Albert Wolsky, a two-time Academy Award-winning and Tony-nominated costume designer whose many high-profile credits include his Oscar-taking work on All That Jazz (1979) and Bugsy (1991), died Saturday, May 23, at his home in Hollywood. He was 95.
His death was announced by friends and colleagues on social media and confirmed by Deadline.
Born on November 24, 1930, in Paris, Wolsky had moved to the United States and attended City College of New York when, at age 30, he switched careers from the travel industry to pursue costume design. An early entry-level position for the legendary costumer Helene Pons came during the original Broadway production of Camelot in the early 1960s.
During those early years Wolsky was credited as an assistant to such costumer designers as Ann Roth (A Case of Libel, 1963), Irene Sharaff (Jennie, 1963) and Patricia Zipprodt (Fiddler on the Roof, 1964). He reteamed with Roth again for 1965’s The Odd Couple, and the same year was designing costumes under his own name for the Broadway production Generation. Other significant solo credits would follow, including Pousse-Café (1966) and, in 1972, the original The Sunshine Boys by Neil Simon.
Subsequent Broadway shows included, among others, The Country Girl, a 2008 production starring Frances McDormand, Morgan Freeman and Peter Gallagher, and, in 2012, The Heiress, his Tony-nominated final Broadway production that starred Jessica Chastain, Dan Stevens and David Strathairn.
Wolsky’s screen work began shortly after his Broadway debut, with credits including a 1968 TV-movie version of Of Mice and Men and feature film The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter that same year.
Over the subsequent decades, he would design the costumes for numerous major motion pictures. Along with his Oscar wins for All That Jazz and Bugsy, Wolsky earned nominations for his work on Sophie’s Choice (1983), The Journey of Natty Gann (1986), Toys (1993), Across the Universe (2007) and Revolutionary Road (2008). In 2015, he received the Costume Designers Guild Award for Excellence in Contemporary Film for Birdman.
His many other film credits include Up the Sandbox, Harry and Tonto, Lenny, The Turning Point, An Unmarried Woman, Grease, Manhattan, The Jazz Singer, Star 80, Moscow on the Hudson, The Falcon and the Snowman, Down and Out in Beverly Hills, Crimes of the Heart, Scenes from a Mall, Toys, Fatal Instinct, Striptease, You’ve Got Mail, Runaway Bride, Road to Perdition, Maid in Manhattan, Jarhead, Birdman and Ad Astra.
He also served four terms on the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Board of Governors representing the costume designers branch.
