Producer Hal Wallis Dies; His Films Won 32 Oscars

Producer Hal Wallis, whose 200 films chronicled the lives of such diverse human creatures as “Little Caesar” and “Becket” and who was probably the last of the studio giants who could write, cast, photograph and edit his own celluloid creations, is dead.

He was 88 and died Sunday. His longtime administrative aide, Marge Giddens, said today that Wallis did not want his death announced until after the funeral, which was held at 11 this morning at Forest Lawn Glendale.

Wallis had suffered from complications of diabetes for some time and died at his Rancho Mirage home with actress-wife Martha Hyer at his side.

Only his wife, son Brent from his first marriage to screen star Louise Fazenda, his accountant, household help and Giddens were at the simple service, Wallis’ aide said.

His quiet death was a distant cry from the life he had led.

His films won 32 Oscars, and the stars he introduced to film-goers numbered in the dozens.

He discovered Loretta Young and Edward G. Robinson in one era, and Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas in another.

The pictures themselves included highly praised (if sometimes inaccurate) biographies of Emile Zola, Knute Rockne and Louis Pasteur.

And Wallis was the only studio icon to gamble on a little-known play called “Everybody Comes to Rick’s” and make of it the screen classic “Casablanca.”

One of its stars was Humphrey Bogart, whom Wallis saw on Broadway in “Petrified Forest” and lured to Hollywood, where Bogart’s film characterization of gangster Duke Mantee endured him to fans forever.

Of the many accolades that came to the one-time publicist for Jack Warner over the years, Wallis liked being a Commander of the British Empire best, he said. That was a tribute to his productions of such pictures as “Becket” and “Mary Queen of Scots.”