Jim Tauber, a longtime executive and the president of Sidney Kimmel Entertainment for a decade until his retirement in 2015, died Wednesday from complications of multiple myeloma, his family confirmed. He was 74.
Tauber, an Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences member, grew up in Glencoe, Ill. His time at SKE included overseeing “Hell or High Water,” “The Place Beyond the Pines,” “Lars and the Real Girl” and “Death at a Funeral.”
He spent the earlier part of his career at Columbia TriStar Pictures as executive VP of acquisitions and business/legal affairs, a position that allowed him to oversee production of films including Steven Soderbergh’s “Sex, Lies and Videotape.”
After that, he was president and chief operating officer of Propaganda Films, producing David Lynch’s “Wild at Heart” and Spike Jonze’s “Being John Malkovich” and contributing to the creation of Gramercy Pictures.
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Tauber then became Anonymous Content’s president and chief operating officer in the company’s infancy before moving to 20th Century Fox as worldwide executive vice president of acquisitions and co-productions and later ending up at SKE.
After retirement, Tauber became a licensed psychotherapist. He and his wife, Laura Newman, ran a practice together. The two, who were living in Los Olivos in recent years, created a coffeeshop in 2022 called Lefty’s Coffee in the area and dedicated the business to ethical sourcing. The couple resided on a farm and vineyard with many animals.
Tauber is survived by his wife Laura, his sister Joanie, and daughters J.Lucy, Dixie and Zazu.