Born in New York City, educated at CCNY, Univ. of Wisconsin and Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. He started in films at 17 as a management traineee with a motion picture theater chain and worked his way up the administrative ladder during his college years. Following WW II service, he joined Monogram as producer of low-budget films and in 1951 he was appointed executive producer of the company's subsidiary Allied Artists. In 1957 he founded with his brother Marvin Mirisch and half brother Harold an independent production company, Mirisch Company, Inc., of which Walter became vice president in charge of production. (Harold was named president and Marvin vice president and director.) The company soon gained a reputation for its quality of production and for its policy of allowing creative freedom to independent producers and directors whose pictures it financed. IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT won the Academy Award as Best Picture of 1967. Some of his other notable producing credits, sometimes as executive producer, include FLAT TOP (1952), THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960), WEST SIDE STORY (1961), TWO FOR THE SEESAW (1962), TOYS IN THE ATTIC (1963), THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING! THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING! (1966), HAWAII (1966), THE HAWAIIANS (1970), MR. MAJESTYK (1974), MIDWAY (1976), GRAY LADY DOWN and SAME TIME, NEXT YEAR (both 1978) and ROMANTIC COMEDY (1983). Mirisch became president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1973, a post he held through 1977. He was presented with the Irving Thalberg Memorial Award during the Oscar ceremony of 1978. The Mirisch Corporation continued in business into the 90s, producing mainly for television, with Marvin as chairman and CEO and Walter as president.  Best Picture 1967: IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT - producer at Mirisch  Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award 1977.  Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award 1982. 1 nomination, 1 Award, 2 Honorary Awards