Actor Ryan O’Neal, known for his roles in ‘Love Story’ and ‘Barry Lyndon,’ dies at age 82

The American actor was in a relationship with actress Farrah Fawcett for more than 20 years.

“This is the hardest thing I have ever had to say, but it is what it is. My father passed away peacefully today,” explained his son, also an actor, Patrick O’Neal, on Instagram. Ryan O’Neal made his name in 1970 with the film love story, a romance in which he plays a Harvard law student who falls in love with a young girl played by actress Ali MacGraw, forced to work at the library to pay for her studies. The role earned him an Oscar nomination.

Two years after the international success of Arthur Hiller’s film, he stars alongside Barbra Streisand in the zany comedy What’s Up, Doc?, a film which achieved another success with the American public and further increased its notoriety. He was then recruited by Stanley Kubrick for his Barry Lyndon in 1975, a historical fresco coupled with a social satire exploring the customs of the 18th century. Kubrick argued at the time that “No one but Ryan O’Neal could play Barry Lyndon”.

Twice married to Farrah Fawcett

“My father was as generous as one could be”added Patrick O’Neal, announcing the death of his father. “He loved to make people laugh (…) No matter the situation, if there was a joke to be made, he made it. He really wanted us to laugh. And we all laughed. Every time. We laughed. “We’re having fun. Having fun under the sun.”writes the actor’s son.

O’Neal married and divorced twice before beginning a tumultuous relationship with the show’s star Charlie’s Angels Farrah Fawcett. The couple were together for almost 20 years starting in the late 1970s, but reportedly split in 1997 after the actress caught him in the act with another actress. They reunited again in 2001 until Farrah Fawcett died at the age of 62 in 2009 from cancer, the same day as Michael Jackson.

Legal disputes

Ryan O’Neal told British journalist Piers Morgan that watching love story – a film in which a rich kid falls in love with a working-class girl who later dies of cancer – was heartbreaking for him. “I lost Farrah to cancer, and I just wonder why it happened that way for me”did he declare.

After the death of the actress, he was at the center of a dispute concerning a portrait of Farrah Fawcett signed Andy Warhol, claimed by the University of Texas. After a legal battle, a California court recognized in 2013 that he was the owner.

The actor had previously had other run-ins with the law. In 2009, he was sentenced to an 18-month drug treatment program after police arrested him and his son Redmond and found methamphetamine at their Malibu home.