Stephen Jones - The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror. Volume 13

French cinematographer Henri Alekan, whose credits include Jean Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast and Wim Wenders’s Wings of Desire, died on June 15th following a brief hospitalization for leukaemia. He was 92.

Michael Green, the chairman of leading independent British film distributor Entertainment, died on June 17th, aged 84. After co-founding Regal Films International in the late 1950s, he launched Entertainment Film Distributors in 1978, since when the company has released everything from Hellraiser to Lord of the Rings and produced the sci-fi flop Slipstream.

Entertainment attorney Paul Schreibman, who was responsible for making the deals with Toho to bring Godzilla, Mothra, Varan etc. to America, died on June 23rd, aged 92.

Oscar-winning special effects supervisor A. D. Flowersdied from complications of emphysema and pneumonia on July 5th, aged 85. Chief of mechanical special effects at Twentieth Century-Fox for many years, his film credits include The Poseidon Adventure , Steven Spielberg’s 1941 and Apocalypse Now.

Disney animator Ted Bermandied on July 15th, aged 81. He worked on Fantasia, Bambi, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, Mary Poppins, Bedknobs and Broomsticks and co-scripted and co-directed The Black Cauldron.

Producer Jules Buck, whose credits include What’s New Pussycat and The Ruling Class, died on July 19th, aged 83.

Record producer and songwriter Milton Gabler, who founded the independent jazz label Commodore Records in 1937 and produced Bill Haley and the Comets’ ‘Rock Around the Clock’ in one take, died on July 20th, aged 90.

Film and TV director Alan Rafkindied of complications during heart surgery in Los Angeles on August 6th, aged 73. A former nightclub comic, he began his career in 1958 with such TV series as 77 Sunset Strip, directing more than eighty prime-time sitcoms along with a number of movies, including Ski Party, Angel in My Pocket and The Ghost and Mr Chicken.

Former film editor and TV producer Art Seiddied on August 9th, aged 87. He edited Lost Horizon (1937) and A Taste of Evil.

Oscar and Emmy Award-nominated American sound designer and sound editor Richard Jay Shorrdied of melanoma at his home in Paris on August 13th, aged 58. In 1979 he wrote and directed Witches Brew, a comic adaptation of Fritz Leiber’s novel Conjure Wife, which was completed by Herbert L. Strock. Switching to sound production, Shorr also worked on The Day After, Die Hard, Poltergeist III, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Highway to Hell.

Music editor Daniel Adrian Carlindied of lung cancer and pulmonary fibrosis on August 14th, aged 73. His credits include Ghost, Ghostbusters, Fatal Attraction and All That Jazz.

Hollywood make-up artist John Chambers, best known for creating Mr Spock’s Vulcan ears on TV’s Star Trek (1966–68) and the make-up for the original Planet of the Apes (1967) and its sequels, died of diabetes complications on August 25th, aged 78. His many other credits include The Three Stooges in Orbit, The Human Duplicators, Slaughterhouse-Five, The Mephisto Waltz, Superbeast, Ssssssss, Phantom of the Paradise, Embryo, The Island of Dr Moreau (1977), Halloween II and TV’s Beauty and the Beast (1976). Chambers won an honorary Oscar for his work on Planet of the Apes, and he was also rumoured to have created the famous Bigfoot creature filmed by Californian ‘researchers’ in 1967.

Film editor and producer Thomas Ralph Fries, the son of producer Charles Fries, died of a protracted cardiopulmonary illness on September 10th, aged 47. His credits include The Martian Chronicles, Starcrossed, Bridge Across Time and Flowers in the Attic. In 1989 he produced Phantom of the Mall: Eric’s Revenge.

54-year-old American television producer David Angelland his wife Lynnwere among the sixty-five passengers and crew aboard United Airlines Flight 175, travelling from Boston to Los Angeles, that terrorists crashed into the South Tower of New York’s World Trade Center on September 11th. The co-creator and executive producer of NBC-TV’s Frasier, he also scripted episodes of the comedy shows Wings and Cheers, sharing six Emmy Awards for his television work.

Fred (Frederick) De Cordova, who directed Bedtime for Bonzo and Bonzo Goes to College starring Ronald Reagan and a chimpanzee, died on September 15th, aged 90. His fifty-year career included directing numerous TV shows (including episodes of Bewitched) a TV version of Blithe Spirit starring Noel Coward, Lauren Bacall and Claudette Colbert, and he was executive producer of Johnny Carson’s The Tonight Show (1971–92).

Samuel Z. Arkoff, the cigar-chewing executive producer and co-founder (with James H. Nicholson, who died in 1972) of American International Pictures, died on September 16th, aged 83. His many films date from The Beast With a Million Eyes (1955) to Hellhole (1985), and include I Was a Teenage Werewolf, I Was a Teenage Frankenstein, Blood of Dracula, Roger Corman’s Edgar Allan Poe series, The Amityville Horror (which grossed $65 million in America) and Dressed to Kill. His autobiography (with Richard Trubo), Flying Through Hollywood by the Seat of My Pants, was published in 1992. Arkoff’s wife Hilda, who provided home-cooked meals for AIP wrap parties, died on July 26th.

Canadian-born film and TV director Gerald Mayer, the nephew of legendary MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer, died of complications from pneumonia on September 21st, aged 82. His credits include episodes of Thriller, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, The Invaders, Tarzan, Six Million Dollar Man and Logan’s Run.

Computer special effects wizard Robert Abel, who created the slit-scan effect for the ‘Star Gate’ sequence in 2001: A Space Odyssey and also worked on Disney’s Tron, died on September 23rd, five weeks after suffering a heart attack. He was 64.

William [‘Herbert’] Coleman, Alfred Hitchcock’s associate producer and right-hand man for a decade, died on October 3rd, aged 93. He worked on such titles as Rear Window, The Trouble With Harry andVertigo, and produced the TV series Alfred Hitchcock Presents andThe Alfred Hitchcock Hour.

British TV special effects director Jim Francisdied on October 5th, aged 47. His numerous credits include Doctor Who, Red Dwarf, Blakes 7, The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, The Tenth Kingdom and such films as Hardware, Nostradamus and Grim.

American director, dancer and choreographer Herbert Ross, who often collaborated with Neil Simon, died of heart failure on October 9th, aged 76. After staging the musical sequences for the Cliff Richard films The Young Ones and Summer Holiday, he worked on Doctor Dolittle before becoming a director with such films as Play It Again Sam, The Last of Sheila, The Seven-Per-Cent Solution and Pennies from Heaven. From 1988–2001 he was married to Jackie Kennedy’s sister, Lee Bouvier Radzi-well.

Italian opera designer, film director, writer and illustrator of children’s books, Beni Montresordied on October 11th, aged 75. During the 1950s he worked at Rome’s Cine Citta studios, where Ricardo Freda asked him to design I Vampiri (aka The Devil’s Commandment!Lust of the Vampire) in 1956.