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A Tribute to Richard Rush: The Maverick Who Made The Stunt Man Didn t Direct Many Films, but Was Always Ahead of the Curve
Owen Gleiberman, provided by
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Richard Rush, the director of “The Stunt Man,” died April 8 at the age of 91, and if you look up his credits he has only 14 of them (and one was an episode of “The Mod Squad”). In a career that spanned 35 years, he made just a dozen features. Yet to an unusual degree, he meant every one of them. Maybe to a fault: As he noted in “The Sinister Saga of Making ‘The Stunt Man, ” his documentary look back at the fabled cult film about filmmaking, Rush gave away the rights to “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” and turned down “Jaws.” He was very choosy. Yet when you watch his movies, you always see them peering around corners and glancing ahead, anticipating the world that was coming.
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reporter: that film gave o toole his big break and made him an international sensation and got him his first nomination for an academy award. if you oppose me i ll strike you anywhere i can. reporter: admittedly a heavy drinker his taste for alcohol not only threatened his career but also his life. he managed to give up the drink and mounted a comeback as a crazed director in the stunt man. it screws you up! reporter: a self-described entertainer by trade, o toole mocked his own image as an alcoholic over the hill matinee idol in my favorite year, a performance that earned him his seventh oscar nomination. ah! reporter: though he made some regretability films through the 80s such as 1984 super girl o toole continued to work appearing in several made-for-tv films including joan of arc. i know a good deed without all of that, but this work is every bit as important as the other. reporter: in 2003, the academy of motion pictures arts