Gervais Duan "G. D." Spradlin (August 31, 1920 – July 24, 2011) was an American actor. He often played devious authority figures. He is credited in over 70 television and film productions, and has performed alongside such notable actors as Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Johnny Depp, and George C. Scott, among others.
Spradlin portrayed a corrupt U.S. Senator from Nevada, Pat Geary, in The Godfather, Part II. He also played a conspirator in the attempted assassination of a state governor in Nick of Time. Among his film credits are One on One (1977) (as an authoritarian basketball coach), Apocalypse Now (as the general who assigns Martin Sheen’s character to the search mission). He played the head football coach B.A. Strother of the North Dallas Forty (1979), General Durrell the commandant of the "Carolina Military Academy" in the 1983 movie The Lords of Discipline, and Ed Wood and The Long Kiss Goodnight, as the President of the United States.
In 1984, Spradlin played a villainous Southern sheriff in Tank. In 1988, he played Admiral Raymond A. Spruance in the miniseries War and Remembrance. In 1989, Spradlin played a small role in the film War of the Roses as a divorce lawyer, with Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner.
Spradlin retired from acting after his last film, Dick (1999), in which he played Ben Bradlee. He appeared in the Electronic Arts Godfather II video game in 2009.
GD Spradlin cause of death
GD Spradlin died of natural causes at his cattle ranch in San Luis Obispo.