Robert Laemmle, the longtime president of the family-owned Los Angeles arthouse theater chain Laemmle Theatres, died Thursday, his family announced. He was 89.
His cause of death was not disclosed, but he was injured on Dec. 23 when he fell and at the time of his death was being treated at Berkley East Healthcare Center in Santa Monica.
Laemmle Theatres was founded in 1938 by Robert Laemmle’s father Max and his Uncle Kurt, cousins of Universal Pictures co-founder Carl Laemmle. Born in 1935, in Paris, where Max was working for Universal, as an adult Robert initially went into banking before joining the family business in the early 1960s. He served as president of Laemmle Theaters for decades before retiring in 2004.
“He loved movies. He did enjoy watching movies. He liked the business. He liked being Mr. Laemmle. There’s nothing better than standing in the lobby and having a patron approach you to say how much they appreciate that Laemmle Theatres exists and it shows the kinds of movies that it does,” Robert’s son, Greg, who has run the company since 2004, told the Los Angeles Times.
Robert Laemmle is survived by Michelle Laemmle, his third wife, and his first wife, Raquel Shantal, as well as his children including Greg, Jessica Laemmle, Yvonne Ascher, Michelle Ascher, David Ascher, Carri Bisbee, Mitchell Needelman, Maitland Finley and Robert Finley, and their families.
