Bob Rafelson, the filmmaker whose strange and often surreal projects helped shape him into a leading figure of the New Hollywood movement, died on Saturday night, his family said. He was 89. Rafelson had been battling lung cancer, said his wife, Gabrielle Rafelson, and died surrounded by family in his Colorado home. A bristling nonconformist whose career began in television in the early 1960s, Rafelson first made waves as a co-creator of the show The Monkees, basing the premise on his own misadventures as a wandering musician in Mexico. The show was a hit, as were the fictional rock ‘n’ roll band’s music and live concerts. Rafelson moved into producing soon after, giving many household names—among them Jennifer Lopez, Sally Field, and Arnold Schwarzenegger—their first big breaks, according to a 2019 Esquire profile. Arguably his most fruitful partnership with an actor, though, was the one he enjoyed as a director with Jack Nicholson, with whom he made seven films, including 1970’s Five Easy Pieces. “I may have thought I started his career,” Nicholson, a three-time Oscar winner, told Esquire, “but I think he started my career.”