He will be best remembered to many as the cackling Voodoo villain who dogged Roger Moore’s footsteps in his first outing as secret agent James Bond. His other films included 1982 musical Annie, in which he played Punjab.

Often cast in exotic roles,

he played a tribal chieftain in 1967 film Doctor Dolittle and a sorcerer in Woody Allen’s “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask).

More recently, his distinctive bass voice was heard narrating Tim Burton’s 2005 film version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Holder, one of four children, was taught to dance by his older brother Boscoe, joining his dance company at the age of seven. He became director of the company in the late 1940s after Boscoe moved to London, before moving to the US in 1954.

Holder made his Broadway debut that same year in House of Flowers, a Caribbean-themed musical in which he first played Baron Samedi. A top-hatted spirit of death in Haitian Voodoo culture, the character made full use of the actor’s imposing physique and physical dexterity.

He won two Tony Awards for best costume design and musical direction in the original Broadway production of The Wiz, an all-black version of The Wizard of Oz. He also appeared in Waiting for Godot.

According to a family spokesman, he died on Sunday in New York from complications caused by pneumonia.