Per an autopsy, it was determined a ruptured abdominal aneurysm felled the star, coroner's officials in Ventura County, California, announced today.
Scott, who suffered a heart attack in 1990, had been known to be in poor health in recent years--even if the ex-Marine did plow ahead with work, appearing in two TV movies and the big-screen remake of Gloria just this year.
"He made every actor proud to say that they were in the same profession," said fellow Oscar winner Jack Lemmon, who costarred with Scott in two recent works, the TV movies 12 Angry Men (1997) and Inherit the Wind (1999).
Scott's key roles include the hawkish general in Stanley Kubrick's classic nuclear-age satire, Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), and one of Paul Newman's pool-hall nemeses in The Hustler (1961).
Another notable film credit is 1959's Anatomy of a Murder, which, like The Hustler, brought Scott an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
Perhaps an even bigger force on the stage, Scott headlined numerous Broadway productions after making his New York debut in 1957--among them, the 1968 premiere of Neil Simon's Plaza Suite and a 1975 revival of Death of a Salesman, which he also directed. A 1996 run in Inherit the Wind was cut short when he took ill. In all, he won two Obies for off-Broadway productions.
Nominated four times for an Academy Award, Scott won the Best Actor trophy for his portrayal of World War II General George S. Patton in the 1970 biopic Patton. His opening monologue in the film, delivered in the shadow of a mammoth U.S. flag, remains one of cinema's most indelible moments.
Scott virtually dared the Academy not to give him the Oscar that year, publicly decrying the competition prior to the ceremony by saying actors shouldn't be pitted against each other. But voters couldn't help themselves; Scott won the award anyway. Presenter Goldie Hawn giggled as she read his name, presumably giddy about the fireworks to come. But it was more like a fizzle. Scott simply didn't bother to show--he spent the night watching hockey, instead.
His statement, however, had been made: Scott was the first actor to decline an Oscar, sparking a mini-trend in the 1970s, which also saw Marlon Brando reject, via Native American actress Sacheen Littlefeather, his own 1972 Oscar for The Godfather.
The Academy didn't take Scott's rebuff too personally; he was nominated again in 1971 for the medical drama The Hospital.
As to what became of Scott's spurned Oscar? The statuette that would have been handed to the actor or a designated sub was put back in the mix that night and given to someone else. (There's no nameplate on an Oscar until after Oscar night.) Thus, there simply is no George C. Scott Oscar, Leslie Unger, a spokeswoman for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, explained today.
Born October 18, 1927, in Wise, Virginia, George Campbell Scott did time as a Marine and a teacher before turning himself over to acting in 1950. For the next seven years, he crisscrossed the country in summer stock and regional companies before finally achieving "overnight" success playing the title role in the New York Shakespeare Festival's 1957 production of Richard III.
Scott made his TV debut in a 1958 episode of Kraft Mystery Theater. Television was yet another medium in which he worked fiercely and often, winning two Emmys, including one for the 1997 Showtime production of 12 Angry Men. Other memorable small-screen credits include an inevitable turn as Scrooge in 1984's A Christmas Carol and a return to his Patton fatigues in 1986's The Last Days of Patton.
Survivors include his actor son Campbell Scott (Dying Young), the product of his union, or unions, to the late actor Colleen Dewhurst. (The two married--and divorced--twice.)
In all, Scott wed five times. His most recent marriage was in 1972 to Day of the Dolphin costar Trish Van Devere.