Richard Donner, the director behind such classics as "Superman", "The Goonies" and the "Lethal Weapon" film series, passed away on July 5th at the age of ninety-one. The filmmaker, along with his wife of thirty-seven years, Lauren Shuler Donner, formed the production company, The Donners' Company (formerly Donner/Shuler Donner Productions) and brought to the screen, "Free Willy" and the "X-Men" franchises.
Donner, born Richard Schwartzberg in the Bronx, NY, began his career wanting to be an actor. But after appearing in a bit part on a television show, the director, Martin Ritt thought he might be better working behind the camera, later hiring him as an assistant. Donner began shooting commercials before moving on to TV, directing episodes of everything from the western, "The Rifleman" to "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." to the comedy series, "Gilligan's Island" to "The Twilight Zone".
In 1961, he got his first opportunity to direct a feature film, "X-15", a story about the X-15 rocket aircraft progrm that starred Charles Bronson and Mary Tyler Moore in her first feature film role. It was not a big success and it took seven years before his next film, a modest comedy with Sammy Davis Jr. and Peter Lawford called "Salt and Pepper".
But Donner's real breakthrough happened in 1976 with "The Omen". This supernatural-horror film with Gregory Peck and Lee Remick as the adopted parents of a child who is the spawn of the devil became a box-office hit that helped launch his career as a go-to-director. His next film was "Superman: The Movie" which brought the Man of Steel to the big-screen in 1978. With a budget of $55 miliion dollars, this all-star, super-hero adventure was one of the most expensive films made at the time due to the cast (Marlon Brando was paid $3.7 million for two-weeks work) and state-of-the-art visual effects. But the film became an international sensation, earning $300 million dollars at the worldwide box-office (which would be an incredible 1.2 billion dollars today).
Some of the other popular films Donner went on to direct include the Bill Murray Christmas classic, "Scrooged"; the film adaption of the television western, "Maverick" with Mel Gibson, Jodie Foster and James Garner (who starred in the series); Gibson and Julia Roberts in the 1997 political action-thriller, "Conspiracy Theory" and the 1985 medieval romantic-fantasy-adventure, "Ladyhawke" (featuring Matthew Broderick and Michelle Pfeiffer in early film roles) that was a box-office disapointment yet has gone on to become a cult-fan favorite. The last feature Donner directed was "16 Blocks" in 2006, a real-time, action-thriller that starred Bruce Willis and Mos Def.
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