Roger Corman, Pioneering Independent Producer and King of B Movies, Dies at 98
variety.comRoger Corman, who directed and produced hundreds of low-budget films and discovered such future industry stars as Jack Nicholson, Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro, has died.
He was 98. Corman died May 9 at his home in Santa Monica, Calif., surrounded by family members, the family confirmed to Variety. “His films were revolutionary and iconoclastic, and captured the spirit of an age.
When asked how he would like to be remembered, he said, ‘I was a filmmaker, just that,’ ” the family said in a statement. Corman’s empire, which existed in several incarnations, including New World Pictures, and Concorde/New Horizons, was as active as any major studio and, he boasted, always profitable.
He specialized in fast-paced, low-budget genre movies — horror, action, science fiction, even some family fare — and his company became a work-in-training ground for a wide variety of major talents, from actors like Nicholson (“Little Shop of Horrors”) and De Niro (“Boxcar Bertha”) to directors like Francis Ford Coppola (“Dementia 13”) and Scorsese (“Boxcar Bertha”).
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