Michael Armand Hammer, the businessman father of actor Armie Hammer, has died. He was 67.
A source confirms with PEOPLE that Michael died from cancer.
TMZ was first to report the news, adding that Michael — who is the grandson of oil magnate Armand Hammer, who ran Occidental Petroleum Corporation — died on Sunday.
Months after Armie's wife Elizabeth Chambers filed for divorce in July 2020 following 10 years of marriage, Armie, 36, was embroiled in controversy after messages allegedly from the actor detailing violent sexual fantasies were leaked online. The Call Me by Your Name actor was later accused of rape by a woman with whom he had been in a relationship, which he categorically denied.
This past February, a source said Armie's "main priority is to be sober and stay sober for the kids and Elizabeth."
Back in September 2020, Armie told British GQ about isolating with his family in a Cayman Islands apartment along with Michael and stepmom Misty Millward, whom Michael proposed to in 2017. "It was a really concentrated family time, which is really great with the kids, but it was intense," he said at the time.
"Handle it well? No. It was a very complicated, intense situation, with big personalities all locked in a little tiny place," he added at the time. "It was tough, man. I'd never dealt with anything like that before in my life, so I didn't have the tools. It was just this thing that snuck up on everybody. I don't think I handled it very well. I think, to be quite frank, I came very close to completely losing my mind."
"I just felt completely powerless," he continued. "And I was on an island where the lockdown was so severe that mail couldn't even come in. I felt so intensely trapped, like a wolf who got caught in a snare and wants to chew his own foot off. I was just like, 'I can't do this. Get me out of here.' "
Armie previously told Vulture back in 2017 about the "serendipitous" way his mother Dru Ann Mobley originally met Michael on an airplane. Michael and ex-wife Dru shared two sons, Armie and Viktor.
"My dad was supposed to be on a flight, went to the airport, and got hammered and passed out. He missed his flight, woke up, and was like, 'Oh God, I have a meeting!' So he had to go to all the airlines and he got the last seat available on this tiny airline called Muse Air, which doesn't even exist anymore," said Armie at the time. "He's tall — 6-foot-2 — and extremely claustrophobic, so after sitting in this middle seat for a while, he stood up and said, 'I'm so sorry, everybody, but I really can't do this. Is there anybody who might be willing to switch seats with me?' "
Continued Armie, "And the person next to my mom was like, 'Yeah, I'll switch seats with you.' So he sat next to my mom, who was traveling with her boyfriend at the time, though he was asleep for the whole flight. After they'd been talking for a while and hitting it off, my dad was like, 'Is that your boyfriend?' And my mom said, 'Nope.' And that was how it all kind of started."
Michael's sister Casey Hammer spoke out in a discovery+ docuseries that debuted earlier this year called House of Hammer. The series looked into the allegations against Armie, as well as "the dark, twisted legacy of the Hammer dynasty" and family history.
