Mark Margolis, ‘Breaking Bad’ actor and Philadelphia native, has died

Mark Margolis, the veteran actor and Philadelphia native best known for playing former drug kingpin Hector “Tio” Salamanca on Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, has died at 83.

Mr. Margolis’ death was announced by his son, Morgan, who said his father died at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York “following a short illness.”

Mr. Margolis, who was born in Philadelphia on Nov. 26, 1939, had a career in Hollywood that spanned decades and included films such as Scarface, The Thomas Crown Affair, and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. He also appeared in nearly all of Darren Aronofsky’s films, including Pi, Requiem for a Dream, The Wrestler, and Black Swan.

But his portrayal of Salamanca, the stroke-stricken uncle in charge of a Mexican crime family, drew widespread praise from critics and viewers alike, earning the actor his first Emmy nomination.

“I was only coming onto Breaking Bad as far as I knew for that one episode, but there’s no accounting for taste, and the fans took a fancy to me,” Mr. Margolis told the Hollywood Reporter in a 2012 interview. “Somebody asked me recently, ‘How did you manage to play such a horrible guy?’ and I said, Have you talked to my friends? They’ll tell you I’m pretty miserable to begin with.”

Mr. Margolis grew up in West Philadelphia, and at the age of 14 attended the Bessie V. Hicks School of Drama. After graduating from Lincoln High School he spent a year at Temple University before dropping out to become an actor. Mr. Margolis and a friend traveled to New York City, where he attended classes with actress and instructor Stella Adler.

“Stella Adler was like, ‘If God was a woman, this is him,’ ” Mr. Margolis said on the Better Call Saul Insider Podcast last year. “It’s all mine now, but the roots of what I have all came from Stella.”

“Absolutely devastated to hear that we’ve lost Mark Margolis,” Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul writer and producer Peter Gould wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “Mark was brilliant, funny, a raconteur with a million stories. I miss him already.”

Mr. Margolis also appeared on scores of television shows, with recurring roles on The Equalizer, Quantum Leap, and HBO’s Oz, where he portrayed Antonio Nappa, an inmate infected with HIV. He also played Dr. Nel Apgar on Star Trek: The Next Generation, a paranoid scientist with a murderous streak.

His final role was mobster Carmine Conti in the Showtime series Your Honor, which starred his Breaking Bad colleague Bryan Cranston. Season Two of the show was released earlier this year.

“Mark has a distinct pedigree in the acting world and a respected reputation, but his contribution on Breaking Bad came down to keeping it simple,” Cranston told the Observer in 2012. “And in our business, simple is hard. To convey a full range of emotion without saying a word, speaks volumes.”

“He was one of a kind,” Robert Kolker, Mr. Margolis’ longtime manager, said in a statement. “We won’t see his likes again. He was a treasured client and a lifelong friend. I was lucky to know him.”