In addition to his acting and directing, Redford helped found the Sundance Festival, helping it become the powerhouse it is today for independent film. He was also a committed campaigner for environmental causes.<\/p>\n
Some of Redford\u2019s most famous films included 1969\u2019s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, 1985\u2019s Out of Africa and 1976\u2019s All the President\u2019s Men.<\/p>\n
Redford won an Oscar not as an actor but as a director for the 1980 film Ordinary People. His only acting Oscar nomination came from 1973\u2019s The Sting.<\/p>\n
Despite that lack of nominations, Redford was a huge Hollywood star who had top billing in his movies and could pivot from thrillers to comedies with ease.<\/p>\n
In 2018, Redford told Entertainment Weekly he was retiring from acting.<\/p>\n
\u201cNever say never, but I pretty well concluded that this would be it for me in terms of acting. \u2026 I can\u2019t last forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
It came just a couple of years after he admitted to being \u201ctired\u201d of his career.<\/p>\n
Bryce Dallas Howard and Robert Redford star in Pete’s Dragon, filmed in New Zealand. <\/p>\n
Despite the actor\u2019s previous criticisms of him, Donald Trump was among the first to publicly react to his death, speaking just before boarding Air Force One to begin his state visit to the UK.<\/p>\n
\u201cWow, that\u2019s a good way to go, I guess. But I\u2019ll tell you, Robert Redford was great. He had a series of years where there was nobody better,\u201d the President told reporters, adding that he\u2019d made \u201cseven or eight great movies\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a period of time when he was the hottest. I thought he was great.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a column for NBC in 2019, Redford likened Trump to a dictator.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur shared tolerance and respect for the truth, our sacred rule of law, our essential freedom of the press and our precious freedoms of speech \u2013 all have been threatened by a single man,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n
All The President’s Men was one of Robert Redford’s most famous movies. He starred alongside Dustin Hoffman. Photo \/ Supplied <\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Redford\u2019s Out of Africa co-star and friend Meryl Streep described the star as a \u201clion\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the lions has passed. Rest in peace my lovely friend,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Director Ron Howard praised him as a \u201ctremendously influential cultural figure for the creative choices made as an actor\/producer\/director\u201d, acknowledging his role in launching Sundance and becoming an \u201cartistic gamechanger\u201d.<\/p>\n
Famed author Stephen King wrote on X: \u201cRobert Redford has passed away. He was part of a new and exciting Hollywood in the 70s and 80s. Hard to believe he was 89.\u201d<\/p>\n
Redford was also branded a \u201cgenius\u201d by actor Marlee Matlin, one of the stars of Oscar-winning film Coda, which premiered at Sundance.<\/p>\n
\u201c…Coda came to the attention of everyone because of Sundance. And Sundance happened because of Robert Redford. A genius has passed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Redford was born in 1936 in Santa Monica, California, close to Los Angeles. He lost his mother when he was a teenager after a difficult birth of twin girls who also died. He remained an only child. Redford dabbled in theatre \u2013 even making it to Broadway \u2013 before turning to film.<\/p>\n
Redford is survived by his wife Sibylle Szaggars Redford, whom he married in 2009, and his children Shauna, James and Amy. He had four children in total, all from his from his first wife Lola Van Wagenen whom he married in 1958. Scott, his youngest son, died just two months after his birth.<\/p>\n
Redford received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honour an American civilian can receive, from then-President Barack Obama in 2016.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In addition to his acting and directing, Redford helped found the Sundance Festival, helping it become the powerhouse…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26369,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[26475,18919,6179,7126,156,1444,3025,435,111,139,69,26473,26474,3046,5436,17450],"class_list":["post-26368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-26475","tag-aged","tag-died","tag-dies","tag-entertainment","tag-famous","tag-most","tag-movie","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-oscarwinner","tag-redford","tag-robert","tag-stars","tag-worlds"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26368\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}