David Bowie was an actor.
David Robert Jones ( 8 January 1947 -- 10 January 2016 ) , known professionally as David Bowie ( [ ˈboʊi ] ) , was an English singer , songwriter and actor . In 1976 , Bowie starred in the cult film The Man Who Fell to Earth and released Station to Station . The Last Temptation of Christ (film) . The film , starring Willem Dafoe , Harvey Keitel , Barbara Hershey , Andre Gregory , Harry Dean Stanton and David Bowie , was shot entirely in Morocco . The Man Who Fell to Earth is a 1976 British science fiction drama film directed by Nicolas Roeg and written by Paul Mayersberg , based on Walter Tevis ' 1963 novel of the same name , about an extraterrestrial who crash lands on Earth seeking a way to ship water to his planet , which is suffering from a severe drought . The Prestige (film) . The film stars Hugh Jackman as Robert Angier , Christian Bale as Alfred Borden , and David Bowie as Nikola Tesla .