ISLAND IN THE SKY

‘Weekend at Bernie’s’ Director Dies of Heart Failure at 94

The prolific Canadian director also helmed films “First Blood” and “The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz.”

Canadian director Ted Kotcheff, who helmed such films as Weekend at Bernie’s, First Blood, Wake in Fright, and The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, has died at age 94. According to a statement from his family, he died of heart failure Thursday in his home of Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico. “He died of old age, peacefully, and surrounded by loved ones,” Kotcheff’s daughter told Canadian Press. Raised in Toronto’s Cabbagetown neighborhood during the Great Depression, Kotcheff got his start in the 1950s with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. He directed TV dramas such as General Motors Theatre and First Performance before transitioning to film in the 1970s. “He was an amazing storyteller. He was an incredible, larger than life character, and he was so knowledgeable about so many different things,” his daughter said. “I think his legacy will be that he was a director who could turn his hand to anything.”