Padma Shri Tom Alter died at his Mumbai residence on September 29 in the presence of his family and close friends
Padma Shri Tom Alter died at his Mumbai residence on September 29 in the presence of his family and close friends. He was 67, and was suffering from advanced skin cancer. He is survived by Carol, his wife, and children Jamie and Afshaan. Jamie had told the media earlier this month, "It is what is called a squamous cell carcinoma. It is a relapse of the same thing which had happened last year and unfortunately, for various reasons, it was not detected at that time and has come back."
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Alter, who grew up in Mussoorie, Uttarakhand, was the son of American Christian missionaries, Jim and Barry Alter, who were of English and Scottish descent. Remembered for playing gangster Musa in Vidhu Vinod Chopra's Parinda (1989), and Mandakini's screen brother Karam Singh in Raj Kapoor's Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985), Alter was otherwise often cast as a British or American in Hindi cinema.
He caught the acting bug after watching Rajesh Khanna in Aradhana and enrolled at the Film and TV Institute of India where he studied with Naseeruddin Shah and Benjamin Gilani. Some of his earlier notable films included Satyajit Ray's Shatranj Ke Khiladi (1977) and Manoj Kumar's Kranti (1981). He also became hugely popular with television audiences when he played a Britisher trying to learn Hindi in Zabaan Sambhalke (1993-'97), the Indian adaptation of Mind Your Language.
In real life, however, Alter was proficient enough in Hindi and Urdu to give lessons himself. His theatre career (he formed Motley Productions with Gilani and Shan in 1977) allowed him to put that talent on show, especially when he played memorable historic characters like Mirza Ghalib, Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad, Sahir Ludhianvi and Bahadur Shah Zafar.
Alter continued to act till his last days and had just wrapped up shooting for a short film called The Black Cat. Adapted from a Ruskin Bond short story, it saw him play the much-loved writer. Following news of his death, tributes poured in on Saturday from the sports and entertainment fraternity, with Harsha Bhogle tweeting, "The world is a good man short this morning."
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