Lynn Stalmaster, the Oscar-winning casting director whose eye for talent helped launch the careers of John Travolta, Christopher Reeve, Richard Dreyfuss and many other actors, died. He was 93 years old.
Stalmaster became the first person to receive a cast Oscar when he received an honorary Oscar for his work as a whole in 2016. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has long resisted giving special recognition to casting directors and Stalmaster has been moved to tears.
“It’s not just an Oscar for me, but it is the recognition of the cast’s greatest contribution,” he said.
He started his acting career, even appearing with John Wayne in the 1951 film “Flying Leathernecks”, but he wanted a backup plan. He was apprenticed to two TV producers who named him casting director.
Stalmaster was looking for stars for shows like “Gunsmoke” and “Ben Casey” when director Robert Wise chose him to cast the supporting actors in a 1958 film starring Susan Hayward called “I Want to Live!”
Stalmaster opened his independent casting office as soon as the reign of the Hollywood contract-based studio system ended, which allowed actors and directors a new freedom of choice in choosing their projects. Stalmaster decided to meet each young artist in Los Angeles and New York, and traveled around the United States and Europe to find new talent.
Stalmaster has cast more than 200 films, including “The Graduate”, “Fiddler on the Roof”, “Harold and Maude”, “Tootsie”, “Deliverance”, “Being There”, Judgment at Nuremberg “and” The Right Stuff “. He also worked on a documentary about casting directors, “Casting By”, whose title is a reference to how Stalmaster and his colleagues were credited in films, rather than being called “casting directors”.
“A pioneer in our craft, Lynn was a pioneer with more than half a century of world-class film and television cast credits,” said the Casting Society of America in a statement. “Thank you, Lynn, for showing us the way.”
Born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1927, Stalmaster said his father gave him the confidence to become an actor.
“Imagine my father – he was at the Supreme Court in Nebraska – parents don’t want their children to be actors,” he said. “But he said to me, ‘I want you to go to the Abbey Theater.'”
With his acting experience, Stalmaster used to read opposites to the actors he hoped to release to bring his best performance during auditions.
“I could look you in the eye and interpret the scene,” he said in a 2016 interview. “And I probably played more roles than any other actor in history – and women!”
He suggested Travolta for what became his leading role: Vinnie Barbarino on the sitcom “Welcome Back, Kotter. Other actors who can thank Stalmaster for his early film roles include Dreyfuss, who had a line in 1967’s The Graduate, as well as Jon Voight, James Caan, Martin Landau and Jeff Bridges.
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Former Associated Press writer Sandy Cohen compiled biographical material for this obituary.