David Ernest Peckinpah was a television writer, producer and director. David Peckinpah was the nephew of film director Sam Peckinpah

Sam Peckinpah

David Samuel "Sam" Peckinpah was an American filmmaker and screenwriter who achieved prominence following the release of the Western epic The Wild Bunch...

. He was a writer and producer of several series including the cable TV shows DEA, Silk Stalkings

Silk Stalkings

Silk Stalkings is a TV crime drama originally shown on CBS in 1991 as part of the network's late-night Crimetime After Primetime programming package, and rebroadcast on the USA Network. After CBS ended the Crimetime experiment in 1993, the series ran exclusively on USA until its finale in the...

, Sliders

Sliders

Sliders is an American science fiction television series. It was broadcast for five seasons, beginning in 1995 and ending in 2000. The series follows a group of travelers as they use a wormhole to "slide" between different parallel universes. The show was created by Robert K. Weiss and Tracy Tormé...

and Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast (TV series)

Beauty and the Beast is an American drama series which first aired on CBS in 1987. Creator Ron Koslow's updated version of the fairy tale has a double focus: the relationship between Vincent , a mythic, noble man-beast, and his Catherine , a savvy assistant District attorney in New York; and a...

, starring Linda Hamilton

Linda Hamilton

Linda Carroll Hamilton is an American actress best known for her portrayal of Sarah Connor in The Terminator and its sequel Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Catherine Chandler in the television series Beauty and the Beast, for which she was nominated for two Golden Globes and an Emmy...

 and Ron Perlman

Ron Perlman

Ronald N. "Ron" Perlman is an American television, film and voice over actor. He is known for having played Vincent in the TV series Beauty and the Beast , a Deathstroke figure known as Slade in the animated series Teen Titans, Clarence "Clay" Morrow in Sons of Anarchy, the comic book character...

.

Personal life

David was married to actress and producer Sandy Peckinpah from 1974 until his death in 2006. They had a son Garrett, (born 1978), Trevor, (born 1982), Julianne Belle, (born 1988), and Jackson, (born 1992). Julianne was born with a bilateral cleft lip. Sandy was inspired to write books about children born with special needs. Some books are "Rosey the Imperfect Angel," "Chester the Imperfect All-Star," (inspired by baseball pitcher Jim Abbott

Jim Abbott

James Anthony Abbott is a former Major League Baseball pitcher, who played despite having been born without a right hand. He played for the California Angels, the New York Yankees, the Chicago White Sox, and the Milwaukee Brewers, from 1989 to 1999.He graduated from Flint Central High School and...

, and "Fairy Tale Life . . . Interrupted.")

When Garrett was 16, he died suddenly from meningitis

Meningitis

Meningitis is inflammation of the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord, known collectively as the meninges. The inflammation may be caused by infection with viruses, bacteria, or other microorganisms, and less commonly by certain drugs...

.

The couple's best friends were actors Melissa Gilbert

Melissa Gilbert

Melissa Ellen Gilbert is an American actress, writer, and producer, primarily in movies and television. Gilbert is best known as a child actress who co-starred as Charles Ingalls's second daughter, Laura Ingalls Wilder, on the dramatic television series Little House on the Prairie...

 and Bruce Boxleitner

Bruce Boxleitner

Bruce William Boxleitner is an American actor, and science fiction and suspense writer. He is known for his leading roles in the television series How the West Was Won, Bring 'Em Back Alive, Scarecrow and Mrs. King , and Babylon 5...

. Melissa gave birth to a very premature son in October 1994. She named him Michael Garrett Boxleitner (in honor of Michael Landon

Michael Landon

Michael Landon was an American actor, writer, director, and producer. He is widely known for his roles as Little Joe Cartwright in Bonanza , Charles Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie , and Jonathan Smith in Highway to Heaven...

 and Garrett Peckinpah). Sandy appeared in E! Entertainment's 1999 "Celebrity Profile" of Melissa Gilbert. Michael eventually fully recovered and was also featured as a healthy and strong 5-year old on the program.

David died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 55. Today his widow Sandy, is a successful realtor and writer in Murrieta, California

Murrieta, California

Murrieta has a Mediterranean climate or Dry-Summer Subtropical . Murrieta has plenty of sunshine throughout the year, with an average of 263 sunshine days and 35 days with measurable precipitation annually....

.

External links