Robert Redford, the Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker whose on-screen presence helped define modern American style, died on Sept. 16, 2025, at his home at Sundance, Utah. He was 89.
Redford’s representative, Cindi Berger, said in a statement that he died “at his home at Sundance in the mountains of Utah — the place he loved, surrounded by those he loved.” The family requested privacy.
Rising to fame in the 1960s, Redford became as influential for his looks as for his performances. He moved easily between genres — romantic comedy, Western, political thriller and literary adaptation — and carried distinct wardrobes that frequently set men's fashion trends. Critics and fashion magazines over the years have credited his film roles with reviving or popularizing items ranging from denim shirts and cowboy hats to tailored three-piece suits and wide, colorful ties.
His breakthrough in mainstream style came with 1967’s Barefoot in the Park, in which Redford’s tailored suits and casual elegance helped cement his status as a leading man. Two years later, his portrayal of the Sundance Kid in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid brought Western cool back into circulation: denim shirts, hats and a relaxed frontier ruggedness became part of the cultural conversation. As he played a frontiersman in Jeremiah Johnson (1972), beards and suede shirts gained cachet among men seeking a more rugged look.
Redford’s 1973 turn in The Sting popularized flamboyant wide ties, while his opposite Barbra Streisand in The Way We Were helped reinvigorate the cable sweater as a symbol of upper‑crust casualness. In 1974’s The Great Gatsby, Redford’s tailored suits — including the now-iconic white three-piece configuration — were held up as the height of sartorial elegance and influenced contemporary menswear and red‑carpet dressing. The mid‑1970s political thriller Three Days of the Condor showed him in the casual, utilitarian pea coats and aviator sunglasses that came to be associated with his 1970s image.
Across the 1980s and 1990s, Redford continued to set tones. Out of Africa (1985) cast him in neutral linens and rugged khakis that matched the film’s colonial‑era aesthetic, while Indecent Proposal (1993) framed his character’s affluent wardrobe as part of a new cultural shorthand for a wealthy older man. He returned to leather jackets, corduroy slacks and a stripped‑down, layered look while costarring with Brad Pitt in Spy Game (2001), demonstrating the persistence of his casual chic into the 21st century.
Redford’s career extended beyond his on‑screen style. He won the Academy Award for Best Director in 1980 for Ordinary People, which also won Best Picture, and his work behind the camera earned him sustained critical respect. He was a founder of the Sundance Film Festival, named after his Butch Cassidy character, which helped create a national platform for independent filmmakers and launched careers for directors such as Quentin Tarantino and Darren Aronofsky.
His filmography included classics that defined multiple eras of Hollywood. Among them were Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid; The Sting; The Way We Were; Jeremiah Johnson; The Candidate; Three Days of the Condor; Out of Africa; Indecent Proposal; The Horse Whisperer; Spy Game; and The Last Castle. Redford made his final major film appearance in the 2019 blockbuster Avengers: Endgame and made an uncredited appearance in the 2023 HBO series White House Plumbers reprising his All the President’s Men character Bob Woodward.
Redford’s public recognition included two Golden Globe Awards and an enduring reputation as one of Hollywood’s most handsome and charismatic stars. Offscreen, he was noted for his environmental advocacy and his long association with the state of Utah, where the Sundance Institute and the film festival fostered independent cinema and arts programming.
Born in 1936, Redford married Lola Van Wagenen in 1958; the couple had four children and later divorced. Their eldest son, Scott, died in infancy. His son James died of cancer in 2020 at age 58. Redford married artist Sibylle Szaggars in 2009 and is survived by Szaggars and his daughters, Shauna and Amy.
Redford’s influence on fashion was often inseparable from his roles: a poetry of costume choices that ranged from the studied elegance of a 1960s suit to the lived‑in ruggedness of a Western. Those choices resonated in shops and on streets, and his name became shorthand for a particular American cool — one that married ease to a careful attention to cut, fabric and silhouette.
His death marks the end of a career that shaped film and fashion for more than half a century. Colleagues, critics and fans have noted that beyond the characters he played, Redford’s legacy includes the institutions he helped build and the filmmakers he championed, ensuring that his influence will continue in cinema and culture long after his passing.