NEW YORK -- Sam Shepard, the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, Oscar-nominated actor and celebrated author whose plays chronicled the explosive fault lines of family and masculinity in the American West, has died. He was 73.
Family spokesman Chris Boneau said Monday that Shepard died Thursday at his home in Kentucky from complications related to Lou Gehrig's disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
The taciturn Shepard, who grew up on a California ranch, was a man of few words who nevertheless produced 44 plays and numerous books, memoirs and short stories. His 1979 play Buried Child won the Pulitzer for drama.
In his 1971 one-act Cowboy Mouth, which he wrote with his then-girlfriend, musician and poet Patti Smith, one character says, "People want a street angel. They want a saint but with a cowboy mouth" -- a role the tall and handsome Shepard fulfilled for many.
"I was writing basically for actors," Shepard told The Associated Press in a 2011 interview. "And actors immediately seemed to have a handle on it, on the rhythm of it, the sound of it, the characters. I started to understand there was this possibility of conversation between actors and that's how it all started."
Shepard was credited with co-writing the screenplay that became Paris, Texas. The 1984 road movie was directed by Wim Wnders and starred Harry Dean Stanton and Dean Stockwell.
Sam Shepard was a towering figure in American theater and film. He indeed had "the right stuff." His voice will truly be missed. https://t.co/gkkK8KHxum
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) July 31, 2017
A great man of the theater has passed. Thank you, Sam Shepard. RIP.
— jason alexander (@IJasonAlexander) July 31, 2017
His Western drawl and laconic presence made him a reluctant movie star, too. He appeared in dozens of films, and was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in 1983's astronaut drama The Right Stuff. Among his most recent roles was the Florida Keys patriarch of the Netflix series Bloodline.
But Shepard was best remembered for his influential plays and his prominent role in the off-Broadway movement. His 1979 play Buried Child won the Pulitzer for drama. Two other plays -- True West and Fool for Love -- were nominated for the Pulitzers as well, and are frequently restaged.
"I always felt like playwriting was the thread through all of it," Shepard said in 2011. "Theater really when you think about it contains everything. It can contain film. Film can't contain theater. Music. Dance. Painting. Acting. It's the whole deal. And it's the most ancient. It goes back to the Druids. It was way pre-Christ. It's the form that I feel most at home in, because of that, because of its ability to usurp everything."
Shepard's manuscript collection is stored at the Harry Ransom Center on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin. The 30-box collection consists of consist of notebooks, drafts, publication proofs, screenplays, scripts, production and publicity material, correspondence, printed material and photographs belonging to Shepard.
An additional 26-box collection of Shepard's material is stored at Texas State University's The Wittliff Collections.
