Biography
Gunnar Milton Hansen (1947–2015) was an Icelandic-born American actor and author. He is best known for playing the cannibal killer Leatherface in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974), his first film role.
Born in Reykjavík, Iceland, Hansen moved to the United States as a child and later studied English and mathematics at the University of Texas at Austin. After graduate school he auditioned for the film while it was being shot locally and was cast in the part. He appeared in a number of later horror films, including Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers (1988) and Mosquito (1995), and wrote the nonfiction book Chain Saw Confidential (2013) about the making of the original film.
Hansen died of pancreatic cancer at his home in Northeast Harbor, Maine, on 7 November 2015.
