by: E&P Staff

Joe Hyams, who covered Hollywood as a syndicated columnist from 1951 to 1964 and was a bestselling author of books ranging from biographies of Humphrey Bogart and James Dean to a popular tome on Eastern philosophy, has died at 85.

Hyams, a former West Coast bureau chief for the New York Herald Tribune, was a Hollywood insider who also was once married to actress Elke Sommer. He covered the Hollywood beat as a syndicated columnist for 13 years, after which he covered the same ground for the Saturday Evening Post, Ladies' Home Journal, Redbook and other magazines.

He wrote more than 25 books, among them the biographies "Bogie" (1966), "Bogart & Bacall: A Love Story" (1975), and "James Dean: Little Boy Lost" (1992), with his son, Jay.

A longtime Los Angeles resident, Hyams moved to Penrose, Colo., in 2005. He died of coronary artery disease Saturday at a Denver hospital.