Telly Savalas He attribute his success to "his complete ability to be himself." Savalas had his first lead role in a film in "Crooks and Coronets" (1969), a British crime comedy. More widely seen was the James Bond movie "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" (1969), where Savalas played Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Savalas had the lead in a Western shot in Spain, "Land Raiders" (1970), then was second-billed to Clint Eastwood in the war-heist film "Kelly's Heroes" (1970), shot in Yugoslavia, directed by Hutton. He was second-billed to Charles Bronson in an Italian–French crime film, "Violent City" (1970), then went to Hollywood to
Telly Savalas TV show, "The Extraordinary" with a paranormal tale where Savalas talked about an experience that he had that he could not explain. After Savalas came back to reprise his role on "Kojak" in the 1980s, he began to lose close relatives. His brother George Savalas, who played Detective Stavros on the original "Kojak" series, died in 1985 of leukemia at age 60. His mother Christina, who had always been his best friend, supporter, and devoted parent, died in 1988. Later that year, Savalas was diagnosed with transitional cell cancer of the bladder. While undergoing treatment, he continued to act, including