News

A glittering purple unicorn landed smack in the middle of American Idol‘s Season 14 New Orleans audition stop — which in no way suggests that the show’s producers surprised us with a special return appearance by Nicki Minaj at the judges’ table. (People genuinely like Keith Urban, after all — they don’t want to see him break out into a Ptsd-induced panic attack.)

Rather, I’m talking about the Idoloonie Nation getting the all-too-rare opportunity to see a 2-to-1 vote against sending a contestant to Hollywood.

Don’t cry for 28-year-old Sarah Quintana, though. Sure, Keith was the only one...

Peter Boyle, the hulking, snappish actor who started out his career as a tough but gained fame for his comedic roles as the Monster in Young Frankenstein and the irascible father on Everybody Loves Raymond, died yesterday in New York; he was 71. In news reports on Wednesday morning, Boyle's publicist stated that the actor passed away at New York Presbyterian Hospital after suffering from from multiple myeloma and heart disease. (The actor had suffered a stroke in 1990, and a heart attack in 1999.) A Christian Brothers monk who taught drama before turning to acting himself, Boyle honed his craft with both the Second City Chicago ensemble and famed acting teacher Uta Hagen. Bit roles soon gave way to a starring role in the Vietnam-era drama Joe, where he played a misanthropic factory worker; in the early '70s, he also had supporting roles in The Friends of Eddie Coyle, The Candidate, and Steelyard Blues. Boyle overcame his rather ominous appearance and brooding presence with a phenomenal comic turn in Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein, where as the Monster he was the he perfect foil to the manic actors surrounding him, including Marty Feldman and Madeline Kahn, and stood out in two memorable scenes: one where he stumbled across a blind man (Gene Hackman) living alone in a cottage, and a show-stopping musical number with Gene Wilder, where the two performed a hilarious version of "Putting on the Ritz." Boyle continued in character actor roles throughout his career, appearing in hard-hitting dramas, raucous comedies, and action flicks alike; very few actors could claim a range that put them in films as disparate as Taxi Driver and While You Were Sleeping throughout their career. Winning an Emmy for a guest turn on the sci-fi series The X-Files in 1996, Boyle was cast that year as cantankerous patriarch Frank Barone in the Ray Romano sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond. The show made him a household name and comedy television fixture, earning him seven Emmy nominations but never a win. In stark contrast to his TV role, his chilling turn as a racist former cop in 2001's Monster's Ball demonstrated that Boyle could still play intense drama as well as light-hearted comedy. Most recently, he appeared in The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause and the upcoming drama Shadows of Atticus. Boyle is survived by his wife, Loraine Alterman (whom he met on the set of Young Frankenstein), and their two daughters. --IMDb staff...

Peter Boyle, whose versatility as a character actor took him from the Vietnam-era angst of Joe to a tap-dancing monster in Young Frankenstein to the cranky paterfamilias of the Barone clan on the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond, has died. He was 71.

Boyle died Tuesday evening at New York Presbyterian Hospital. He had been suffering from multiple myeloma and heart disease, according to the Associated Press.

With his bald pate, wide forehead, dark eyebrows and eyes that could jut to sides, he flashed a manic glint that could be scary or endearing. A one time monastery student, Boyle turned to acting after he felt the "normal pull of the world and the flesh."

Boyle earned 10 Emmy nominations in his long career, seven of them for his role as Frank Barone on Raymond, which ran on CBS from 1996-2005. But Boyle's sole Emmy win came in 1996 for a dramatic guest shot on Fox's The X-Files.

Boyle in recent years had suffered with heart trouble. In 1990, he suffered a stroke and couldn't talk for six months. He had a heart attack on the set of Raymond in 1999 but quickly recovered.

Boyle won his first movie recognition for his portrayal of a blue-collared bigot Joe in 1970's Joe. He played a taxi driver in Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver, one of the nocturnal cabbies who drove the same weird streets as Travis Bickel.