Celebrity Grave: Charles K. Feldman, Producer & Agent

 

Charles K. Feldman (April 26, 1904 - May 25, 1968) was a film producer and talent agent born in New York City. In 1934 he married actress Jean Howard, whom he divorced in 1948. He managed the careers of Howard Hawks, John Wayne, George Stevens, Claudette Colbert, Irene Dunne, Charles Boyer, and many others.

 

Feldman pioneered the use of overlapping nonexclusive contracts with clients like Irene Dunne and Claudette Colbert, demonstrating flexible alternatives to the so called iron-clad studio contract in the classical Hollywood era. One of the most powerful agents in Hollywood at the time, Feldman also won percentages of the film's profits for his clients.

 

Among some of Feldman's more notable films: the Orson Welles Macbeth (1948), The Glass Menagerie (1950), A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) which was nominated for an Academy Award, The Seven Year Itch (1955), What's New, Pussycat? (1965), The Group (1966), The Honey Pot (1967), and the satirical James Bond film adaptation Casino Royale (1967).

On his passing in 1968, Charles K. Feldman was interred in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California.