Mark Rydell, the Oscar-nominated director of the sentimental blockbuster "On Golden Pond" who worked with such Hollywood heavyweights as Henry Fonda, Katharine Hepburn, Steve McQueen and John Wayne, has died. He was 97.

His daughter, Amy Rydell, told The Hollywood Reporter that her father died Thursday of natural causes at a retirement community for the entertainment industry in the Woodland Hills section of Los Angeles.

"Hard to put into words how much I loved my dad," she posted Friday on her Instagram account. "He was truly one of a kind. Funniest and most talented person I've ever known."

"On Golden Pond" earned 10 Oscar nominations
"On Golden Pond," which teamed Fonda with Hepburn and his daughter, Jane Fonda, was nominated for 10 Oscars. Henry Fonda and Hepburn won leading acting honors and the film won for screenplay, which Ernest Thompson adapted from his play of the same name. Rydell was nominated for directing but lost to Warren Beatty for "Reds."

It earned over $119 million at the box office, making it the second-highest grossing film of 1981 behind "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

"On Golden Pond" was Henry Fonda's final movie role. He starred as Norman Thayer, an emotionally brittle and distant father who becomes more accessible at the end of his life after his teenage grandson spends the summer with him and his wife, Ethel (played by Hepburn), at their cottage in New England. The film's story resembled Fonda's real-life relationship with daughter Jane, who said working on the movie together helped resolve some of their issues. The elder Fonda died at age 77 months after winning his only Oscar.

Rydell's other Oscar-nominated films were "The Fox" in 1967, "The Reivers" with McQueen in 1969,... Read More