Joe Hyams, a former Hollywood columnist and best-selling author of books ranging from biographies of Humphrey Bogart and James Dean to a popular tome on Eastern philosophy, has died. He was 85.

Hyams, a longtime Los Angeles resident who moved to Penrose, Colo., three years ago, died of coronary artery disease Saturday at a Denver hospital, said his wife of 14 years, Melissa.

A former West Coast bureau chief for the New York Herald Tribune who once was married to actress Elke Sommer, Hyams covered Hollywood as a syndicated columnist from 1951 to 1964. He then continued chronicling Hollywood for the Saturday Evening Post, Ladies’ Home Journal, Redbook and other magazines for several more years.