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Richard Widmark, the Oscar-nominated actor who became a household name playing on-screen villains, has died aged 93.

His wife, Susan Blanchard, confirmed today that the Hollywood veteran passed away at him home in Roxbury, Connecticut on Monday after a long illness.

She said her husband had fractured a vertebrae in recent months, the New York Times reported.

Widmark’s talent for playing villains made him an instant star with his first film role, in the 1947 gangster film Kiss of Death at the age of 32.

His portrayal of Tommy Udo, a laughing psychopath who pushed an elderly woman in a wheelchair to her death down a flight of stairs, won him a Golden Globe as well as an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actor and ensured his future in cinema.

By then, Widmark was already a well-known radio actor, but after Kiss of Death he went on to play a string of other Hollywood bad guys during a seven-year contract with 20th Century Fox.

His career ultimately spanned more than half a century, during which time he portrayed everyone from pickpockets to Presidents and starred opposite Marilyn Monroe, Sidney Poitier and Spencer Tracy.

Widmark was born on December 26, 1914 in Minnesota. He studied law and drama in Illinois and taught the latter before moving to New York where he became an actor himself, featuring in the radio soap opera Aunt Jenny's Real Life Stories.

After the outbreak of World War Two, Widmark attempted to enlist in the army but was rejected on three occasions because of his perforated eardrum. Instead, in 1943, he made his Broadway debut playing an army lieutenant in Kiss and Tell before moving into films four years later.

When not acting, he disliked the limelight, preferring charitable work to giving interviews.

The New York Times reported that he once vowed never to appear in a television talk show, stating: “When I see people destroying their privacy — what they think, what they feel — by beaming it out to millions of viewers, I think it cheapens them as individuals.”

He created the Jean and Richard Widmark Foundation, which has funded Alzheimer's and cancer research, environmental conservation and efforts to combat handgun violence and nuclear weapons.

His first wife, Jean Hazlewood, died in 1997 after 55 years of marriage. Widmark is survived by their daughter Anne and by his second wife.

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