Film and television producer
Robert F. Colesberry, Jr., co-creator of HBO’s “The Wire,” died Monday Feb. 9 of complications from heart surgery. He was 57.
A New York-based film and television producer for more than two decades and producer of such varied films as “Mississippi Burning,” “After Hours” and “61*,” Colesberry worked with directors including Martin Scorsese, Alan Parker, Ang Lee and Robert Benton.
He received a Peabody Award and an Emmy for best miniseries as executive producer of HBO’s “The Corner,” Oscar and Golden Globe nominations for his work on “Mississippi Burning” and Emmy noms for HBO’s “61*” and the CBS production of Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman.”
Born in Philadelphia, Colesberry struggled to graduate from high school and had a brush with delinquency after attempting to steal a ceramic cow from the roof of a local steakhouse. After stints at minor league baseball training camp, in the military and as a chauffeur and bar owner, he decided on drama school, where he began acting.
Graduating from NYU in 1973, he began working on various New York productions as a locations manager and first assistant director, working with filmmakers including Andy Warhol and Bernardo Bertolucci.
On the movie “Fame,” Colesberry not only served as the first assistant director, but co-wrote the B-side to the hit title single, remembered director Alan Parker.
He was a producer on Barry Levinson’s “The Natural” and Scorsese’s “The King of Comedy” and “After Hours.”
Working with Colesberry on “Mississippi Burning,” Parker recalled his producer making him drive the Mississippi back roads, using historical maps and photographs to find the actual location where, in 1963, local police and Ku Klux Klansmen had detained three civil rights workers whose ensuing murders were the central tragedy of the film.
“He was insistent that we be as authentic as we could,” said Parker, who would go on to make two other films with Colesberry.
Colesberry was “what you might call a practical romantic, which in my estimation is the definition of the true film producer,” said director Bill Forsyth, who worked with him on several projects.
Colesberry first began his association with HBO in 1999 when he was brought in to help produce a six-hour miniseries based on “The Corner,” a nonfiction book about a drug-ridden neighborhood in West Baltimore. In addition to best miniseries, “The Corner” won Emmys for writing and directing.
Continuing with HBO, Colesberry, a devoted Yankee fan, worked with director Billy Crystal on “61*,” an HBO film about the relationship between Yankee stars Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle during the 1961 season’s home-run race.
He then returned to Baltimore for HBO in 2001 to help create urban drama “The Wire,” recently named by the American Film Institute as one of the premier shows on television.
Colesberry often appeared in cameos in his films — a gangster in “Billy Bathgate,” a truck driver in “Come See the Paradise.” On “The Wire,” he had a recurring role as the hapless Baltimore homicide detective Ray Cole.
Colesberry directed the last episode of the second season of “The Wire” and was slated to direct the opening episode of the coming season as well.
Survivors include his wife Karen L. Thorson, also a producer on “The Wire,” and two sisters.
A memorial service is being planned.
A scholarship fund for young filmmakers has been established in the name of Robert F. Colesberry at the Tisch School for the Arts at New York University, 721 Broadway, 12th Floor, New York, NY 10003.
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