‘Christmas Story’ Director Dies With Son In Car Crash
Posted April 5, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Bob Clark, the director whose bittersweet film ‘A Christmas Story’ became a holiday classic, has died along with his son in a car crash.
Clark, 67, and 22-year-old Ariel Hanrath-Clark were killed on the Pacific Coast Highway in the Pacific Palisades when, according to police, an alleged drunk driver in an SUV veered into their lane and hit them head-on at about 2:20am Wednesday. The two men were pronounced dead at the scene.
“It’s a tragic day for all of us who knew and loved Bob Clark,” said Scott Schwartz, one of the cast from ‘A Christmas Story’. “Bob was a fun-lovin’, jelly-roll kinda guy who will be sorely missed.”
Hector Velazquez-Nava, the 24-year-old who was driving the other car, was arrested on charges of driving under the influence of alcohol and vehicular manslaughter.
“The initial investigation has concluded that Nava was driving without a license northbound in the southbound lanes while under the influence of an alcoholic beverage,” said police Lt. Paul Vernon.
Aside from ‘A Christmas Story’, much of which was shot in Toronto, Clark made another cult classic in the 1970s, the horror film ‘Black Christmas’.
However he became a household name in 1981 when he directed the Canadian sex romp ‘Porky’s’, following it up two years later with ‘Porky’s II: The Next Day’.
‘A Christmas Story’ may prove to be his most enduring film, based on Jean Shepard’s story about a boy’s Christmas in the 1940s. Peter Billingsley memorably played the film’s central character, Ralphie Parker, who wanted a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas but was always being told, “You’ll shoot your eye out, kid.”
Among Clark’s other films: ‘Loose Cannons’, ‘Rhinestone’, ‘Turk 182!’, ‘Baby Geniuses’, and ‘Superbabies: Baby Geniuses 2.’
