Celebrity Biographies
Geoffrey Holder
Geoffrey Holder was a prolific Broadway dancer known to moviegoers for using voodoo against James Bond in “Live and Let Die.” The versatile artist died on October 5, 2014, at the age of 84 at Mount Sinai St. Luke Hospital in New York, due to complications from pneumonia.
Geoffrey Holder , who would reach 1.98 meters in height, was born on October 1, 1930 in Port of Spain, the capital of Trinidad and Tobago, into a very humble family. At the age of seven he began dancing with his brother Boscoe, whose company he joined shortly thereafter. An American choreographer attended a group show, and offered Geoffrey to attend classes at a prestigious New York school.
After launching a prolific career as a Broadway dancer, he won a Tony for the costume design of a version of “The Wizard of Oz” starring African-Americans. In 1955, Holder married the dancer Carmen De Lavallade.
He started acting in movies like John Huston ‘s Annie , where he played Punjab, the bodyguard of the millionaire who adopts the leading girl. But he became internationally popular as the voodoo villain Baron Samedi, in Live and Let Die , where Roger Moore played James Bond. He would later appear in such films as The Wacky Doctor Dolittle , The Prince of Women , and Tim Burton ‘s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory .