LOS ANGELES – Director, writer and producer Blake Edwards, who made more than 40 films including the classic Breakfast at Tiffany's and the Pink Panthercomedies, has died from complications of pneumonia at the age of 88.
A spokesman for his wife, Julie Andrews, to whom he had been married since 1969, said Edwards died on Wednesday night at St John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, California, with Andrews and immediate family by his side.
During his career Edwards won wide acclaim for films such as Days of Wine and Rosesand Victor Victoria, but also suffered flops.
His battles with Hollywood executives got so intense that for a period he secretly taped conversations with them.
Born on July 26th, 1922, Edwards broke into movies as an actor with a small role in the 1942 film Ten Gentlemen from West Point, and appeared in some two dozen less-than-successful films. "Look at any one of those movies," Edwards said, "and you'll see why I decided to become a writer." In the late 1940s he created the popular Richard Diamond, Private Detectiveradio series. He later created two popular private-eye series for television, Peter Gunnand Mr Lucky. Edwards received Emmy nominations for writing and directing Peter Gunn.
His diverse work includes light-hearted comedies and heart-breaking dramas, and has featured some of Hollywood's top talent. In 1959, Edwards had his first big film success with Operation Petticoat, starring Cary Grant and Tony Curtis.
After making Breakfast at Tiffany's with Audrey Hepburn and Days of Wine and Roseswith Jack Lemmon, he shifted gear and directed The Pink Panther, the first of seven wacky comedies featuring Peter Sellers as the bumbling Inspector Clouseau.
Edwards and Sellers were, however, not always a happy team. “The most fun and the worst times were with Peter,” Edwards said in 2002. “When he was at the top of his form, he was great fun. When he was in his depressed, angry world, he was impossible.”
Edwards, who was given an honorary Oscar in 2003, also had critical and financial failures. Darling Lili, co-starring Andrews, was such a box-office disaster that it imperilled Paramount Pictures.
After a series of flops derailed his career, Edwards bounced back in 1979 with 10. It featured Andrews and made stars of Bo Derek and Dudley Moore.
Andrews also appeared in 1982's Victor Victoria, which earned Edwards an Oscar nomination for the screenplay, and the dark comedy S.O.B., Edwards's indictment of Hollywood studio executives.
"I had a lot of bitterness in me when I wrote the first draft," Edwards said of S.O.B. "The final screenplay was toned down a lot. What's funny now is that I keep meeting people who are characters straight out of that movie and who don't know it. They're the same terrible people doing the same terrible things."
He was married twice, the second time to Andrews. Andrews and Edwards raised five children, three from separate marriages and two they adopted. Andrews and all of his children survive him.