LA, Sept 13: Actor John Ritter, who gained fame playing bumbling and lovable characters in a pair of hit TV comedies decades apart, collapsed while he was on the set of his new series and died suddenly of a heart problem he never knew he had, his representatives said on Friday. Ritter, who was 54, died on Thursday evening after a coronary artery tore while he was filming "8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter."
The ABC television comedy had reinvigorated his career and was a centerpiece of the network's upcoming fall season.

Ritter, the former star of "Three's Company," was taken to Providence St. Joseph hospital in Burbank, California, across from the studio where he had been working. Surgeons at the hospital were unable to save him after his major coronary artery tore from an undiagnosed condition, his publicists, Wolf-Kasteler & Associates Public Relations, said.

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Such tears, hard to detect, are often related to high blood pressure and are extremely dangerous, said surgeon Barry Katzen, head of the Miami Cardiac and Vascular Institute in Florida. "It is very difficult to predict and as many as half of the patients die, often in minutes or hours," he said.

Ritter was best known for his portrayal of Jack Tripper in the 1970s situation comedy "Three's Company," which won him Emmy, Golden Globe and People's Choice awards.
Bureau Report