Clarence Gilyard Jr., an actor best known for starring in “Walker, Texas Ranger” and his supporting performance in “Die Hard,” has died.

Clarence Gilyard, a film and TV star who cherished his role as a UNLV theater professor, has died. He was 66. UNLV’s College of Fine Arts announced Gilyard’s death in a news release Monday afternoon.

Gilyard’s death was confirmed through a statement by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Gilyard had been working as a film and theatre professor at UNLV College of Fine Arts.

Gilyard was a UNLV Department of Film professor since 2006. By then, he was a well-established television, film and theater professional for more than 30 years.

Gilyard was famous for his role as computer-terror expert Theo in the 1988 thriller “Die Hard.” For 13 years, he was on prime time, network TV on “Matlock,” portraying Andy Griffith’s private investigator, Conrad McMasters; then as Jimmy Trivette on “Walker, Texas Ranger,” opposite Chuck Norris.

“My manager-agent is not happy that I’m not working, but the university is just too much fun. And once you start a semester and meet those students, it’s like doing a TV series,” Gilyard said in 2010.

“You’re plugged into them. How can you leave them once you see in their eyes that they’re depending on you? They have aspirations for their own growth for those 15 weeks.”

He had many extraordinary talents and was extremely well-known in the university through his dedication to teaching and his professional accomplishments,” Uscher said in a statement.