Albert S. Ruddy, the Oscar-winning producer of The Godfather, has died at age 94.
Ruddy died “peacefully” Saturday at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles, according to a spokesman, who added that among his last words were: “The game is over, but we won it.”
He produced more than 30 films, including The Godfather, Million Dollar Baby and The Longest Yard.
His television credits included Hogan’s Heroes and Walker Texas Ranger.
With a cast that included Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and Robert Duvall, The Godfather was a critical and commercial sensation and remains among the most beloved and cited films in history.
“Al Ruddy was absolutely beautiful to me the entire time on The Godfather; even when they didn’t love me, he loved me,” Al Pacino said in a statement.
“He gave me the gift of encouragement when I needed it most and I will never forget it.”
Al Pacino, Marlon Brando, James Caan and John Cazale as the Corleone family in The Godfather
When Ruddy won the Oscar for best picture in 1973, the presenter was Clint Eastwood, with whom he would produce Million Dollar Baby, his second best picture winner in 2005.
On the 50th anniversary of the release of The Godfather, in 2022, Ruddy himself became an on-screen character.
Top Gun: Maverick and Whiplash star Miles Teller played him in The Offer, a Paramount+ miniseries about the making of the film, based on Ruddy’s experiences.
Born in Montreal in 1930, Ruddy moved to the United States as a child and grew up in New York City.
After graduating from the University of Southern California, he was working as an architect when he met actor Bernard Fein in the early 1960s.
Ruddy had grown bored with architecture and he and Fein decided to develop a television series, although neither of them had written anything.
Ruddy collected the Oscar for best picture for The Godfather in 1973. Photo: AP
Their original idea was a comedy set in an American prison, but they soon changed their mind.
“We read in the paper that a network was making a comedy set in an Italian prisoner-of-war camp and we thought, ‘Perfect,'” Ruddy later explained.
“We rewrote our script and set it in a German prisoner-of-war camp in about two days.”
Starring Bob Crane as the cunning Colonel Hogan, Hogan’s Heroes aired from 1965 to 1971 on CBS, but was criticized for trivializing World War II and turning Nazis into adorable cartoons.
Ruddy recalled that network head William Paley called the show’s concept “reprehensible,” but changed his mind after Ruddy “literally acted out an episode.”
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Ruddy then turned to film, and his reputation for managing costs led Paramount Pictures head Robert Evans to hire him to produce Mario Puzo’s hit novel The Godfather for what was supposed to be a minor gangster film. for profit.
“I got a call on a Sunday. ‘Do you want to do The Godfather?'” Ruddy told Vanity Fair.
“I thought they were joking, right? I said, ‘Yes, of course, I love that book,’ which I’d never read.”
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Ruddy was married to Wanda McDaniel, a sales executive and liaison for Giorgio Armani.
They had two children.
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