Adam Somner, an award-winning assistant director, producer and longtime collaborator of Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese and Paul Thomas Anderson, has died. He was 57.
Somner died Wednesday of anaplastic thyroid most cancers, a household spokesperson introduced.
Born within the U.Okay., Somner constructed a profitable profession in Hollywood, working alongside Spielberg, Scorsese, Anderson, Alejandro G. Iñárritu and Ridley Scott. His most up-to-date mission was Anderson’s untitled Warner Bros. movie, starring Leonardo DiCaprio.
Some of the flicks Somner labored on with Spielberg all through his profession have been West Side Story, Lincoln, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Ready Player One, Bridge of Spies and Munich. As for Scorsese, he labored on Killers of the Flower Moon and The Wolf of Wall Street. He collaborated with Anderson on Licorice Pizza, Phantom Thread, Inherent Vice, The Master and There Will Be Blood. Somner labored with Scott on All the Money within the World, Exodus: Gods and Kings, Gladiator, Hannibal and G.I. Jane. And he labored with Iñárritu on The Revenant and Birdman.
Somner earned an Oscar nomination for his work on 2021’s Licorice Pizza and acquired a DGA Award for excellent directorial achievement in a characteristic for 2015’s The Revenant.
“The job title ‘assistant director’ is inadequate to explain what Adam Somner was to me and the contribution he made to my movies — simply as my left arm is extra than simply an assistant to my proper,” Spielberg wrote in a tribute. “He labored as AD and producer, and he carried out each of these duties with equal measures of devotion. He liked making films. He liked being on the set. It was his gridiron. He was a cheerleader and ball service, and at instances I couldn’t inform if he was following my lead or I used to be following his.”
The filmmaker continued: “He made everybody who joined the crew really feel like they have been a part of the household. He was a uniter, and when issues weren’t going in response to plan, his English working class wit and humor may easy out the issue by means of his under-the-breath cursing, laughter and the backup plan he at all times appeared to have standing by. He was an icon in his discipline and an inspiration to anybody who desires a profession within the mounting of productions — with the total recognition that it’s as artistic as it’s organizational. Going again to work with out Adam won’t ever be the identical.”
Scorsese shared in an announcement: “Adam Somner was credited as an assistant director and a producer on three of my footage, however his presence meant extra to me and to the movies than any credit may actually even point out. Adam had a really particular and really specific set of qualities — the organizational skills and the self-discipline of a basic on the battlefield; a singular means to work as intently with me or with any director as two dancers doing a routine or two musicians bouncing off one another; and a unprecedented artistry when it got here to organizing and orchestrating motion within the body. Adam Somner embodied and practiced all of it. I’d by no means have been capable of make The Wolf of Wall Street or Killers of the Flower Moon with out him, and we have been in the course of planning one other mission. He handed away far too early, and I’ll miss him terribly. He liked ‘making footage,’ as he put it. He was one of many best collaborators I may ask for, and I do know that my fellow administrators would say the identical.”
Anderson remembered Somner, writing: “Adam liked making movies greater than anybody else ever within the historical past of the film enterprise. It was food and drinks to him. He made everybody who labored with him really feel protected. He noticed the whole lot from all sides without delay and had a backup plan to the backup plan to the backup plan. He moved mountains and vans and folks like he was shifting a salt shaker throughout a desk. It was wonderful to look at him work. He knew how one can make a movie higher than anybody else. His instinct and expertise was second solely to how deeply humorous and loving he was. Most of all and above the whole lot, he was beneficiant. For these of us fortunate sufficient to work with him, we all know going to work won’t ever be the identical or as a lot enjoyable. I’d rank him within the Kobe Bryant, Mick Jagger, Winston Churchill class of Legends. And that might be underselling it.”
Somner is survived by his spouse, Carmen Ruiz de Huidobro; his youngsters, Olivia and Bosco; and his brother, Mark Somner.
A DGA scholarship in his title will probably be established, with donation particulars forthcoming.
