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Herbert Coward, the actor behind perhaps the creepiest villain in the 1972 film ReleaseHe died in a car accident earlier this week along with his girlfriend and two pets.
Coward, who gained fame for playing Toothless Man in the nightmarish thriller, was leaving a doctor’s office Wednesday in Haywood County, North Carolina, when another car hit him, killing him, his girlfriend Bertha Brooks and his pet squirrel and chihuahua. , local authorities said.
The other driver, identified as a 16-year-old boy, has not been charged, as police determined that no crime had been committed in the accident.
Coward was affectionately called “The Squirrel Man” in Haywood County for his penchant for taking his pet squirrel, Cowgirl, wherever he went, local newspaper. The mountaineer grades. Both Cowgirl and her chihuahua Little Man were frequently at his side and, tragically, also accompanied him on the trip that claimed his life this week.
Coward, 85, landed his iconic role in Release after Burt Reynolds saw him carry out a shootout at the Wild West-themed Ghost Town in the Sky amusement park atop a North Carolina mountain.
In 2014, he said The mountaineer that Reynolds had advised him to “act very badly” to get the role of the Toothless Man.
“When I met the director, he said he was glad I had dressed for the part, so I shouted at him and told him I was wearing my usual clothes and pushed him against the wall very cruelly,” Coward was quoted as saying at the time. .
Most recently, Coward starred in the 2013 reality show “Hillbilly Blood,” but preferred to stay in the mountains of North Carolina rather than pursue his Hollywood dreams.
He was reportedly a well-known member of his local church, which he attended with his squirrel.
“I remember him and his squirrel sitting up front on Sunday at Longs Chapel. He was just part of things that way,” one woman commented on Facebook in reaction to the news of his death.