Haskell Wexler, 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest' Cinematographer, Dies at 93

Cinematographer Haskell Wexler, the socially conscious two-time Academy Award winner who lensed Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and many other masterpieces, has died. He was 93.


Wexler died in his sleep on Sunday, his son, Jeff Wexler, told The Hollywood Reporter. News of Haskell’s passing also was posted on Jeff’s website and Haskell’s personal blog.

Jeff’s blog post reads, “It is with great sadness that I have to report that my father, Haskell Wexler, has died. Pop died peacefully in his sleep, Sunday, December 27th, 2015.  Accepting the Academy Award in 1967, Pop said: ‘I hope we can use our art for peace and for love.’ An amazing life has ended but his lifelong commitment to fight the good fight, for peace, for all humanity, will carry on.”

One of the most influential American cinematographers of all time, Wexler nabbed his first Oscar for making Elizabeth Taylor look haggard in black and white for director Mike Nichols in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966). He garnered a second trophy 10 years later for his work on Bound for Glory, Hal Ashby’s biopic of folk singer Woody Guthrie during his Dust Bowl years.

The Chicago legend also finished shooting Terrence Malick’s spectacular Days of Heaven (1978), for which Nestor Almendros received the cinematography Oscar, and photographed the Oscar-winning short-subject documentary Interviews With My Lai Veterans (1971).

Wexler’s other Oscar nominations came for Milos Forman’s best-picture winner One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), John Sayles’ coal-mining drama Matewan (1987) and Ron Shelton’s Huey Long biopic Blaze (1989). For the latter, he was given the American Society of Cinematographers’ top honor that year, and the organization honored him with its Lifetime Achieve Award in 1993.

Wexler also worked as director of photography on Gore Vidal’s political gem The Best Man (1964);Norman Jewison’s best picture winner In the Heat of the Night (1967); the three-time Oscar winner Coming Home (1978); the comeback documentary Richard Pryor Live on the Sunset Strip (1982); and Lee Tamahori’s gritty Mulholland Falls (1995).

Related: Oscar Winner Haskell Wexler Speaks About Sarah Jones Accident, Urges Safety

For American Graffiti (1973), he served as supervising cameraman and visual consultant after meeting George Lucas at a race track and giving him a recommendation that helped him get into USC’s film school. He shot the paranoid Union Square sequence at the start of The Conversation (1967) before being fired by Francis Ford Coppola. And he did the music videos for Bruce Springsteen’s “The River” and “Thunder Road” as well as a breakthrough Imax concert film for the Rolling Stones.

Wexler was politically minded and ventured into directing a number of documentaries with social and political themes. His documentaries include Introduction to the Enemy (1974), shot in Vietnam with Jane Fonda; No Nukes (1980); and Target Nicaragua: Inside a Covert War (1983), directed by Saul Landau. He wrote, directed and co-produced the feature film Latino (1985) and lensed the Michael Moore satire Canadian Bacon (1995).

Watch Wexler talk about the lighting in some of his most famous movies:


Along this theme of social consciousness, Wexler attracted national attention for writing, directing and producing Medium Cool, the groundbreaking 1969 film that blended fiction with the reality of the tumultuous 1968 Democratic National convention held in his hometown. Famously, he’s seen — behind a camera, of course — on the screen at the end.

Wexler was born Feb. 6, 1922, in Chicago and attended the University of California at Berkeley for a year before joining the Merchant Marine. He stayed at sea for five years, rising to the rank of second officer.

Upon his discharge, Wexler returned to the Windy City, where he spent 10 years making documentary and educational films before heading back to California.

He shot his first feature, Irvin Kershner’s Stakeout on Dope Street (his brother Yale starred as one of the teenagers who finds a stash of heroin in the film), under the pseudonym Mark Andrews in 1958, then followed with the dark, documentary-style film The Savage Eye (1960) and two films released in 1961: Kershner’s Hoodlum Priest and Angel Baby.hollywoodreporter,youtube