British filmmaker Alan Parker, director of movies ranging from Bugsy Malone, a gangster comedy featuring children armed with cream-shooting guns, to tense prison drama Midnight Express, has died aged 76, British media reported on Friday.

Parker, who also directed Fame, Evita, Mississippi Burning, The Commitments and other successful movies, died on Friday after a lengthy illness. Known for his eclecticism, Parker was equally at ease in the worlds of musical comedy and of hard-hitting true crime drama.

Bugsy Malone, his highly original feature film debut in 1976, was a musical parody of Prohibition-era gangster movies, performed entirely by children.

It featured a young Jodie Foster as glamorous singer Tallulah, and other child actors who went on to have successful careers.

Parker followed up with Midnight Express, based on the true story of an American man imprisoned in Turkey for smuggling hashish. The film won two Oscars, including one for Oliver Stone, who wrote the script.