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William “Ted” Kotcheff (né Velichko Todor Kostadin Kotcheff), filmmaker, producer (born 7 April 1931 in Toronto, ON; died 10 April 2025 in Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico). Ted Kotcheff is best known today for his work on the film adaptation of Mordecai Richler’s novel The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974) and First Blood (1982), the first Rambo film starring Sylvester Stallone.
Education and Career
Ted Kotcheff studied literature at the University of Toronto, joined the CBC in 1952 and soon began directing. He left for England in 1957, directing many TV productions and stage plays as well as his first films.
After making Outback (1971) in Australia, Ted Kotcheff returned to Canada to adapt Mordecai Richler’s novel about a young Jewish hustler living in Montreal. At the time, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974) was the most expensive privately financed film produced in Canada, but it did not sacrifice artistic integrity for commercial gain. Although most of his subsequent work was produced in the United States, Ted Kotcheff returned to Canada to adapt another Richler novel, Joshua Then and Now (1985).
Many of Ted Kotcheff's movies have been comedic and have met with much success at the box office including Fun with Dick and Jane (1977), Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe? (1978), Switching Channels (1988), and both Weekend at Bernie's movies (1989 and 1993). He also directed Sylvester Stallone's first Rambo movie, First Blood, in 1982.
Kotcheff has enjoyed success in television as well. Among other projects, in 2000 he began directing and producing episodes of the hugely popular series Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
Honours
For his adaptation of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, Ted Kotcheff received a Golden Bear (Best Film) at the 1974 Berlin International Film Festival and won Film of the Year at the 1975 Canadian Film Awards. In 1986 Kotcheff was nominated for a Genie Award for Joshua Then and Now (Best Direction). His direction of Borrowed Hearts (1997) earned him a Gemini Award nomination in 1998. In 2011 Kotcheff received the Directors Guild of Canada's Lifetime Achievement Award and the Oldenburg International Film Festival’s German Independence Honorary Award. He also received the Academy Board of Directors' Tribute at the Canadian Screen Awards in 2014 and won silver in the Performing Arts category at the 22nd Independent Publisher Book Awards in 2018 for Director’s Cut: My Life in Film.
