Vitali died Friday in Los Angeles, his family said Sunday. He died peacefully surrounded by his loved ones, including his three children, Masha, Max and Vera. “Leon was a special and wonderful man, driven by his curiosity, who spread love and warmth wherever he went,” his children said. “He will be fondly remembered and greatly missed by the many people he touched.” Although Vitali was often described as Kubrick’s assistant, the 2017 documentary Filmworker shed light on his vast and largely unknown contributions to the work of one of cinema’s greatest figures, from The Shining through Eyes Wide Shut. He did everything from casting and directing actors to overseeing restorations. Vitali even once built a video screen so Kubrick could watch his dying cat. Matthew Modine, who starred in Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, tweeted his condolences on Sunday. “There are people we meet who have a profound effect on our lives. Leon Vitali was such a person in mine,” Modine wrote. “An artist in every aspect of his life. A beloved father and friend to so many. A kind, generous and forgiving nature. Show and personify grace.” Director Lee Unkrich also tweeted that he was “absolutely devastated.” “He helped me a lot with my Shining book and I’m sad he won’t see it. He was a sweet, kind, humble, generous man and a vital part of Stanley Kubrick’s team.” Before meeting Kubrick, Vitali was an up-and-coming actor in the UK, appearing in several British TV shows such as Softly, Softly, Follyfoot, Z Cars and Notorious Woman. In 1974 he was cast in the film Barry Lyndon as Lord Bullingdon, the son-in-law of Ryan O’Neal. Vitali was so fascinated by Kubrick and his processes that he made the unusual decision to give up acting and devote himself entirely to the famously demanding director for more than two decades. Vitaly’s next Kubrick title was as “director’s personal assistant” on The Shining, though that’s only part of the story. He famously helped four-year-old Danny Lloyd cast Danny Torrance and Louise and Lisa Burns as the creepy Grady twins (citing Diane Arbus as an inspiration). “Meeting Stanley was a turning point for me,” she told the Guardian in 2017. “Through him, I started to see things from a different perspective. I talked to Stanley about working with him, and he said, “Okay, let’s see what happens.” That same year, he described his decision to quit acting as “a really, really radical change in my life”. After Kubrick’s death in 1999 Vitali oversaw the restoration of many of Kubrick’s films and received a Cinema Audio Society Award for his work. He later worked with director Todd Field on his films Little Children and In the Bedroom. Before filming the documentary Filmworker, its director, Tony Zierra, said that he and many Kubrick-obsessed fans knew Vitali for his performances in Barry Lyndon and Eyes Wide Shut, in which he played Red Cloak, and that he was key member of Kubrick’s inner circle. . But when she finally met Vitali to make the film, she was struck by “his kindness, humility and the fascinating breadth of his story.” Zierra is working on a Filmworker directorial piece that will include new footage that he and Vitali wanted in the film but were unable to complete in time for its Cannes debut in 2017.
