Daniel Selznick, a Hollywood producer and executive who was a son of legendary Gone With the Wind producer David O. Selznick and theatrical producer Irene Mayer Selznick, has died. He was 88.
He died Thursday of natural causes at the Motion Picture Country Home and Hospital in Woodland Hills and will be remembered “for his intelligence, charm, sweetness and generosity,” a spokesperson announced.
Born in Los Angeles on May 18, 1936, Selznick graduated from Harvard University, attended the University of Geneva and did graduate work at Brandeis University. He continued in his family’s footsteps and pursued a career in the entertainment industry, including working as a production executive at Universal Studios for four years.
His father, who died in 1965, produced dozens of iconic films, including 1939’s Gone With the Wind, 1946’s Duel in the Sun and 1933’s King Kong. His mother, who died in 1990, was the daughter of MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer and received a Tony nomination in 1956 for The Chalk Garden.
Selznick produced the Peabody Award-winning documentary The Making of a Legend: Gone With the Wind alongside his older brother, Jeffrey Selznick, who died in 1997. The doc captured how their father shepherded the Clark Gable classic.
Selznick produced a handful of other projects, including the miniseries Blood Feud, Hoover vs. the Kennedys: The Second Civil War, Night Drive and Reagan’s Way: Pathway to the Presidency, which he also directed.
He served for several years as the director of the Louis B. Mayer Foundation and had success as a theatrical producer, presenting his stepmother, actress Jennifer Jones, in a light comedy, The Man With the Perfect Wife.
His memoir, Walking With Kings, which he wrote while at the Motion Picture Home, is set to be published next year by Alfred Knopf.
Selznick, who was married three times, has no immediate survivors.
