
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, March 4, 1990                   TAG: 9003042128
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-4   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                 LENGTH: Short

ROBERT MCDONALD, FILM MAKER, DIES

Robert L. McDonald, an award-winning film maker who became the chief of the Perry Ellis design house after its founder's death, died of AIDS on Friday night at his home in Manhattan. He was 45.

He was executive producer of two films nominated for Academy Awards and received other honors for films created for use in school study programs. He began his film work in 1970.

The Academy Awards nominations were for two short films, "It's So Nice to Have a Wolf Around the House" in 1978 and "Split Cherry Tree" in 1982.

In 1986, at the request of his longtime friend, the fashion designer Perry Ellis, McDonald became president and later chairman of Perry Ellis International after the designer's death.

McDonald was born in Toronto, where he graduated from the University of Toronto. He is survived by his mother, Margaret Carroll McDonald, of Toronto; a sister, Betsy Drake of Morristown, N.J., and a brother, W. Scott McDonald of Bermuda.

by CNB