Robert Evans, American actor and producer
Robert Evans (born Robert J. Shapera; June 29, 1930 – October 26, 2019) was an American film producer, studio executive, and actor, best known for his work on Rosemary's Baby, Love Story, The Godfather, and Chinatown.
Evans began his career in a successful business venture with his brother, selling women's apparel. In 1956, while on a business trip, he was by chance spotted by actress Norma Shearer, who thought he would be right to play the role of her late husband Irving Thalberg (appropriately, another film mogul) in Man of a Thousand Faces. Thus he began a brief film acting career. In 1962, Evans decided to go into film producing instead, using his accumulated wealth from the clothing business, and began a meteoric rise in the industry; he was installed as the head of Paramount Pictures in 1967. While there, he improved the ailing Paramount's fortunes through a string of commercially and critically acclaimed films. In 1974, he stepped down in order to produce films on his own.
In 1980, Evans's career, and life, took a downturn after he pleaded guilty to cocaine trafficking; over the next 12 years, he produced only two films, both financial flops: The Cotton Club and the Chinatown sequel The Two Jakes. In 1993, he began to produce films on a more regular basis, with a mixed track record that included both flops (such as Jade in 1995) and hits (such as How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days in 2003, his final film credit).
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Robert Evans
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Events on 1930
- 12Mar
Salt March
Mahatma Gandhi begins the Salt March, a 200-mile march to the sea to protest the British monopoly on salt in India - 6Apr
Salt Satyagraha
Gandhi raises a lump of mud and salt and declares, "With this, I am shaking the foundations of the British Empire," beginning the Salt Satyagraha. - 7Jul
Hoover Dam
Industrialist Henry J. Kaiser begins construction of Boulder Dam (now known as Hoover Dam). - 6Sep
Hipólito Yrigoyen
Democratically elected Argentine president Hipólito Yrigoyen is deposed in a military coup. - 24Oct
Getúlio Vargas
A bloodless coup d'état in Brazil ousts Washington Luís Pereira de Sousa, the last President of the First Republic. Getúlio Vargas is then installed as "provisional president".