Pressman has embraced multiple genres, from commercial studio fare to mystery art films. He cared about movies, not money.

Ed Pressman was cool. And he had taste. He didn’t care what other people thought of a given project. If he thought that was cool, that was enough. He kept his own council; he was calm. But if he wanted something, he let you know. He wasn’t one to take no for an answer.

This helps explain how he came to produce some 80 films over the decades. And he hadn’t slowed down in recent years. When Ed and his son Sam came to the Cannes IndieWire party two years ago, Ed found a quiet corner and worked his phone. Pressman died Jan. 17 of respiratory failure, aged 79.

Watch the friends who showed up to speak at his memorial at the Paris Theater in New York last Thursday: Mary Harron, David Byrne and Eric Bogosian, among others, plus video tributes from David Hare, David Gordon Green, Bill Kramer, Ben Kingsley, Jason Blum and many more (see below).

“He was gentle, caring, unassuming and gracious,” former CAA chief Rick Nicita said in his video tribute, who first met Pressman on Terrence Malick’s “Badlands” in 1973. Pressman also supported the debut of then-unknown Brian DePalma. thriller “Sisters” (1972), followed two years later by “Phantom of the Paradise”.

Pressman was expected to follow in the family business of Pressman Toy Corporation, but he took his own course instead, studying philosophy at Stanford.

“He loved a particular genre of individual film,” said Irons, who won an Oscar for Barbet Schroeder’s critically acclaimed “Reversal of Fortune” (1990). “He was a man of honesty who could be trusted, a rare man in our industry.”

When Abel Ferrara was ready to back down and give up when ‘Bad Lieutenant’ (1992) found himself in choppy waters, “Ed never backed down,” he said. Ferrara is writing a book that Pressman is definitely in, he added.

Who but Pressman would put musician David Byrne at the helm of a movie, “True Stories” (1986), written by Stephen Tobolowsky and Beth Henley and set in small town Texas, starring John Goodman?

In the ’80s, Ed and his wife Annie held gatherings at his Hollywood Hills home, which had glorious views and incredible artwork on the walls. They then moved to New York. I mostly hung out with him in Cannes, where he hosted a lunch at the Hotel du Cap’s Eden Roc for the Taviani brothers (“The Night of the Shooting Stars”), hosted a party at the former villa a pal’s family and toured every year to create a movie (“Bad Lieutenant,” “The King,” “Thank You for Smoking,” “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”) or raise money for countless others (“The Crow”).

Pressman and Oliver Stone have teamed up on a number of films, including his second feature ‘The Hand’ and ‘Wall Street,’ which scored at the box office and won Michael Douglas the Oscar. Stone and Pressman produced Arnold Schwarzenegger’s action epic “Conan” and the much smaller, but prophetic “Talk Radio,” as well as Kathryn Bigelow’s third feature, “Blue Steel,” starring Jamie Lee Curtis. .

Christian Bale worked with Pressman on Harron’s “American Psycho” and has stayed in touch with the producer over the years. “He was an original and he was looking for other originals,” he said. “He liked to vouch for people who hadn’t been tested. Thanks for the stories.

In lieu of flowers, the Pressman family welcomes donations to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, “in memory of Edward R. Pressman”, here.

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