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 Hiller, whose work also included successful collaborations
with playwrights Neil Simon and Paddy Chayefsky, died of natural
causes in Los Angeles, the Academy said in a statement.
The director was the president of the Academy, which hosts
Hollywood's annual Oscars ceremony, from 1993 to 1997, and
served as a longtime member on the organization's Directors
Branch.
Current Academy president Cheryl Boone Isaacs said the
organization was "deeply saddened" by Hiller's death.
"I was a member of the Board during his presidency and fortunate
enough to witness firsthand his dedication to the Academy and
his lifelong passion for visual storytelling," Boone Isaacs
said.
Hiller directed more than 30 films from 1957 through 2006
covering a range of genres including comedies, dramas,
tearjerkers, war stories, satires and musicals. He guided five
different actors - O'Neal, MacGraw, George C. Scott, Maximilian
Schell and John Marley - to Oscar-nominated performances.
His films were nominated for 15 Academy Awards, winning two.
Hiller's adventure comedy "Silver Streak" marked the first
screen pairing of Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor and became one
of the top box office hits of 1976.
Hiller also collaborated with Chayefsky on two notable films -
the anti-war comedy "The Americanization of Emily" (1964)
starring James Garner and Julie Andrews and the dark satire "The
Hospital" (1971) starring Scott.
He joined forces with Simon for the comedies "The Out of Towners"
(1970) with Jack Lemmon and "Plaza Suite" (1971) with Walter
Matthau.
"Love Story," Hiller's biggest success, was nominated for seven
Academy Awards, including best picture and Hiller as best
director. It won only one Oscar, for best original score, as
"Patton," starring Scott, swept the top awards.
"Love Story" was a tale of ill-fated lovers - privileged Oliver
(O'Neal) and working-class Jennifer (MacGraw). It featured one
of the most famous movie lines of the 1970s: "Love means never
having to say you're sorry."
It was uttered twice: once by MacGraw to O'Neal and then at the
end of the movie by O'Neal to his judgmental and disapproving
father, played by Ray Milland.
"I LITERALLY HAD TO SWEAR"
Hiller said "Love Story" nearly did not get made.
"Paramount (film studio) was in rocky financial shape," he told
the Los Angeles Times in 1991. "They'd sold off part of the lot
and moved their offices to Beverly Hills - although I never
understood how they figured to save money that way.
"But Bob Evans, who was running the studio then, loved the project.
And he said we could make if I would swear - and I literally had to
swear - that I would bring it in for under $2 million," Hiller
added, noting that he finished the movie under budget.
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"Love Story" was a colossal hit, generating more than $100 million
at the box office.
When Hiller received a special humanitarian award at the Academy
Awards ceremony in March 2002, it was MacGraw and O'Neal who
presented it. "Thank you, Mama. Thank you, Papa. It feels humbling
to receive a humanitarian award for doing what my parents brought me
up to do," Hiller told the audience.
Hiller was an influential figure in Hollywood, heading the
Director's Guild of America from 1989 to 1993, before his stint as
Academy president.
From the mid-1950s to the early 1960s, Hiller also directed episodes
of numerous TV shows including "Playhouse 90," "Alfred Hitchcock
Presents," "Perry Mason," "Gunsmoke," and even the first episode of
the classic dark TV comedy "The Addams Family."
Hiller was particularly proud of "The Americanization of Emily,"
which explored a love affair pairing Andrews as a British war widow
and Garner as a U.S. officer. "It's the only one of my films I can
sit through and not want to redo while I'm watching it," Hiller told
the Los Angeles Times.
Some critics tagged the movie as anti-American, which Hiller said
was wrong. "It was never anti-American. It's anti the glorification
of war. Don't make war seem so wonderful that kids want to be
heroes; that's what it was saying," he said.
Some of Hiller's other films included the musical "Man of La Mancha"
(1972) with Peter O'Toole and Sophia Loren, "Author! Author!" (1982)
with Al Pacino, "The Lonely Guy" (1984) with Steve Martin,
"Outrageous Fortune" (1987) with Bette Midler and "The Babe" (1992)
with John Goodman as Babe Ruth.
Hiller was born on Nov. 22, 1923, in Edmonton to parents who had
come from Poland first to New York and then to Canada.
During World War Two, he flew bombing raids for the Royal Canadian
Air Force over Germany. He studied psychology in college, then began
his career in radio in Canada before moving to Los Angeles to direct
a live TV drama series.
Hiller is survived by his daughter, Erica Hiller Carpenter, his son,
Henryk, and five grandchildren. Gwen Hiller, his wife of 68 years,
died in June.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; editing by Bill Trott and Diane Craft)
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