Peter Bogdanovich, the Oscar and Golden Globe-nominated filmmaker, who wrote and directed The Last Picture Show, died on Thursday, according to The Hollywood Reporter. He was 82.
“Our dearest Peter passed away today from complications of Parkinson’s disease. The Bogdanovich/Stratten family wishes to thank everyone for their love and support in this most difficult time,” his family said in a statement to the publication.
Born in Kingston, New York, in 1939, Bogdanovich was the son of a Serbian painter who had immigrated to the US the same year, before the onset of World War II. According to the THR report, Bogdanovich was a film enthusiast from an early age and maintained a card file with his opinions on every movie that he had watched, when he was 12 years old. At 16, he graduated from New York City’s Collegiate School and studied acting at Stella Adler Conservatory.
He decided to get into directing around the same time.
After dabbling with a few theatrical productions, including Broadway, and working as a film journalist with the publication Esquire, Bogdanovich relocated to Hollywood, Los Angeles. There, he met director Roger Corman, who was familiar with his writings in Esquire, and offered him a project to direct.
Bogdanovich went on to rewrite the screenplay and direct the end of Peter Fonda’s 1966 film The Wild Angels. Two years later, he worked with Corman on Targets and Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women, under the pseudonym Derek Thomas.
He began to gain critical acclaim with the 1971 coming-of-age drama The Last Picture Show, which was based on the 1966 novel of the same name. The film earned Bogdanovich the British Academy for Film and Television Award for Best Screenplay, and other nominations in BAFTA, the Oscars, as well as the Golden Globes, for best direction. The story revolves around a group of high-schoolers, who come of age in an isolated, decaying town in North Texas.
Some of his other notable works include, Paper Moon (1973), which also earned him a Golden Globe nomination for best direction, Nickelodeon (1976), Saint Jack (1979), Mask (1985), and Texasville (1990).
Apart from direction, Bogdanovich authored books, including, Who the Devil Made It: Conversations With Legendary Directors (1997), the 2004 collection of profiles and interviews titled Who the Hell’s in It: Portraits and Conversations, and the 1984 book The Killing of the Unicorn: Dorothy Stratten 1960-1980, which he wrote after the murder of model Dorothy Stratten, his former partner.
Bogdanovich’s last feature was the 2014 film, She’s Funny That Way.
Industry veterans such as Francis Ford Coppola and Guillermo del Toro paid their tributes to the filmmaker.
del Toro called him a ‘champion of cinema’, and wrote on Twitter, “He birthed masterpieces as a director and was a most genial human. He single-handedly interviewed and enshrined the lives and work of more classic filmmakers than almost anyone else in his generation.”
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Francis Ford Coppola said in a statement to Deadline, “Oh dear, a shock. I am devastated. He was a wonderful and great artist. I’ll never forgot attending a premiere for THE LAST PICTURE SHOW. I remember at its end, the audience leaped up all around me bursting into applause lasting easily 15 minutes. I’ll never forget although I felt I had never myself experienced a reaction like that, that Peter and his film deserved it. May he sleep in bliss for eternity, enjoying the thrill of our applause forever.”
Actor Tatum O’Neal, who featured in Paper Moon and Nickelodeon, wrote on Instagram, “Peter was my heaven & earth. A father figure. A friend. From “Paper Moon” to “Nickelodeon” he always made me feel safe. I love you, Peter.”
Both of Bogdanovich’s marriages, first with Polly Platt and later with Louise Stratten, ended in divorce. He is survived by his daughters and grandchildren.