Gabrielle Beaumont dead: Pioneering director of ‘M*A*S*H’, ‘Hill Street Blues’ and numerous Aaron Game hits, turns 80

Gabrielle Beaumont, who may have filmed more hours of prime-time television than any woman in history, died peacefully at her home in Spain on October 8, her brother Christopher Toyne confirmed to Deadline.

Beaumont was the first female director of many TV hits of the 1980s and 1990s. Your resume includes positions Hill Street Blues, The Waltons, Miami Vice, Cagney & Lacy, M*A*S*H, LA Law, Baywatch, Archie Bunker’s Place, Remington Steele, The Dukes of Hazard, Doctor Quinn, Medicine Woman, Doogie Howser, MD, Touched by an angel and three different iterations of star pull.

Her big break came when she met Aaron Spelling, who was under pressure to put women and other minorities behind the camera. According to Beaumont’s brother, actor and producer Christopher Toyne, Spelling didn’t bother to look at the footage she brought with her. He asked Beaumont, “Can you fucking rule?” She said, “Damn yes!” She left that night to cover an episode of the Robert Urich hit Vega$.

Beaumont was a regular behind the camera on game shows including Knots Landing, Hart to Hart, The Colbys, Hotel, Melrose Place, Beverly Hills, 91210, 7th Heaven and of course dynastywhich the director lobbied for her friend Joan Collins to cast.

She has also directed TV movies such as NBC’s Death of a Centerfold: The Story of Dorothy Stratten with Jamie Lee Curtis and CBS The other women.

Beaumont was born in England to parents known in the British theater and film world. Her mother, Diana Beaumont, was a leading lady of stage and screen, and her father, Gabriel Toyne, was a noted producer and skilled swordsman, often brought in to train British actors such as Laurence Olivier and Alec Guinness for film roles and movie. on stage.

Beaumont trained at the BBC and entered the film industry as an editor before directing a number of horror films including velvet house, The Johnstown Monster and Heaven’s Gift.

Beaumont has also directed television shows such as the HBO miniseries Riders, made-for-television films such as Diana: a tribute to the people’s princess and that of the BBC a last chance. She spent the last decade of her life in Spain filming and writing commercials. She recently published her cousin Daphne du Maurier’s book, The King’s Generalas a miniseries.

As a director, she won the Humanitas Award for The other womenAn Emmy nomination for an episode of Hill Street Blues and a DGA nomination for her work LA law.

Beaumont is preceded in death by her first husband, producer and recording artist Olaf Pooley, her daughter Amanda and her second husband, cinematographer Michael Davis. She is survived by her brother and his wife, former Disney executive Esther Ewert, of Vancouver, Washington.