Director Mike Nichols, who made such films as The Graduate, which earned him a best director Oscar, and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, has died at the age of 83.
He was was married to ABC News veteran Diane Sawyer and was one of only a dozen people to have won at least one Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony award.
James Goldston, president of ABC News, shared the news of his death with ABC News staff in a note on Thursday morning. The U.S. director, who was born in Germany under the name Michael Igor Peschkowsky, died of cardiac arrest, according to an ABC News representative.
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“I am writing with the very sad news that Diane’s husband, the incomparable Mike Nichols, passed away suddenly on Wednesday evening,” Goldston’s note said.
“In a triumphant career that spanned over six decades, Mike created some of the most iconic works of American film, television and theater—an astonishing canon ranging from The Graduate, Working Girl and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf to Closer, Charlie Wilson’s War, Annie, Spamalot, The Birdcage and Angels in America,” Goldston wrote. “He was a true visionary, winning the highest honors in the arts for his work as a director, writer, producer and comic and was one of a tiny few to win the EGOT—an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony.”
This article originally appeared on The Hollywood Reporter.