Last modified on Fri 8 Jan 2021 17.54 EST
The British director Michael Apted has died at the age of 79.
The film-maker and documentarian was known for films such as Gorillas in the Mist and Coal Miner’s Daughter, as well as his long-running series of Up documentaries.
His death has been confirmed by his agency to the Hollywood Reporter. No further details are yet known.
Apted’s career started in the 1960s on the small screen, and in 1964, he assisted on the the show Seven Up! as part of the current affairs show World in Action. He helped the director Paul Almond interview 14 seven-year-old children, and continued to independently revisit them every seven years over the course of their lives. The most recent, 63 Up, was released in 2019 and the director referred to it as “the most important thing I have ever done”. The series as a whole won the Peabody award in 2012.