{"id":211646,"date":"2026-03-19T16:59:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T16:59:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/211646\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T16:59:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T16:59:17","slug":"matt-clark-acclaimed-actor-and-former-fort-worth-resident-dies-at-89","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/211646\/","title":{"rendered":"Matt Clark, acclaimed actor and former Fort Worth resident, dies at 89"},"content":{"rendered":"

Famed actor Matt Clark<\/a>, who appeared in a number of acclaimed Westerns, has died. He was 89.<\/p>\n

Clark died Sunday, March 15, in Austin following complications from back surgery, his wife, Sharon Mays, confirmed to Variety.<\/a> Mays and Clark had been married since 2000 and lived in Fort Worth for several years.<\/p>\n

The veteran character actor appeared in more than 100 film and television projects over his 50-year career.<\/p>\n

Some of his most famous roles came in \u201cBrubaker,\u201d \u201cJeremiah Johnson,\u201d \u201cThe Outlaw Josey Wales\u201d and \u201cBack to the Future Part III.\u201d Other roles include \u201cThe Cowboys,\u201d \u201cPat Garrett & Billy the Kid,\u201d Walker, Texas Ranger,\u201d \u201cThe Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean\u201d and \u201cThe Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension.\u201d<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udd25 In case you missed it…<\/p>\n

\u25fd\ufe0f Sign up for Star-Telegram news alerts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Matt Clark\u2019s early days<\/p>\n

Born in Washington D.C. in 1936, Clark grew up in nearby Arlington, Va. His father, Frederick, was a carpenter and his mother, Theresa, was a teacher.<\/p>\n

After serving in the United States Army, Clark enrolled at George Washington University in Washington D.C., according to a 1991 newspaper article from Portland\u2019s The Oregonian.<\/a><\/p>\n

He later dropped out during his sophomore year to pursue acting, which took him to New York City. Clark\u2019s first union acting job was off Broadway in \u201cA Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clark\u2019s first screen credit came in 1964\u2019s \u201cBlack Like Me,\u201d in which he played the role of \u201cMugger in Alley.\u201d He followed that up with a few television roles in \u201cBen Casey,\u201d \u201cBob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre\u201d and \u201cT.H.E. Cat.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1967, Clark appeared in the Academy Award-winning \u201cIn the Heat of the Night.\u201d A year later, Clark worked as a stand-in for Martin Sheen in \u201cThe Subject Was Roses.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clark and Sheen had known each other since they both moved to New York.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s my oldest friend. I was kind of a mentor to Martin. I was a couple of years older. And, as happens with friends, those positions chance though the years,\u201d Clark told The Oregonian in 1991.<\/p>\n

\"Lone<\/p>\n

Lone Star Film Society presents “An Evening at the Academy Awards” honoring Pilar & Jesse Upchurch Dee J. Kelly Alumnai & Visitors Center: February 25, 2007 L-R: Matt Clark, Sharon Mays, Ambler Cantey, Johnny Langdon.<\/p>\n

Matt Clark\u2019s Fort Worth connection<\/p>\n

In 2000, Clark married Sharon Mays, a Fort Worth realtor who founded Mays Realty Group.<\/a><\/p>\n

Clark and Mays were regulars at Fort Worth\u2019s celebrity hotspot \u2014 Joe T. Garcia\u2019s<\/a>. The couple were spotted numerous times over the years at the Stockyards restaurant, according to the Star-Telegram archives.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Clark was seen at the eatery with Sheen<\/a>, who was in town shooting the inspirational sports drama \u201c12 Mighty Orphans.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI was like, \u2018Oh crap, that\u2019s Martin Sheen!\u2019\u201d said Joe Lancarte, one of the family owners of Joe T. Garcia\u2019s, at the time.<\/p>\n

\"In<\/p>\n

In this file photo from Nov. 13, 2019, Martin Sheen (middle) poses with actor Matt Clark (left) and Joe T. Garcia’s co-owner Joe Lancarte (right) inside the restaurant Monday night. Sheen is in “12 Mighty Orphans,” an upcoming movie about the Masonic Home Mighty Mites high school football team in Texas.<\/p>\n

Just a few years ago in 2022, Joe T.\u2019s posted a photo<\/a> online of Lancarte posing with Clark and Mays.<\/p>\n

\u201cGreat seeing actor and friend Matt Clark and his wife Sharon. You never know who you might run into at Joe Ts!\u201d the post\u2019s caption read.<\/p>\n

In addition to Mays, Clark is survived by his daughter Amiee, his sons, Matthias Clark, Jason Clark and Seth Clark; grandchildren Sequoia, Dylan, Elizabeth, Miles, Emily, Izzy, Dax, Emanuel and Lucas; great-grandson Claude; and stepchildren Michelle, Joyce and Ray. He was preceded in death by another daughter, Alexandria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Famed actor Matt Clark, who appeared in a number of acclaimed Westerns, has died. He was 89. Clark…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":211647,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[116,118,117,82875,82876,82873,82877,82874],"class_list":["post-211646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-jason-clark","tag-martin-sheen","tag-matt-clark","tag-seth-clark","tag-sharon-mays"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211646"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211646\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}