Mike Nichols, Director of 'The Graduate,' Passes Away

Mike Nichols, the prominent American director, winner of 9 Tony Awards in theater and an Academy Award for directing 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf,' passed away on Wednesday night, November 28, at the age of 83. Reuters reports that no director has been able to move between theater and Hollywood as easily as Mike Nichols. He was one of the few artists to win all major entertainment awards, including Tony, Oscar, Emmy, and Grammy. Nichols' artistic brilliance began in the late 1950s with a comedy program alongside Elaine May. Nichols was the husband of Diane Sawyer, former anchor of ABC's 'World News Tonight.' James Goldston, head of ABC News, announced his death in a note to news department employees, stating, 'Mike created many memorable and historic works in film, television, and theater over six decades of successful artistic activity. He was a true visionary.' Reuters continues that Mike Nichols, born Michael Igor Peshkovsky in 1931 in Berlin, saw his parents flee Russia and settle in Berlin. They emigrated to America in 1939 during the Nazi regime when Michael was seven years old. He grew up in New York. Nichols, along with his wife Diane Sawyer, often felt like an outsider due to his unfamiliarity with English and his unusual appearance. His sensitivity to whooping cough medicine caused him to go bald. His college years at the University of Chicago were marked by depression, but it was during this time that he met like-minded individuals such as Elaine May. Mike Nichols and Elaine May formed a comedy team in the late 1950s, being pioneers of a comedy movement that included Lenny Bruce, Jonathan Winters, and Woody Allen, satirizing contemporary American life. The duo won a Grammy for Best Comedy Album in 1961, but soon after, differences in their comedic styles led to their separation, with May preferring improvisation and Nichols favoring a fixed performance style. By the mid-1960s, Nichols had become a driving force in New York's Broadway shows. During this period, the play 'Barefoot in the Park' by Neil Simon marked the beginning of a successful collaboration between the two. Neil Simon told The New Yorker, 'I have never worked with anyone as well as Mike in my life.' For his fourth collaboration with Simon, Nichols won Tony Awards for the plays 'The Odd Couple' in 1965, 'Brighton Beach Memoirs' in 1984, 'Spamalot' in 2005, and a revival of Arthur Miller's 'Death of a Salesman' in 2012, as well as the musical 'Annie' in 1977. When Nichols was ready to venture into filmmaking, he impacted the American film industry by making three influential films in a five-year period. His first film, 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf,' was a cinematic adaptation of a play by Edward Albee, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. The film was nominated for 13 Academy Awards and won five, although Nichols did not win Best Director. The following year, 'The Graduate,' featuring Dustin Hoffman, who was not yet a well-known actor, not only won an Oscar but also became a cultural touchstone of the 1960s with its memorable soundtrack and several famous lines of dialogue. Nichols stirred controversy in 1971 with 'Carnal Knowledge' due to its sexual themes. A theater manager in Virginia was arrested for showing the film and was forced to appeal to the Supreme Court. Directing the film 'Wit' in 2001 and a television miniseries about the AIDS epidemic titled 'Angels in America' earned him two more Emmy Awards. In the mid-1980s, Nichols experienced a severe mental health crisis. He stated that the use of strong painkillers led to hallucinations, and he believed he had completely lost his memory. It was known that Nichols was very loud while directing. Meryl Streep told The Hollywood Reporter, 'He was always the smartest and most exceptional person, and sometimes he could be the worst.' Mike Nichols had three children from previous marriages.