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Actor Swayze dead at 57 after long cancer battle

Sep 15, 2009, 0:40 GMT

New York/Los Angeles - Hollywood actor Patrick Swayze has died at 57, spokeswoman Annett Wolf told The Hollywood Reporter on Monday. (FILE) A file picture dated 22 October 2004 of US actor Patrick Swayze outside the Emergency Room of the Mother and Child Medical Care Institute in Warsaw, Poland. According to media reports, Swayze's publicist Annett Wolf says the 57-year-old

(FILE) A file picture dated 22 October 2004 of US actor Patrick Swayze outside the Emergency Room of the Mother and Child Medical Care Institute in Warsaw, Poland. According to media reports, Swayze's publicist Annett Wolf says the 57-year-old "Dirty Dancing" actor died 14 September 2009 with family at his side. He came forward about his illness last spring, but continued working as he underwent treatments. EPA/Jacek Turczyk POLAND OUTHe had publicly battled cancer for nearly two years, continuing to act in television projects. Swayze is best known for the 1980s romance, "Dirty Dancing" and the film "Ghost" which had him working with Demi Moore and Whoopi Goldberg. Swayze, who was diagnosed in January 2008, defied the odds of survival with Pancreatic cancer– living for more than a year-and-half with this usually fast moving cancer. During that time, he put together a memoir with his wife Lisa and even started filming the A&E crime drama “The Beast,” in which he refused to take painkillers because he was worried it would affect his performance.