Tony Roberts, known for his roles in a series of Woody Allen films including Annie Hall, has died at the age of 85.
The news was confirmed by his daughter Nicole Burley to the New York Times on Saturday (February 8), who said he passed away from complications related to lung cancer.
In a long and versatile career on stage and screen, Roberts became closely associated with Allen and often played the best friend of the writer/director. He appeared in a total of six of his feature films: Play It Again, Sam, Annie Hall, Stardust Memories, A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy, Hannah And Her Sisters and Radio Days.
Tony Roberts, Diane Keaton and Woody Allen on the set of ‘Annie Hall’. (Photo by Sunset Boulevard/Corbis via Getty Images)
He was also nominated twice for a Tony Award for his work in theatre – first for his role in the 1968 musical How Now, Dow Jones, and then for the stage version of Play It Again, Sam, three years before he reprised his role of Dick Christie in the big screen version.
David Anthony Roberts was born in New York on October 22, 1939 and raised in Manhattan’s Upper East Side. He went on to major in speech and theatre at Northwestern University and landed his first role in the Broadway comedy Take Her, She’s Mine, alongside Art Carney.
Allen first saw Roberts on Broadway in 1966 in Barefoot In The Park, who promptly cast him in his own stage production of Don’t Drink The Water.
Perhaps his most high-profile role came in the Oscar winning Annie Hall in 1977, where he played Rob, the friend and confidant of Allen’s Alvy Singer. He portrayed Rob as a self-assured television actor that served as a counterpoint to Allen’s neurotic and nervous protagonist, becoming exasperated by his friend’s snobbery about the television industry.
Among Roberts’ other credits are the 1970s film classics Serpico and The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three.
He was married to Jennifer Lyons between 1969 and 1975 and is survived by his daughter Nicole.
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