Donald Sutherland, the actor whose career spanned M*A*S*H to ...

Donald Sutherland, the Canadian actor whose wry, arresting screen presence spanned more than half a century from M*A*S*H to The Hunger Games, has died. He was 88.

Son Kiefer Sutherland confirmed the death on Thursday. 

No details were immediately available.

"I personally think one of the most important actors in the history of film," Kiefer Sutherland said on X. 

"Never daunted by a role, good, bad or ugly. He loved what he did and did what he loved, and one can never ask for more than that."

The tall and gaunt Sutherland, who flashed a grin that could be sweet or diabolical, was known for offbeat characters like Hawkeye Pierce in Robert Altman's M*A*S*H the hippie tank commander in Kelly's Heroes and the stoned professor in Animal House.

Before transitioning into a long career as a respected character actor, Sutherland epitomised the unpredictable, anti-establishment cinema of the 1970s. 

He never stopped working, ultimately appearing in nearly 200 films and series.

Over the decades, Sutherland showed his range in more buttoned-down — but still eccentric — roles in Robert Redford's Ordinary People and Oliver Stone's JFK. 

More, recently, he starred in the Hunger Games films. 

A memoir, Made Up, But Still True, is due out in November.

"I love to work. I passionately love to work," Sutherland told Charlie Rose in 1998. 

"I love to feel my hand fit into the glove of some other character. I feel a huge freedom — time stops for me. I'm not as crazy as I used to be, but I'm still a little crazy."

AP