Actor Roy Scheider died yesterday aged 75.
Roy Scheider was nominated for Oscars on two occasions
The two-time Oscar nominee was best known for his roles as a small-town police chief in Jawsand his portrait of famed choreographer Bob Fosse in All That Jazz.
He died of complications from multiple myeloma, a cancer of the blood cells, at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock. The actor had been treated there for the disease over the past two years.
A classically trained actor recognised for his angular facial features and boxer's nose, the New Jersey-born Scheider often played harried lawmen or average guys caught up in extraordinary circumstances.
He earned his first Oscar nomination for his supporting role as a narcotics detective partnered with Gene Hackman in the 1971 crime drama The French Connection.
Eight years later, he was nominated as best lead actor for playing the womanising, pill-popping Fosse alter ego Joe Gideon in the semi-autobiographical All That Jazz, which Fosse co-wrote and directed.
But Scheider will perhaps best be remembered as the intrepid police chief of a small seaside resort who goes on a hunt for a giant man-eating shark in Steven Spielberg's blockbuster thriller Jaws.
One of his most memorable lines from the film, "You're gonna need a bigger boat," was ranked 35th on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest movie quotes.
He reprised his role as Amity Island's top lawman, Martin Brody, in the 1978 sequel, Jaws 2.
Scheider also made notable appearances in such films as Klute, Marathon Man- as Dustin Hoffman's older brother - and in Still of the Nightopposite Meryl Streep.
As his film career petered out in the 1990s, Scheider moved into television as the star of SeaQuest DSV, playing the captain of a giant, high-tech submarine.