Ricou Browning, who performed the creature in Creature from the Black Lagoon, poses for pictures for individuals throughout Florida SpringsFest at Silver Springs State Park in Silver Springs, Fla., Sunday, March 4, 2018.

Bruce Ackerman/AP

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Bruce Ackerman/AP

Ricou Browning, who performed the creature in Creature from the Black Lagoon, poses for pictures for individuals throughout Florida SpringsFest at Silver Springs State Park in Silver Springs, Fla., Sunday, March 4, 2018.

Bruce Ackerman/AP

Ricou Browning, a talented swimmer greatest identified for his underwater function because the Gill Man within the quintessential 3D black-and-white Nineteen Fifties monster film Creature from the Black Lagoon, has died, his household instructed numerous media retailers. He was 93.

Browning died Feb. 27 at his house in Southwest Ranches, Florida.

In addition to performing roles, Browning additionally collaborated as a author on the 1963 film “Flipper,” and the favored TV collection of the identical identify that adopted.

He instructed the Ocala Star Banner newspaper in 2013 that he got here up with the concept after a visit to South America to seize fresh-water dolphins within the Amazon.

“One day, when I came home, the kids were watching ‘Lassie’ on TV, and it just dawned on me, ‘Why not do a film about a boy and a dolphin?'” he instructed the newspaper.

Browning directed the 1973 comedy “Salty,” a couple of sea lion, and the 1978 drama “Mr. No Legs,” a couple of mob enforcer who’s a double amputee. He additionally did stunt work in numerous movies, together with serving as Jerry Lewis’s underwater double within the 1959 comedy “Don’t Give Up the Ship,” according to The New York Times.

But nothing would mark Browning’s Hollywood profession like swimming underwater in an elaborately grotesque go well with because the Gill Man, a personality that may maintain its personal in horror film lore alongside aspect monsters like King Kong and Godzilla. Browning did the swimming scenes in two sequels, “Revenge of the Creature” (1955) and “The Creature Walks Among Us” (1956). Other actors performed the Gill Man on land.

Browning instructed the Ocala Star Banner, he might maintain his breath for minutes underwater, making him particularly adept for the swimming half.

He was found when the movie’s director visited Silver Springs, the place Newt Perry, who carried out as a stand-in for “Tarzan” actor Johnny Weissmuller, was selling one in every of Florida’s first vacationer points of interest the place Browning acquired a job as a teen swimming in water reveals.

Perry requested Browning to take the Hollywood guests to Wakulla Springs, one of many largest and deepest freshwater springs on this planet. They later recruited Browning to look within the film, which was partly filmed on the springs.

Ricou Ren Browning was born on Feb. 16, 1930, in Fort Pierce, Florida. He swam on the U.S. Air Force swim group.

Survivors embrace his 4 youngsters, Ricou Browning Jr., Renee, Kelly and Kim; 10 grandchildren; and 11 great-grandchildren. His spouse, Fran, died in March 2020. His son Ricou Jr. is a marine coordinator, actor and stuntman like his father, based on The Hollywood Reporter.