Joe Turkel Obituary

Joe Turkel best known for portraying the haunting bartender in Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining and the creator of the replicants in Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner, has died. He was 94.

Turkel passed away on Monday, June 27, 2022, at Providence St. John’s Health Center in Santa Monica.

Turkel also appeared in two other Kubrick films;

1. 1. As a gunman in the climactic shootout in The Killing (1956) and
   2. As soldier sent to the firing squad in Paths of Glory (1957), which the lanky Brooklyn-born actor called the greatest film ever made.

Turkel was born in Brooklyn in 1927, and joined the U.S. Army at age 17, serving in Europe during World War II.

After the war, he moved to California to pursue acting, and landed his first film credit with “City Across the River” in 1948.

Over the course of the next four decades, Turkel worked extensively, starring in films including;

1. “King Rat,”
2. “The Sand Pebbles,”
3. “The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre” and
4. His final film “The Dark Side of the Moon.”

Turkel also appeared in three of director Bert I. Gordon’s films:

1. “Tormented,”
2. “The Boy and the Pirates” and
3. “Village of the Giants.”

Turkel has also appeared on TV, starring in episodes of popular shows such as;

1. “The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp,”
2. “Sky King,”
3. “The Andy Griffith Show,”
4. “Ben Casey,”
5. “The Untouchables,”
6. “Dragnet,”
7. “Miami Vice”
8. “Bonanza.”
9. “Tales from the Darkside,”
10. “The Lone Ranger,”
11. “S.W.A.T,”
12. “Adam-12” and
13. “Ironside.”

Turkel completed a memoir titled “The Misery of Success,” prior to his death and his family plans to publish the memoir later in the year.

Turkel is survived by his two sons, two daughter-in-laws and his brother David Turkel.