American character actress [Anna] Eileen Heckart died after a three-year battle with cancer on December 31st, aged 82. Among her many roles, she appeared in both the Broadway and film productions of The Bad Seed, gaining an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress in the part of Mrs Daigle. Her other movies includeNo Way To Treat a Lady and Burnt Offerings. She retired from acting in 2000.
Swiss-born leading man Paul Hubschmid (aka Paul Christian) died in Berlin of a pulmonary embolism the same day, aged 84. He appeared in Bagdad, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, Fritz Lang’s Tiger of Eschnapur (aka Journey to the Lost City), Funeral in Berlin, The Day the Sky Exploded and Skullduggery.
FILM/TV TECHNICIANS
British cartoon film-maker Alison de Vere died on January 2nd, aged 73. In 1967 she helped create the backgrounds for The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine and made a cameo appearance as one of the photographed figures in the ‘Eleanor Rigby’ sequence.
American independent film producer/director James Hill died of Alzheimer’s disease on January 11th, aged 84. After working as a contract screenwriter at MGM, he joined actor Burt Lancaster and agent Harold Hecht in a production partnership. In 1958, he became Rita Hayworth’s fifth and final husband. The marriage lasted two years.
Following years of poor health (his death was prematurely announced in 1996), Spanish writer/director Amando De Ossorio died on January 13th, aged 82. His many films include Malenka The Niece of the Vampire, Tombs of the Blind Dead, Return of the Evil Dead, Night of the Sorcerers, Horror of the Zombies (1974), Night of the Seagulls and The Sea Serpent.
Film exhibitor Ted Mann, who changed the name of Hollywood’s famed Grauman’s Chinese Theatre to his own in 1973, died of a stroke on January 15th, aged 84. He also produced the 1969 adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man and Krull, and was married to actress Rhonda Fleming.
Sam Wiesenthal, who was production manager to Carl Laemmle, Jr’s vice-president at Universal Pictures, died on February 11th at the Motion Picture & Television Hospital, aged 92. With Laemmle, he was responsible for All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) and the studio’sFrankenstein and Dracula franchises. After Universal was sold in 1936, he moved on to other studios and later became an independent producer.
Screenwriter/director Burt Kennedy, best known for his comedy Westerns, died of cancer on February 15th, aged 78. He had undergone heart surgery the previous month, after which his kidneys had failed. Among his many credits are The Killer Inside Me, Suburban Commando and the TV movies The Wild Wild West Revisited andMore Wild Wild West.
Former president of production at Paramount, producer Howard W. Koch reportedly died of Alzheimer’s disease on February 16th, aged 84. His credits include The Manchurian Candidate, The President’s Analyst, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, Heaven Can Wait (1978), Dragonslayer, The Keep and Ghost. During the 1950s he was a partner with Aubrey Schenck in independent production company Bel-Air, which produced such low-budget chillers as The Black Sleep, Pharaoh’s Curse and Voodoo Island, and he directed Frankenstein 1970 starring Boris Karloff.
French film director Robert Enrico, whose early films include the Oscar-winning 1961 short La Riviere Du Hibou (Incident at Owl Creek), based on the story by Ambrose Bierce, died of cancer in Paris the same day, aged 69. In America, his short film was shown as part of The Twilight Zone TV series.
American producer/director Stanley [Earl] Kramer, whose classic films include High Noon, The Caine Mutiny and Judgment at Nuremberg, died of pneumonia on February 19th, aged 87. His other credits include The 5,000 Fingers of Dr T, On the Beach (1959), Inherit the Wind and It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. During the 1950s he kept Lon Chaney, Jr. in high-profile films, while both Karloff and Lugosi were scrabbling for work.
German-born American cinematographer Ralf D. Bode, whose credits include Dressed to Kill, died of lung cancer on February 27th, aged 59.
The same day saw the death of film and TV producer Stan Margulies from cancer at the age of 80. His credits include Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Former actor, director and cinematographer John A. Alonzo died on March 13th, aged 66. After starring in The Hand of Death (1962), the Mexican-American cinematographer began as James Wong Howe’s camera operator on Seconds (1966) before working with such directors as Martin Ritt, Roger Corman, Roman Polanski, John Frankenheimer and Brian De Palma. He photographed parts of Steven Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Look What’s Happened to Rosemary’s Baby, Blue Thunder, Terror in the Aisles, The Guardian, Meteor Man, Star Trek Generations and the live TV movie remake of Fail Safe (2000).
British film director Ralph Thomas, the older brother of the late Carry On director Gerald Thomas, died after a long illness on March 17th, aged 85. Best known for his series of Doctor comedies (1953–70), based on the novels by Richard Gordon, his other films include Helter Skelter (1948), The 39 Steps (1959), Hot Enough for June, Deadlier Than the Male, Some Girls Do, Percy, Percy’s Progress and Quest for Love (based on a story by John Wyndham). His son is producer Jeremy Thomas.
Motion picture designer and conceptual artist Mentor Huebner, who designed Robby the Robot for MGM’sForbidden Planet, died on March 19th after several vascular bypass surgeries on his right leg. He was 83, and among his more than 250 other credits are many conceptual drawings for Alfred Hitchcock’s films, The Time Machine (1960), Planet of the Apes (1967), King Kong (1976), Flash Gordon (1980), Blade Runner, Dune (1984), Cat’s Eye, The Addams Family, Honey I Shrunk the Kids, So I Married an Ax Murderer, Total Recall and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Early in his career he had worked at Disney as an animator, drawing the ‘Heigh-Ho’ sequence for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
Cartoon director and producer William [Denby] Hanna, who with partner Joseph Barbera founded Hanna-Barbera Productions in 1957, died on March 22nd, aged 90. He had been in declining health for several years. Among the many TV shows he helped to create were The Flintstones, The Jetsons, Jonny Quest, Captain Caveman and Scooby-Doo, winning eight Emmys for his work. The duo began their collaboration in 1937 at MGM, where they won seven Oscars for Tom and Jerry before the studio closed down its animation department in 1957. They also combined cartoon sequences with live action for such films as Anchors Aweigh, Dangerous When Wet and Invitation to the Dance.