RIP Tom Sizemore, 1961-2023

Veteran actor Tom Sizemore has died at the age of 61.

As Rolling Stone report, Sizemore was “found unconscious after suffering a brain aneurysm from a stroke at his Los Angeles home in the early morning of Feb. 19″. Having been kept alive on a ventilator for the past two weeks, his family made the decision over the weekend to “remove him from life support”, and he subsequently “passed away peacefully in his sleep”.

Sizemore, an actor frequently and rightfully labelled as “troubled” over the course of his career (he had long-standing drug problems and in 2003 spent seven months in prison on domestic abuse charges), was one of the most memorable stars of the 90s, owning every second he appeared on the screen in everything from Heat to True Romance to Saving Private Ryan

For me, I can just never get his “very upset undercover agent” Point Break character out of my head. I will, even today, say the line “YOU THINK I LIKE THESE CLOTHES?!?!” every time I’m forced to put on a tie. Incredibly, the dude is only in this movie for like a minute. Point Break goes for two hours! And here I am saying it’s one of his most iconic performances. That’s what Tom Sizemore would do to a movie.

As you’d already know, this being a video game website, Sizemore was also famous for his role as Sonny Forelli in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City

The game opens with Sizemore’s performance. He’s miles away from where the game’s actually set, you will barely see his face and yet he’s entrusted with setting up the whole damn thing, tone and all, and he absolutely nails it. Even when you can tell the parts where he’s just reading off a script with little idea of the context or what’s coming, it’s still good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfUsnjNbIRg

His WHERE’S THE GODDAMNED MONEY phone calls are also excellent:

Here’s some behind the scenes footage of the game’s voice cast—and man, what a cast—in which Sizemore makes a brief appearance:

In a statement following his passing, Grand Theft Auto developers Rockstar Games point out that Sizemore’s “effortless cool and phenomenal character work” had been “an inspiration to all of us” years before Vice City