Bruce Malmuth, the director of "Nighthawks" (with Sylvester Stallone in 1981) and "Hard to Kill" (with Steven Seagal in 1990) died of esophageal cancer at the age of 71.
According to his brother Daniel Malmuth, the director's death surveyed on June 29th, at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

Born on February 4, 1934 in New York, Malmuth grew up in Brooklyn and started to make documentaries during his Army service, where he met baseball announcer Walter "Red" Barber.

The passionate sports fan worked on the baseball documentaries "A Boy's Dream" featuring Darryl Strawberry and on the Emmy-winning documentary "Baseball or Switchblades?", and had also directed New York Yankee games at W-P-I-X radio in New York.

Malmuth also tried his luck in directing commercials and he has won several Clio advertising awards for Excedrin and Fresca Snowstorms.

In 1981 he directed the thriller "Nighthawks" starring Sylvester Stallone, followed by "Where Are All the Children?" with Jill Clayburgh (1995) and "Hard to Kill" (1990) starring Steven Seagal.

Malmuth has also played some parts in several movies, like "Happy New Year" (1987), "Lean on Me" (1999) and the first two "Karate Kid" films (1994-1996) - as the ring announcer.