List of Famous people who died in 2009

Edmund Anthony Cutlar Purdom was an English actor, voice artist, and director. He worked first on stage in Britain, performing various works by Shakespeare, then in America on Broadway and in Hollywood, and eventually in Italy. He is perhaps best known for his starring role in 1954's historical epic The Egyptian. By taking over important roles exited by Mario Lanza and Marlon Brando, Purdom was known by the mid-1950s as "The Replacement Star". After the failure of his Hollywood career, Purdom returned briefly to the United Kingdom and then settled in Italy, where he spent the remainder of his life appearing in local films. Between the 1970s and 1990s, he was a regular in European genre cinema, working with directors like Juan Piquer Simón, Joe D'Amato, Sergio Martino and Ruggero Deodato.

Dominique Zardi was a French actor. He acted in more than 200 feature films, including Fantômas with Louis De Funès and Jean Marais. He died of cancer at the age of 79. He was the uncle of the actress and film director Agnès Jaoui.

Yves Rocher was a French businessman and founder of the cosmetics company that bears his name. He was a pioneer of the modern use of natural ingredients in cosmetics.

Gayane Khachaturian was a Georgian-Armenian painter and graphic artist.

Jaafar Muhammad an-Nimeiry was a Sudanese politician who served as the President of Sudan from 1969 to 1985.

Peter Zadek was a German director of theatre, opera and film, a translator and a screenwriter. He is regarded as one of the greatest directors in German-speaking theater.

Alfred Hrdlicka was an Austrian sculptor, painter, and professor. His surname is sometimes written Hrdlička.

Günter Kochan was a German composer. He studied with Boris Blacher and was a master student for composition with Hanns Eisler. From 1967 until his retirement in 1991, he worked as professor for musical composition at the Hochschule für Musik "Hanns Eisler". He taught master classes in composition at the Academy of Music and the Academy of Arts, Berlin. He was also secretary of the Music Section of the Academy of Arts from 1972 to 1974 and vice-president of the Association of Composers and Musicologists of the GDR from 1977 to 1982. Kochan is one of eleven laureates to have been awarded the National Prize of the GDR four times. In addition, he received composition prizes in the US and Eastern Europe. He became internationally known in particular for his Symphonies as well as the cantata Die Asche von Birkenau (1965) and his Music for Orchestra No. 2 (1987). His versatile oeuvre included orchestral works, chamber music, choral works, mass songs and film music and is situated between socialist realism and avant-garde.

Valeriu Lazarov or Valerio Lazarov was a Romanian-born television producer and director of Spanish Channel, Telecinco between 1985–1994.

Edith Hahn Beer was an Austrian Jewish woman who survived the Holocaust by hiding her Jewish identity and marrying a Nazi officer.