Love Story and Barry Lyndon actor Ryan O'Neal dies aged 82, as family pay tribute to Hollywood star
8 December 2023, 22:50
The Hollywood star Ryan O'Neal has died aged 82, his family have said.
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The US actor starred in TV show drama Peyton Place, before moving onto cinema and international stardom in his Oscar-nominated turn as Oliver in the 1971 film Love Story, also starring Ali MacGraw.
O'Neal also starred in What's Up, Doc? with Barbra Streisand, and Paper Moon, opposite his daughter Tatum, who won an Academy Award at the age of 10 for her performance.
He played the title character in Stanley Kubrick's 1975 masterpiece Barry Lyndon, about a cunning Irishman who makes his way into the British aristocracy of the 18th century.
"My dad passed away peacefully today, with his loving team by his side supporting him and loving him as he would us," O'Neal's son Patrick announced on Instagram.
"My father Ryan O'Neal has always been my hero. I looked up to him and he was always bigger than life. When I was born in 1967 my dad was already a TV star on Peyton Place.
"That's where he met my mum Leigh Taylor-Young, and about nine months later (give or take a date night or two) I was born.
"My dad became an international movie star with Love Story at the beginning of the 1970s, a decade he absolutely crushed by starring in movies like What's Up, Doc?, Paper Moon, Barry Lyndon, A Bridge Too Far, The Main Event, and The Driver.
"He is a Hollywood legend. Full stop."
His family did not give O'Neal's cause of death, but he had been diagnosed with leukaemia in 2001 and prostate cancer in 2012.
