Larry Peerce

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Larry Peerce
Born
Lawrence Peerce

(1930-04-19) April 19, 1930 (age 94)
The Bronx, New York, U.S.
OccupationDirector
Years active1958–2003
Spouses
  • Marilyn Hassett (divorced)
Beth Leichter Peerce
​
​
(m. 2002)​
ParentJan Peerce (father)

Lawrence "Larry" Peerce (born April 19, 1930) is an American film and TV director whose work includes the theatrical feature Goodbye, Columbus (1969), the early rock and roll concert film The Big T.N.T. Show (1965), One Potato, Two Potato (1964), The Other Side of the Mountain (1975) and Two-Minute Warning (1976).

Life and career

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The son of operatic tenor Jan Peerce[1] and talent agent Alice (Kalmanowitz) Peerce,[citation needed] Larry was born in The Bronx, New York.[citation needed] He attended the University of North Carolina.[2] He made his directing debut with One Potato, Two Potato, released in 1964 by the distributor Cinema V. The groundbreaking drama about an interracial marriage between a white divorcee (played by Barbara Barrie, who won the Best Actress award at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival for the role) and an African-American office worker (Bernie Hamilton) was the first U.S. movie to portray such an interracial relationship.

Peerce went on to direct several episodes of the television series Branded, the superhero series Batman, and other shows, and then directed the early rock and roll concert film The Big T.N.T. Show, released in 1965 by American International Pictures.[3] It featured The Byrds, Ray Charles, Bo Diddley, Donovan, The Lovin' Spoonful, The Ronettes and The Ike & Tina Turner Revue.[4]

Following more television, Peerce returned to film in 1967 with The Mystery of the Chinese Junk and The Incident, the latter of which starred Martin Sheen and Tony Musante.[5] He followed this with Goodbye, Columbus, an adaptation of the Philip Roth novel. The movie earned Peerce a DGA Award nomination for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures and screenwriter Arnold Schulman an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.

Peerce's subsequent theatrical features included The Sporting Club, A Separate Peace, Ash Wednesday, and The Other Side of the Mountain. He directed the television movies The Stranger Who Looks Like Me (1974), and Elvis and Me (1988), and directed several episodes of the children's television series The Ghost Busters a.k.a. The Original Ghostbusters, and after more theatrical films did not meet success, he became a frequent director of television miniseries, including Queenie (ABC, 1987), The Neon Empire (Showtime, 1988), the Jacqueline Kennedy biography A Woman Named Jackie (NBC, 1991) and John Jakes' Heaven and Hell: North and South Book III (ABC, 1994). He additionally did several more television movies, ending with Second Honeymoon (2001), starring Roma Downey and Tim Matheson. He directed one episode of the 1960s CBS series The Wild Wild West as Lawrence Peerce. He also directed an episode of the television show The Green Hornet.

Peerce was married for a time to Marilyn Hassett, who appeared in several films he directed in the mid to late 1970s.[citation needed]

Filmography

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References

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  1. ^ AllMovie.com: Larry Peerce
  2. ^ "The Big T.N.T. Show - Trailer - Cast - Showtimes - NYTimes.com". 2009-04-11. Archived from the original on 2009-04-11. Retrieved 2024-03-19.
  3. ^ Scott, John. L (1965-12-01). "Performers Rock, Audience Roll at Pop-Folk Concert". The Los Angeles Times. pp. Part V 21. Retrieved 2023-11-18.
  4. ^ "'Big TNT Show' Has Many Music Stars". Irving News Texan. December 30, 1965. p. 2. Retrieved 2023-11-18.
  5. ^ Crowther, Bosley (November 6, 1967). "The Incident (1967) Screen: 'The Incident' on View at Two Theaters:Tale of Subway Terror Is Taken From TV". The New York Times.
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