American actor Gerald Dwight Hauser has passed away at the age of 77 at his home in Santa Monica, California, due to a chronic lung disease. The deceased, who pursued his career under the stage name Wings Hauser, acted in 63 movies and 26 television series, from The A-Team to Tough Guys Don't Dance, from Murder, She Wrote to Rubber.
Hauser was hailed as a legend of cinema by his family in the social media post announcing his death. He was undoubtedly a skilled craftsman in his profession, capable of navigating through all genres of commercial cinema: his resume includes horror films, war films, gangster films, vampire films, erotic thrillers, and even French cinema.
His first significant role was in The Young and the Restless, an American soap opera that has already aired 51 seasons. Wings worked there for four years, until 1981. He then landed a villain role in a somewhat prestigious thriller, Vice Squad. Tall, blond, and with a slightly sinister look, his appearance suited the 80s horror film industry and its variations. For instance, Coldfire (V. V. Dachin Hsu and Michael W. Leighton, 1990), a Hong Kong vampire film in which he played a fake bloodsucker. Or Mind, Body & Soul (Rick Sloane, 1992), an erotic and satanic thriller starring Hauser, which was initially not well-regarded but eventually became a cult film. In 2009, an Australian film festival held a retrospective of the actor's B-movie work.
Hauser was also a somewhat famous supporting actor. He appeared in four episodes of Murder, She Wrote and two of The A-Team, portraying different characters each time. He made appearances in Beverly Hills 90210, Perry Mason, and House. He had four wives, a father who was a filmmaker and a victim of the McCarthy Commission, and two sons, one of whom is an actor. Very Hollywood.