The jarring, mysterious death of Gene Hackman marks a tragic end to one of the truly great actors of his generation.
Found at his home in Santa Fe, New Mexico, alongside the body of his wife of 34 years, classical pianist Betsy Arakawa, both deaths are now under investigation.
The local Sheriff said they may have been dead for several days or “weeks,” before the bodies – along with the remains of one of their three dogs – were found by maintenance workers last Wednesday.
News of the passing of the 95-year-old and his 65-year-old wife came as a shock to not only to the world, but also his own children.
Daughter Leslie Anne Hackman, 58, said she is very close to her father, but admitted she hadn’t spoken to him in a couple of months and noted he was in “very good physical condition,” for his age.
Those thoughts were echoed by longtime friends of the couple Barbara Lenihan, 75, of Santa Fe and her husband, author Daniel Lenihan, 79, in an exclusive interview with The Post.
“They were delightful. Both Betsy and Gene were very witty and sharp as a tack. Very creative,” said Barbara, adding: “Betsy was very fun. They would occasionally go out to dinner but mostly Betsy would do grocery shopping because she was a very good cook — they always were the two of them, even though they had lots of friends and everybody wanted to be around them.”
By all accounts, Hackman and Arakawa — his second wife who he married in 1991 — had a real love story and a rare, enduring show business marriage.
Lenihan said she and her husband had seen the two at the beginning of the year and despite Gene appearing somewhat frail, they both seemed fine. Betsy was very protective of Hackman’s life and health, she said.
Hackman’s acting career spanned six decades, with bit parts in the early 60s before scoring his breakthroughs in Warren Beatty’s “Bonnie and Clyde” in 1967 and as the hard-boiled detective star of “The French Connection” in 1971, both movies which were cornerstones of the New Hollywood era. The latter role also brought him his first Best Actor Oscar.
Once established, Gene continued to be prolific, appearing in up to five movies a year throughout the 70s and 80s, but refused to be pigeonholed, taking on iconic roles including Lex Luthor in “Superman” and Coach Norman Dale in Hoosiers. In 1993 he got his second Oscar for western “Unforgiven”.
He retired from acting after 2004’s “Mooseport,” and focused on writing and painting with Arakawa’s support.
For the last 20 years the Hackmans enjoyed an almost reclusive life in their sprawling $3.8 home on 12 acres just north of Santa Fe.
The few pictures which emerged of Hackman in his advanced years show him looking thin and gaunt, although Leslie Anne – one of his three children with first wife Faye Maltese alongside Christopher, 65 and Elizabeth, 63 – said he liked Pilates and yoga, and still did both several times a week.
Santa Fe Sheriff Adan Mendoza has said there are no signs of foul play in Hackman and Arakawa’s deaths while he awaits for the official autopsy and toxicology reports.
An open prescription pill bottle and pills were scattered around the room where Awakawa was found, according to authorities, later revealed to be Tylenol, thyroid medication and a drug to treat high blood pressure.
Hackman was discovered in what police believe was the mudroom. Officers said that it appeared he had “suddenly fallen.”
The Lenihans remain as baffled as others about what really happened.
Daniel Lenihan, 75, a master diver, underwater archeologist and author, met Hackman around 1991 when he was in training to dive in the 1993 film, “The Firm” with Tom Cruise. They met in dive shop in Santa Fe when Lenihan was in charge of underwater archaeology for the National Parks.
Lenihan raved about Hackman’s enduring wit and charm and his sometimes “twisted sense of humor.” He said his friend was never ostentatious and did not seek out celebrity, but thought nothing about hiring a private plane and heading out to wherever the Lenihans were to work or hang out with them.
The two ended up collaborating on three historical fiction novels including the well-reviewed, “Wake of the Perdido Star,” about a young boy coming of age on the high seas, “Justice for None,” which involved racial injustice, and “Escape from Andersonville” set during the Civil War.
“We had an intense relationship,” Daniel Lenihan told The Post. “He was a very forceful fellow. I’m a little bit the same way. I couldn’t be easily convinced to change something but he wouldn’t let up. We were writing intensely. He was a very intelligent creative man, often stubborn. But we could always work things out. He was also good to work with.”
Hackman told Time magazine in 2004 that he began writing that same year because he could do it “without 90 people standing around” waiting for him to perform. “I feel it’s creative. And I like the loneliness of it.”
He also wrote two solo novels: A Western titled “Payback at Morning Peak,” which came out in 2011 and a police thriller called “Pursuit” two years later.
Hackman overcame a difficult childhood to ascend to the highest reaches of Hollywood.
His father abandoned the family when he was small, and his mother tragically died in a fire she accidentally set with a cigarette while drunk in 1962.
“Dysfunctional families have sired a lot of pretty good actors,” he observed during a 2001 interview with The New York Times.
Hackman, who enlisted as a Marine when he was young, had a reputation for playing pugnacious characters onscreen and could be “stubborn” Lenihan said, but never truly difficult.
The tough guy was actually funnier than anyone knew, according to Barbara Lenihan.
“We laughed a lot together,” Barbara told The Post. “We’d be here at dinner at our house and Gene would give that look and start acting in the character of another person – it was hysterical. He was very fun and gracious and probably underneath it all very shy. We had a great time and lots of laughs.
She recalled Hackman’s sense of humor in the parting shot he always used whenever they said goodbye to each other.
“I remember him always saying ‘I’m so glad you got to see me’ – that was always his line every time we parted ways.”
Daniel Lenihan said he won’t soon forget his friend.
“He was easy to enjoy, very bright, deep, kind of no nonsense, and he had a twisted sense of humor sometimes, as I have. I think the legacy is that he was man who was alive with ideas. And I think his brain was really attached to his heart. As a person, I never got tired talking to him.”