Robert Redford spent the last fifty years of his life on a ranch in Utah, where he started the Sundance Institute and the film festival that changed American independent cinema. He died there on September 16, 2025, aged 89. Within three weeks Europe had lost Giorgio Armani and Claudia Cardinale. These are eight of the best-known people who died in September 2025.
1. Graham Greene (September 1, aged 73)
The Oneida actor from Canada was nominated for an Oscar for playing Kicking Bird in Dances with Wolves in 1990, and later appeared in The Green Mile, Wind River and the series 1883. He was one of the best-known Indigenous actors of his generation.
2. Giorgio Armani (September 4, aged 91)
Giorgio Armani founded his company in Milan in 1975 and made the soft, unstructured suit famous when he dressed Richard Gere in American Gigolo in 1980. He built an empire of fashion, perfume and hotels and remained in charge of it until the end. His company said he died at home in Milan.
3. Mark Volman (September 5, aged 78)
Mark Volman was one of the two singers of the Turtles, whose “Happy Together” was a number one in 1967. With Howard Kaylan he later joined Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention and sang backing vocals as Flo and Eddie for T. Rex and Bruce Springsteen.
4. Charlie Kirk (September 10, aged 31)
The founder of the conservative youth group Turning Point USA was shot dead while speaking to students at Utah Valley University. A suspect was arrested and charged with his murder.
5. Ricky Hatton (September 14, aged 46)
Ricky Hatton was a two-weight world champion from Manchester who beat Kostya Tszyu in 2005 and took tens of thousands of fans to Las Vegas for his fights with Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao. He had spoken publicly about his struggles with depression. He was found at his home in Greater Manchester.
6. Robert Redford (September 16, aged 89)
Robert Redford starred in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting, The Way We Were and All the President’s Men, and won the Oscar for Best Director for his first film as director, Ordinary People. His publicist said he died in his sleep at his home in Utah.
7. Sonny Curtis (September 19, aged 88)
Sonny Curtis played with Buddy Holly’s Crickets, wrote “I Fought the Law”, later a hit for the Bobby Fuller Four and the Clash, and wrote and sang “Love Is All Around”, the theme of The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
8. Claudia Cardinale (September 23, aged 87)
Claudia Cardinale was born in Tunis, became the face of Italian cinema in the 1960s and starred in Visconti’s The Leopard, Fellini’s 8½ and Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West. Her family said she died in Nemours, France, surrounded by her children.
Armani and Cardinale were close friends. When he died, she said her heart was broken. Less than three weeks later, she was dead too.