Actor James Ransone died Friday, apparently by suicide, according to the Los Angeles County medical examiner. He was 46.
Ransone, a native of Maryland, was best known for playing Ziggy Sobotka in the TV series “The Wire” and for his role as Eddie Kaspbrak in the horror movie “It: Chapter Two.”
He acted on shows such as “Generation Kill” and “Bosch,” with his final TV appearance in a Season 2 episode of “Poker Face” that aired in June, according to The Movie Database.
Ransone’s other film credits included roles in the “Sinister” horror franchise, “Tangerine,” “Mr. Right” and the “Black Phone” series of films.
Ransone opened up about the social challenges he faced growing up in a conversation with Interview magazine in 2016.
“I did not fit in well with all of the kids,” he said. “Adolescence was a really hard time for me—as I think it is for most kids.”
Ransone said he had a hard time with “normal public schools,” so his mother found an arts school he could audition for, and he jumped at the opportunity.
“I think it saved me as a kid,” Ransone said. “Going to arts school saved me.”
Ransone later attended film school in New York, but he said he failed because he “didn’t show up to class.”
Ransone “kicked around for a couple of years” and pursued some smaller acting opportunities while also playing a lot of music, at one point considering a career as a musician.
After a few years, he realized that acting was his calling.
“I woke up at 27 after being on heroin for five years,” Ransone said. “It was like I sobered up and I realized: ‘My job is being an actor. This is crazy!’”
Ransone said he sobered up six or seven months before he worked on “Generation Kill,” a job that ended up being transformative.
Because his father was a Vietnam War veteran, Ransone said, being around Marines who had fought in war while they were young allowed him to see a “version of my dad as a young man.”
“A lot of things started to make sense to me in a different way,” Ransone said. “It didn’t do so much for my career, but it shaped me and the way that I think about my life.”
Ransone is survived by his wife, Jamie McPhee, and their two children.
Ransone’s representatives did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
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