Director Paul Mazursky Dead at 84

He was a visionary in terms of independent filmmaking with a series of pioneering works beginning  in the late ’60s. Sometimes referred to as the ‘Woody Allen of the West Coast’, Paul Mazursky was nominated for five Oscars, mostly for his writing. BOB & CAROL & TED &  ALICE, HARRY AND TONTO (which won an Oscar for star Art Carny in 1974), MOSCOW ON THE HUDSON, AN UNMARRIED WOMAN, DOWN AND OUT IN BEVERLY HILLS were among his many accomplishments. His last significant work was ENEMIES A LOVE STORY in 1989, the story of a Holocaust survivor who finds himself involved with three women – his current wife, a passionate married woman, and his long-vanished wife whom he thought was killed during the war. Mazursky has spent the last couple of decades acting in small roles, but there was a time when he was considered one of the most important filmmakers working, and for good reason. He made his mark with a string of smart, adult, offbeat movies that will live on. Paul Mazursky died of a heart attack Tuesday at age 84.

From Variety:

“Though he was never nominated by the Academy for director, he did cop four screenplay nominations (three of them shared) for “Bob and Ted,” “Harry and Tonto,” “Enemies” and “An Unmarried Woman,” for which he also shared a best picture nomination.

While he made  his most significant films as a director several decades ago, he returned to acting on TV in later years, playing Norm on “Curb Your Enthusiasm” and appearing on “The Sopranos” and on ABC drama “Once and Again” as Sela Ward’s father.

Mazursky captured the spirit of the late ’60s and the ’70s, when the American moral climate was turned on its head. His films entertainingly and humanistically explored such weighty issues as marital fidelity, the merits of psychological therapy and modern divorce: “Bob and Ted,” starring Robert Culp and Natalie Wood as a “liberated” married couple; “Blume in Love,” starring George Segal and Susan Anspach and focusing on the nature of romantic commitment; “Harry and Tonto,” starring Art Carney and focusing on the modern family and approaching old age; the more personal “Next Stop, Greenwich Village”; and his most popular film, “An Unmarried Woman,” with Jill Clayburgh and Alan Bates, about divorce in the feminist era……”

Read the rest HERE

http://variety.com/2014/film/news/paul-mazursky-director-of-unmarried-woman-dies-at-84-1201256304/