I just read that the veteran actor Bo Hopkins has passed away at the age of 84.  The last movie of note that I saw Hopkins in was Hillbilly Elegy, where he had a small role as Glenn Close’s husband.  However, if you’re a fan of older films, you will probably recognize Bo Hopkins, even if you don’t know the name.  He was a handsome but weathered actor with a Texas accent and a reckless attitude.  He was a doomed member of a gang of old west bank robbers in The Wild Bunch.  In Midnight Express, he played a mysterious government agent who turned out to be not as benevolent as he originally seemed.

And, in the 1973 classic American Graffiti, he played the leader of the Pharaohs, the local gang of small town James Dean wannabes.  Even though Hopkins didn’t get a lot of screentime in American Graffiti, he definitely made an impression as the intimidating but ultimately friendly aspiring delinquent.  In the scene below, he and Richard Dreyfuss flip a cop car.

RIP, Bo Hopkins.