Robert Redford — the heartthrob-handsome actor who personified “movie star” in the 1960s and 1970s in such films as “Barefoot in the Park,” “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” “The Sting,” “The Way We Were” and “All the President’s Men” before becoming an Academy Award-winning director and founder of the Sundance Film Festival — died Tuesday at age 89.
His death, at his home in the mountains near Provo, Utah, was announced by his publicist, who did not give a cause.
Publicist Cindi Berger told The New York Times that Redford died in his sleep, adding he was in “the place he loved surrounded by those he loved.”
Tributes poured in Tuesday, including from director Ron Howard, who praised Redford’s impact on generations of filmmakers.
“#RIP & thank you Robert Redford, a tremendously influential cultural figure for the creative choices made as an actor/producer/director & for launching the Sundance Film Festival which supercharged America’s Independent Film movement. Artistic Gamechanger,” Howard wrote on X.
Actress Jane Fonda, who co-starred with Redford in “Barefoot in the Park,” “The Electric Horseman” and “Our Souls at Night,” said his death left her heartbroken.
“It hit me hard this morning when I read that Bob was gone. I can’t stop crying. He meant a lot to me and was a beautiful person in every way. He stood for an America we have to keep fighting for,” Fonda said in a statement.
Author Stephen King also reflected on Redford’s passing, noting his influence on a changing Hollywood.
“Robert Redford has passed away. He was part of a new and exciting Hollywood in the 70s and 80s. Hard to believe he was 89,” King wrote on X.
Actress Octavia Spencer praised Redford for his mix of artistry and advocacy.
“From Butch Cassidy to Sundance, he blended art and activism in ways few have. His quiet strength will live in every frame he directed, every festival he championed and every artist he encouraged,” Spencer wrote on Instagram.
Director James Gunn remembered Redford as the definitive Hollywood leading man.
“I grew up with his movies: his quiet, unforced performances and ever-present grace. He was THE movie star, and will be greatly missed,” Gunn wrote on Instagram.
Redford was born Aug. 18, 1936 in Santa Monica and attended Van Nuys High School, graduating in 1954 before setting off on a legendary six-decade career in the 1960s — beginning in television with guest roles in such staples of the era as “Maverick,” “Playhouse 90,” “Perry Mason,” “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” and “The Twilight Zone.”
He made his Broadway debut in 1959 in “Tall Story” and hit it big on The Great White Way in 1963 in the Neil Simon play “Barefoot in the Park” — reprising that role in the 1967 film version in a co-starring role with Jane Fonda that began a string of mega-hits that vaulted Redford to the pinnacle of Hollywood stardom and success.
Those films included 1969’s “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” playing the Sundance Kid alongside fellow icon Paul Newman in a turn that would later give name to Redford’s groundbreaking, career-making indie film festival, Sundance.
A string of hits followed, including “Downhill Racer”; “Jeremiah Johnson”; “The Candidate”; “The Way We Were” with Barbra Streisand; “The Sting,” again with Newman; “The Great Gatsby”; The Electric Horseman”; “The Great Waldo Pepper”; “Three Days of the Condor”; “All the President’s Men” with Dustin Hoffman; “The Natural”; and “Out of Africa.”
The blond-haired box-office magnet then made another name for himself as a serious-minded, critically acclaimed director in films that often bucked popular Hollywood trends and tackled heavy subjects such as, suicide, grief, corruption and greed.
He won the best-director Oscar for his first directorial effort, 1980’s “Ordinary People,” which took three Academy Awards in all, including Best Picture.
Over his career, Redford would amass five Golden Globes, a Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, Kennedy Center Honors and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
“Forever the cowboy, the fugitive, the candidate, the prisoner, the Great Gatsby, the con man, the student, the playboy, the loner, the cryptographer, the soldier, the reporter, the rodeo champion, the lover, the baseball star, the sailor, the horse whisperer,” Cannes Film Festival director Thierry Fremaux wrote on X.
“Redford was more than a legend: he was a role model. Forever Robert Redford, the electric horseman who loved freedom.”
In 2018 Redford announced he would be retiring from acting, following “The Old Man & The Gun,” a western that screened at the Telluride Film Festival.
At the time, he said he “can’t last forever” and that he “put my soul and heart into it over the years.”
“I thought, `That’s enough. Why don’t you quit while you’re a little bit ahead? Don’t wait for the bell to toll. Just get out,”’ he said at the time.” So I felt my time had come and I couldn’t think of a better project to go out on than this film.”
But later that year, he had second thoughts about retiring, telling People magazine, “I think it was a mistake to say that I was retiring because you never know. It did feel like it was time maybe, to concentrate on another category.”
In fact, he would work again on “Buttons, A New Musical Film,” as a narrator in 2018, followed by roles in “Avengers: Endgame” in 2019, “Omniboat: A Fast Boat Fantasia” in 2020 and finally, this year, the AMC show “Dark Winds,” a crime drama set in the 1970s about Navajo Tribal Police officers.