James Whitmore appeared in more than 50 films during a distinguished Hollywood acting career. He was best known in recent years for his touching portrayal of a gentle old “lifer” in a corrupt prison in the hugely popular film The Shawshank Redemption (1994).

Whitmore’s character, Brooks Hatlen, was reconciled with his fate and ran the modest prison library with his pet bird on his shoulder. He cheerfully lifted the spirits of his fellow inmates, including the initially gloomy main protagonist Andy Dufresne, played by Tim Robbins. When the time comes for the thoroughly institutionalised Brooks to be released, he can’t cope with life on the outside and takes his own life. With his characterful craggy face and gentle smile, Whitmore brought great pathos to the role.

Whitmore was hailed as an “actors’ actor” who was much in demand for supporting roles in postwar Hollywood. But his greatest love was the stage and in the 1970s he won critical acclaim for his one-man performances on Broadway portraying Harry Truman in Give ’Em Hell Harry, Theodore Roosevelt in Bully and the actor Will Rogers in Will Rogers USA.

Such was the intensity that he brought to the role of US President Harry Truman in Give ‘Em Hell Harry, that the play was adapted for the big screen in 1975 and won Whitmore a second Oscar nomination, and the only one ever for a film with a one-man cast.

His first Oscar was for his portrayal of the battle-weary, tobacco-chewing platoon sergeant Kinnie in the Second World War drama Battleground (1949). Whitmore was himself a veteran of the US Marine Corps and served in the South Pacific. His tough features and stocky build would make him a natural for roles in war films early in his career and drew him comparisons with Spencer Tracy.

Whitmore’s versatility saw him develop an ecletic filmography which included a role in Planet of the Apes (1968) as the imperious president of the simian assembly.

He also appeared in The Asphalt Jungle (1950), musicals Kiss Me Kate (1953) and Oklahoma (1955), Madigan (1968), On Golden Pond (1980), Nuts (1987) and The Relic (1997). Directors liked to cast Whitmore because he was said to be particularly adept at gradually exposing a warm heart behind a curmudgeonly exterior.

While he never had the looks to play romantic leads, starring roles came in more unusual films. These included the science fiction film Them (1954) about a man’s encounter with a colony of giant ants and Black Like Me (1964), based on the controversial real life account of a journalist who darkens his skin and travels through the racially segregated states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia to expose the realities of life as a black person in the American South.

Whitmore was born in 1921 in White Plains, New York state. Thick-set and athletic, he won a football scholarship to Choate school, Connecticut, and an athletic scholarship to Yale University, where he studied law.

At school his interest in acting was sparked with performances in Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. His sporting career was cut short by knee injuries and, even though his strict Methodist parents disavowed acting, Whitmore pursued his thespian dreams. After returning from the war he studied acting in New York City, notably at the newly established Actor’s Studio, the famous Method acting school based on the ideas of the Russian dramatist Konstantin Stanislavsky, which would later nurture the talents of Marlon Brando, Paul Newman and Al Pacino.

His big break came with his Broadway debut in the war drama Command Decision (1947), for which he won a Tony award. He was overlooked for the film role, which went to Van Johnson. But he was cast in another Second World War movie, The Undercover Man (1949), this time alongside Johnson and Glenn Ford.

Whitmore also appeared in some of the best-known US television shows of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including The Twilight Zone, Dr Kildare, The Law and Mrs Jones, The Detectives and Temperatures Rising. His tough looks made him a convincing cowboy and he appeared in the Guns of the Magnificent Seven (1969) and TV cowboy favourites such as Rawhide, Gunsmoke and Bonanza.

Towards the end of his life he won an Emmy for his role in the TV drama The Practice (2000) and an Emmy nomination for Mister Sterling (2003). His final film appearance was in The Majestic (2001) about a blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter.

He is survived by his third wife, Noreen, three sons from his first marriage and eight grandchildren.

James Whitmore, actor, was born on October 1, 1921. He died on February 6, 2009, aged 87