Jerome Hellman, ‘Midnight Cowboy’ Producer, Dies at 92

Jerome Hellman, an Oscar-winning producer of movies reminiscent of “Midnight Cowboy” and “Coming Home,” has died. He was 92.

Hellman’s spouse, Elizabeth Empleton Hellman, first informed Deadline that he died on May 26, saying, “We will miss him terribly.” No reason for demise was given. Hellman’s widow didn’t return TheWrap’s request for remark.

Jerome Hellman was a producer on seven movies all through his profession between the 1960s and 1980s, and people films earned a complete of 17 Oscar nominations and 6 wins. He himself gained an Oscar in 1969 when “Midnight Cowboy,” John Schlesinger’s X-rated drama starring Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight, gained Best Picture. The movie was thought of an extended shot on the Oscars, contemplating its bleak subject material of crime, prostitution and homosexuality, and he as soon as informed the Los Angeles Times that he was so sure they’d lose that he hadn’t even ready a speech.

Hellman started his profession as an agent and would finally type his personal company representing TV administrators, writers and producers within the early days of dwell tv. But in 1959, he dissolved his expertise company and have become a producer, first working with Unit Four Productions alongside George Roy Hill and producing dramas for NBC. He then pivoted to movie and produced Hill’s “The World of Henry Orient” (1964), which starred Peter Sellers, Angela Lansbury and Tom Bosley.

He would proceed working with a formidable array of stars, together with Sean Connery in “A Fine Madness” (1966), Donald Sutherland in “The Day of the Locust” (1975) and Jane Fonda in “Coming Home” (1978), which was additionally nominated for Best Picture and earned Hellman his second Oscar nod.

In 1979, Hellman directed and produced the drama “Promises in the Dark,” which starred Marsha Mason as a doctor hiding behind her work after a latest divorce who finally ends up making a promise to a 17-year-old most cancers affected person to raised fulfill her life. That similar yr, Hellman additionally had a small performing function in Hal Ashby’s “Being There,” once more with Peter Sellers.

The remaining movie Hellman produced was 1986’s “The Mosquito Coast,” starring Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren and River Phoenix. The supply materials for the film was only in the near past changed into an Apple TV+ collection.