PASSINGS: Leroy Miller, Suzanne Grossmann

Leroy Miller

L.A. architect mainly used brick, concrete

Leroy Miller, 78, a Los Angeles architect who designed commercial, residential and institutional buildings mainly of brick and concrete and whose noted work includes the Evco Film Library building in Hollywood, died of respiratory failure Friday at his home in Santa Monica, his family said. He had suffered from dementia for several years.

Miller, who established his architectural firm in Santa Monica in 1966, was a member of the L.A. 12, a group of local architects who exhibited their work in a 1976 show at the Pacific Design Center. The other members included Craig Elwood, Frank Gehry, Raymond Kappe, John Lautner and Cesar Pelli.

Born Dec. 24, 1931, in Cleveland, Leroy Benjamin Miller earned a bachelor’s degree in architecture at the University of Michigan in 1956. He served for two years in the Army and, after moving to Los Angeles, joined the firm of another Michigan graduate, Daniel Dworsky, and worked there until establishing himself on his own.

A 1967 Times feature on Miller and the house he built for his family on the Westside noted his “special feeling for lofty space, balanced light and orderly geometric design” and praised the home’s “atmosphere of warmth, visual variety and inviting livability.”

Miller was honored by the Los Angeles chapter of the American Institute of Architects for his design of the Leonard I. Beerman Early Childhood Center at Leo Baeck Temple in Bel-Air.

Suzanne Grossmann

Actress, writer and translator

Suzanne Grossmann, 72, an actress, writer and translator, died Thursday at her home in Los Angeles, said family friend Patricia MacKay. Grossmann had chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, a progressive disease that affects breathing.

Grossmann’s works were performed at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, the Old Globe in San Diego and several other theaters in the United States, Canada and England.

Working with actor-director Paxton Whitehead, Grossman translated and adapted “La Main Passe” by French playwright Georges Feydeau, which opened as “The Chemmy Circle” at the Shaw Festival in Canada in 1968 and at the Mark Taper in 1969. They also translated and adapted another Feydeau play, “Le Dindon,” into “There’s One In Every Marriage,” which reached Broadway in 1972.

Her stage adaptations included “Number Our Days” for the Mark Taper in 1982.

As an actress, Grossmann made her Broadway debut in 1966 in “The Lion in Winter.” Other credits included “Cyrano de Bergerac” and “The Show Off” in 1968 and “Private Lives” in 1969. She also had a role in the 1967 television production of “The Diary of Anne Frank.”

Grossmann also wrote more than 100 episodes of the television soap opera “Ryan’s Hope” and several works for Canadian television.

Born Dec. 21, 1937, in Basel, Switzerland, she was reared in Brazil, the United States and Canada. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts at McGill University in Montreal and was in the National Theatre School of Canada’s first graduating class in 1963.

— Times staff and wire reports

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