Michael Winner dies aged 77, wife Geraldine announces
It is understood that Winner, who made more than 30 films, had been ill for some time.
He died at his home in Kensington, central London, where he was being nursed by his wife.
Paying tribute to her husband, Mrs Winner, a former dancer, said: ‘Michael was a wonderful man, brilliant, funny and generous.
‘A light has gone out in my life.’
The couple married two years ago.
In later life he forged a new career as a restaurant critic, writing for the Sunday Times in his Winner’s Dinners column.
He also found fame among a new generation of television viewers for his appearance in a series of car insurance adverts noted for his ‘calm down dear’ catchphrase.
And he founded and funded the Police Memorial Trust after the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan embassy in London in 1984.
Writing on Twitter, where he amassed almost 40,000 followers, in October, he had written: ‘Other than being in intensive care, hospital, an asylum, and generally ill I’m having a great time.’
In a tweet, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (Bafta) said it was ‘saddened’ to hear of the director’s death.
Michael Winner’s words of wit and wisdom:
- The best thing you could say about the restaurant is that you could hear yourself talk.
- The only way to hold a decent dinner party in Hollywood now is to have a séance.
- I always laughed ladies into bed. If you are entertaining, they like you.
- A little vulgarity is a thoroughly good thing.
- All children should be locked up until the age of ten and only selected ones should be let out when they are ten.
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