Samuel Goldwyn Jr. grew up with Hollywood royalty.
When Sam Jr. started his own independent film company, which became a major force in 1980s and ’90s Hollywood, he took on modestly budgeted movies that didn’t risk the house but often scored with critics and audiences — the Julia Roberts breakout film “Mystic Pizza” (1988); “Longtime Companion” (1989), which took up the topic of AIDS; and “The Madness of King George” (1994), to name a few.
Mr. Goldwyn, 88, died Jan. 9 at a hospital in Los Angeles. The cause was congestive heart failure, said his son Peter Goldwyn.
Although Samuel Goldwyn Sr., who produced more than 100 films including “Wuthering Heights” (1939) and “The Best Years of Our Lives” (1946), was a founding father of Hollywood, he was in his own way an independent producer. He had to sell his Goldwyn company — which eventually became Metro Goldwyn Mayer — in the silent era because of debt.
By the early 1990s, Mr. Goldwyn Jr. had built his Samuel Goldwyn Co. into one of three major independent film operations — along with New Line and Miramax — while other highly touted indie operations had failed.
"The independents who were our fiercest competitors all succumbed to the one-hit-makes-
you-a-genius philosophy," he told the New York Times in 1992. "It is a mistake to think you have the magic touch. Show business is roulette.
“If you start to play for stakes you can’t afford, there’s no way you can survive.”
If the stakes looked right, he would bet on new talent. Early in their directing careers, his company got involved with Ang Lee’s “The Wedding Banquet” (1993) and “Eat Drink Man Woman” (1994), Anthony Minghella’s “Truly Madly Deeply” (1990) and Kenneth Branagh’s “Henry V” (1989).
Other notable films distributed by the company include “Mississippi Masala” (1991), the gritty “Straight Out of Brooklyn” (1991) and Luc Besson’s “La Femme Nikita” (1990).
Mr. Goldwyn also bolstered his company with television productions, including the syndicated “American Gladiators.” He produced the Oscars telecasts of 1987 and 1988.
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For the most part, his career might not have been as glamorous as that of his father, who died in 1974. But Sam Jr. was taught early that the glamour of Hollywood was not what was important.
“I’m often asked what it was like to be part of the old Hollywood, and what people want to hear is how I was dangled on Clark Gable’s knee,” Mr. Goldwyn told the Los Angeles Times in 1995. “But what I remember most is the days my father’s movies were paid off.”
Samuel Goldwyn Jr. was born Sept. 7, 1926, in Los Angeles. He attended the University of Virginia, then left for a stint in the Army. He worked for the J. Arthur Rank film productions in London, then for the CBS news operation in New York.
In the mid-1950s, Mr. Goldwyn came back to L.A. His first Hollywood film as producer was the 1955 Western “Man With the Gun,” starring Robert Mitchum. In 1964 came his sole outing as a director with “The Young Lovers,” starring Peter Fonda.
In 1995, with tightened margins in the industry and other titles flopping at the box office, Mr. Goldwyn was forced to sell the company.
He was not finished, however. In 2003, he produced a film based on Patrick O’Brian’s “Master and Commander” books. And his last credit harked back to his father — it was on a 2013 Ben Stiller version of “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” which Sam Sr. had made into a film in 1947 starring Danny Kaye.
The Goldwyn Hollywood dynasty extends to the third generation, the Associated Press reports: Mr. Goldwyn’s son John was vice chairman of Paramount Pictures, and another son, actor Tony Goldwyn, stars in the ABC drama “Scandal.”
— Los Angeles Times
