was in five films, all Oscar-nominated films, and he was great in all of them. He was particularly great in Godfather II and I don't think he got that kind of recognition. In following generations, celebrated actors such as Philip Seymour Hoffman, Steve Buscemi, Sam Rockwell, and Michael Fassbender named Cazale as an influence. The Boston Globe asked: "Why was Cazale so influential? In part, it was because of his commitment to the craft of acting." To Streep, he was "monomaniacal", which had an effect on his co-stars, who were then "challenged to take their own games up a notch". Cazale has a theater named after him, the McGinn/Cazale Theatre (currently inhabited by the company Second Stage Theatre), located at 2162 Broadway at 76th Street in New York City. The theatre is co-named for Cazale and his friend, the actor Walter McGinn, who had died in a car accident in 1977. The theatre was dedicated on March 12, 1984. His life and career were profiled in the documentary film, I Knew It Was You, directed by Richard Shepard, which premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. All five of the films that he starred in would later be selected for preservation in the U.S. National Film Registry of the Library of Congress. Notes Cazale died at approximately 3 a.m. on Monday, March 13, 1978, which is the date on his gravestone and confirmed by his brother, Stephen. His date of death has been commonly reported as March 12, 1978, due to contemporary newspaper reports referencing his death occurring on "Sunday night". References External links eFilmCritic.com Interview with director Richard Shepard on the John Cazale Documentary I Knew It Was You Natural Born Plumbers: John Cazale and the Character Actors of the 1970s John Cazale: Stepped Over at Alternate Takes 1935 births 1978 deaths 20th-century American male actors American male film actors American people of Irish descent American people of Italian descent Boston University College of Fine Arts alumni Male actors from Massachusetts Oberlin College alumni People from Revere, Massachusetts Deaths from lung cancer in New York (state) Obie Award recipients Buxton School (Massachusetts) alumni