Lance Kerwin, the former child actor who shot to fame in the late 1970s as the star of the sometimes controversial NBC teen drama series James at 15, died of undetermined causes Tuesday in San Clemente, California.
He was 62. His death was announced by his daughter Savanah in a Facebook post today. Kerwin, who was a busy child actor throughout the ’70s, also starred in the 1979 TV miniseries Salem’s Lot, based on the novel by Steven King.
He played the central character of Mark Petrie, the young horror film buff turned vampire hunter. In the film’s most chilling and memorable scene, he is visited by a schoolmate who has become a vampire and floats eerily outside Mark’s bedroom window.
Kerwin’s TV career began in the early- to mid-1970s with appearances on such shows as Emergency!, Little House on the Prairie and Wonder Woman, but his breakthrough role came in 1977 with James at 15.
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