Gavin MacLeod, 'Love Boat' captain, dies at 90

LOS ANGELES: Gavin MacLeod, the veteran supporting actor who achieved stardom as Murray Slaughter, the sardonic TV news writer on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” died early Saturday morning.

He was 90.

MacLeod's nephew, Mark See, confirmed his death to Variety.

MacLeod’s health had been poor recently but no cause of death was given, the trade publication reported.

Known to sitcom fans for his bald head and wide smile, MacLeod toiled in near anonymity for more than a decade, appearing on dozens of TV shows and in several movies before landing his “Mary Tyler Moore” role in 1970.

“The Mary Tyler Moore Show” was a smash from the start and remains a classic of situation comedies.

It produced two spin offs, “Rhoda” and “Phyllis,” starring Valerie Harper and Cloris Leachman, who had portrayed Mary’s neighbors.

It was still top-rated when Moore, who played news producer Mary Richards, decided to end it after seven seasons.

MacLeod moved on to “The Love Boat,” a romantic comedy in which guest stars, ranging from Gene Kelly to Janet Jackson, would come aboard for a cruise and fall in love with one another.

Among his final TV credits were “Touched by An Angel,” “JAG” and “The King of Queens.”

MacLeod’s lighthearted screen persona was in contrast to his private life.

In his 2013 memoir, “This Is Your Captain Speaking,” MacLeod acknowledged that he had struggled with alcoholism in the 1960s and ’70s.

He also wrote that losing his hair at an early age made it hard for him to find work as an actor.

MacLeod, whose given name was Allan See, took his first name from a French movie and his last from a drama teacher at New York’s Ithaca College who had encouraged him to pursue an acting career.

After college, the Mount Kisco, New York-native became a supporting player in “A Hatful of Rain” and other Broadway plays, and in such films as “I Want to Live!” and “Operation Petticoat.”

MacLeod had four children with his first wife, Joan Rootvik, whom he divorced in 1972.

He was the son of an alcoholic and his drinking problems helped lead to a second divorce, to Patti Steele.

But after MacLeod quit drinking, he and Steele remarried in 1985.

The couple later hosted a Christian radio show called “Back on Course: A Ministry for Marriages.”