FREDDIE FIELDS - TALENT AGENT FIELDS DEAD AT 84

Hollywood talent agent and producer FREDDIE FIELDS has died after losing his battle with lung cancer. He was 84. Fields passed away at his home in Beverly Hills, California, on Tuesday (11Dec07), according to his publicist Warren Cowan. As a producer, Fields earned a name for himself with films like 1986's Crimes of the Heart, 1989's Glory and 1980's American Gigolo, which catapulted its star, Richard Gere, to Hollywood stardom. In later years, he became the executive producer and a partner in U.S. chat show The Montel Williams Show. But Fields' biggest success was as a Hollywood talent agent, starting out as a partner in the First Artists Company with Paul Newman, Steve MCQueen, Dustin Hoffman, Sidney Poitier and Barbra Streisand. He went on to form his own agency, Creative Management Associates - today known as International Creative Management (ICM) - which is responsible for guiding the careers of stars including Newman, Streisand, Robert Redford, Gene Hackman, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, and Woody Allen. ICM is currently considered to be one of Hollywood's biggest and most powerful agencies. Fields was married twice: first to actress Polly Bergen, which ended in divorce; second to actress and former Miss Universe Corinna Tsopei. He is also survived by his three children.