Jerry Adler, best known for playing a mobster’s confidant on “The Sopranos,” died on Saturday at the age of 96, according to an obituary from the Riverside Memorial Chapel in New York.
The obituary did not provide details on Adler’s death. Adler’s friend Frank J. Reilly confirmed his death in a post on X Saturday.
“You know him from one of his iconic roles [and] from many of his guest appearances,” Reilly wrote. “Not bad for a guy who didn’t start acting until he was 65.”
Adler came from a theater family, the son of Group Theatre manager Phil Adler and the nephew of actor Jacob Pavlovich Adler, he told the Southern New England Jewish Ledger in 2014.
He was a theater veteran who worked behind the curtain on some of Broadway’s biggest shows. Adler worked as stage manager for the original 1956 production of “My Fair Lady” featuring Julie Andrews and Rex Harrison.
He’d later direct the revival in 1976 after having worked on shows like “Annie,” “Marlene Dietrich” and “We Interrupt This Program…” as a production supervisor and director.
Adler wouldn’t receive his first acting credit until 1991, when he appeared on an episode of “Brooklyn Bridge.” He appeared on popular television series such as “Quantum Leap” and “Law & Order,” and even had some leading roles in shows like “Hudson Street.”
But the world will likely best remember Adler for his six seasons on the HBO series “The Sopranos.”
Hesh Rabkin, played by Adler, was a confident to lead character Tony Soprano, a troubled New Jersey mafia boss struggling with his work and his family.
A recurring character, Rabkin was a loan shark who often doled out advice to the younger mafioso.
Adler made appearances in a number of other hit series, such as “Broad City,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm” and “Transparent.” He was a recurring guest on “The Good Wife,” a legal procedural led by Julianna Margulies.
Robert King, co-creator of “The Good Wife,” recalled Adler’s role on the show as Howard Lyman in a social media post Sunday. He described Adler as “one of our favorite collaborators.”
“The intent was only to have him for one episode of THE GOOD WIFE, but he was so funny in a diner scene, yelling ‘I said ice cream, you stupid b—-’ we had him back for six years of Good Wife and three years of Good Fight,” King wrote.
What was meant to be one episode turned into 30 for Adler, according to his IMDb page. He then appeared in two episodes of the show’s spinoff “The Good Fight.”
