'Saving Private Ryan' actor Tom Sizemore dies at 61
STORY: Actor Tom Sizemore died on Friday (March 3) at age 61, his manager said.
He was hospitalized in critical condition after suffering a brain aneurysm on Feb. 18.
He died in his sleep at a hospital in Burbank, California, his manager said in a statement.
His first major leading role came in the 1997 horror thriller "The Relic," playing a police detective.
He's best remembered for playing battle-hardened soldiers in two films - Steven Spielberg's "Saving Private Ryan" Ridley Scott's "Black Hawk Down."
"And he goes hey Tom it's Ridley. You want to be in my film you know? I am going to offer one of the leads to you and Josh Hartnett you know? Lt Colonel McKnight. Come in to the office next week you know. So I went to the office and said I'd love to be in it. He said 'you haven't read it yet', I said 'oh no I haven't'', ok. Well come to the office I read it. And he said 'Do you think you could do this? You got to look like a ranger?"
Through it all, Sizemore's career was overshadowed by personal upheavals stemming from long-time bouts with substance abuse, which landed him in and out of jail and drug rehabilitation treatment.
And a relationship with onetime Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss.
He was convicted in 2003 of domestic violence against Fleiss during their stormy yearlong romance, resulting in a six-month jail sentence.
