Mogul brought Bond, Beatles to big screen
Hollywood producer a ‘true visionary’ who helped launch many to stardom
Hollywood film producer David V. Picker died Saturday, April 20, in New York. He was 87.
The movie mogul, who helped bring Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels to the big screen, died after a battle with colon cancer, The Hollywood Reporter says.
Bosses at the MGM studio, where he worked as the head of its United Artists subsidiary in the 1960s, paid tribute to him in a tweet.
“We are saddened to hear that a member of the United Artists family has passed away. David Picker was a true visionary who brought iconic films to theatres such as the James Bond franchise,” their post says.
David Victor Picker was born May 14, 1931 in New York. His father, Eugene Picker, was a movie theatre executive of Loew’s Theaters. David attended Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, graduating with a bachelor of arts degree in 1953. After serving in the U.S. army, Picker joined United Artists in 1956 and quickly rose through the ranks, first becoming an assistant and then the head of production.
During his time there, he secured the rights to Fleming’s spy novels and pushed for Sean Connery’s casting as the first 007 in the 1962 movie Dr. No. After the box office disappointment of George Lazenby as Bond in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969), Picker later persuaded Connery to return as Bond in Diamonds Are Forever (1971).
Additionally, Picker helped bring The Beatles to the silver screen in films including A Hard Day’s Night and Help! and championed Tony Richardson’s Oscar-winning 1963 adaptation of Henry Fielding’s 18th-century novel Tom Jones, starring Albert Finney.
Toward the end of the 1960s, Picker also backed groundbreaking projects including Women in Love, for which Glenda Jackson won an Academy Award for best actress; Last Tango in Paris; and Midnight Cowboy, the first X-rated film to win the Oscar for best picture. Picker also brought European filmmakers Federico Fellini, Ingmar Bergman, François Truffaut, Louis Malle and Sergio Leone to United Artists.
He left United Artists in 1973, joining Paramount as president of motion pictures three years later, where he greenlit 1970s classics Grease and Saturday Night Fever and the 1980 Oscar-winning Ordinary People.
Picker, who also headed Columbia Pictures and Lorimar Productions, helped launch comedian Steve Martin’s film career by independently producing his breakthrough movie The Jerk and later comedies including Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid and The Man With Two Brains.
In 1997, Picker became president of Hallmark Entertainment Productions Worldwide and moved the company into feature films.
The producer is survived by his wife, Sandra Jetton, as well as his sister Jean Picker Firstenberg, a former president of the American Film Institute.