Mike Nichols, famed director, writer, actor, and comedian (paired as a comedy team with Elaine May), who conquered Hollywood and the entertainment world in many facets and culminated a career which won him scores of accolades and unbridled success, has died. He was 83.
There really wasn’t much of the show business landscape that wasn’t treaded by the sharp mind and extremely creative talents of Mike Nichols, husband to ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer since 1988. His crowning achievement is The Graduate — in which he won a Best Director Academy Award in 1968 and which remains a film that is one of Hollywood’s most memorable productions — was one of the first films for the youth culture of the 1960s with themes of anti-establishment towards authority of every stripe. Nichols employed keen, perceptive direction throughout the comedy/drama, using memorable set pieces to tell a flawless story. (The opening sequence, in which the film’s protagonist Dustin Hoffman is on a long airport conveyor belt, is indicative of Nichols’ style throughout The Graduate).
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