Ricou Browning is dead: Gill-Man actor of “Creature From The Black Lagoon” was 93 years old

Ricou Browning, the underwater stuntman who played the Gill-Man in the 1954 horror classic Creature from the Black Lagoon and went on to co-produce The Dolphin Story pinball for both the big screen and television, died Monday of natural causes at his home in Southwest Ranches, Fla. He turned 93.

His son Ricou Browning Jr., who works as a maritime coordinator for film and television productions, confirmed his father’s death to Deadline.

Browning, a native of Florida, is believed to be the last surviving original actor who played one of the Universal Classic Monsters underwater locations in several Tarzan films.

Working in Wakulla Springs, Browning began appearing in the underwater shows and newsreels developed by fellow swimmer and promoter Newt Perry. In 1953, Browning was hired to assist a film crew scouting locations for an upcoming Universal horror film. Soon he would be asked to don the humanoid fish costume that would become an icon of Hollywood horror: director Jack Arnold’s Gill Man Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954).

Although actor Ben Chapman donned a creature costume for the land scenes, it was Browning’s graceful, eerie performance in the water that gave the film its most compellingly hypnotic scenes. A sequence in which Browning’s Gill-Man swims directly under the film’s heroine, played by Julia Adams, is particularly memorable.

Browning would reprise the underwater role in the sequels revenge of the creature (1955) and The creature walks among us (1956).

In the early 1960s, Browning expanded into other water-related aspects of the film and television industry. In 1963, together with the writer Jack Cowden, he invented a story about a highly intelligent bottlenose dolphin. The 1963 film pinballwritten by Arthur Weiss, produced by Ivan Tors and directed by James B. Clark, will do for dolphins what the previous ones do girl did for Collies.

A television series adapted from the film ran from 1964 to 1967 on NBC. Browning directed more than 30 episodes of the series, which starred Chuck Connors as the chief of a fictional Florida state park. Child actor Tommy Norden played Bud, the director’s son, who befriends the title character. Around the same time, Browning directed episodes of soft legAdd a bear to the TV menagerie.

His other credits include directing underwater sequences in the 1969 Tony Randall-Janet Leigh comedy hello down there (1969), and four years later he directed the family film Saltabout a friendly sea lion and his human companions.

Over the next few decades, Browning worked continuously as a second unit director, stunt coordinator or underwater sequence director on films such as thunder ball (1965), Under the sea around the world (1966), Island of the Lost (1967) and never say never (1983).

In 1980, Browning was second unit director at Harold Ramis’ CaddyshackHe lends his underwater skills to one of comedy’s most infamous segments: a swimming pool scene that marks the opening moments of Jawbut with the shark replaced by a terrible candy bar.

Browning is survived by son Ricou Browning Jr., who followed his father into acting and stunt work; Daughters Renee, Kelly and Kim and other extended families.