Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Oscar’s ‘official biographer’ was gracious host of TCM
Robert Osborne, who displayed an encyclopedic knowledge — and love — of films and film history as the primary host of Turner Classic Movies, has died in New York, the network said Monday. He was 84.
Osborne was a former longtime columnist for the Hollywood Reporter and the author of the official history of the Academy Awards. The genial, silverhaired and dapper Osborne was a bona fide movie connoisseur, who displayed his wide knowledge of films on TCM since the 24-hour commercial-free cable network’s launch in 1994.
“Hi, I’m Robert Osborne,” he’d cordially greet viewers, then quickly begin serving up fascinating information and insider trivia about the movie that was about to be shown.
At the end of each film, the man Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales dubbed “an avatar of erudition” offered his closing remarks.
With an extensive film library spanning the decades, Osborne was clearly in his element, and he never lost his enthusiasm for either the classics or the more obscure movies aired on the cable channel.
Viewers looked forward to hearing his comments on each movie. “You feel like it’s not just a guy up there reading copy that people prepared for him to read,” film critic and historian Richard Schickel told The Washington Post in 2005. “
Besides hosting movies seven evenings a week, Osborne hosted special one-on-one “Private Screening” interviews with stars such as Esther Williams and Robert Mitchum. He also cohosted films considered “The Essentials,” most recently with actress Drew Barrymore.
Dubbed the “official biographer” of Oscar, Osborne wrote a series of books chronicling the Academy Awards. The most recent updated edition, “85 Years of the Oscar,” was published in 2013.
Making a living off writing and talking about movies, not to mention being satirized on “Saturday Night Live” and having a bobblehead made in his image, was a dream come true for Osborne.
He was born May 3, 1932, in Colfax, Wash., a small farming town, where he found escape at the movies.
“I’d see Clifton Webb and Gene Tierney in ‘Laura’ and Bette Davis in ‘All About Eve,’ and I’d think, ‘Those people are so much more interesting than what I’m living around in this town,’ ” he recalled in a 2006 interview with The New York Times.
Osborne majored in journalism at the University of Washington and then spent two years in the Air Force. While stationed in Seattle, he began acting in local theater in his spare time. At the suggestion of Oscar-winning actress Jane Darwell, with whom he appeared in a play, he headed to Hollywood in the late ’50s.
In Hollywood, Osborne quickly landed a six-month contract at 20th Century Fox and then joined a new contract-player group at Desilu studios under Lucille Ball’s personal supervision. Osborne had small parts in TV series, including the pilot episode of “The Beverly Hillbillies” in 1962.
He became close friends with Ball, who ultimately advised him not to stick with acting.
He joined the Hollywood Reporter in 1977 and took over the Rambling Reporter column from Hank Grant in 1983.
On television, Osborne began serving as entertainment reporter for KTTV in Los Angeles in 1982 and five years later became a regular contributor on CBS’ “The Morning Program.” He was a host on cable’s The Movie Channel before moving to TCM.