Jon Landau, an Oscar-winning producer and longtime collaborator of the director James Cameron who helped convey to life three of the highest-grossing movies of all time, “Titanic” and the 2 “Avatar” films, died on Friday in Los Angeles. He was 63.
Mr. Landau’s loss of life was confirmed by his household in an announcement supplied by the Walt Disney Firm. It didn’t give a explanation for loss of life.
Mr. Landau and Mr. Cameron’s decades-long collaboration made field workplace historical past. Their first movie collectively, “Titanic,” grew to become the primary film to gross greater than $1 billion globally after its 1997 launch. Its whole earnings document, $1.84 billion, was damaged by the following movie they made collectively, the science-fiction epic “Avatar” (2009).
“Titanic” was nominated for 14 Oscars and received 11, together with for finest image, an award Mr. Cameron and Mr. Landau shared.
“I can’t act and I can’t compose and I can’t do visible results, so I suppose that’s why I’m producing,” Mr. Landau stated in his acceptance speech.
Jon Landau was born on July 23, 1960, in New York Metropolis. His first publicity to filmmaking was by his mother and father, Ely and Edie Landau, who have been each producers.
He studied on the College of Southern California Faculty of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles and later labored as a manufacturing supervisor on movies together with “Honey, I Shrunk the Children” (1989) and “Dick Tracy” (1990).
He grew to become the chief vice chairman of function productions at twentieth Century Fox, the place he oversaw movies together with “Dwelling Alone” (1990), “Mrs. Doubtfire” (1993) and “Pace” (1994).
It was throughout this time that he met Mr. Cameron, who was directing “True Lies” (1994), an motion comedy distributed by twentieth Century Fox, in line with the assertion. When Mr. Landau determined to depart the corporate, Mr. Cameron requested if he wished to learn the script for a undertaking code-named “Planet Ice.” That undertaking would develop into “Titanic” and kick off a partnership that lasted a long time.
The second movie Mr. Landau and Mr. Cameron made collectively, “Avatar,” grossed practically $3 billion worldwide and was nominated for 9 Oscars. It received for finest artwork route, finest cinematography and finest visible results. A sequel, “Avatar: The Manner of Water,” was launched in 2022.
Mr. Landau additionally labored because the chief working officer of Mr. Cameron’s manufacturing studio, Lightstorm Leisure, and was the driving drive behind a Walt Disney World attraction primarily based on the “Avatar” films.
Mr. Landau is survived by his spouse, Julie Landau; their two sons, Jamie and Jodie; a brother, Les, and two sisters, Tina Landau and Kathy Landau.
