Legendary American actor and two-time Oscar winner Gene Hackman has died at the age of 95, it has been confirmed. The screen veteran, star of such films as The French Connection, Unforgiven, The Royal Tenenbaums, and the original Superman, was found dead alongside his 63-year-old wife Betsy Arakawa and the couple's dog at the couple's Santa Fe home late on Wednesday afternoon, per The New York Post.

A character actor in the mould of Humphrey Bogart, Robert Mitchum, and James Cagney, Hackman — over the course of an acting career spanning five decades, 85 movies, and dozens more plays and television shows — demonstrated remarkable range and an ineffable combination of grit and charisma that enabled him to play average Joes, comic book supervillains, no-nonsense cops, and estranged patriarchs that all felt real, all felt alive. Among his contemporaries, the Pacinos, Hoffmans, and De Niros of this world, Hackman measured up and stood tall,...