List of Famous people who died in 1987

Maruthur Gopalan Ramachandran, popularly known as M. G. R., was an Indian politician and film actor who served as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for ten years between 1977 and 1987. He was also a philanthropist and a humanitarian icon. In 1988, M.G.R. was awarded India's highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, posthumously.

Fred Astaire was an American actor, dancer, singer, choreographer, and television presenter. He is widely considered the most influential dancer in the history of film.

Dean Paul Martin Jr. was an American pop singer and film and television actor. A member of the California Air National Guard, Martin died in a crash during a military training flight. Martin was the son of American entertainer Dean Martin.

Andy Warhol was an American artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationship between artistic expression, advertising, and celebrity culture that flourished by the 1960s, and span a variety of media, including painting, silkscreening, photography, film, and sculpture. Some of his best known works include the silkscreen paintings Campbell's Soup Cans (1962) and Marilyn Diptych (1962), the experimental films Empire (1964) and Chelsea Girls (1966), and the multimedia events known as the Exploding Plastic Inevitable (1966–67).

Pablo Acosta Villarreal, commonly referred to as El Zorro de Ojinaga was a Mexican narcotics smuggler who controlled crime along a two-hundred mile stretch of U.S.-Mexico border. At the height of his power, he was smuggling 60 tons of cocaine per year for the Colombians—in addition to the incalculable amounts of marijuana and heroin that were the mainstay of his business. He was the mentor and business partner of Amado Carrillo Fuentes, the so-called 'Lord of the Skies', who took over after Acosta's death.

Andrei Alexandrovich Mironov was a Soviet and Russian theatre and film actor who played lead roles in some of the most popular Soviet films, such as The Diamond Arm, Beware of the Car and Twelve Chairs. Mironov was also a popular singer.

Thomas Isidore Noël Sankara was a Burkinabé military officer and socialist revolutionary who served as the President of Burkina Faso from 1983 to 1987. A Marxist–Leninist and pan-Africanist, he was viewed by supporters as a charismatic and iconic figure of revolution and is sometimes referred to as "Africa's Che Guevara".

Bernhard Klemens Maria Grzimek was a renowned German zoo director, zoologist, book author, editor, and animal conservationist in postwar West Germany.

Iolanda Cristina Gigliotti, professionally known as Dalida, was a Italian born French naturalized singer and actress, born in Egypt to Italian parents. She won the Miss Egypt beauty contest in 1954 and began a 31-year singing career in 1956, selling 170 million albums and singles worldwide. She died by suicide in 1987.

Danny Kaye was an American actor, singer, dancer, comedian, musician, and philanthropist. His performances featured physical comedy, idiosyncratic pantomimes, and rapid-fire novelty songs.

Héctor Abad Gómez was a Colombian prominent medical doctor, university professor, and human rights leader whose holistic vision of healthcare led him to found the Colombian National School of Public Health. He developed practical public health programs for the poor in Medellín. The increasing violence and human rights abuses of the 1970s and 1980s led him to fight for social justice in his community, but his political views put him at odds with those in power and Abad was killed in 1987. He and other great defenders of the human rights of the time shows us the importance of standing up against injustice and fight for the respect for human rights, despite staggering opposition. His son said he learned something from his father that the murderers don't know how to do: to use words to express the truth – a truth that will last longer than their lie.

Robert Louis Fosse was an American dancer, musical-theatre choreographer, actor, theatre director, and filmmaker. He directed and choreographed musical works on stage and screen, including the stage musicals The Pajama Game (1954), Damn Yankees (1955), How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (1961), Sweet Charity (1966), Pippin (1972), and Chicago (1975). His films include Sweet Charity (1969), Cabaret (1972), Lenny (1975), and All That Jazz (1979).

James Arthur Baldwin was an American novelist, playwright, essayist, poet, and activist. His essays, collected in Notes of a Native Son (1955), explore intricacies of racial, sexual, and class distinctions in the Western society of the United States during the mid twentieth-century. Some of Baldwin's essays are book-length, including The Fire Next Time (1963), No Name in the Street (1972), and The Devil Finds Work (1976). An unfinished manuscript, Remember This House, was expanded and adapted for cinema as the Academy Award–nominated documentary film I Am Not Your Negro (2016). One of his novels, If Beale Street Could Talk, was adapted into the Academy-Award-winning film of the same name in 2018, directed and produced by Barry Jenkins.

Rudolf Walter Richard Hess was a German politician and a leading member of the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Appointed Deputy Führer to Adolf Hitler in 1933, Hess served in that position until 1941, when he flew solo to Scotland in an attempt to negotiate peace with the United Kingdom during World War II. He was taken prisoner and eventually convicted of crimes against peace, serving a life sentence until his suicide in 1987.

Nicholas Stephen Alkemade was an English tail gunner in the Royal Air Force during World War II who survived a freefall of 18,000 feet (5,490 m) without a parachute when abandoning his out-of-control, burning Avro Lancaster heavy bomber over Germany.

Margarita Carmen Hayworth was an American actress, dancer, and producer. She achieved fame during the 1940s as one of the era's top stars, appearing in 61 films over 37 years. The press coined the term "The Love Goddess" to describe Hayworth after she had become the most glamorous screen idol of the 1940s. She was the top pin-up girl for GIs during World War II.

John Marcellus Huston was an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and visual artist. He travelled widely, settling at various times in France, Mexico, and Ireland. Huston was a citizen of the United States by birth but renounced U.S. citizenship to become an Irish citizen and resident in 1964. He later returned to the United States, where he lived the rest of his life. He wrote the screenplays for most of the 37 feature films he directed, many of which are today considered classics: The Maltese Falcon (1941), The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), The Asphalt Jungle (1950), The African Queen (1951), The Misfits (1961), Fat City (1972), The Man Who Would Be King (1975) and Prizzi's Honor (1985).

Abhas Kumar Ganguly, better known by his stage name Kishore Kumar was an Indian playback singer and actor. He was one of the most popular singers in the Indian film industry and from soft numbers to peppy tracks to romantic moods, Kumar sang in different genres but some of his rare compositions which were considered classics were lost in time. According to Ashok Kumar, Kumar's success came because his voice hit the microphone straight at its most sensitive point. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest Indian singers.

Angiolino Giuseppe Pasquale Ventura was an Italian actor who grew up in France and starred in many French films. Born in Italy, he was raised in Paris by his Italian mother. After a first career as a professional wrestler was ended by injury, he was offered a part as a gang boss in the Jacques Becker film Touchez pas au grisbi (1954) and rapidly became one of France's favourite film actors, playing opposite many other great stars such as Bourvil, Jean Gabin, Alain Delon, Claude Rich, Bernard Blier, Jacques Brel, Michel Serrault, Jean-Paul Belmondo, and working with other leading directors such as Louis Malle, Claude Sautet, Claude Miller, and the great script writer Michel Audiard. Usually portraying a tough man, either a criminal or a cop, he also featured as a leader of the Resistance in the Jean-Pierre Melville directed Army of Shadows. After one of his four children, a daughter, was born handicapped, he and his wife founded a charity Perce-Neige (Snowdrop) which aids disabled children and their parents. Though he never renounced his Italian citizenship, he was voted 23rd in a poll for the 100 greatest Frenchmen.

Jacqueline Mary du Pré was a British cellist. At a young age, she achieved enduring mainstream popularity. Despite her short career, she is regarded as one of the greatest cellists of all time.