Gary Abrahams; Co-Founder of Popular L.A. Film Festivals

Gary Abrahams, a co-founder of the Los Angeles International Film Exposition (Filmex) and a prominent figure in the local cinema scene, died Thursday in a Los Angeles hospice. He was 48 and died of the complications of AIDS.

Abrahams also was a founder of American Cinematheque, like Filmex an organization devoted to the international motion picture community in which films are selected from often exotic locations around the world for screening locally. Over the years millions of people have seen hundreds of films at the two festivals.

A native of Cleveland and a graduate of the University of Arizona, Abrahams came to Los Angeles in the late 1960s and worked in development for Paramount Television and later as director of corporate relations and merchandising for Marble Arch Productions.

He and Gary Essert, his longtime companion, founded Filmex in 1971 and American Cinematheque in 1983.

Abrahams also was a producer of “The Movies,” a four-hour history of the American film industry shown on ABC-TV in 1975.

He is survived by Essert, his parents, Bernard and Mrs. Abrahams, and brother, Ken, of Arizona.

A funeral service is scheduled at Eden Memorial Park Light Chapel in Mission Hills at 11 a.m. Monday. In lieu of flowers the family asks donations to the American Foundation for AIDS Research or American Cinematheque, a nonprofit organization.