Report: Longtime WWE Director Kerwin Silfies passes away at the age of 75

Mike Johnson of PWInsider.com is reporting that Kerwin Silfies, a longtime director for WWE (formerly WWF), has passed away at the age of 75. According to Johnson, Silfies had been privately dealing with health issues and died last night. In recent years, he had been living in Florida.

Silfies began working for WWF in 1985 and remained with the company for decades, playing a major role in shaping its television and special event presentations as it expanded nationally and globally. From Saturday Night’s Main Event in the 1980s to multiple WrestleMania broadcasts and WWE’s first shows in Saudi Arabia, he directed many of the company’s most significant productions. He was furloughed during the Covid-19 pandemic in the 2020s and never returned, a move that was said to have surprised people within the company. Marty Miller later took over directing RAW.

Silfies was widely respected for his production vision, particularly his work on character vignettes. Bruce Prichard publicly credited him for helping craft the vignettes that established Curt Hennig as Mr. Perfect in the late 1980s.

Outside of WWE, Silfies directed The Last Full Measure, a 2007 documentary about the Battle of Gettysburg narrated by Stacy Keach. His first name also inspired the short-lived Kerwin White character portrayed by Chavo Guerrero in 2005.

Though he largely stayed out of the spotlight, Silfies did appear in a recent Peacock documentary about WrestleMania IX.