Albert Ruddy, the Academy Award-winning producer of “The Godfather” and “Million Dollar Baby,” has passed away at the age of 94.
The Canadian producer, who made more than 30 films during his long career and was also known for co-creating “Hogan’s Heroes” and “Walker, Texas Ranger,” died peacefully on Saturday at UCLA Medical Center, a spokesman said.
According to a spokesman, one of his final words was, “The game is over, but we won the game.”
Ruddy’s career has taken him to meteoric heights, but along the way he’s dodged controversy and even danger, including a real-life gangster shooting out his car window and leaving a note to stop production on “The Godfather,” people like Frank Sinatra complaining that Mafia movies reinforced negative stereotypes about Italian-Americans and even criticizing “Hogan’s Heroes” for making light of the Nazis.
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Albert Ruddy, the Academy Award-winning producer of “The Godfather” and “Million Dollar Baby,” has passed away at the age of 94. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon, File)
He immediately met face-to-face with Mafia members to try to assuage their dissatisfaction with the photo.
“Joe sat across from me, one on the couch, the other by the window,” Ruddy told Vanity Fair in 2009 about a meeting with Colombo crime family boss Joseph Colombo and some of his associates. “He put on his little Ben Franklin glasses and looked at it (the script) for about two minutes. And then he asked me, ‘What does ‘fade in’ mean?”
Ruddy said he removed one instance of the word “Mafia” from the film, made a donation to the Italian American Civil Rights League and was present at a press conference where Mafia boss Colombo voiced his support for the film.
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Mafia members also worked as extras in films and became friendly with the cast.
“It was like a happy family,” Ruddy told Vanity Fair. “They all loved underworld characters, and of course underworld characters loved Hollywood.”
Albert Ruddy talking with Marlon Brando on the set of “The Godfather.” (Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images)
“The Godfather” won Best Picture in 1973.
“Al Ruddy was amazing to me throughout my time in ‘The Godfather.’ He wanted me even when no one else on the cast wanted me,” star Al Pacino said in a statement. “He gave me the gift of encouragement when I needed it most, and I will never forget that.”
“Million Dollar Baby,” starring Clint Eastwood, won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2005, and Ruddy also starred with Eastwood in 2021’s “Cry Macho.”
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Ruddy is the co-creator of Hogan’s Heroes. (CBS via Getty Images)
Ruddy is also played by Miles Teller in the miniseries about the making of The Godfather, which will air on Paramount+ in 2022.
Ruddy told Vanity Fair that he got a call after Paramount Pictures acquired the rights to Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, despite it initially being planned as a low-budget gangster movie.
“They asked me, ‘Do you want to do The Godfather?'” Ruddy says. “You thought I was kidding? I said, ‘Yeah, sure. I love that book,’ but I’d never read it.”
Albert Ruddy and Million Dollar Baby star Clint Eastwood, along with Oscar presenters Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon, File)
Mr. Ruddy and his co-creator, actor Bernard Fain, originally envisioned the characters in “Hogan’s Heroes” as inmates in a U.S. prison, but when they heard a network was making a series about Italian prison camps, they changed it to a German one.
“I thought, ‘This is perfect,'” Ruddy later explained. “I rewrote the script in about two days and set it in a German prison camp.”
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The series, which starred Bob Crane as U.S. Army Colonel Robert Hogan and Werner Klemperer as Nazi Colonel Klink, aired for six seasons on CBS. The sitcom remains popular in cable reruns.
Albert Ruddy won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1973 for The Godfather. (AP Photo, File)
Ruddy said former CBS president William Paley initially called the comedy “reprehensible” for its possible trivialization of Nazi atrocities, but changed his mind after Ruddy performed an episode for him.
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Ruddy also produced films such as The Longest Yard and Cannonball Run starring Burt Reynolds, and Scout starring Brendan Fraser and Albert Brooks.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
