Marjoe Gortner, Preacher and Actor Who Was Subject of Oscar-Winning Doc and Appeared in ‘Earthquake,’ ‘Falcon Crest,’ Dies at 82 — SkimNews
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- Marjoe Gortner died Friday in Santa Fe, N.M., at age 82 after years of congestive heart failure, according to his wife Susan Magestro, who survives him along with no other immediate family named in the notice
- The 1972 documentary "Marjoe", directed by Howard Smith and Sarah Kernochan on Gortner's 1971 farewell revival tour, won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature and drew a rapturous Cannes response from Roger Ebert, but the film was later 'lost' for years until Kernochan tracked down the rights
- Gortner's parents pushed him into evangelical preaching as a child, staging a press photo op when he officiated a marriage ceremony at age 4; his father later absconded with approximately $3 million in donations when Marjoe was 16
- Gortner built a B-movie and television career playing crazed drug dealers, outlaws, and preachers, with roles in 1974's "Earthquake" as unhinged grocery store manager turned National Guardsman Sgt. Jody Joad, Walter Hill's "Wild Bill," "Starcrash," and a corrupt psychic on "Falcon Crest," plus TV appearances on "The A-Team," "Airwolf," "T.J. Hooker," and "Fantasy Island"
- He produced the Marjoe Gortner celebrity sports invitationals, which aired on CBS on Saturdays for years and raised millions for various charities, according to actor Ian Ziering, who called him 'a force of nature'
- Gortner was married five times, including briefly to actress Candy Clark after the two co-starred in Milton Katselas' 1969 drama "When You Comin' Back, Red Ryder?"; he also released a record titled "Bad, but Not Evil" early in his post-preaching career
Why it matters: Gortner's life arc — from a 4-year-old officiating marriages for a family that fleeced revival audiences to an Oscar-winning documentary subject exposing that same hustle, and finally to a decades-long charity producer who raised millions — encapsulates a rare public reckoning with religious showmanship that almost disappeared when the 'Marjoe' film itself went undistributed for years.
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