Carl Samrock

CARL SAMROCK, FORMER WARNER BROS. PUBLICITY VICE PRESIDENT AND ENTERTAINMENT PHOTOGRAPHER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES   Carl Samrock – who, over the course of a 50-year career in publicity and photojournalism, was Vice President of Publicity at Warner Bros. Pictures, a freelancer for The New York Times, and owner/founder of Carl Samrock Public Relations – passed away October 1, 2022.  Confirmed by Carol Andelman Samrock, his wife of 44 years who said the cause was pancreatic cancer.  Samrock was Vice President of National Publicity at Warner Bros. Pictures in Burbank, Calif. for most of the studio’s storied years under Chairmen Bob Daly and Terry Semel. He joined the company in 1982 as West Coast Publicity Director and eventually built and managed a 16-member staff responsible for publicity duties on some 30 films in production or release annually.   After leaving Warner theatrical publicity in 1997, Samrock moved to Warner Home Video as a consultant to help then-president Warren Lieberfarb, the acknowledged “godfather of DVD,” introduce the new format that would revolutionize the home entertainment business model. Shortly after, in 1998, Samrock founded Carl Samrock Public Relations, a boutique firm that focused primarily on publicity and promotion campaigns for major studios’ DVD and Blu-ray releases. For the next nearly two decades, the company handled such tent-pole titles as “The Wizard of Oz,” “Casablanca,” “Gone with the Wind” for Warner; Sony’s “Seinfeld: The Complete Series,” and many Disney and DreamWorks Animation classics. In 2017, the firm was acquired by its strategic partner Click Communications.   Samrock was born on the Upper Westside of Manhattan in 1941, the son of the late Victor Samrock, a Broadway producer and manager, and the late Hyla Rubin Samrock, a former member of the Doris Humphreys modern dance troupe.  Samrock attended the Little Red School House and Elizabeth Irwin High School and graduated from the Horace Mann School in 1959 and Tufts University in 1965. Soon after college, Samrock worked extensively as a theatrical press agent on shows including Broadway’s “The Subject Was Roses”; “Private Lives” with Maggie Smith; “In Praise of Love” with Rex Harrison and Julie Harris; “A Day in the Life of Joe Egg” with Albert Finney; “I Have a Dream,” starring Billy Dee Williams as Martin Luther King; and Off-Broadway’s “You’re A Good Man Charlie Brown.”  In 1977, Samrock was appointed Vice President in the New York Office of ICPR Public Relations, a corporate and entertainment publicity firm that worked with major movie studios and independent film producers, movie stars and filmmakers.   From the late ‘60s through the mid-‘70s, Samrock was a freelance photographer, specializing in entertainment and editorial work, in particular for The New York Times Arts and Leisure section. He made many personality portraits for the paper including Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck, Jessica Tandy, Randy Newman, Joan Baez, Robert Altman, Anne Baxter and Christopher Walken. In 1972, his photo coverage of Bella Abzug’s run for Congress accompanied a New York Times Magazine feature on the campaign. In addition to Broadway and off-Broadway shows, he provided publicity photos for WNET/13 (the “Great Performance” series, “The Adams Chronicles,” “Theatre in America,” and Monty Python’s 1972 trip to New York City); Warner Bros. Records (Joe Cocker, Gordon Lightfoot, Bob Seeger) and others.   Samrock was involved in community and educational activities over the years. He lectured regularly on publicity at Loyola Marymount University and UCLA, serving on the latter’s faculty for brief period. He was president of Encino Little League for the 1995-1996 season. He was a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and on the board of directors of the American Society of Magazine Photographers.   In addition to his wife Carol, he is survived by his sons Gabriel (Faye Hudson) and Steven (Katsue Anzai), sister Ellen and granddaughter Daisy. In recent years, Samrock took to writing obituaries for fellow industry veterans. He, in fact, wrote this one.  Donations in Samrock’s memory can be made to Pancreatic Action Network. www.pancan.org