Notable deaths last week

• Roger Rees, the lanky Tony Award-winning Welsh-born actor and director who made his mark onstage as Nicholas Nickleby and later played English multi-millionaire Robin Colcord on the TV show "Cheers," has died. He was 71.

Rees played the snobbish Robin Colcord on TV's "Cheers" - he was known for his condescending remarks and rivalry with Sam Malone and for dating Rebecca Howe - and the British ambassador, Lord John Marbury, in "The West Wing." Other recent TV credits include "Elementary" and "The Good Wife."

But he was probably best known onstage for playing the title character in the Royal Shakespeare Company's original production of Charles Dickens' "The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby" in England and on Broadway. He won an Olivier Award and then a Tony. When it was adapted to TV, he earned an Emmy Award nomination.

He earned two further Tony nominations in 1995 for "Indiscretions" and in 2012 for co-directing "Peter and the Starcatcher," a Peter Pan prequel. Other Broadway roles were in "The Addams Family," ""Uncle Vanya," "The Rehearsal," "The Red Shoes" and "London Assurance."

• Fashion designer Christian Audigier, who was born in France but gained fame and fortune in the United States with his tattoo-inspired, street-wise designs for the Ed Hardy and Von Dutch brands, died Friday. He was 57.

Audigier had cancer, said his former publicist, Michele Elyzabeth.

Besides his colorful designs, the designer was known for his energetic promotion and for friendships with celebrities, including Michael Jackson, Madonna and the French singer Johnny Hallyday.

• Omar Sharif died of a heart attack in a Cairo hospital on Friday at the age of 83, his London-based agent Steve Kenis and close friends said.

When director David Lean cast him in 1962's "Lawrence of Arabia," Sharif was already the biggest heartthrob in his homeland, where he played brooding, romantic heroes in multiple films in the 1950s - and was married to Egyptian cinema's reigning screen beauty. But he was a virtual unknown elsewhere.

The film brought him a supporting-actor Oscar nomination. His international stardom was cemented three years later by his starring turn in another sweeping historical epic by Lean, "Doctor Zhivago."

Though he had over 100 films to his credit, "Doctor Zhivago" was considered his Hollywood classic. The Russian doctor-poet Zhivago makes his way through the upheaval of World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution, guided by his devotion to his art and to his doomed love for Lara, played by Julie Christie.

He was Argentine-born revolutionary Ernesto "Che" Guevara in "Che!", Italian Marco Polo in "Marco the Magnificent" and Mongol leader Genghis Khan in "Genghis Khan." He was a German officer in "The Night of the Generals," an Austrian prince in "Mayerling" and a Mexican outlaw in "Mackenna's Gold."

He was also the Jewish gambler Nick Arnstein opposite Barbra Streisand's Fanny Brice in "Funny Girl." The 1968 film was banned in his native Egypt because he was cast as a Jew.

In his middle years Sharif began appearing in such films as "The Pink Panther Strikes Again," "Oh Heavenly Dog!," and others he dismissed as "rubbish."

The drought lasted so long that finally, beginning in the late 1990s, Sharif began declining all film offers.

"I lost my self-respect and dignity," he told a reporter in 2004. "Even my grandchildren were making fun of me. 'Grandpa, that was really bad. And this one? It's worse."'

He had something of a revival. In 2003, he portrayed a Muslim shopkeeper in Paris who adopts a Jewish boy in the French film "Monsieur Ibrahim," winning him a Cesar, the French equivalent of the Oscar.

But for most of the 1990s and 2000s, he was better known for the lifestyle of an international playboy, living in hotels and gambling prodigiously, reportedly once winning a million dollars at an Italian casino. He was a world-class bridge player who for many years wrote a newspaper column on the game.

• James Tate, who planned to be a gas station attendant but changed course in college when he discovered that he could write poetry, the art form that occupied him for the rest of his life and for which he received the highest honors in American letters, has died. He was 71.

Tate first encountered poetry after enrolling in college in what he described as an afterthought. He went on to write more than 20 collections of verse - among them "Selected Poems" (1991), a recipient of the Pulitzer Prize and the William Carlos Williams Award, and "Worshipful Company of Fletchers" (1994), which won a National Book Award.

• Veteran newspaper editor Bob Fallstrom, who in his 66 years with the Herald and Review in Decatur served as a reporter, sports writer and editor, has died at age 88.

• Ken Stabler, who led the Oakland Raiders to a Super Bowl victory and was the NFL's Most Valuable Player in 1974, has died as a result of complications from colon cancer. He was 69.

"He was a cherished member of the Raider family and personified what it means to be a Raider," owner Mark Davis said in a statement. "He wore the silver and black with pride and poise and will continue to live in the hearts of Raider fans everywhere. Our sincerest thoughts and prayers go out to Kenny's family."

Stabler's coach with the Raiders, John Madden, said his former quarterback was cool under pressure.

"I've often said, if I had one drive to win a game to this day, and I had a quarterback to pick, I would pick Kenny," Madden said. "Snake was a lot cooler than I was. He was a perfect quarterback and a perfect Raider. When you think about the Raiders you think about Ken Stabler."

Stabler was a four-time Pro Bowl selection with the Raiders, leading the franchise to consistent success during the 1970s, including a 32-14 victory over the Minnesota Vikings in the 1977 Super Bowl.

The Foley, Alabama, native threw for 27,938 career yards over 15 seasons, which also included stints with the Houston Oilers and New Orleans Saints.

During his college career, Stabler led Alabama to an undefeated 1966 season and was chosen the Sugar Bowl MVP after a 34-7 rout of Nebraska. He also ran for a long touchdown on a rain-soaked field during the 1967 Iron Bowl to lead the Tide to a 7-3 win over Auburn.

• Irwin Keyes, who was Hugo the bodyguard on TV's "The Jeffersons" and had a long career playing villains and henchmen, died Wednesday in Southern California. He was 63.

Talent manager Travis Engle said Keyes died of complications from acromegaly, a hormonal disorder in which the pituitary gland produces excess growth hormone. The condition can cause changes in facial bone structure and lead to premature death.

Engle said Keyes had the disorder throughout his life. He spent the last two years living at a rehabilitation center in Playa del Rey. Actor Andre Rene Roussimoff, better known as Andre the Giant, also had the condition.

Engle called Keyes "probably one of the last of a generation of true character actors."

"There aren't really a lot of them left," he said Thursday.

Keyes was born in New York City and went on to play roles in films including "Friday the 13th" and "House of 1,000 Corpses" as well as comedies, action movies and sitcoms. He played a malicious henchmen in the Coen brothers film "Intolerable Cruelty" and Fred and Barney's friend Joe Rockhead in the "Flintstones" movies.

• Saudi Arabia's Prince Saud al-Faisal, who was the world's longest-serving foreign minister with 40 years in the post until his retirement this year, has died. He was 75.

The tall, stately Prince Saud was a fixture of Mideast diplomacy, representing the oil-rich Gulf powerhouse as it wielded its influence in crisis after crisis shaking the region.

President Barack Obama said in a statement that generations of U.S. leaders and diplomats benefited from Saud's "thoughtful perspective, charisma and poise, and diplomatic skill."

Saud was the son of Saudi Arabia's third king, Faisal, who ruled from 1964 until he was assassinated in 1975.

• Michael R. Argetsinger, a founder of the International Motor Racing Research Center and an award-winning motorsports author, has died. He was 70.

Argetsinger died Tuesday of cancer at his home in Chicago, according to Glenda Gephart of the research center.

Argetsinger was a member of the steering committee that in 1997 began planning for the Racing Research Center, an archival and research library dedicated to the preservation of the history of motorsports. He was a member of the center's governing council at the time of his death.

• Former Cincinnati Bengals president and part owner John Sawyer has died. He was 90.

He was team president from 1968-93 and had served as a vice president since 1994.

• Amanda Peterson, best known for her role in the 1987 romantic comedy "Can't Buy Me Love," has died. She was 43.

Sgt. Mike Moran with the Greeley, Colorado, police department says Peterson was found dead at an apartment complex. She was alone, and an investigation into her death is ongoing.

Peterson appeared in her last film, "Windrunner," in 1994.

• Jerry Weintraub, the dynamic producer and manager who pushed the career of John Denver and produced such hit movies as "Nashville" and "Ocean's Eleven," has died. He was 77.

Weintraub rose from talent agency mail room employee to top concert promoter - working with the likes of Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra - and shaping Denver's career before tackling the movie business starting in the 1970s.

• Scot Alexander Breithaupt, who helped turn BMX bike racing from a backyard backwater into an international action sport, has died.

Breithaupt was among the first to organize bicycle races on dirt motorcycle courses in the early 1970s, becoming first a founder of BMX - or bicycle motocross - then a champion, then one of its first famous faces.

"Scot was one of the key figures in making BMX become what it is today. He would say he was the key figure, because that was the kind of guy he was," said Craig Barrette, spokesman for USA BMX, which runs the sport's Hall of Fame, where Breithaupt is enshrined. "He was involved in every aspect of BMX."

• Burt Shavitz, the reclusive beekeeper who co-founded Burt's Bees, and whose face and wild beard appeared on labels for the natural cosmetics, has died at age 80.

Shavitz was a hippie making a living by selling honey when his life was altered by a chance encounter with a hitchhiking Roxanne Quimby. She was a single mother and a back-to-the-lander who impressed Shavitz with her ingenuity and self-sufficiency.

In the 1980s she began making products from his beeswax, and they became partners.

The business partnership ended after Quimby moved the company to North Carolina in 1994. The company continued to expand, but Shavitz moved back to Maine. He has said he was forced out after having an affair with an employee. In 2007, Clorox purchased Burt's Bees for $925 million.

"Burt was an enigma; my mentor and my muse. I am deeply saddened," Quimby said.

• Longtime Chiefs executive Jack Steadman, who spent more than four decades with the franchise and helped build its only Super Bowl team, died early Sunday. He was 86.