Cinematographer of ‘Slums of Beverly Hills’ was 72 – The Hollywood Reporter

Cinematographer Tom Richmond, whose CV included work on films such as Stand and deliver, Killing Zoe, Little Odessa, Slums in Beverly Hills and Nick and Norah’s never-ending playlist, is dead. He was 72.

Richmond died Friday in New York City, said Anthony Jannelli, director of film at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. The Hollywood Reporter (Richmond also taught at NYU). The cause of death was not immediately available.

Richmond, who was director of photography on nearly four dozen features, also shot Keenan Ivory Wayans’ I’m Gonna Git You Sucka (1988), Scott Silvers John’s (1996), Rob Zombies House with 1,000 Lig (2003) and Todd Solondz’s Palindromes (2004).

He won the Best Cinematography Award at Sundance in 2006 for his work on Right at your doora drama about a terrorist attack involving chemical bombs.

He received Spirit Award nominations for Stand & Live (1988), Edward James Olmo’s breakout directed by Ramón Menéndez; Pastime (1990), a love letter to baseball; and the crime drama starring Tim Roth Little Odessa (1994), which marked James Gray’s directorial debut.

Richmond shot every film with Keith Gordon at the helm — The Chocolate War (1988), Midnight clarity (1992), Mother night (1996), To wake the dead (2000) and The Singing Detective (2003).

And for director Jesse Peretz, he served as DP on First love, last ritual (1997), The château (2001) and Ex (2006).

Richmond “was an older guy with the vibe of a teenage skateboarder. He used to refer to himself as the Keith Richards of photography. And in a way, he was exactly that,” Peretz wrote on Facebook.

“He taught me not only so much about photography, but also about character and story. He never wanted photography to stage the characters – and that’s how he served his films and their stories, even if it undermined his ability to grasp limelight and promote themselves.”

Thomas Julian Richmond was born in Bronxville, New York in 1950, and graduated from Harvard University with a degree in photography.

He studied at the UCLA film school from 1976-78 and at the American Film Institute from 1979-80, after which he worked as a camera operator at Alex Cox’s Repo man (1984) and Oliver Stone’s El Salvador (1986).

He and Cox would reunite for Straight to hell (1987), Walker (1987) and The winner (1996).

To Little Odessahe and Gray decided to go widescreen and shoot in the 2.35 aspect ratio used by Sergio Leone in his spaghetti westerns.

Besides Roger Avarys Killing Zoe (1993), Tamara Jenkins’ Slums in Beverly Hills (1998) and Peter Sollett’s Nick and Norah’s never-ending playlist (2008), Richmond photographed CM Talkington’s Love & a .45 (1994), Ross Kagan Marks’ Golden twilight (1996), Ethan Hawkes Chelsea walls (2001), Brian Koppelman and David Levien’s Knockaround guys (2001), JP Schaefer’s Chapter 27 (2007) and Rob Meyers A Birder’s Guide to Everything (2013).

A big music fan – especially punk rock – Richmond shot music videos for Pearl Jam (“Jeremy”), New Order, Iris DeMent, Emmylou Harris, Foo Fighters, Grace Jones, The Go-Go’s, Eric Clapton and more.

In later years he taught at Brooklyn College as well as at NYU.