Charles A. Pratt, 81; Film Producer’s Titles Included ‘The Great Santini,’ ‘Walking Tall’

Charles A. Pratt, a film producer whose works included the movies “Willard,” “The Great Santini” and the “Walking Tall” trilogy, has died. He was 81.

Pratt died of lung cancer April 27 at his home in Encino.

As president of Bing Crosby Productions, he produced 22 feature films as well as a dozen made-for-television movies. His favorite was 1979’s “The Great Santini,” which earned Robert Duvall an Academy Award nomination for best actor and Michael O’Keefe a nomination for best supporting actor.

Pratt was born in Chicago and attended the prestigious Chicago Latin School and the Culver Military Academy. At 17, he found work as a professional cowboy at a ranch in Colorado. In 1942, he joined the U.S. cavalry and patrolled the U.S.-Mexico border until the cavalry was phased out. He then served in the Army in the Pacific.

He graduated from Amherst College after the war and worked in advertising and sales for many years before joining Bing Crosby Productions. His role in the company was to expand its reach into theatrical productions.

The firm’s first release was the low-budget “Willard” (1971), which critic Leonard Maltin called “a touching story of a boy and his rats” that could not, however, rise above being “a second-rate thriller.” “Willard” was popular enough at the box office to generate a sequel, “Ben,” and several similar low-budget films.

In 1973, Pratt had an unexpected hit with “Walking Tall,” starring Joe Don Baker as Buford Pusser, a Southern sheriff fighting corruption in his hometown. Neither of the film’s two sequels, “Walking Tall Part II” and “Final Chapter: Walking Tall,” did as well as the original. “Walking Tall” was remade in 2004 with wrestler-turned-actor the Rock in the role of Pusser.

Pratt’s most critically successful movie was “The Great Santini,” a character study of a career Marine officer (Duvall) who, without a war to fight, struggles with his family, most prominently his son (O’Keefe). The film was based on Pat Conroy’s novel and directed by Lewis John Carlino.

Pratt traveled extensively after retiring from filmmaking in 1985.

He is survived by his wife, Joan, two sons and a daughter. He also is survived by four grandchildren and two step-grandchildren.