- Share this article on Facebook
- Share this article on Twitter
- Share this article on Flipboard
- Share this article on Email
- Show additional share options
- Share this article on Linkedin
- Share this article on Pinit
- Share this article on Reddit
- Share this article on Tumblr
- Share this article on Whatsapp
- Share this article on Print
- Share this article on Comment
C.O. ‘Doc’ Erickson, whose long Hollywood career included working as a unit production manager or executive producer on movie classics like Chinatown, Blade Runner and Groundhog Day, has died. He was 93.
During a near-50 year career in Hollywood where he had a front row view of film history, Erickson was a production manager for Alfred Hitchcock, Sidney Lumet, John Huston, Anthony Mann, Roman Polanski and Ridley Scott, among other directors.
Erickson died on Wednesday in Las Vegas owing to heart complications, according to the Gersh Agency. Born in Dec. 1923 in Kankakee, Illinois, he began his career at Paramount Pictures in 1944, working on varied duties around movie sets, from budgeting of set construction to stage management and supervision.
Erickson served as production manager on all five films Hitchcock made for Paramount between 1954 and 1958: Rear Window, To Catch A Thief, The Trouble with Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much and Vertigo. All were shot onstage 18 at Paramount.
Erickson left Paramount to work with John Huston as associate producer on The Misfits, Freud and Reflections in a Golden Eye. He was production manager on Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s There Was A Crooked Man, and also spent three years supervising film production for Brut Productions.
Erickson later became associated with Robert Evans on Chinatown, Players, Urban Cowboy and Popeye. Other producer/production credits include 55 Days at Peking, Blade Runner, Nicholas and Alexandra, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Groundhog Day, Disturbing Behavior, Magic, The Lonely Guy, Cleopatra and Windtalkers.
Erickson is survived by his only child, Dawn, and her husband, Olivier, his sister, Ruth, and her husband, Earl, and former wife Gloria Gresham.
THR Newsletters
Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day