Five-Time Tony Nominee John McMartin, Star of Follies, Sweet Charity & More, Dies at 86

John McMartin, Tony Award-nominated actor of stage and screen, has died at the age of 86 following a battle with cancer. A death notice for the performer appeared in the New York Times on July 7.

A Tony nominee for Sweet Charity, Don Juan, Show Boat, High Society and Into the Woods, McMartin is best known for creating the role of Ben Stone Follies in 1971. His recent Broadway credits included All the Way and Grey Gardens.

McMartin was born on November 18, 1929, in Warsaw, Indiana. He initially went to school for journalism but went on to pursue acting in New York. On his 30th birthday, McMartin celebrated the opening night of his off-Broadway debut in Little Mary Sunshine; his performance won him a Theatre World Award.

In 1961, McMartin made his Broadway debut in The Conquering Hero. He also performed in Blood Sweat and Stanley Poole before originating the role of Oscar in Sweet Charity in 1966. Three years later, he reprised his performance for the film adaptation.

Follies marked the start of McMartin’s Stephen Sondheim repertoire; in 1991, he played Frederik Egerman in A Little Night Music at the James A. Doolittle Theatre (now the Ricardo Montalban Theatre) in Los Angeles. He later played the Narrator and Mysterious Man in the 2002 revival of Into the Woods, earning a Tony nod for Best Actor in a Musical.

McMartin’s numerous additional Broadway credits include Children From Their Games, Love for Love, Solomon’s Child, Is He Dead?, A Free Man of Color and Anything Goes. In 1973, he starred as Anton Schill in Friedrich Duerrenmatt’s The Visit. He played the same role in the musical adaptation at Chicago’s Goodman Theatre in 2009, opposite Chita Rivera. “Your sweet and gifted spirit will be missed,” Rivera wrote in McMartin’s online guest book following his death. “I’m so blessed our lives crossed.”

McMartin is survived by his brother Jim, his partner Charlotte Moore (founder of the Irish Repertory Theatre) and his two daughters, Susan and Kathleen, from his previous marriage to Cynthia Baer (whom he had met when she was a producer on Little Mary Sunshine.)