Sam Cohn, Agent to the Stars, Dead at 79

Sam Cohn, one of Broadway and Hollywood’s top talent agents, has died after a short illness. The media mogul, who recently retired from the widely known International Creative Management firm, was 79.

One of the founding members of ICM, formed in 1974, Cohn was best known for his representation of a stable of the industry’s top acting, directing and writing talents, including Meryl Streep, Susan Sarandon, Vanessa Redgrave, Woody Allen, Robert Altman, Nora Ephron, Bob Fosse, John Guare, Kander and Ebb, Arthur Miller, Paul Newman, Lily Tomlin, Dianne Wiest and Kathleen Turner, among many others.

Born May 11, 1929, Cohn was brought up in an affluent Pennsylvania family, the third generation benefactor of his grandfather’s Independent Oil Company fortune. Cohn spent part of his child in military school before graduating from Princeton University and Yale Law, dabbling in a legal career at CBS before beginning his crossover into talent management at Herb Siegel’s GAC in the early 1960s, with comedian Jackie Gleason as his first client. After shrewdly negotiating the mega-merger of GAC with competitor David Begelman’s CMA in the 1970s, Cohn collaborated on the formation of ICM in New York City, combing through Broadway and regional theaters to develop a roster of top-level talent. The agent was best known for his uncanny ability to pair clients with the right deals and producers often landing multiple artists within the same project, and was the networker behind productions as artistically nurturing as the Public Theater’s Drinks Before Dinner, directed by Mike Nichols and written by E.L. Doctorow, or as blockbusting as Broadway’s Annie.

A devout New Yorker, Cohn eventually crossed into Hollywood, becoming one of the biggest players on either coast with a career and talent pool that jumped easily across mediums. A notorious workaholic with a predilection for chewing paper, Cohn was hailed by coworkers and clients as a personality who celebrated the creative mind, one more focused on the satisfaction of his artists than schmoozing and moneymaking.

Cohn is survived by his wife, Jane Gelfman; son, Peter Cohn; daughter Marya Cohn; and four grandchildren.