Legendary Canadian filmmaker Norman Jewison died on Saturday at the age of 97, per The Hollywood Reporter.
Jewison was a jack of all trades in the filmmaking world, responsible for bringing Topol’s Tevye to life on the big screen in the beloved musical adaptation Fiddler on the Roof and directing screen legend Sidney Poitier as detective Virgil Tibbs in the iconic police drama In the Heat of the Night.
Starting his career with the 1962 Tony Curtis comedy 40 Pounds of Trouble, Jewison earned critical and Oscar attention for his 1966 Cold War satire The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming starring Alan Arkin. The filmmaker saw his next project win Best Picture outright with 1967’s In the Heat of the Night.
Rod Steiger won Best Actor for his role in that film, making him the first of three actors who won Oscars with Jewison directing them.
Cher and Olympia Dukakis would join Steiger in that group after they won Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress, respectively, for their performances in 1987’s Moonstruck, one of the great comedies of that decade.
Multiple other actors earned nominations at the Oscars by working with Jewison on various projects, including Denzel Washington (1999’s The Hurricane), Al Pacino (1979’s …And Justice for All) and Anne Bancroft (1985’s Agnes of God)
Jewison remained active throughout the 20th century behind the camera, with his final film coming in 2003 with the Michael Caine-led The Statement.
While the famed filmmaker was nominated at the Oscars for Best Director on a handful of occasions, the Academy honored his career in 1999 with its Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award.
Perhaps Jewison’s most admirable quality as a filmmaker was his impeccable range, as few filmmakers could pivot from making Doris Day comedies in the 1960s to spearheading big-budget musicals like Jesus Christ Superstar and a sci-fi action film like Rollerball in the 1970s with such ease.
His work with actors is also a heralded aspect to his stellar filmography, as evident by all the attention from the Academy Awards.
Here are some of Jewison’s best films, representative of a career full of stone-cold iconography and impressive diversity of talent and genre.
