Baker, Joe Don (1936–2025).Joe Don Baker, actor, was born in Groesbeck, Limestone County, Texas, on February 12, 1936, to Doyle Charles Baker, manager of a service station, and Edna (McDonald) Baker. His mother died in 1946, when he was ten years old, and his paternal aunt, Anna Thompson, took him in and raised him.

At Groesbeck High School, Baker played football (as a linebacker and co-captain) and basketball and occasionally served as a stagehand and an extra in school plays. After graduating in 1954, he enrolled at North Texas State College (now the University of North Texas), where he was a member of the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity. He graduated in 1958 with a degree in business administration, but after getting a part in a play in his senior year, he decided to pursue a career as an actor. After serving two years in the U.S. Army, he went to New York to study at the Actors Studio.

Heavyset and 6’2” tall, Baker had a commanding stage presence. His first Broadway credit was for Marathon ’33, an autobiographical drama by actress June Havoc. The play, starring Julie Harris, opened in December 1963 and ran for just forty-eight performances, but it gave Baker the opportunity to work with a number of up-and-coming actors, such as Doris Roberts, Conrad Janis, and Ralph Waite. His next Broadway role was in James Baldwin’s Blues for Mister Charlie, directed by Burgess Meredith. The play opened in April 1964 and ran for 148 performances. Baker not only worked with Ralph Waite again but also with veteran Pat Hingle and fellow Texans Rip Torn and Ann Wedgeworth.

After his second Broadway play, Baker turned to Hollywood. His first appearance on television was in a 1965 episode of the private eye series Honey West (1965–66); his first movie appearance was as a prison camp inmate in Cool Hand Luke in 1967. Primarily appearing in Westerns and police procedurals, he worked steadily in movies and television through 1973, when he had his breakthrough role in Walking Tall.

Walking Tall was a low-budget ($500,000) film, directed by veteran director Phil Karlson and based on the deeds of Buford Pusser, a former professional wrestler who had become something of a folk hero while serving as the gangbusting sheriff of McNairy County, Tennessee, from 1964 to 1970. Pusser was known for wielding a wooden club against suspected gangsters and surviving multiple attempts on his life. The film opened at drive-ins and grindhouses but became a mainstream success thanks to strong word of mouth and eventually grossed $40 million. According to Karlson, the film was successful because it fulfilled “a deep hunger to have a man in a movie who is big, powerful, and one people can look up to.” “Baker’s Buford has the mighty stature of a classic hero; he seems like a giant from the earth,” critic Pauline Kael wrote.

Baker continued to appear in crime thrillers, though not always on the side of the law. Soon after Walking Tall, he appeared in Charley Varrick (1973), in which he played a pipe-smoking hitman named Molly, and The Outfit (1973) with Robert Duvall. In 1975 he again teamed up with Phil Karlson for Framed. He starred in the television series Eischeid (1979–80) as a New York chief of detectives with a Texas drawl. The character was based on a role he had played in To Kill a Cop, a 1978 made-for-television movie. One of his more memorable movie roles, albeit one that was little more than a cameo, was in The Natural (1984), in which he played a Babe Ruth-inspired slugger known as the Whammer.

In 1986 Baker was nominated for a BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) Award for playing a CIA agent in Edge of Darkness, a 1985 BBC mini-series. He played a James Bond villain, an international arms dealer named Brad Whitaker, in The Living Daylights (1987). He returned to the franchise after Martin Campbell, who had directed him in Edge of Darkness, cast him in GoldenEye (1995). Baker played CIA operative Jack Wade in that film, as well as its sequel Tomorrow Never Dies (1997).

In 1994 Baker received a Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of North Texas. His portrayal of Alabama governor “Big Jim” Folsom in John Frankenheimer’s 1997 television movie George Wallace garnered him two nominations for Best Supporting Actor, one from the National Cable Television Association (CableACE Awards) and one from the International Press Academy (Satellite Awards). In the 1990s two of Baker’s lesser films were given a back-handed tribute on the Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988–99) comedy series. The show lampooned Baker’s rogue cop movies, Mitchell (1975) and Final Justice (1985).

Baker continued working in television and films through 2012. His final credit was in Mud, a 2012 feature starring Matthew McConaughey. As a member of the cast, he shared in the film’s Independent Spirit Robert Altman Award for best ensemble.

Baker died of lung cancer on May 7, 2025, at an assisted living facility in Los Angeles. He was buried at Oakwood Memorial Park in the Chatsworth area of the San Fernando Valley. He was married to Maria Dolores Rivero-Torres from 1969 to 1980, but no children resulted from the relationship.