James Jacks, the veteran producer who helped make “The Mummy” franchise a worldwide box office smash, died Monday, his one-time producing partner Sean Daniel said on Facebook. He was 66.
Jacks’ cause of death was a heart attack, according to media reports.
Daniel and Universal Studios did not immediately respond to TheWrap’s requests for comment.
“Here’s to Jim Jacks,” Daniel wrote on Facebook. “Nobody loved movies more. Passionate, loyal, generous, accomplished, noble, caring, heavily armed, creative, dare I say obsessive on occasion. A good man, a good friend, a wonderful partner, a loving son to his family. You will be missed.”
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Over nearly three decades in film, Jacks helped guide a range of box office and critical successes to the big screen, teaming with such significant artists as Joel and Ethan Coen, Richard Linklater and Sam Raimi.
His credits include “Raising Arizona,” “A Simple Plan,” “Tombstone,” “Intolerable Cruelty” and “Dazed and Confused.”
Yet, the three “Mummy” films and its spin-off “The Scorpion King” that he produced under the Alphaville Films banner form the spine of his legacy and made him one of the most commercially astute producers of the late 1990s and early aughts. Together the breathed new life into one of Universal Pictures’ oldest horror brands and made over $1.4 billion globally.