William C. Gerrity

William C. Gerrity was an assistant director best known for his work on the 1960s ABC television series Naked City and the 1971 film The French Connection, starring Gene Hackman. The film followed a pair of New York City cops in the narcotics bureau who are trying to bring down a French drug smuggling operation.

Naked City was also set in New York City and followed the cases of the NYPD’s 65th Precinct. Gerrity worked on 119 episodes of the series from 1959 to 1963.  Directly following that job he continued his work in television, as an assistant director on another NYPD show, Brenner.

As an assistant director he also worked on the series The Doctors and the Nurses, Hawk, Coronet Blue and Kojak, as well as the telefilms Crawlspace and The Art of Crime. As a production manager he contributed to the telefilms F. Scott Fitzgerald and 'The Last of the Belles,’ Family Reunion, Rage of Angels and Classified Love. He also contributed as a producer, including the television movie Nicky’s World and the miniseries The Dain Curse.

In addition to his work on The French Connection, Gerrity also served as an assistant director on Elia Kazan’s A Face in the Crowd, starring Andy Griffith and Patricia Neal; Sidney Lumet’s Stage Struck, starring Henry Fonda and Susan Strasberg; Lumet's That Kind of Woman, starring Sophia Loren; Hello Down There, starring Tony Randall; The Owl and the Pussycat, with Barbra Streisand and George Segal; Klute, with Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland; and Woody Allen’s Play It Again, Sam.

Later in his career, Gerrity shifted into work as a unit production manager, and contributed to the films Sophie’s Choice, Dead Again, Trading Places, Last Action Hero and 1994’s Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult.

In 1983, he was the recipient of the DGA’s Frank Capra Achievement Award.

Gerrity died November 15, 2015. He was 86.