Richard Stermer, one of many longest-serving staff of the Academy of Movement Image Arts and Sciences, is retiring, The Hollywood Reporter has realized.
For LA-based members of the Academy, that’s very large information. Why? As a result of Stermer, since 1994, has been a fixture on the 1,000-seat Samuel Goldwyn Theater inside the Academy’s Beverly Hills headquarters — initially as deputy theater supervisor, then as theater supervisor and, since January, as senior theater supervisor — presiding over every part from weekend screenings for members to early-morning Oscar nominations bulletins to premieres hosted by studios who rented the venue from the Academy.
The pleasant and unassuming Stermer, who can also be a part-time actor, songwriter, composer and voice artist, has additionally been corralled, from time to time, to make voiceover declarations at Academy occasions together with the aforementioned Oscar nominations gatherings, which magnetize tons of of feisty press and publicists, in addition to Oscar Nominee Luncheons, Sci-Tech applications and extra.
Stermer’s predecessor because the Academy’s theater supervisor, underneath whom he initially served, was Robert Rigamonti, who died abruptly in 2013, at which level Stermer was promoted.
Ric Robertson, who was the Academy’s government administrator from 1989 by 2011 and COO from 2011 by 2013, tells THR, “Richard’s superb. He’s a superb supervisor, well-organized, and all the time up to the mark. I might go to screenings and watch him, previous to the movie, stroll up and down the aisles of the Goldwyn greeting folks and asking them about their children or grandkids. I prefer to name him the Mayor of the Goldwyn. He was the last word host, all the time pleasant and making folks really feel welcome. It was actually exceptional.”
Stermer, in a characteristically self-effacing transfer, declined to remark for this piece.