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The death of actor, writer and director Gene Wilder was announced today; he had been suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. With his striking blue eyes that could go from sensitive to crazed with ease, he was a new sort of screen comic presence when he appeared in his film debut Bonnie and Clyde, a scene-stealer as the undertaker, and he quickly captured audience's interest. This led to him getting hired for Mel Brooks' directorial debut The Producers, where he suited the mayhem perfectly, and would go on to appear in two further Brooks classics, Young Frankenstein and Blazing Saddles.
In addition to those, he appeared in cult movies, often comedies, like Start the Revolution Without Me, Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (one of his defining roles for generations of children), Woody Allen's Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (with the sheep), Ionesco's Rhinoceros and The Little Prince. He also got the directing bug, going on to helm his own vehicles like The World's Greatest Lover and The Woman in Red, the latter alongside his then wife Gilda Radner, who he also appeared with in Hanky Panky. As if that were not enough, he was additionally paired with Richard Pryor for "odd couple" comedies like Silver Streak, Stir Crazy and two of his last films, See No Evil, Hear No Evil and Another You. One of the cinema's true originals, we shall not see his like again. |
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