Now a father, Jones continued to work steadily through the 1980s.
Chong remembered the first day she met Jones on the set of “Soul Man,” then intimidated as a girl who grew up with “Star Wars.”
“All the cast was a little afraid of him, not just because he was this towering great of an actor who was Othello in New York and his history,” Chong said. “But in fact, he[turnedouttobe[agentlegiantextremelygenerousHe’sverykindandsoft-spoken”[turnedouttobe[agentlegiantextremelygenerousHe’sverykindandsoft-spoken”
Settling into his 50s and past the expiration date for the leading man parts of the era, Jones piled together an impressive run of supporting parts, including roles in “Field of Dreams” (1987), “Matewan” (1987) and “The Hunt for Red October” (1990), a role he would reprise for two sequels.
Perhaps his most famous role of the decade — not counting “The Empire Strikes Back” and “Return of the Jedi” (1983), of course — was as Eddie Murphy’s father in the 1988 comedy “Coming to America.”
“You have to remember ‘Coming to America’ was the biggest Black film of its time,” Morales said. “It was the ‘Black Panther’ of the era.”
He also kept one foot on the boards, earning his second Tony award in 1987 for August Wilson’s “Fences” — a role that Denzel Washington would play in a movie version 29 years later.
In 1990, Jones was cast as the lead in the TV drama “Gabriel’s Fire,” the type of signature role that might have been better appreciated had the series run on a premium cable network two decades later. At the time, however, TV execs considered the material too dark and canceled the show after one season.
Show co-creator Jacqueline Zambrano remembered being called to meet with Jones about a script during a break in shooting. In most cases, that meant the star would have diva-like demands for rewrites. “I sat down and immediately opened my notebook and I had my pen poised,” Zambrano said. “He started talking about a particular scene and asking me questions. Then we went on to another scene, and, you know, we talked as long as we could until they were ready for him on set.
“We both left, and I looked down at my notebook, and I had nothing written down. He didn’t have any notes. He didn’t want to tell me, ‘I want to fix this.’ He just wanted to understand the text. He just wanted to understand the character better.”
Jones shined enough in that limited time to earn his first prime-time Emmy for outstanding lead actor. (He won a second Emmy that night for his supporting turn in the TV movie “Heat Wave,” about the 1965 Watts race riots.)
In 1994, Jones lent his voice as Mufasa in Disney’s animated blockbuster “The Lion King.” He would return to the role in the live-action version 25 years later, the only actor from the original voice cast to return.
Over the ensuing three decades, Jones continued to work continuously — even after he was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes in 1995. He racked up Emmy nominations with guest-starring appearances on “Picket Fences,” “Under One Roof,” “Frasier” and “Everwood.” On Broadway, he notched two more Tony nominations — for a 2005 production of “On Golden Pond” and for a revival of Gore Vidal’s “The Best Man” seven years later.
In 2011, Jones was awarded an honorary Academy Award for his career as a whole. That he never won an Oscar for a specific movie role, denying him the coveted EGOT, is a lingering symbol of just how much he was underappreciated over a prolific and profound career.
Taylor, the UCLA professor, always includes a clip of Jones in the 1987 production of “Fences” in his master class on acting.
“He was a gargantuan presence but such a fine, precise, attuned actor onstage,” Taylor said. “It was beautiful to watch him work.”
