Robert Redford, a cinematic star, director and activist whose role in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” lent its name to a Utah festival that would become a pillar in independent film, has died at the age of 89.
He died Tuesday morning in the mountains outside of Provo, Utah — “the place he loved surrounded by those he loved,” his longtime publicist, Cindi Berger, told The New York Times.
The Times reported that Redford died in his sleep and that Berger “did not provide a specific cause.”
The last Sundance Film Festival in Utah will honor Robert Redford
On Tuesday, the Sundance Institute — which Redford founded in 1981 — released a statement on the actor’s death.
“We are deeply saddened by the loss of our founder and friend Robert Redford,” Sundance said in a statement that was shared with the Deseret News. “Bob’s vision of a space and a platform for independent voices launched a movement that, over four decades later, has inspired generations of artists and redefined cinema in the U.S. and around the world.
“Beyond his enormous contributions to culture at large, we will miss his generosity, clarity of purpose, curiosity, rebellious spirit and his love for the creative process. We are humbled to be among the stewards of his remarkable legacy, which will continue to guide the institute in perpetuity.”
Redford’s death comes just a few months before the Sundance Film Festival’s final run in Utah, after more than 40 years.
Although the festival heads to Boulder, Colorado, in 2027, the festival’s director, Eugene Hernandez is adamant that through the Sundance Institute, Utah will remain a part of the festival’s story.
“Even though the festival is moving on, we’re still rooted here,” Hernandez recently told the Deseret News. “Sundance’s roots are here in Utah.”
Festival organizers already had plans in place to celebrate Redford’s vision and passion for storytelling throughout the final festival in Utah.
“We want to take the opportunity to honor and salute and celebrate the legacy of the festival in Utah,” Hernandez recently told the Deseret News. “It really all goes back to that founding vision that comes from Robert Redford. It created a new energy for and vitality for independent filmmaking in this country and across the world.”
Redford has remained connected to the festival over the years, as it has evolved and grown in popularity from its headquarters in Park City, Utah. Last year, the Sundance Film Festival brought in more than 72,000 people and resulted in 141,212 tickets being redeemed at screenings, the Deseret News previously reported.
“Mr. Redford shared with us recently this notion that everyone has a story,” Hernandez said. “To me, it’s a really powerful statement, because it’s not just the stories that we will share on screen. Everybody attending, we all have our own stories, our own stories of the Sundance Film Festival and what it’s meant to us. … You’ll see that there will be ways to honor and celebrate that throughout the festival this year.”
Robert Redford on moving to Utah
Never one for being in the Hollywood spotlight, Redford moved to Utah in 1961 near the beginning of his career, for two reasons, he previously told the Deseret News: the land and the people.
“It is not like I came to rip it up or to take it away,” he said. “I came here to be part of something.”
The actor, who was from Southern California, saw Utah as a place where he could raise a family.
“It was a place where I could see a future,” he told the Deseret News in 1996. “So I committed myself to this state and its future for my own sake and my children’s sake. That’s what brought me here.”
Redford had four children with his former wife, Lola Van Wagenen. His son, Scott, died in infancy. His other son, filmmaker Jamie Redford, died in 2020 — just months before his documentary on “Joy Luck Club” author Amy Tan premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
The actor is survived by two daughters, Shauna and Amy, and his wife, Sibylle Szaggars, a German artist he met at the Sundance Institute in the 1990s.
Throughout his years in Utah, Redford used his star power to champion and draw attention to environmentalism and independent filmmaking.
“The more I traveled the world with my job, I grew to appreciate it even more. I realized that Utah was even more special than I had thought because I saw there was no other place like it,” he told the Deseret News in 1996. “And that made me even more determined to protect it.”
A few years after founding the Sundance Institute, which brought rising filmmakers together to workshop scripts and develop projects, Redford’s institute expanded to showcase independent film, taking control of the festival that for decades has been a strong cultural and economic force in Utah.
Robert Redford’s defining roles onscreen
Redford began acting when he was 21, and spent roughly six decades in front of the camera.
He had a reputation as Hollywood’s “golden boy,” but his early filmography reveals an up-and-coming actor who worked tirelessly racking up credit after credit in mostly thankless (and sometimes nameless) parts, the Deseret News previously reported.
In 1960 alone — the year he made his on-screen debut — Redford appeared in no less than a dozen different film and TV projects.
Seven years later, Redford reprised the role he originated on Broadway for a film version of “Barefoot in the Park,” starring alongside Jane Fonda (they would appear together several times throughout their careers), per the Deseret News.
But it was at the end of the ‘60s that Redford found fame for being the Sundance Kid to Paul Newman’s Butch Cassidy.
That film helped to form a lifelong friendship between Newman and Redford, who also starred together in 1973’s “The Sting” — which won seven Oscars and gave Redford his only nomination for acting, per Deseret News.
Other defining movies of Redford’s career included “Jeremiah Johnson” — reportedly filmed in Utah at the actor’s request; the ‘70s political thriller “All the President’s Men” — where Redford played young Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward alongside Dustin Hoffman’s Carl Bernstein; and “The Natural,” where he plays a baseball player who gets a second chance at a career.
Redford earned an Oscar for best director for the 1980 film “Ordinary People” — his directorial debut.
At one point, in 2018, Redford announced plans to retire from acting following his role in “The Old Man & The Gun.”
But the following year saw a surprise appearance from Redford in “Avengers: Endgame” — reprising a minor role he had in the 2014 film “Captain America: The Winter Soldier.”
“I think it was a mistake to say that I was retiring because you never know,” Redford told People.