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This actor is unmissable when he appears on screen thanks to his incredible seven-foot stature.
The film and television star — whose extreme height is the result of the disorder acromegaly — hails from the Netherlands, but he made his mark after moving to the United States to try to make it in Hollywood.
He made his feature debut in an ill-conceived jukebox musical inspired by the music of the Beatles in the late '70s.
But his career reached its greatest heights in the early 1990s, when he played unforgettable characters in a cult-classic television series — which spawned a follow-up film and a revival series more than 25 years later — and in a hit black comedy that topped the box office.
This actor was spotted earlier this week as he took care of some chores outside his home in Los Angeles.
Can you guess who he is?
This actor is unmissable when he appears on screen thanks to his incredible seven-foot stature, the result of the disorder acromegaly
Can you guess who he is?
He's Carel Struycken, 77, the seven-foot-tall actor who has had a prolific career playing monumental and often otherworldly figures in films and on television.
He was seen taking care of business around his home in LA. The hulking actor was hunched over as he took his trash bins out to the street while dressed casually in a black fleece jacket, a gray T-shirt and black sweatpants, along with black flip flops.
Struycken was also seen carrying some packages and bags around the lawn.
The Twin Peaks actor was revealed in January to have suffered a tragedy, as he and his wife Tracey lost their home in Altadena as part of the devastating LA fires.
In a GoFundMe, Struycken's son-in-law Michael Anspach shared photos of the rubble of what was once the actor's home.
As of this week, the fundraiser has raised around $104,000 to help the couple, who are grandparents, move on from their destroyed home.
Despite losing his primary home, he appeared to have moved into a new home in Long Beach.
Struycken is instantly recognizable because of his extreme height, which contributed to his big break, as he recalled being discovered on the corner of Hollywood and Vine in 1978 when a woman driving by stopped her car in the street to beg him to appear in a movie she was working on.
Struycken was soon cast in the critically reviled musical Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, which starred The Bee Gees and Peter Frampton and featured covers of Beatles tunes from the title album and Abbey Road performed by other artists.
He's Carel Struycken, the seven-foot-tall actor who has had a prolific career playing monumental and often otherworldly figures in films and on television; seen as Lurch in 1993's Addams Family Values
Struycken is also well known for playing the Giant on Twin Peaks (1990–91) and its revival series Twin Peaks: The Return (2017; pictured)
He was seen taking care of business around his home in LA earlier this week
The hulking actor took his trash bins out to the street while dressed casually in a black fleece jacket, a gray T-shirt and black sweatpants, along with black flip flops
He appeared to be hunched over while working around the house
The Twin Peaks actor was revealed in January to have suffered a tragedy, as he and his wife Tracey lost their home in Altadena as part of the devastating LA fires
As of this week, a GoFundMe set up by his son-in-law has raised $104K for Struycken and his wife Tracey
The film was only modestly successful at the box office, but the foreign-born actor was able to parlay his role into numerous future parts.
The actor gained greater recognition in the 1980s with a role in a Star Wars spinoff TV movie Ewoks: The Battle For Endor.
Struycken's unusual height made him a go-to actor for fantasy, science fiction and horror projects, including multiple episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
He even scored a role as Jack Nicholson's butler in the hit film The Witches Of Eastwick, which also starred Cher, Susan Sarandon and Michelle Pfeiffer.
After a 1988 episode of St. Elsewhere in which he played a character referred to as The Giant, Struycken again played a character called The Giant in the season two premiere of the hit mystery series Twin Peaks.
The show, which was created by the late filmmaker David Lynch and Mark Frost, used Struycken in otherworldly dream sequences featuring series star Kyle MacLachlan after his character, FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper, had been shot by an unseen assailant.
Struycken appeared in five more episodes of the series, before returning to appear in four more episodes of the series revival Twin Peaks: The Return, which aired in 2017.
A year after his hit appearance on the TV series, he made a splash in the box office hit The Addams Family as the corpse-like butler Lurch.
He was born in The Hague in the Netherlands in 1948 and spent much of his childhood on the Caribbean island of Curaçao
Later, he moved to Amsterdam to go to film school to be a director, before moving to the US to attend the American Film Institute
But he got his big break as an actor when he was discovered on the corner of Hollywood & Vine for a part in the misbegotten musical Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978)
He went on to have numerous roles in the '80s, including on Star Trek shows and a Star Wars spinoff, as well as opposite Jack Nicholson in 1987's The Witches Of Eastwick
His best known film is 1991's The Addams Family (pictured), in which he played the tall, corpse-like butler Lurch
His character The Giant was introduced on the season two premiere of Twin Peaks in 1990. He was part of a near-death vision Kyle MacLachlan's character had after being shot (pictured)
He reprised the role two years later in 1993's sequel Addams Family Values, which received even warmer reviews from critics, and he was one of the few original stars to appear in the 1998 made-for-TV movie Addams Family Reunion, which aired four years after the death of lead actor Raul Julia, who had played Gomez Addams.
Struycken also had a small but pivotal role in 1997's blockbuster Men In Black, and he had some of his juiciest roles in years in the horror films Gerald's Game (2017) and Doctor Sleep (2019), both of which were adapted from Stephen King novels of the same names and directed by Mike Flanagan.
Struycken's work on TV has included roles on Babylon 5, Star Trek: Voyager, Charmed, My Name Is Earl, Cold Case and The Blacklist.
After years of steady work, he appears to have slowed down in recent years, and his last credited role was from 2022.
When Struycken was just four, his family relocated to the island of Curaçao in the the Netherlands Antilles in the Caribbean, which was later dissolved when islands constituting the country gained their independence.
While abroad, he focused on music composition as a teenager, before making his return to the Netherlands at 16 to finish his schooling.
It was there that he revealed an interest in filmmaking after training to be a director at a film school in Amsterdam.
Struycken continued his film education by moving to the US to study at the American Film Institute in LA.
Despite training to be a director, Struycken doesn't appear to have any credited work as a director after establishing himself as an in-demand actor.
