Jerome Hellman (September 4, 1928 – May 26, 2021) was an American film producer. He is best known for being the 42nd recipient of the Academy Award for Best Picture for Midnight Cowboy (1969).[1] His 1978 film Coming Home was nominated for the same award.
Life and career
Hellman was born to a Jewish family[2] in New York City. He began his career as a talent agent starting with the Ashley/Steiner Agency and shortly set out on his own to form Jerome Hellman Associates, which represented some of the outstanding directors, writers and producers during the "golden age" of live television.
Hellman had his first taste of producing when he took over the role of Executive Producer from his client, President and Producer Worthington C. Miner, in the final days of Unit Four Productions, a partnership of George Roy Hill, Franklin Shaffner and Fielder Cook, producing live one-hour dramas on NBC (1955–57). After leaving NBC, Hill, Shaffner and Cook moved on to directing assignments at Playhouse 90, the first 90-minute TV drama series out of CBS's new studio on the West Coast.
His collaboration with director John Schlesinger and screenwriter Waldo Salt in the production of Midnight Cowboy garnered seven Academy Award nominations and won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay.[1] This creative team would last through The Day of the Locust and the early production stages of Coming Home.
Coming Home was directed by Hal Ashby and received eight Academy Award nominations including Best Picture. It won Academy Awards for Jon Voight (Best Actor), Jane Fonda (Best Actress), and Waldo Salt, Robert C. Jones and Nancy Dowd (Best Original Screenplay).[4]
Hellman's seven feature films garnered seventeen Oscar nominations and won six.
Hellman had a stroke twelve years prior to his death. He died after a long illness at his home in South Egremont, Massachusetts on May 26, 2021, at age 92.[6][7]
