it.
Sutherland took on the role of the French post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin in Danish director Henning Carlsen's Copenhagen set drama 'The Wolf at the Door' in 1986, with a young Sofie Grabol and Max Von Sydow.
Burt Kennedy directed him and Ned Beatty in the so-so 1987 spoof 'The Trouble With Spies' alongside Ruth Gordon, Michael Horden, Robert Morley and Suzanne Danielle.
In Fred Walton's 'The Rosary Murders,' he was a Catholic priest investigating the murders of fellow clerics and nuns in a Elmore Leonard scripted tale that co-starred Charles Durning, Josef Sommer and Belinda Bauer but it made little impression on audiences.
The same was true for Ralph L Thomas' 1988 thriller 'Apprentice to Murder' with Chad Lowe and Mia Sara, in which he played a dubious doctor practicing folk medicine.
1989 saw him play an Afrikaans school teacher investigating the disappearance of his gardener in Euzhan Palcy's well received anti-Apartheid drama 'A Dry White Season' with Zakes Mokae, Janet Suzman, Jurgen Prochnow, Susan Sarandon and Marlon Brando.
Hugh Hudson directed him again in the psychiatric hospital drama 'Lost Angels' with Adam Horivitz and Amy Loncane.
Sylvester Stallone pitted his will against Sutherland's sadistic warden in John Flynn's prison drama 'Lock Up' with Tom Sizemore which underperformed at the box office, narrowly failing to match its $24 million budget in box office receipts.
Following lead roles in 1990 in a highly regarded independent German comedy 'Buster's Room' with Geraldine Chaplin and the Canadian period biopic 'Bethune: The Making of a Hero' with Helen Mirren, Helen Shaver and Colm Feore, Sutherland had two exceptional cameo roles the following year.
In Ron Howard's hit firemen action thriller 'Backdraft' with William Baldwin, Kurt Russell and Robert de Niro, he played an imprisoned pyromaniac in a creepy performance that stood from much of the pack.
Sutherland would reprise the role in Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego's 2019 direct to video sequel with Baldwin that barely registered with audiences 18 years later.
He had the pivotal role of Mr X, an off-the-record Pentagon source who confirms suspicions about the US establishment's involvement in the assassination of President John F Kennedy in Oliver Stone's dazzling, yet highly controversial thriller 'JFK'.
Clearly relishing his role, Sutherland breathtakingly imparts a lot of information supporting Stone's conspiracy theory in a stylish, gripping, star studded film with Kevin Costner, Tommy Lee Jones, Gary Oldman, Sissy Spacek, Joe Pesci, Ed Asner, John Candy, Jack Lemmon, Kevin Bacon, Laurie Metcalf and Walter Matthau.
John Irvin directed him, Anne Archer, Paul Freeman and Johdi May in the Iron Curtain drama 'Eminent Domain' about a Polish Politburo member who falls foul of his comrades and he also starred in Werner Herzog's climbing drama 'Scream of Stone,' with Brad Dourif, Mathilda May and Al Waxman which the director later claimed was one of his weakest works.
Sutherland received a CableACE Supporting Actor nomination for his portrayal of a corrupt Los Angeles private eye who tries to frame Tim Matheson's married architect for murder in the 1992 MCA Television feature length thriller 'Quicksand: No Escape' with Felicity Huffman.
In Michael Whyte's 'The Railway Station Man,' he was reunited with Julie Christie in a movie about a romance between his English war hero living in Co Donegal on Ireland's Atlantic coast and a woman who moves there.
Co-starring John Lynch, Frank McCusker and Ingrid Craigie, it had a low key release.
He also joined Diane Lane and Masaya Kato in a Japanese and Taiwanese co-production 'The Setting Sun'- a historical drama.
There were much higher profile roles as Merrick Jamison-Smythe in Fran Rubel Kuzui's Josh Whedon scripted 1993 cult movie 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' with Kristy Swanson, Rutger Hauer and Luke Perry and as a Fifth Avenue socialite and art dealer in Fred Schepisi's critically acclaimed drama 'Six Degrees of Separation' with Will Smith, Stockard Channing and Ian McKellen.
There was a comic role as a man who is haunted by his dead wife and finds her spirit increasingly attractive in Percy Adlon's 'Younger and Younger' with Lolita Davidovich and Brendan Fraser and joined Lou Diamond Phillips, Jennifer Tilly and Toshiro Mifune ina Canadian-French adventure film 'Shadow of the Wolf' which made little impact.
He was the KGB commander father of Carla Gugino's character in the Paul Haggis directed, Soviet Union set but Canadian backed rock n'roll drama 'Red Hot' and played an ex-con in Jonathan Heap's underwhelming thriller 'Benefit of the Doubt' who Amy Irving's daughter believes murdered her mother 20 years earlier.
A part in 1994 as a CIA agent investigating a UFO sighting in Iowa in Stuart Orme's 'The Puppet Masters' with Eric Thal, Julie Warner and Yaphet Kotto met with critical brickbats.
There was a more high profile role as a tech company founder who promotes Demi Moore's executive to his role over Michael Douglas in 'Disclosure' the controversial hit sexual harassment thriller from Barry Levinson.
Sutherland got the chance to star in a US Civil War miniseries in 1994 in CBS's Emmy award winning 'Oldest Living Confederate War Widow' tells all, with Diane Lane, Cicely Tyson, Blythe Danner and Anne Bancroft.
That year, there were some brutal reviews for a Sci-Fi Channel's TV movie he starred in 'The Lifeforce Experiment,' in which he played a scientist obsessed with trying to harness life's magnetic flux at the point of death which Variety's critic described as "monumentally boring".
In 1995, however, Sutherland acted opposite Stephen Rea, Max Von Sydow, Imelda Staunton and Joss Auckland in Chris Gerolmo's gripping HBO Iron Curtain serial killer TV movie 'Citizen X', winning an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or TV Movie and a Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries or TV movie Golden Globe for his portrayal of a Soviet Union colonel involved in the eight year hunt for the murderer.
That year there was a villainous role to savour as a US Major General covering up the use of Ebola as a bioweapon in Wolfgang Petersen's highly enjoyable pandemic thriller 'Outbreak' with Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo, Morgan Freeman, Cuba Goofing Jr and Kevin Spacey.
He and his son Keifer were among the cast in Joel Schumacher's hit movie of John Grisham's courtroom drama 'A Time to Kill' with Matthew McConaughey, Samuel L Jackson, Sandra Bullock, Kevin Spacey, Oliver Platt and Brenda Fricker on which he played an activist.
A year later, Sutherland voiced the part of Hollis Hurlbut, the curator of the Springfield Historical Society in an episode of Fox's 'The Simpsons'.
There was also a ho hum thriller, 'Hollow Point' from director Sidney J Furie with Tia Carrere, Thomas Ian Griffith and John Lithgow about an FBI agent and ex DEA agent teaming up to bring down a Mobster.
Douglas Jackson directed him, William McNamara, Lesley Ann Warren, Joe Pantoliano and Tia Carrere in the 1997 thriller for HBO, 'Natural Enemy' about a stockbroker with a terrible past going on the rampage in his boss's house.
In Christian Dugray's 'The Assignment' with Ben Kingsley, Sutherland played a CIA agent who engages Aidan Quinn's naval officer to impersonate the Venezuelan terrorist leader Carlos the Jackal but the thriller failed to cause ripples.
In George P Costamos' political thriller 'Shadow Conspiracy,' he joined Charlie Sheen, Linda Hamilton, Ben Gazzara and Sam Waterston, playing the White House Chief of Staff behind an attempted power grab but it was a commercial and critical disaster.
His next high profile project was Gregory Hoblit's far fetched supernatural thriller 'Fallen' with Denzel Washington, James Gandolfini, Embeth Davidtz and John Goodman which drew negative reviews and failed to make an impression with audiences.
Sutherland played a judge in Marlon Brando's penultimate film, Yves Simoneau's 1988 Canadian black comedy 'Free Money' with Charlie and Martin Sheen, Mira Sorvino and Thomas Haden Church which performed decently at the box office.
In Robert Towne's sports film 'Without Limits,' playing the coach of Billy Crudup's runner but while it drew positive reviews, the film struggled to find an audience.
Jon Turteltaub directed him, Anthony Hopkins, Cuba Gooding Jr and Maura Tierney in the 1999 film 'Instinct' in which he played an academic and which again underwhelmed audiences and critics, falling well below box office aspirations.
Sutherland, Matthew Fox, Mary McDonnell and Bradley Whitford drew good reviews for Tom McLaughlin's poignant 1999 TV movie drama for CBS 'Behind the Mask' as a doctor who runs a centre for adults with mental disabilities who suffers a massive heart attack.
In John Gray's TNT historical TV movie drama that year 'The Hunley,' he was a Brigadier General in a tale about a submarine in 1860s South Carolina with Armand Assante, Alex Jennings and Michael Stuhlbarg among the cast.
There was a John Bruno sci-fi horror movie 'Virus,' in which he played an alcoholic tug boat captain that stumbles across a Russian research vessel and cyborgs.
A commercial failure and critical disaster, the film with Jamie Lee Curtis, William Baldwin, Cliff Curtis and Joanna Pacula has in the years that followed developed a cult following.
Sutherland was entered into Canada's Walk of Fame in 2000 in Toronto. In 2011, he was entered into the Hollywood Walk of Fame in LA.
He also received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award for Lifetime Achievement in Canada in 2000.
His most high profile role that year was as a flight engineer among of a team of ageing astronauts in Clint Eastwood's well received and commercially successful 'Space Cowboys,' starring the director, Tommy Lee Jones, James Garner, Marcia Gay Harden and James Cromwell.
Sutherland played William H Macy's father who trained him as an assassin in Henry Bromwell's little seen but critically respected crime drama 'Panic' with Neve Campbell, Tracey Ullman and John Ritter.
In Christian Duguay's 'Art of War' with Wesley Snipes, Anne Archer and Michael Biehn, he played the UN Secretary General in a spy action thriller that did not connect with critucs or match box office expectations but nevertheless spawned a straight to DVD sequel.
Robert Markowitz directed him, John Heard and Jamie Harris in A&E's 2001 Canadian and American docudrama 'The Big Heist' about the Lufthansa heist, which also featured in Martin Scorsese's 'Good Fellas,' in which he played Jimmy Burke who led the Mafia linked gang responsible.
In Jon Avnet's well received two part 2001 NBC miniseries 'Uprising,' with Leelee Sobeiski, David Schwimmer, Hank Azaria, Sadie Frost, Cary Elwes, Radha Mitchell and Jon Voight, he portrayed the Polish engineer and Senator Adam Czerniakow who was the head of the Warsaw Ghetto Jewish Council during the Nazi occupation.
He also narrated that year the much admired PBS documentary miniseries 'Queen Victoria's Empire'.
There was a voice role as a mentor to Ming Na's scientist in Hironobu Sakaguchi's computer animated feature 'Final Fantasy - The Spirits Within' which also featured the talent of Alec Baldwin, Peri Gilpin, Ving Rhames, James Woods and Steve Buscemi.
Feng Xiaogang cast him as an American filmmaker remaking 'The Last Emperor' in the Forbidden City in the Chinese comedy 'Big Shot' with Ge You, Rosamund Kwan and Paul Mazursky.
There was another Golden Globe nomination in 2002 for Best Supporting Actor in Series, Miniseries or TV movie for his portrayal of US President Lyndon Johnson's adviser Clark M Clifford in John Frankenheimer's highly regarded three hour HBO TV movie 'Path to War' with Michael Gambon, Alec Baldwin, Gary Sinise, Felicity Huffman, Tom Skerritt and JK Simmons.
After being interviewed in Damian Pettigrew's lauded documentary 'Fellini: I'm A Born Liar' about the great director, Sutherland played a safecracker who assembles a daring heist team in F Gary Gray's 2003 remake of 'The Italian Job' with Mark Wahlberg, Charlize Theron and Jason Statham which proved a hit with audiences and most critics.
He played a Reverend in Anthony Minghella's handsome US Civil War hit romantic drama 'Cold Mountain' with Nicole Kidman, Jude Law, Renée Zellweger, Brendan Gleeson, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Natalie Portman and Ray Winstone.
In Renzo Martinelli's Italian movie 'Five Moons Square,' he played a judge in a thriller about the real life Red Brigades kidnapping and murder of the politician Aldo Ray.
Reuben Leder's 'Baltic Storm' saw him play an American official involved in the cover-up of the sinking of a Swedish ship carrying Russian defence materials to the United States in a film featuring Greta Scaachi and Jürgen Prochnow.
In the 2004 Mikael Solomon remake of Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot' for TNT with Rob Lowe, Andre Braugher, James Cromwell, Samantha Mathis and Rutger Haier, he played the businessman Richard Straker acting in the principal vampire's interests in the Maine town of Jerusalem's Lot.
He also popped up as Captain Walton in the Hallmark Channel and Kevin Connor's faithful adaptation of 'Frankenstein' with Alec Newman, Luke Goss, Julie Delpy and William Hurt which drew positive reviews.
There was a regular role in 2005 for 19 episodes as an ambitious Republican Congressional leader and Speaker of the House of Representatives in Rod Lurie's shortlived ABC political drama 'Commander in Chief' which saw Geena Davis portray an Independent Vice President elected on a Republican Party ticket who becomes the first woman President when her colleague dies.
Pitched as a rival to NBC and Aaron Sorkin's hit White House drama 'The West Wing,' 'Commander in Chief' was axed after one season because of disappointing ratings despite positive reviews from the critics.
However the part of Speaker Nathan Templeton earned Sutherland a third Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Miniseries, Series or TV movie.
Sutherland also teamed up in 2005 with Mira Sorvino, Robert Carlyle and Remy Girard for Lifetime Television miniseries 'Human Trafficking' in which he played the head of a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement unit looking into a sex trafficking network involving the Czech Republic, the Philippines, Austria, the Ukraine, Mexico and the United States.
Well received by most critics, it earned him an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or TV movie and a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor in a Miniseries or TV movie despite not matching the grittiness of Channel 4 and CBC's similarly themed 2004 miniseries 'Sex Traffic' with John Simm, Anamaria Marinca, Len Cariou and Maury Chaykin.
He scored a huge box office success as Mr Benet in Joe Wright's critically lauded adaptation of Jane Austen's 'Pride and Prejudice' with Keira Knightley, Matthew MacFadyean, Brenda Blethyn, Rosamund Pike, Judi Dench and Tom Hollander.
Courtney Solomon directed him in the role of a disgraced father in the 19th Century in the critically panned horror movie 'An American Haunting' with Sissy Spacek and James D'Arcy.
A year later, be turned to in Jay Chandrasekhar's bawdy comedy 'Beerfest' with Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, Mo'Nique, Jürgen Prochnow, Cloris Leachman and the director, playing a German grandfather whose death brings his US grandsons to Barvaria but the film again only made a slight profit.
Sutherland turned up as a judge in Mike Binder's post-9/11 drama 'Reign Over Me' in 2007 with Adam Sandler, Don Cheadle, Jada Pinkett-Smith, Liv Tyler and Saffron Burrows which made a modest profit after favourable reviews.
In 2007, he also landed another Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actor in a Miniseries, Series or TV movie for his performance as the patriarch of the Darling Family in Craig Wright's ABC series 'Dirty, Sexy, Money' with Peter Krause, Jill Clayburgh, Blair Underwood, Lucy Liu and William Baldwin.
The show ran for only two seasons, despite being broadcast in many territories.
He played a multi-millionaire in Andy Tennant's successful 2008 romcom 'Fool's Gold' with Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson which made a decent profit despite iffy reviews from the critics
In 2008, the Huffington Post hired Sutherland to regularly blog on the US Presidential Election in which he openly endorsed Barack Obama's bod for the White House.
The French Government acknowledged his career by conferring on him the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.
There was an appearance as an Earl in the Starz network's eight part miniseries 'The Pillars of the Earth,' a 12th Century drama set between the sinking of the White Ship and the murder of Thomas Becket.
Featuring Ian McShane, Eddie Redmayne, Matthew MacFadyean, Hayley Atwell, Rufus Sewell, Allison Pill and Sarah Parish, it drew enthusiastic reviews.
In 2010, his son Rossif starred in Risa Bramon Garcia's direct to DVD romcom 'The Con Artist' with Rebecca Romijn in which Donald played a crime boss.
2011 saw him score a box office hit as a mentor to Jason Statham's hitman in Simon West's action thriller 'The Mechanic' which also starred Ben Foster and drew mixed reviews.
He was Father Mapple in a mostly well received, star studded Canadian German miniseries adaptation of 'Moby Dick' for Encore with Ethan Hawke, Gillian Anderson, William Hurt, Charlie Cox and Eddie Marsan.
In Seth Gordon's bawdy smash hit comedy 'Horrible Bosses' with Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, Jason Sudekis, Jennifer Aniston, Kevin Spacey and Jamie Foxx, he played the wealthy owner of a chemical firm and the father of Colin Farrell's spoilt, drug addicted jerk.
Kevin MacDonald cast him as the uncle of Channing Tatum's centurion in the historical epic 'The Eagle' about the Romans in Scotland with Jamie Bell, Mark Strong and Tahar Rahim which made a slight profit after a mixed critical response.
© Prospero Pictures, Pembroke Pictures & Remarkable FilmsHe found himself acting alongside U2 drummer Larry Mullen Jr in Irish director Mary McGuckian's remake of the French film 'The Man On The Train' which slipped in and out of cinemas with no real fanfare.
A year later, he popped up as Captain Flint in another reworking of a literary classic, 'Treasure Island' for Sky with Eddie Izzard, Elijah Wood, Daniel Mays, David Wilmot, Julian Barratt, Shirley Henderson and Keith Allen which also drew mostly positive reviews.
Sutherland was cast in the Rai Uno, TF1 and NBC co-production, 'Crossing Lines' about a team of investigators operating for the International Criminal Court in the Hague.
After its first season about a New York cop who joins the unit aired on NBC in 2013, the series with William Fichtner, Goran Visnij, Lara Rossi, Richard Flood and Naomi Battrick was acquired subsequently by Netflix.
Many critics felt Sutherland's presence enhanced the show.
There was an unremarkable Western for director Terry Miles, 'Dawn Rider' with Christian Slater and Jill Hennessy - a remake of a 1935 film starring John Wayne.
He joined Slater on another project, Isaac Florentine's 'Assassin's Bullet' - a direct to DVD release with Timothy Spall about the FBI trying to discover the identity of a hitman taking out the world's most wanted terrorists one by one.
Between 2012 and 2015, Sutherland landed the plum role of the autocratic villain President Coriolanus Snow in the hugely successful and critically admired 'Hunger Games' movies with Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright and Stanley Tucci.
This introduced him to a new generation of teenage and young adult filmgoers and he was praised for his performances.
He lent his voice in 2015 to the role of Captain Charles Johnson in a CBC animated adaptation of William Gilkerson's children's tale 'Pirate's Passage' which he adapted for TV with with writer Brad Peyton and slsi starred Gage Munroe and Carrie-Ann Moss.
There was a villainous role in 2016 in the diamond industry drama 'Ice' for the Audience Network with Jeremy Sisto, Raymond J Barry and Ray Winstone which was axed after one season.
Although Sutherland never received an Oscar nomination, the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Sciences marked his accomplished career in 2017 with an Honorary Award.
He likened the experience to carrying the Canadian flag at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics and even joked that he would die a happy man if his last breath was on a movie set.
"I'm really hoping that in some movie I'm doing, I die but I die - me, Donald - and they're able to use my funeral and the coffin.
"That would be absolutely ideal. I would love that."
Fortunately, though, there was plenty of more in the tank as Sutherland continued to effervesce in film and television work.
He reunited with Helen Mirren in Paolo Virzi's 'The Leisure Seeker,' playing a retired professor in the early stages of dementia in a drama that critics felt was too derivative and soppy and which made a modest dent in the box office.
In 2018, Sutherland impressed as the sociopathic J Paul Getty in Danny Boyle's FX series 'Trust' about the kidnapping in Italy in 1973 of his grandson John Paul Getty III.
His performance might have received more praise had it not been for his fellow Canadian Christopher Plummer and his Oscar nominated turn as Getty in Ridley Scott's 'All the Money in the World' following Kevin Spacey's departure from the role
In 2019, Sutherland was awarded the highest honour a Canadian could receive, being promoted to the Companion of the Order of Canada.
In James Gray's pretty but dull sci-fi flick 'Ad Astra' with Brad Pitt, Ruth Negga, Liv Tyler and Tommy Lee Jones, he played a former associate of Pitt's missing astronaut father.
Gray's film performed decently at the box office after receiving mostly positive reviews.
The Covid-19 pandemic played havoc with the release of Giuseppe Capotondi's thriller 'The Burnt Orange Heresy' with Claes Bang, Elizabeth Debicki and Mick Jagger in which he depicted a reclusive artist.
Due to open a week before societies start to go into lockdown in March 2020, the film ended up on digital platforms but got decent reviews.
There was another straight to video on demand release with Johnny Martin's 2020 zombie apocalypse tale 'Alone' with Tyler Posey which failed to strike a chord with audiences in the Covid lockdown era.
There was, however, a Critics Choice Television Award that year for Best Supporting Actor in a TV Movie/Miniseries and another Golden Globe nomination for his performance as a wealthy Manhattan family patriarch in Danish director Susanne Bier's overrated HBO miniseries thriller 'The Undoing' with Nicole Kidman, Hugh Grant, Noah Jupe, Edgar Ramirez and Sofie Grabol.
Roland Emmerich directed him in the 2022 big budget disaster movie 'Moonfall' with Halle Berry, Patrick Wilson, Michael Pena and John Bradley.
In the title role of 'Mr Harrigan's Phone,' Sutherland played a retired businessman who befriends a college student in John Lee Hancock's horror drama which was dismissed byany critics as dull.
He also played that year a sleazy Hollywood studio boss on his deathbed in The Roku Channel's disappointing TV version of 'Swimming With Sharks' starring alongside Kieran Shipka and Diane Kruger.
Michelle Danner directed him alongside Abigail Breslin, Andy Garcia, Luke Wilson and Kyle McLachlan in the well received 2023 period drama 'Miranda's Victim' in which he played a judge.
Before his death, he was vast in David Carson's British Canadian apocalyptic thriller 'Heart Land' which was on pre-production.
There was a recurring TV role as a judge in Paramount+'s 'Lawmen: Bass Reeves' with David Oyelewo, Lauren E Banks and Barry Pepper.
Oyelow would treasure working with Sutherland on what would be his last screen role, describing it as a "privilege".
He observed: "The glint in his eye was that of an inquisitive, hungry artist still on the hunt for the truth.
"Seeing that glint, up close, in the eyes of a legend was something to behold."
It certainly was - not just for those who acted alongside him but for those who enjoyed his rich, enduring career on the big and small screen.
(Donald Sutherland passed away at the age of 88 on June 20, 2024)
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