Robert Guillaume, star of TV's Benson, dies at age 89

Los Angeles

TWO-TIME Emmy Award-winning actor Robert Guillaume, who became one of the most prominent black actors on US television playing the cantankerous title character in the hit 1980s series Benson, died of complications from prostate cancer on Tuesday, his wife said. He was 89.

The gravelly-voiced Guillaume, who thrived in Broadway musicals before starring on the TV series Soap and its spinoff Benson, died at his Los Angeles home, his wife Donna Brown Guillaume said in a statement. It is not known how long he had been battling cancer.