Police: TV pitchman Billy Mays found dead at home
AP
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TAMPA, Fla. – Tampa police say Billy Mays, the television pitchman known for his boisterous hawking of products such as Orange Glo and OxiClean, has died. He was 50.
Authorities say Mays was pronounced dead Sunday morning after being found by his wife at home. There were no signs of a break-in, and investigators do not suspect foul play. The coroner's office expects to have an autopsy done by Monday afternoon.
Mays' wife, Deborah Mays, says the family doesn't expect to make any public statements and asked for privacy.
Mays was also featured on the reality TV show "Pitchmen" on the Discovery Channel, which followed Mays and Anthony Sullivan in their marketing jobs.
Discovery Channel spokeswoman Elizabeth Hillman released a statement Sunday extending sympathy to the Mays family.
"Everyone that knows him was aware of his larger-than-life personality, generosity and warmth," Hillman's statement said. "Billy was a pioneer in his field and helped many people fulfill their dreams. He will be greatly missed as a loyal and compassionate friend."
Oscar-winning actor Karl Malden dies at 97
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By Dennis McLellan
12:17 PM PDT, July 1, 2009
Karl Malden, one of Hollywood's strongest and most versatile supporting actors, who won an Oscar playing his Broadway-originated role as Mitch in "A Streetcar Named Desire," died today. He was 97.
Malden starred in the 1970s TV series "The Streets of San Francisco" and was the longtime American Express traveler's-check spokesman, warning travelers to not leave home without it. He died of natural causes at his home in Brentwood, said his daughter Mila Doerner.
With his unglamorous mug -- he broke his bulbous nose twice playing sports as a teenager -- the former Indiana steel-mill worker realized early on the course his acting career would take.
"I was so incredibly lucky," Malden once told The Times. "I knew I wasn't a leading man. Take a look at this face." But, he vowed as a young man, he wasn't going to let his looks hamper his ambition to succeed as an actor.
In a movie career that flourished in the 1950s and '60s, Malden played a variety of roles in more than 50 films, including the sympathetic priest in "On the Waterfront," the resentful husband in "Baby Doll," the warden in "Birdman of Alcatraz," the outlaw-turned-sheriff in "One-Eyed Jacks," the pioneer patriarch in "How the West Was Won," Madame Rose's suitor in "Gypsy," the card dealerin "The Cincinnati Kid" and Gen. Omar Bradley in "Patton."
His varied performances established Malden, former Times film critic Charles Champlin once wrote, "as an Everyman, but one whose range moved easily up and down the levels of society and the IQ scale, from heroes to heavies and ordinary, decent guys just trying to get along."
Malden was a longtime holdout to television until he agreed to play Lt. Mike Stone on the ABC police drama "The Streets of San Francisco," with Michael Douglas. The series, which ran from 1972 to 1977, earned Malden four consecutive Emmy nominations as lead actor in a drama series.
When he finally won his sole Emmy, it was for outstanding supporting actor in a limited series or special, as a man who begins to suspect that his daughter was murdered by her husband in the fact-based 1984 miniseries "Fatal Vision."
Malden also starred in "Skag," a short-lived 1980 NBC dramatic series in which he played a Serbian family man and union foreman at a Pittsburgh steel mill.
But for all his movie and television roles, it was primarily the series of American Express traveler's-check commercials Malden made between 1973 and 1994 that gave him his greatest public recognition. (Even Johnny Carson, complete with fake proboscis, dark suit and short-brimmed fedora, spoofed Malden's sober-faced commercials on "The Tonight Show.")
"After 50 years of doing all those other things in the business, wherever I go, the one thing people will say to me is, 'Don't leave home without it,' " Malden said in 1989. "What am I going to say? It's kind of frustrating in a way, but at the same time, American Express has been very good to me, and it's given me independence. I don't have to jump at anything and everything that comes my way."
He was born Mladen Sekulovich in Chicago on March 22, 1912, the son of an immigrant mother from the nation that later became Czechoslovakia and a Serbian father, who delivered milk for 38 years.
Malden spoke little English until after his family moved from their Serbian enclave in Chicago to the steel-mill community of Gary, Ind., when he was 5.
Malden's father was a theater lover who staged Serbian plays in the church and in Serbian patriotic organizations in Gary. As a teenager, Malden played heavies -- usually Turks, complete with a big, black mustache -- in his father's productions.
Another great has left us...
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-karl-malden2-2009jul02,0,5658128.story
Mollie Sugden 86. Those of you who remember Are You Being Served will know what a fantastic comedy actress she was. Her timing was impecable.
Robert McNamara, ex-defense secretary, dies
updated 11:27 a.m. EDT, Mon July 6, 2009
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Robert McNamara meets with President Kennedy in the Oval Office in 1963.
(CNN) -- Former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, a key architect of the U.S. war in Vietnam under presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, has died at age 93, according to his family.
McNamara was a member of Kennedy's inner circle during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, when the United States and the Soviet Union stood on the brink of nuclear war.
But he became a public lightning rod for his management of the war in Vietnam, overseeing the U.S. military commitment there as it grew from fewer than 1,000 advisers to more than half a million troops.
Though the increasingly unpopular conflict was sometimes dubbed "McNamara's War," he later said both administrations were "terribly wrong" to have pursued military action beyond 1963.
"External military force cannot reconstruct a failed state, and Vietnam, during much of that period, was a failed state politically," he told CNN in a 1996 interview for the "Cold War" documentary series. "We didn't recognize it as such."
A native of San Francisco, McNamara studied economics at the University of California and earned a master's degree in business from Harvard. He was a staff officer in the Army Air Corps during World War II, when he studied the results of American bombing raids on Germany and Japan in search of ways to improve their accuracy and efficiency.
After the war, he joined the Ford Motor Company and became its president in November 1960 -- the first person to lead the company from outside its founding family. A month later, the newly elected Kennedy asked him to become secretary of defense, making him one of the "whiz kids" who joined the young president's administration.
In October 1962, after the discovery of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba, McNamara was one of Kennedy's top advisers in the standoff that followed. The United States imposed a naval "quarantine" on Cuba, a Soviet ally, and prepared for possible airstrikes or an invasion. The Soviets withdrew the missiles in exchange for a U.S. guarantee not to invade Cuba, a step that allowed Soviet premier Nikita Kruschev to present the pullback as a success to his own people.
In the 2003 documentary "The Fog of War," McNamara told filmmaker Errol Morris that the experience taught American policymakers to "put ourselves inside their skin and look at us through their eyes." But he added, "In the end, we lucked out. It was luck that prevented nuclear war."
McNamara is credited with using the management techniques he mastered as a corporate executive to streamline the Pentagon, computerizing and smoothing out much of the U.S. military's vast purchasing and personnel system. And in Vietnam, he attempted to use those techniques to measure the progress of the war.
Metrics such as use of "body counts" and scientific solutions such as using the herbicide Agent Orange to defoliate jungles in which communist guerrillas hid became trademarks of the conflict. McNamara made several trips to South Vietnam to study the situation firsthand.
He, Johnson and other U.S. officials portrayed the war as a necessary battle in the Cold War, a proxy struggle to prevent communism from taking control of all of Southeast Asia. But while they saw the conflict as another front in the standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union, which backed communist North Vietnam, McNamara acknowledged later that they underestimated Vietnamese nationalism and opposition to the U.S.-backed government in Saigon.
"The conflict within South Vietnam itself had all of the characteristics of a civil war, and we didn't look upon it as largely a civil war, and we weren't measuring our progress as one would have in what was largely a civil war," he told CNN.
Casualties mounted, as did domestic opposition to the war. In 1965, a Quaker anti-war protester, Norman Morrison, set himself on fire outside McNamara's office window. In 1967, tens of thousands of demonstrators marched on the Pentagon, which was ringed with troops.
By November 1967, McNamara told Johnson that there was "no reasonable way" to end the war quickly, and that the United States needed to reduce its forces in Vietnam and turn the fighting over to the American-backed government in Saigon. By the end of that month, Johnson announced he was replacing McNamara at the Pentagon and moving him to the World Bank. But by March 1968, Johnson had reached virtually the same conclusion as McNamara. He issued a call for peace talks and announced he would not seek re-election.
After leaving the Pentagon in early 1968, McNamara spent 12 years leading the World Bank. He said little publicly about Vietnam until the publication of a 1995 memoir, "In Retrospect."
"You don't know what I know about how inflammatory my words can appear," he told Morris. "A lot of people misunderstand the war, misunderstand me. A lot of people think I'm a son of a b*[email protected]"
July 6, 2009
Joe Bowman, Sharpshooter, Dies at 84
By WILLIAM GRIMES
It is not easy to whip out a pistol and split a playing card edgewise at 30 paces. Joe Bowman did it routinely, and he had a few more tricks up his elaborately embroidered western sleeve.
“I remember him throwing a washer up in the air, firing a pistol, and saying, ‘I shot right through it,’ ” said Dan Pastorini, a former quarterback for the Houston Oilers and a longtime friend of Mr. Bowman. “I laughed and said, ‘Sure, Joe.’ So he wrapped a piece of tape over the hole in the washer, threw it in the air and fired again. The tape was gone.”
Joe Bowman, known as the Straight Shooter and the Master of Triggernometry, died June 29 in Junction, Tex., where he had stopped for the night after putting on a fast-draw and sharpshooting exhibition for the Single Action Shooting Society’s annual convention near Albuquerque. He was 84 and lived in Houston.
The cause was a heart attack, his wife, Betty Reid-Bowman, said.
At gun shows and rodeos all over the country, Mr. Bowman dazzled audiences with his fancy gunplay and sharpshooting with pistol and rifle. In one of his more elaborate stunts, he put two lighted candles on either side of an ax blade, balanced a .22-caliber bullet on the blade and then split the bullet with a rifle shot. The two pieces of the bullet extinguished the candle flames.
Mr. Bowman’s way with a gun made him famous. In the United States, he trained television and film actors to draw a gun at lightning speed and twirl a six-shooter with authority. In “Lonesome Dove,” Robert Duvall hefted the heavy Walker revolver once used by the Texas Rangers thanks to lessons from Mr. Bowman.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/football/nfl/07/07/mcnair.ap/index.html
RIP Steve McNair
I'm still in shock over the circumstances of his death.
Walter Cronkite, who pioneered and then mastered the role of television news anchorman with such plain-spoken grace that he was called the most trusted man in America, died Friday, his family said. He was 92.
From 1962 to 1981, Mr. Cronkite was a nightly presence in American homes and always a reassuring one, guiding viewers through national triumphs and tragedies alike, from moonwalks to war, in an era when network news was central to many people’s lives.
By WILLIAM GRIMES
Published: July 19, 2009
Frank McCourt, a former New York City schoolteacher who turned his miserable childhood in Limerick, Ireland, into a phenomenally popular, Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir, “Angela’s Ashes,” died in Manhattan on Sunday. He was 78 and lived in Manhattan and Roxbury, Conn.
Wow, I wonder if Harry and Henry knew each other! R.I.P.
Taken in 2006. Left to right, Harry Patch, Bill Stone and Henry Allingham. They are all gone now
By ALASTAIR MACAULAY
Published: July 27, 2009
Merce Cunningham, the revolutionary American choreographer, died Sunday night at his home in Manhattan. He was 90.
His death was announced by the Cunningham Dance Foundation.
Over a career of nearly seven decades, Mr. Cunningham went on posing “But” and “What if?” questions, making people rethink the essence of dance and choreography. He went on doing so almost to the last.
SOURCE: The New York Times - Jazz
George Russell, a jazz composer, educator and musician whose theories led the way to radical changes in jazz in the 1950s and ’60s, died on Monday in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston. He was 86 and lived in Boston.
The cause was complications of Alzheimer’s disease, said his wife, Alice.
Though he largely operated behind the scenes and was never well known to the general public, Mr. Russell was a major figure in one of the most important developments in post-World War II jazz: the emergence of modal jazz, the first major harmonic change in the music after bebop.
Bebop, the modern style pioneered by Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and others, had introduced a new level of harmonic sophistication, based on rapidly moving cycles of dense and sometimes dissonant chords. Modal jazz, as popularized by Miles Davis and John Coltrane, sought to give musicians more freedom and to simplify the harmonic playing field by, in essence, replacing chords with scales as the primary basis for improvisation.
Billy Lee Riley 1933-2009
RIP John Hughes
I grew up on his movies, many of which helped define a generation. I love The Breakfast Club, and may have seen it more than any other non-Eastwood flick.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/Movies/08/06/obit.john.hughes/index.html
Hughes died of a heart attack while taking a morning walk in Manhattan, according to the statement.
TOKYO —
German soprano Hildegard Behrens, one of the finest Wagnerian performers of her generation, has died while traveling in Japan. She was 72.
Jonathan Friend, artistic administrator of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, said in an email to opera officials that Behrens felt unwell while traveling to a festival near Tokyo. She went to a Tokyo hospital, where she died of an apparent aneurism on Tuesday.
Friend’s email was shared with The Associated Press by Jack Mastroianni, director of IMG Artists.
Her funeral was planned in Vienna.
Organizers for Behrens’ visit in Japan said she was in this country to teach lessons in the hot springs resort town of Kusatsu, north of Tokyo, from Aug 21-29. The lessons were being sponsored by the Kanshinetsu Music Association.
The organizers refused to comment further.
A website for the Kusatsu Summer Music Festival said Behrens’ performances had been canceled, but gave no further details. It said she was to perform on Aug 20.
Behrens was among the finest actors on the opera stage during a professional career that spanned more than three decades. She made her professional stage debut in Freiburg as the Countess in Mozart’s “Le Nozze di Figaro” in 1971 and made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Giorgetta in Puccini’s “Il Tabarro” in 1976.
One of her breakthrough roles came the following year, when she sang the title role in Strauss’ “Salome” at the Salzburg Festival in Austria.
She sang 171 performances at the Met, where she appeared until 1999. Her breakthrough there was as Leonore in Beethoven’s “Fidelio” under conductor Karl Boehm in 1980, and she was most acclaimed in the late 1980s and early 1990s for her portrayal of Bruennhilde in the Otto Schenk production of the Ring Cycle, the Met’s first televised staging of Wagner’s tetralogy.
“She is the finest Bruennhilde of the post-Birgit Nilsson era,” Associated Press critic Mike Silverman wrote in 1989. “Though she lacks the overpowering vocal resources of a great Wagnerian soprano, she makes up for that with dramatic intensity as she changes before our eyes from a frisky young Valkyrie to a passionate and then betrayed lover, and finally to a compassionate woman whose sacrifice returns the ring to its rightful owners, the Rhinemaidens.”
A dramatic soprano, her Met career include Elettra in Mozart’s “Idomeneo,” Isolde in Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde,” Senta in “Die Fliegende Hollander,” Donna Anna in Mozart’s “Don Giovanni,” Santuzza in Mascagni’s “Cavalleria Rusticana,” the title roles in Strauss’ “Elektra” and `Salome,” and Puccini’s “Tosca,” and Marie in Berg’s “Wozzeck.”
She recorded Isolde in Munich in 1981 with conductor Leonard Bernstein and received praise for her Bruennhilde with conductor Georg Solti at the Bayreuth Festival in 1983. Her “Tosca” at the Met, opposite Placido Domingo’s Cavaradossi, is preserved on video along with her Met Ring Cycle.
She was injured during the final scene of Wagner’s “Goetterdaemmerung” at the Met on April 28, 1990, when Valhalla collapsed prematurely and an overhead of foam rubber landed on her. Behrens walked off the stage under her own power and was taken to Roosevelt Hospital.
She missed subsequent performances because of the injury, and later sued the Met, according to a 1995 article in The New York Law Journal.
According to Behren’s official website, she was born in the north German town of Varel-Oldenburg. Her parents were both doctors and she and her five siblings studied piano and violin as children. It said she earned a law degree from the University of Freiburg, where she was also a member of the student choir.
She received Germany’s Bundesverdienstkreuz (Order of the Merit Cross), Bavaria’s Bayerischer Verdienstorden and was honored by both the Bavarian State Opera in Munich and the Vienna State Opera.
"M*A*S*H" TV show writer Larry Gelbart dead at 81
Writer Larry Gelbart, who developed the hit television show "M*A*S*H" that uncovered a rich wellspring of comedy and pathos in war, died of cancer on Friday at age 81.
Australian explorer Mike Leyland dies age 68
Mike Leyland, one half of iconic Australian exploration team The Leyland Brothers, has passed away aged 68.
The Leyland brothers rose to fame as pioneering Australian explorers and documentary film-makers, and were best known for their popular Channel Nine television show, Ask the Leyland Brothers.
Ask the Leyland Brothers ran on Australian television from 1976 until 1984.
Always remember watching The Leyland Brothers on TV every Saturday night as a kid.
Just heard the sad news that Patrick Swayze has succumbed to pancreatic cancer at the age of 57.
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-mew-patrick-swayze15-2009sep15,1,927951.story
R.I.P.
(http://livenews.com.au/feature/australian-explorer-mike-leyland-dies-age-68/2009/9/14/219364)
Always remember watching The Leyland Brothers on TV every Saturday night
Just heard the sad news that Patrick Swayze has succumbed to pancreatic cancer at the age of 57.
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-mew-patrick-swayze15-2009sep15,1,927951.story
R.I.P.
Actor Henry Gibson dead at 73, spokesman says
LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Actor Henry Gibson, who played roles ranging from loopy poets to vengeful Illinois Nazis and cranky judges during a 40-year film and television career, has died at age 73, his representatives said Wednesday.
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Gibson was a regular on "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In," where he was known for popping up to read short, humorous poems during the show's 1968-71 run.
He was a frequent guest star on television shows from the 1970s through the mid-2000s, with a recurring role as a judge on ABC's "Boston Legal" as late as 2008.
His movie roles included turns in two of director Robert Altman's 1970s films, "Nashville" and "The Long Goodbye," and as the neo-Nazi leader pursuing John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd in "The Blues Brothers."
No details of his death were immediately available, said Peter Gross, a spokesman Talentworks LA, which represented Gibson.
AUSTRALIAN television great Don Lane has passed away in Sydney.
The American-born Lane, best known for his work on the hugely successful Don Lane Show, had recently battled Alzheimer's Disease and is believed to have died at an Eastern suburbs care facility.
An era has ended :That would be Joseph Wiseman. He was 91.
Dr No is dead......Wiseman was last surviving 60s Bond villain :'(
Richard Todd, dashing actor and real-life hero on D-Day, dies age 90
Near the end of his life Richard Todd, the actor who has died aged 90, was asked what it meant to be British. “To me,” he said, “it means fairness, good sense, decency, kindness, politeness.”
To that list he might have added heroism, and a certain understatement. Todd, the star who embodied all those virtues, may be best known now for his performance in The Dam Busters and a series of other war films in which matinee idol good looks and a stiff upper lip helped to defeat the Nazis.
Simmons, who was 80 and had lung cancer, died at her home in Santa Monica on Friday night, it quoted her agent Judy Page as saying.
Born in London, Simmons started acting in films as a teenager and later moved to the United States to star in movies such as the 1955 musical "Guys and Dolls" with Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, and Stanley Kubrick's "Spartacus" with Kirk Douglas in 1960.
Simmons won a best supporting actress Oscar nomination for playing Ophelia in "Hamlet" in 1948 and a best actress nomination for her role in "The Happy Ending" -- a 1969 film directed by her second husband Richard Brooks.
Her marriage to Brooks ended in divorce in 1977. She married Brooks in 1960, months after divorcing actor Stewart Granger.
"As a 14-year-old dance student she was plucked from her school to play Margaret Lockwood's precocious sister in 'Give Us the Moon' (1944)," according to a biography of the actress on IMDb.COM movies website.
Simmons "made a comeback to films in 1995 in 'How to Make an American Quilt' co-starring Winona Ryder and Anne Bancroft, and most recently played the elderly Sophie in the English version of Hayao Miyazaki's 'Hauru no ugoku shiro'," a 2004 animated film, according to IMDb.COM.
Simmons is survived by her two daughters, Tracy Granger and Kate Brooks, Los Angeles Times said. She lived in Santa Monica with her pets, a dog and two cats, according to IMDb.COM.
(Reporting by Mohammad Zargham; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
Robert B. Parker, R.I.P. (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/20/books/20parker.html)
"The name's Spenser, with an 'S', like the poet."
He was a good writer ... for a Red Sox fan. ;)
'Catcher in the Rye' author J.D. Salinger dies
By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National Writer Hillel Italie, Ap National Writer – Thu Jan 28, 6:44 pm ET
NEW YORK – J.D. Salinger, the legendary author, youth hero and fugitive from fame whose "The Catcher in the Rye" shocked and inspired a world he increasingly shunned, has died. He was 91.
Salinger died of natural causes at his home on Wednesday, the author's son, actor Matt Salinger, said in a statement from Salinger's longtime literary representative, Harold Ober Associates, Inc. He had lived for decades in self-imposed isolation in a small, remote house in Cornish, N.H.
(http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/240/13495459.jpg) (http://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Franny-and-Zooey-JD-Salinger-Lotte-Jacobi/photo//100128/480/eb4cc7403cfc47b98c03a67039962be3//s:/ap/20100128/ap_on_en_ot/us_obit_salinger)
Ruben Kruger - Rugby Player
South Africa
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Full name Ruben Jacobus Kruger
Born March 30, 1970, Vrede
Died January 27, 2010 (aged 39 years 303 days)
Major teams South Africa
Position Flanker
Height 6 ft 2 in
Weight 224 lb
Former South Africa flanker Ruben Kruger has passed away following a long battle with brain cancer.
Ruben Kruger played for the South Africa national rugby union team between 1993 and 1999. In 1995, he played in the Rugby World Cup. During this tournament, he made 5 starts, and scored 1 try, in the controversial semi-final against the France national rugby union team. Years later, he admitted that the try was not legitimate. He also played in the 1999 World Cup.
At club level, Ruben Kruger represented his South African province in the Currie Cup for the Blue Bulls (former team of Northern Transvaal).
In 1995 Ruben Kruger was named South African Rugby Football Union's player of the year.
Grant Roberts played the part of Ruben Kruger in Invictus
90% of obituary/news posts are generally the same.There's no reason to link to/quote from more than one source unless you want to take that trouble.
http://www.imdb.com/DiedInYear?year=2010
I always go through this page every few weeks, as there is always someone well known, but not a huge name in Hollywood that passes away, but doesn't get mentioned here in the press, or if it does in such a tiny blurb you can easily miss it. I always get a little shock when I see a name that I recognise but didn't know they had left us.
Looks like they've stopped that page altogether now for some reason. I always found it so helpful.
Try this link ...
http://us.imdb.com/search/name?death_date=2010
DOVER, Tenn. – Charles B. Pierce, an independent filmmaker whose inexpensively made documentary-style drama "The Legend of Boggy Creek" influenced the hit film "The Blair Witch Project" decades later, has died at age 71.
Pierce, who grew up in Arkansas and made his films mostly in that state, died Friday at a Dover nursing home, according to Wayne Anglin of Anglin Funeral Home at Dover. A cause of death could not be obtained.
Pierce was born in Hammond, Ind., but moved to southwest Arkansas with his family as a child, according to a daughter, Amanda "Amy" Squitiero. He grew up in Hampton, Ark., and as an adult lived in nearby Texarkana, where he ran an advertising agency. But it was his 1972 low-budget movie that gained him fame.
'Boggy Creek' filmmaker Pierce dies in Tenn. at 71
He was also a screenwriter for the 1983 film "Sudden Impact," starring Clint Eastwood.
'Lost Boys' star Corey Haim dies at 38
From Alan Duke, CNN
March 10, 2010 2:31 p.m. EST
Los Angeles, California (CNN) -- Former 1980s teen movie actor and heartthrob Corey Haim died early Wednesday, authorities said.
Haim, 38, was taken to Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, California, where he was pronounced dead at 2:15 a.m. PT (5:15 a.m. ET), said Lt. Cheryl MacWillie, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County coroner's office. The hospital is a mile from Haim's apartment.
A 911 call came in just before 1 a.m. PT (4 a.m. ET), said police Sgt. William Mann.
Los Angeles police Sgt. Frank Albarran said earlier that Haim's death appeared to be accidental and may have been due to an overdose.
But "the cause of death at this time is unknown," Mann said. "He had flulike symptoms before the incident. His mother was giving him various over-the-counter medications."
Haim's agent, Mark Heaslip, also told CNN's sister network HLN, "We do not think this is a drug overdose. Corey was actually going very clean in his life."
Haim had struggled with drug abuse in recent years, but Heaslip said he was attempting to wage a comeback and had signed several contracts, including one for a reality show.
Haim was not feeling well Tuesday night and was running a low-grade fever, he said. The actor went into his mother's bedroom and asked her to lie down by him, Heaslip said. He told his mother he was having trouble breathing, and his mother told him to roll on his side, he said. He began to feel better, but at midnight he woke his mother by walking around the bedroom and then collapsed.
Asked if news of Haim's death comes as a surprise, Heaslip said, "100 percent." He said the death could have come as a reaction to medication Haim was taking as part of his sobriety program.
The actor was under the care of his doctor, who visited him Tuesday night, as well as an addictionologist, Heaslip said. An addictionologist is a doctor who specializes in treating addictions.
Haim's mother's condition was "horrible," he told HLN. "She's a wreck."
The coroner's office has taken possession of Haim's body, MacWillie said.
The actor's most famous role was in the 1987 movie "The Lost Boys" in which he appeared with his frequent co-star, Corey Feldman.
In later years, the two friends -- who appeared in eight movies together -- both struggled with drug abuse and went their separate ways. They reunited for a reality show, "The Two Coreys," in 2007, but A&E Network canceled the program after slightly more than a year.
Did you ever meet Corey Haim? Share your photos, story
In a 2007 interview on CNN's "Larry King Live," Haim and Feldman both discussed their battle with drugs. Feldman told King that he had gotten clean, but it took Haim a while longer.
Haim called himself "a chronic relapser for the rest of my life."
"I think I have an addiction to pretty much everything," he said. "I mean, I have to be very careful with myself as far as that goes, which is why I have a support group around me consistently."
He told King that he also had lost more than 150 pounds while getting sober.
"I didn't like looking in the mirror anymore," Haim said. "I couldn't do it ... See, I hit about, my peak, about 302 [pounds]. ... And now I'm back to 150."
In 2008, Feldman told People magazine that he would no longer speak to Haim until his former co-star got sober. In a clip from "The Two Coreys," Feldman and his wife, along with two other former teen stars, called on Haim in an effort to get him to admit he needed help, the magazine said.
The meeting followed an incident in which Haim -- scheduled to film a cameo appearance in a direct-to-DVD sequel to "The Lost Boys" -- appeared on the set "clearly under the influence," People reported.
"I don't feel that he's a safe person to have around my wife and child at the moment, for a multitude of reasons," Feldman told People. Haim told the magazine in the August 2008 story that he was currently sober and said, "I will always love Corey Feldman, but I lost 105 percent respect for him and his wife."
Christopher Ameruoso, a photographer who lives in the Oakwood Apartments complex, said Wednesday that Haim had been his neighbor for at least a year. He said he last saw Haim two days ago getting into a taxi.
"He looked good," he said. "He's putting on a lot of weight."
He said Haim sometimes could be seen wandering around the complex, "looking for companionship, looking for friends."
Haim was born December 23, 1971 in Toronto, Ontario, according to a biography on his Web site. He made his first television appearance in 1982 on the Canadian series "The Edison Twins." His first film role was in 1984, when he appeared in the American movie "First Born."
Haim also won rave reviews for his title role in the 1986 film "Lucas." Film critic Roger Ebert said of him at the time, "If he continues to act this well, he will never become a half-forgotten child star, but will continue to grow into an important actor."
Following "The Lost Boys," both Haim and Feldman appeared in "License to Drive" and "Dream a Little Dream."
Actor Peter Graves found dead at his home in Pacific Palisades
March 14, 2010 | 5:08 pm
Lanow.graves Actor Peter Graves was found dead Sunday at his home in Pacific Palisades, according to law enforcement sources. Graves, who stared in "Mission: Impossible," "Airplane!" and Billy Wilder's "Stalag 17"--apparently died of natural causes, the sources said.
Graves was 83, according to a biography on the website IMDB.com.
In a Times story late last year, Graves said he initially turned down the role for "Airplane!" because he thought it was in poor taste--until actors Robert Stack, Lloyd Bridges and Leslie Nielsen signed on to the cast. "They say you are supposed to stretch as an actor, so let's go stretch it," he told The Times' Susan King.
--Andrew Blankstein and Cara Mia DiMassa
I liked him in Mission Impossible.
Disney had been searching for a quintessential American type to play the rough-hewn hero of the Alamo and had considered established stars like Glenn Ford, Sterling Hayden and Ronald Reagan before deciding against them. When someone suggested James Arness, Disney went to see “Them!,” a well-regarded 1954 science-fiction movie in which Mr. Arness — who later went on to TV stardom on “Gunsmoke” — had a major role. Mr. Parker had a small but visible part in the film, and when Disney saw him — rugged-looking and well over 6 feet tall — he was said to have exclaimed, “There’s our Davy Crockett!”
So Sylvie, how do you say "Killed him a b'ar when he was only three" in French? :D
Y'avait un homme qui s'appelait Davy
Il était né dans le Tennessee
Si courageux que quand il était p'tit
Il tua un ours du premier coup d'fusil
Davy, Davy Crockett, l'homme qui n'a jamais peur
Actor Robert Culp passed away today. (http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Movies/03/24/obit.robert.culp/index.html?hpt=P1) He was in the "Rawhide" episode Incident at the Top of the World.
Also for those that don't know Dennis Hopper has been battling prostate cancer for quite awhile now. Well it seems that he's taken a huge turn for the worse. He weighs almost 100 pounds now and is close to passing. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100325/ap_on_en_mo/us_people_dennis_hopper;_ylt=Annv5fKSUWWS1JS8lATrEUCs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTJzZ3A3YWhkBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMzI1L3VzX3Blb3BsZV9kZW5uaXNfaG9wcGVyBGNwb3MDOQRwb3MDNgRzZWMDeW5faGVhZGxpbmVfbGlzdARzbGsDZGl2b3JjZWF0dG9y)
Actor Robert Culp passed away today. (http://www.cnn.com/2010/SHOWBIZ/Movies/03/24/obit.robert.culp/index.html?hpt=P1) He was in the "Rawhide" episode Incident at the Top of the World.
Also for those that don't know Dennis Hopper has been battling prostate cancer for quite awhile now. Well it seems that he's taken a huge turn for the worse. He weighs almost 100 pounds now and is close to passing. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100325/ap_on_en_mo/us_people_dennis_hopper;_ylt=Annv5fKSUWWS1JS8lATrEUCs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTJzZ3A3YWhkBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMzI1L3VzX3Blb3BsZV9kZW5uaXNfaG9wcGVyBGNwb3MDOQRwb3MDNgRzZWMDeW5faGVhZGxpbmVfbGlzdARzbGsDZGl2b3JjZWF0dG9y)
Charlie's an Angel Now: John Forsythe Dies at 92
Something in Forsythe's uncomplicated manliness appealed to Alfred Hitchcock; maybe Hitch saw him as a domesticated Cary Grant, or Jimmy Stewart with better posture.
Programming the Altair was an extremely tedious process. The user toggled the switches to positions corresponding to an 8080 microprocessor instruction or opcode in binary, then used an 'enter' switch to load the code into the machine's memory, and then repeated this step until all the opcodes of a presumably complete and correct program were in place. When the machine first shipped the switches and lights were the only interface, and all one could do with the machine was make programs to make the lights blink.
Dixie Carter passed away at age 70. She was one of the stars of the sitcom Designing Women.
http://tv.yahoo.com/news/article/tv-news.en.ap.org/tv-news.en.ap.org-20100411-us_obit_dixie_carter
The Oscar-nominated screenwriter Furio Scarpelli, who co-wrote some of the best post-war Italian comedies and the spaghetti western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, starring Clint Eastwood died yesterday.
He was 90. Scarpelli received two Oscar nominations for best screenwriting in the 1960s. He received another nomination for Il Postino ("The Postman") in 1996.
Lynn Redgrave, who as an actress upheld the tradition of her theatrically royal family on stage and on screen and as a playwright wrote about her family with probing affection and equally probing anguish, died on Sunday at her home in Kent, Conn. She was 67.
Since blacks were not allowed to live in Hollywood, “Felix Young, a white man, signed for the house as if he was going to rent it,” Ms. Horne said. “When the neighbors found out, Humphrey Bogart, who lived right across the street from me, raised hell with them for passing around a petition to get rid of me.” Bogart, she said, “sent word over to the house that if anybody bothered me, please let him know.”
Frank Frazetta, an illustrator of comic books, movie posters and paperback book covers whose visions of musclebound men fighting with swords and axes to defend scantily dressed women helped define fantasy heroes like Conan, Tarzan and John Carter of Mars, died on Monday in Fort Myers, Fla. He was 82.
One of my childhood heros passed on this morning. :'(
Keep on rocking Ronnie James Dio! >:D
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jA6HT4q0zJZ0g1f80auXnU5vacJQD9FO6D100
NEW YORK – Jazz pianist and composer Hank Jones, whose 70-year career included a stint as Ella Fitzgerald's pianist and Marilyn Monroe's accompanist when she sang "Happy Birthday" to President John F. Kennedy, has died, his manager said Monday. He was 91.
Jones, who won a Grammy lifetime achievement award last year and received the National Medal of Arts from President George W. Bush in 2008, died Sunday night at a New York hospital after a brief illness, Jean-Pierre Leduc said.
A tireless musician who performed his blend of swing and bebop until the end, Jones came from a family of jazz musicians who included brothers Thad, a trumpeter, composer and arranger, and Elvin, a drummer known for the polyrhythmic beat that propelled John Coltrane's classic quartet.
(http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/9003/dio1972.jpg)
R.I.P.
Garrett also played a bartender in the 1977 Diane Keaton film "Looking for Mr. Goodbar" and a cop on Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry" (1971).
Louise Bourgeois, the French-born American artist who gained fame only late in a long career, when her psychologically charged abstract sculptures, drawings and prints had a galvanizing effect on the work of younger artists, particularly women, died on Monday in Manhattan, where she lived. She was 98.
Rue McClanahan, 'Golden Girl' Blanche, dies in NY
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) – Corey Allen, who fatally challenged James Dean to a "chicken race" in the 1955 film classic "Rebel Without a Cause" before embarking on a career as a prolific TV director, died of natural causes in Hollywood on Sunday, two days before his 76th birthday.
With the May 29 death of his longtime friend Dennis Hopper, Allen was briefly the last surviving member of the "Rebel" main cast. He played Buzz Gunderson, one of the pic's antagonistic tough guys in a leather jacket.
Allen turned to directing in 1969, and collected an Emmy Award for a 1983 episode of "Hill Street Blues" after being nominated for another series episode two years earlier. In all, he shot about 80 TV episodes and 20 TV movies.
The star passed away on Thursday (01Jul10) after battling a suspected viral infection.
Hutchings trained at Britain's famous Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) and began his career on the stage with the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC), later winning a Laurence Olivier Award in 1982 for his role in popular musical Poppy.
He moved on to movie roles, appearing on the big screen opposite Clint Eastwood in 1990's White Hunter, Black Heart, as well as enjoying turns in Kenneth Branagh's Henry V, Topsy-Turvy, Clockwise with John Cleese and The Affair of the Necklace alongside Hilary Swank.
He was great as Sid James....
From the last days of DiMaggio through the primes of Mantle, Berra, Jackson and Jeter, Sheppard’s precise, resonant, even Olympian elocution — he was sometimes called the Voice of God — greeted Yankee fans with the words, “Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Yankee Stadium.”
“The Yankees and Bob Sheppard were a marriage made in heaven,” said his son Paul Sheppard, a 71-year-old financial adviser. “I know St. Peter will now recruit him. If you’re lucky enough to go to heaven, you’ll be greeted by a voice, saying, ‘Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to heaven!’ ”
In an era of blaring stadium music, of public-address announcers styling themselves as entertainers and cheerleaders, Sheppard, a man with a passion for poetry and Shakespeare, shunned hyperbole.
“A public-address announcer should be clear, concise, correct,” he said. “He should not be colorful, cute or comic.”
Harvey Pekar, whose autobiographical comic book series "American Splendor" portrayed his life with bone-dry honesty and wit, was found dead at home early Monday, authorities said. He was 70.
Pekar never drew himself but depended on collaborations with artists, most notably his friend R. Crumb, who helped illustrate the first issue of the ironically titled "American Splendor," published in 1976. It was made into an acclaimed 2003 film starring Paul Giamatti. The most recent "American Splendor" was released in 2008.
Pekar's quirky commentary developed a following and his insights and humor were often a bit on the dark side.
NEW YORK -- George Steinbrenner, who rebuilt the New York Yankees into a sports empire with a mix of bluster and big bucks that polarized fans all across America, died Tuesday. He had just celebrated his 80th birthday July 4.
Steinbrenner had a heart attack, was taken to St. Joseph's Hospital in Tampa, Fla., and died at about 6:30 a.m. ET, according to multiple reports.
"It is with profound sadness that the family of George M. Steinbrenner III announces his passing. He passed away this morning in Tampa, Fla., at age 80," the Steinbrenner family said in a statement.
"He was an incredible and charitable man. First and foremost he was devoted to his entire family -- his beloved wife, Joan; his sisters, Susan Norpell and Judy Kamm, his children, Hank, Jennifer Jessica and Hal; and all of his grandchildren.
"He was a visionary and a giant in the world of sports. He took a great but struggling franchise and turned it into a champion again."
The Steinbrenner family said that funeral arrangements will be private, however details about an additional public service will be announced at a later date.
His death was the second in three days to rock the Yankees. Bob Sheppard, the team's revered public address announcer from 1951-07, died Sunday at 99.
For more than 30 years, Steinbrenner lived up to his billing as "the Boss," a nickname he earned and clearly enjoyed as he ruled with an iron fist.
Her big-screen heyday included roles in 'Blacula,' 'Hammer' and 'Shaft in Africa.' She later appeared with Clint Eastwood in 'The Eiger Sanction.' In the '80s, she had numerous TV credits
I've always thought Vonetta McGee was very good in The Eiger Sanction (I have seen Blacula as well).
Elliott Kastner, film producer: born New York City 20 January 1930 died London 30 June 2010.
Elliott Kastner: Film producer best known for his adaptations of novels by MacLean and Chandler
By Tom Vallance
Kastner's biggest hit of all was the first of three films he made from Alistair MacLean stories, Where Eagles Dare (1968), a Second World War adventure with Burton and Eastwood leading a group of commandos on a mission to rescue an American general being held captive by Nazis in a castle in the Bavarian Alps. The film had its genesis in a request from Burton that Kastner find him a popular subject in which he could play a "real hero" to please his children, who were tired of seeing him in heavy drama. Kastner then approached MacLean, who wrote the original script in six weeks, later turning it into a novel. Brian G Hutton directed, but famed action man Yakima Canutt directed the team of stuntmen in the action sequences, causing Eastwood to suggest the film be re-titled Where Doubles Dare. Kastner's later films by MacLean, When Eight Bells Toll (1971) and Breakheart Pass (1975), did not have equal success, though the latter, starring Charles Bronson, was a gripping and inventive Western, set mainly on a train.
He may not be a celebrity but I believe David Warren deserves a mention in this thread. You may not recognise the name but you'll know of his invention.
www.theaustralian.com.au (http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/aviation/black-box-inventor-david-warren-dies-at-85/story-e6frg95x-1225895120709)
I think there's just a couple o' guys up there and this @#!hole is one of them!
Actress Patricia Neal has passed away.
I saw her in so many great films with some big names, John Wayne, Gary Cooper. It will be Hud that I'll forever remember her in.
Just a brilliant performance.
RIP Patricia. :'(
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/09/movies/09neal.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
That New York Times obit makes gripping reading. As Brian said, a hell of a life.
R.I.P.
ELO star Mike Edwards dies in freak hay bale accident
The Telegraph said Edwards was driving down the A381 highway when the circular hay bale careened down a slope in a field beside the road, flipped over a hedge and went airborne into traffic, landing on the roof of his van.
Kevin McCarthy, the suave, square-jawed actor who earned accolades in stage and screen productions of “Death of a Salesman” but will always be best known as the star of the 1956 science fiction movie “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” died Saturday at Cape Cod Hospital in Hyannis, Mass. . He was 96.
I only just found out about the passing of Harold Gould on September 11, 2010.
I'll always remember him as Kid Twist in The Sting.
RIP Harold. :(
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/arts/14gould.html
LOS ANGELES – James Bacon, who began his career at The Associated Press in the 1940s and spent six decades chronicling Hollywood's biggest stars as a reporter, author and syndicated columnist, died Saturday. He was 96.
Bacon died in his sleep of congestive heart failure at his Northridge home, according to family friend Stan Rosenfield.
As a reporter for the AP for 23 years and later as columnist for the now-defunct Los Angeles Herald Examiner, Bacon had a knack for befriending A-list celebrities. He palled around with John Wayne, shared whisky with Frank Sinatra, was a confidant of Marilyn Monroe and met eight U.S. presidents.
"Jim always made you feel like ... he was a pal looking to hang out," Clint Eastwood once said of Bacon.R.I.P.
Eddie Fisher, one of the most popular singers of the 1950s who made headlines with marriages to — and divorces from — some of the most famous Hollywood starlets of that era, has died. He was 82.
I only just found out about the passing of Harold Gould on September 11, 2010.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/arts/14gould.html
British businessman Jimi Heselden, who bought the company last year, dies in a fall off a cliff on his West Yorkshire estate, apparently while riding a Segway.
Gloria Stuart, a glamorous blond actress during Hollywood’s golden age who was largely forgotten until she made a memorable comeback in her 80s in the 1997 epic “Titanic,” died on Sunday at her home in Los Angeles. She was 100.
Arthur Penn, the stage, television and motion picture director whose revolutionary treatment of sex and violence in the 1967 film “Bonnie and Clyde” transformed the American film industry, died on Tuesday night at his home in Manhattan, the day after he turned 88.
The cause was congestive heart failure, his son, Matthew, said.
A pioneering director of live television drama in the 1950s and a Broadway powerhouse in the 1960s, Mr. Penn developed an intimate, spontaneous and physically oriented method of directing actors that allowed their work to register across a range of mediums.
In 1957 he directed William Gibson’s television play “The Miracle Worker” for the CBS series “Playhouse 90” and earned Emmy nominations for himself, his writer and his star, Teresa Wright. In 1959 he restaged “The Miracle Worker” for Broadway and won Tony Awards for himself, his writer and his star, Anne Bancroft. And in 1962 he directed the film version of the Gibson text, capturing the best actress Oscar for Bancroft, the best supporting actress Oscar for her co-star, Patty Duke, and nominations for writing and directing.
Mr. Penn’s direction may have also changed American history. He advised Senator John F. Kennedy during his watershed television debates with Richard M. Nixon in 1960 (and directed the broadcast of the third debate). Mr. Penn’s instructions to Kennedy — to look directly into the camera and keep his responses brief and pithy — helped give Kennedy an aura of confidence and calm that created a vivid contrast to Nixon, his more experienced but less telegenic Republican rival.
But it was as a film director that Mr. Penn left his mark on American culture, most indelibly with “Bonnie and Clyde.”
Tony Curtis, a classically handsome movie star who earned an Oscar nomination as an escaped convict in Stanley Kramer’s 1958 movie “The Defiant Ones,” but whose public preferred him in comic roles in films like “Some Like It Hot” (1959) and “The Great Race” (1965), died Wednesday of cardiac arrest in his Las Vegas area home. He was 85.
His death was confirmed by the Clark County coroner, The Associated Press reported.
As a performer, Mr. Curtis drew first and foremost on his startlingly good looks. With his dark, curly hair, worn in a sculptural style later imitated by Elvis Presley, and plucked eyebrows framing pale blue eyes and wide, full lips, Mr. Curtis embodied a new kind of feminized male beauty that came into vogue in the early 1950s. A vigorous heterosexual in his widely publicized (not least by himself) private life, he was often cast in roles that drew on a perceived ambiguity: his full-drag impersonation of a female jazz musician in “Some Like It Hot”; a slave who attracts the interest of a Roman senator (Laurence Olivier) in Stanley Kubrick’s “Spartacus” (1960); a man attracted to a mysterious blond (Debbie Reynolds) who turns out to be the reincarnation of his male best friend in Vincente Minnelli’s “Goodbye Charlie” (1964).
But behind the pretty-boy looks could be found a dramatically potent combination of naked ambition and deep vulnerability, both likely products of his Dickensian childhood in the Bronx. Tony Curtis was born Bernard Schwartz on June 3, 1925, to Helen and Emanuel Schwartz, Jewish immigrants from Hungary. Emanuel operated a tailor shop in a poor neighborhood, and the family occupied cramped quarters behind the store, the parents in one room and little Bernard sharing another with his two brothers, Julius and Robert. Helen Schwartz suffered from schizophrenia and frequently beat the three boys. (Robert was later found to have the same disease.)
Stephen J. Cannell, the prolific television writer and producer who co-created "The Rockford Files" and "The A-Team" and later became a bestselling novelist, has died. He was 69.
Cannell died Thursday evening of complications associated with melanoma at his home in Pasadena, his family said.
AMSTERDAM (AP) — Solomon Burke, the larger-than-life "King of Rock and Soul" who was revered as one of music's greatest vocalists but never reached the level of fame of those he influenced, died early Sunday at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport. He was 70.
Born to the sound of music in an upstairs room of a Philadelphia church, Burke was acknowledged as one of the greatest soul singers of the 1960s, but his popularity never matched that of contemporaries like James Brown or Marvin Gaye.
Two of Burke's best-known songs reached a wider audience when they were featured in hit movies.
He wrote "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love" in 1964 and it was later featured in the Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi movie "The Blues Brothers." The Rolling Stones and Wilson Pickett also recorded it.
A bare-chested Patrick Swayze danced seductively with Jennifer Grey to Burke's "Cry To Me" in one of the most memorable scenes from the movie "Dirty Dancing."
Simon MacCorkindale, the dashing British actor who turned heads in the star-studded 1978 film “Death on the Nile” and went on to play villains and charming Englishmen on numerous television shows in Britain and the United States, died on Thursday in London. He was 58.
I remember Tom in Happy Days.
I'll also always remember Tom Bosley as David the Gnome.
Tom Bosley passed away! RIP
http://tv.yahoo.com/news/article/tv-news.en.reuters.com/tv-news.en.reuters.com-20101019-us_tombosley
Don't worry KC.
There'll be only one more big story about Paul, and then no one is going to hear about him again...
(http://gamedesignconcepts.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/snidelywhiplash.png?w=293&h=400)
NO ONE DARE ASK ME WHAT MY PREDICTIONS ABOUT THE SUPERBOWL IS!!!!
LOS ANGELES - Stage and screen actor James MacArthur, who played "Danno" in the original version of television's "Hawaii Five-O," died Thursday at age 72.
MacArthur's agent, Richard Lewis, said the actor died in Florida of "natural causes," but no direct cause was specified.
In a career that spanned more than four decades, MacArthur was most recognized for his role as detective Danny "Danno" Williams on "Hawaii Five-O," which aired from 1968 to 1980. Episodes often ended with detective Steve McGarrett, the lead character, uttering what became a pop culture catch phrase: "Book 'em, Danno."
Let's not forget his role in Hang 'Em High!
(http://i1020.photobucket.com/albums/af323/TWOMULES/11.jpg?t=1285199511)
R.I.P. Marshal Jed Cooper :'( :'(
Jill Clayburgh, a two-time Academy Award nominee for best actress, who was best known for her realistic, emotionally searing portrayals in the late-1970s films "An Unmarried Woman" and "Starting Over," died Nov. 5 at her home in Lakeville, Conn. She was 66 and had battled leukemia for 21 years.
Dino De Laurentiis, the high-flying Italian film producer and entrepreneur whose movies ranged from some of Federico Fellini’s earliest works to “Serpico,” “Death Wish” and the 1976 remake of “King Kong,” died on Wednesday at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif. He was 91.
In keeping with his adopted comic persona, when Mr. Nielsen in 1993 published an autobiography, “Naked Truth,” it was one that cheerfully, blatantly fabricated events in his life.
They included two Academy Awards, an affair with Elizabeth Taylor and a stay at a rehabilitation center, battling dopey-joke addiction.
In real life he was nominated twice for Emmy Awards, in 1982 as outstanding lead actor in a comedy series for “Police Squad!” and in 1988 as outstanding guest actor in a comedy series for an episode of “Day by Day,” an NBC sitcom about yuppies and day care.
Off screen, he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada, the country’s highest civilian honor, in 2002.
In a 1988 interview with The New York Times, Leslie Nielsen discussed his career-rejuvenating transition to comedy, a development that he had recently described as “too good to be true.”
“It’s been dawning on me slowly that for the past 35 years I have been cast against type,” he said, “and I’m finally getting to do what I really wanted to do.”
I get home, turn on the computer, and see this sad news.
R.I.P. Leslie Nielsen
That's my policy. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4ui_eQF4oE)
I get home, turn on the computer, and see this sad news.I love that one Doug!
R.I.P. Leslie Nielsen
That's my policy. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4ui_eQF4oE)
Star Wars fans will be saddened to hear of the passing of Director Irvin Kershner. Kershner directed The Empire Strikes Back, which some critics label the best sequel ever made.
http://www.nypost.com/entertainment/movies/news/n43040.htm
Star Wars fans will be saddened to hear of the passing of Director Irvin Kershner. Kershner directed The Empire Strikes Back, which some critics label the best sequel ever made.
http://www.nypost.com/entertainment/movies/news/n43040.htm
At least audiences had heard of the first three, but this guy -- it was true, when it came time to select an actor to play Dr. Rumack, my brother Jerry, Jim Abrahams and I remembered: "This one guy, he's been in hundreds of television shows, and I think he played the captain of the Poseidon. What's his name … ?" Our research revealed that the actor's name was Leslie Nielsen. Jim, Jerry and I were thrilled when he agreed to meet, not because he was "funny" but because of his long résumé of serious films and TV. To us, he was hysterical. The long list of straight dramatic acting roles demonstrated to us that he would be perfect. When we watched those movies, we laughed.
At our first meeting, he mentioned proudly that he had done an episode of M*A*S*H*.
We assured him we wouldn't count this brief comedy experience against him. But when he read the Airplane! script, he "got" its unconventional nature and offbeat style. We heard later that he told his agent, "Take whatever they offer; I'd pay them to do this."
Leslie was grateful for everything in his life (most especially his wife Barbaree), almost as though he didn't feel he deserved any of it. Maybe that's why he was so happy.
And maybe that's why he was so good at making everyone else happy.
I thought Superman II was an excellent sequel. I think the Matrix series and the Bourne movies were great as well.
RIP all of the great people by which we've had the pleasure of being entertained...
LCat. :)
A Political Life Filled With Cruel Reversals
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
Elizabeth Edwards, who as the wife of former Senator John Edwards gave America an intimate look at a candidate’s marriage by sharing his quest for the 2008 presidential nomination as she struggled with incurable cancer and, secretly, with his infidelity, died Tuesday morning at her home in Chapel Hill, N.C. She was 61.
Her family confirmed the death, saying Mrs. Edwards was surrounded by relatives when she died. A family friend said Mr. Edwards was present. On Monday, two family friends said that Mrs. Edwards’s cancer had spread to her liver and that doctors had advised against further medical treatment.
Mrs. Edwards posted a Facebook message to friends on Monday, saying, “I have been sustained throughout my life by three saving graces — my family, my friends, and a faith in the power of resilience and hope.” She added: “The days of our lives, for all of us, are numbered. We know that.”
To stay on topic I just looked up Mr. Kershner on IMDB and sad to say I'm not very familiar with his work. I don't remember liking Never Say Never Again or Robocop 2 when I saw them but would like to see Eyes Of Laura Mars. I remember the ads for this on tv way back when but haven't seen the film.
A lifelong depressive, Mr. Edwards told The New York Times in 2001 that at one point his depression was so bad that he became “seriously suicidal.” After deciding that shooting himself would be too messy and drowning too uncertain, he decided to slit his wrists on the beach at Malibu while looking at the ocean. But while he was holding a two-sided razor, his Great Dane started licking his ear, and his retriever, eager for a game of fetch, dropped a ball in his lap. Trying to get the dog to go away, Mr. Edwards threw the ball, dropped the razor and dislocated his shoulder. “So I think to myself,” he said, “this just isn’t a day to commit suicide.” Trying to retrieve the razor, he stepped on it and ended up in the emergency room.
Before [City Heat] was finished—before it was started—it became the playground for much trickier Hollywood rituals. Indeed, it developed into something like a paradigmatic conflict between someone trying to conduct business as usual, Hollywood style, and someone fully intending to do business as usual, Eastwood style. The script, under another title, had been submitted to Warners by its writer, Blake Edwards, who intended to direct it as well. It was a period piece, set in Kansas City in 1933, during the waning days of Prohibition, and it featured a bantering relationship between private eye Mike Murphy and police detective Lieutenant Speer, who had once been partners on the force but were now on the outs. The freelance investigator is a raffish sort, the cop more dour and often obliged to rescue his pal from the potentially deadly consequences of his insouciance. It had something of the air of those quick, tough little movies Warner Bros. used to make about once a month in the thirties, which Clint had always enjoyed.
When the studio passed it on to him, however, he passed on it—too talky. There the matter might have rested, except that "Blake was kind of a bad boy," says Clint. He sent the script to Sondra Locke, proposing that she again play the part of an heiress in difficulty. She—as Edwards surely expected she would—mentioned the offer to Clint and asked him why he hadn't liked the script. He replied that he hadn't entirely hated it and, rereading it, began to see self-satirizing possibilities in what he calls "the Pat O'Brien part," a sort of superego in a snap brim, imagining Burt Reynolds—then doing rather disheveled sequels to his Smokey and the Bandit and Cannonball Run successes—as the piece's Cagneyish id, the high-stepping Murphy, and giving Sondra a chance at a colorfully comedic part.
So it was done—handshakes all around—and then immediately undone. It turned out that Edwards had been using Locke to get to Clint. He announced that he had actually—well, er—promised the part to his daughter. This precipitated a small Eastwoodian explosion. There was also talk at some point of using Edwards's wife, Julie Andrews, in the role of Murphy's secretary. This brought outraged yelps from Reynolds. He had just worked with her, under Edwards's direction, in The Man Who Loved Women, and was not eager to repeat the experience. Clint, predictably dismayed by these shenanigans, threatened to withdraw.
A project-saving compromise was reached when all parties agreed not to employ any loved ones in the picture, but, needless to say, Clint remained wary. This was to be a back-lot picture—as thirties crime stories had always been—and now Edwards was insisting that a house be rented for him in Bel-Air so he did not have to make the long daily commute from his house in Malibu to the Warners and Universal lots where he would be working. The need for a car and driver was also mentioned. What was not being mentioned were certain rewrites that Edwards had promised Clint, who was aware, as well, that Reynolds was growing increasingly skittish with the situation. Of Edwards, Clint said to a studio executive, "This guy is just on a different planet."
Actually he was just on Planet Hollywood. Edwards had been around town since the forties, when he began his career as an actor, had gone on to large success in television (Peter Gunn) and features (Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Pink Panther and its sequels, 10) and obviously knew all its ropes. Indeed, he had recently made a vicious, hilarious satire on Hollywood, S.O.B. He should have known better. Certainly he should have known his leading man's reputation better.
Clint had had enough. "I'll tell you what," he said, "why don't we do this some other time, on some other script down the line that we both like?"
Warner Bros., however, decided to persist. The studio liked this attractive star pairing in a picture they were confident could be a hot Christmas release. So they fired Edwards. And turned the project over to Clint, though both Malpaso and Reynolds's company, Deliverance, would eventually share production credit. That and Clint's billing ahead of him were all right with Reynolds—"He's taller than I am," he wisecracked.
There is one Blake Edwards-Eastwood connection: Edwards wrote the original screenplay for City Heat. Can't resist quoting this rather long passage from Richard Schickel's Clint Eastwood (p. 395-396):
In the finished film, Edwards is credited as "Sam O. Brown" (think about the initials for a second). The other credited screenwriter is Joseph Stinson, who had done the script for Sudden Impact.
(http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/2474/chedwardscredit.jpg)
Screencap from City Heat, slightly cropped.
John Dye, best known as the angel of death Andrew on "Touched By an Angel," has died.
I don't know this actor, but 47 is obviously way too young.
Cold Chisel drummer Steve Prestwich dies from brain tumour
A sad day for Aussie Music. :'(
Daily Telegraph (http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/entertainment/cold-chisel-drummer-steve-prestwich-dies-from-brain-tumour/story-e6frewyr-1225989226346)
PARIS (AFP) – French actress Annie Girardot, who performed in over 100 films from the 1950s on, died in Paris on Monday after a long battle with Alzheimer's, her family said. She was 79 years old.
Born in Paris on October 25, 1931, Girardot trained as a nurse before becoming a stage actress. Jean Cocteau said she had "the most beautiful post-war dramatic temperament."
RIP
Annie Girardot (The Witches)
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/movies/02girardot.html?_r=1&ref=movies (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/movies/02girardot.html?_r=1&ref=movies)
" French actress Annie Girardot dies "
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110228/ennew_afp/entertainmentfrancefilm
Rest in peace, Annie. :'(
TRENTON, N.J. – Legendary jazz drummer Joe Morello, whose virtuosity and command of odd time signatures made him an integral part of the Dave Brubeck Quartet on such classic recordings as "Take Five" and "Blue Rondo a la Turk," has died at age 82.
Family members said Morello died Saturday at his home in northern New Jersey. A cause of death was not immediately available.
Brubeck said the loss of his friend "came as a complete shock to me."
"Many people consider the rhythm section of (bassist) Eugene Wright and Joe Morello in my quartet as being one of the most consistent, swinging rhythm sections in jazz," Brubeck said in a statement e-mailed to The Associated Press. "Drummers worldwide remember Joe as one of the greatest drummers we have known."
Jet Harris, the original bass guitarist with The Shadows, has died from throat cancer, aged 71. Harris, who received an MBE for services to music last year, joined Cliff Richard’s backing group in 1959. They were then known as The Drifters, but Harris suggested they change their name to The Shadows.
He died in the early hours of yesterday at his partner Janet Hemingway’s home in Winchester, his agent, Peter Stockton, said.
Elizabeth Taylor, R.I.P.
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/hollywood-icon-elizabeth-taylor-dies-79/story?id=12894882
(http://i.usatoday.net/communitymanager/_photos/on-deadline/2011/03/23/Taylorx-wide-community.jpg)
Elizabeth Taylor, the actress who dazzled generations of moviegoers with her stunning beauty and whose name was synonymous with Hollywood glamour, died on Wednesday in Los Angeles. She was 79.
Married or single, sick or healthy, on screen or off, Ms. Taylor never lost her appetite for experience. Late in life, when she had one of many offers to write her memoirs, she refused, saying with characteristic panache, “Hell no, I’m still living my memoirs.”
http://www.nytimes.com/?emc=na
(http://cache2.allpostersimages.com/p/LRG/12/1259/IY2T000Z/posters/elizabeth-taylor.jpg)
http://bit.ly/hw7zMh
(http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/6300000/Elizabeth-Taylor-and-Richard-Burton-elizabeth-taylor-6349969-314-400.jpg)
http://www.fanpop.com/spots/elizabeth-taylor/images/6349969/title/elizabeth-taylor-richard-burton-photo
R.I.P........ :'(
LOS ANGELES -- Clint Eastwood spoke to KSBW Action News 8 about iconic actress and friend Elizabeth Taylor's death at 79 on Wednesday.
"I was a fan of Elizabeth's since I was kid and saw her with Montgomery Clift," Eastwood said.
He said he first met Taylor in the 1960s, when he was filming "Where Eagles Dare," in Austria with Richard Burton.
"She was with us on set the whole production. We became good friends," he said. "She was a guy's girl.
Eastwood remembered Taylor as "one of the guys," but also beautiful and feminine.
"She was feminine with an edge … a great lady," Eastwood said.
They Live By Night 1946
Director Sidney Lumet has passed away.
So many great films in his career. 12 Angry Men, Serpico, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, The Verdict and many others.
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-sidney-lumet-20110410,0,7115943.story
Cancer is cruel. It took my mother when she was 59. It spared my cousin, though--She got cancer at 16, but she's 61 or 62 now.
As far as I know Frank Thornton (Captain Peacock) is still alive, Lin.
The brilliant creator of comedy classics Citizen Smith, Just Good Friends and, of course, Only Fools And Horses, John Sullivan was Britain’s foremost writer of mainstream comedy. From Citizen Smith in 1977 to last year’s Rock And Chips (the prequel to Only Fools And Horses), he consistently produced engaging and heart-warming entertainment.
Indeed, Mark Freeland, BBC’s Head of Comedy, called John ‘The Dickens of Our Day’.
So true. My mom as well. She was just 3 days shy of her 64th birthday when she left us a little over 4 years ago.
Cancer is cruel. It took my mother when she was 59. It spared my cousin, though--She got cancer at 16, but she's 61 or 62 now.
So true. My mom as well. She was just 3 days shy of her 64th birthday when she left us a little over 4 years ago.
My mom has been dead a long time now, but I still miss her. I can imagine how you feel when the passing of your mom is still relatively recent.
My mom has been dead a long time now, but I still miss her. I can imagine how you feel when the passing of your mom is still relatively recent.
Thanks, LCat. The first year especially, and to top it off our first born came along within that first year and at times I was saddened at the reminder she was gone before his birth. That first month she came to me in a dream after a weekend of intense physical labor. No words were spoken, she just came over to me and hugged me and it was the best feeling in the world. I'm getting choked up now just relaying the story again here. I truly feel she knew how exhausted I was and came to me in my dream to comfort me. It was fantastic to say the least.
Hi, Brian.
(You were in labor? Then I guess you are not really Brian-- ;D) I, too have had dreams in which the dead have appeared and somehow comforted me! It's a great feeling.
My mom was a celebrity--She was a champion marathon swimmer who got a key to the city eons ago. I still have left the crumbling newspaper article that she even had her photo in. Too bad my mom didn't cut out the date and name of the paper as well.
Oh, I guess I should've said 'manual' labor instead of 'physical'? What happened was later the same month my mom passed, there was a fire at my wife's brother's home. He got out okay but unfortunately lost a dog and a cat. The main structure had to come down but the two additions needed to be stripped or else they would've had to come down as well and he wanted to prevent that. So, for the better part of two days I was tearing out walls and ceilings; pulling out nails and staples, removing insulation and everything else you can think of. It was very tiring but there was a lot of us and we successful. He's since had the main structure rebuilt and the two additions redone and it looks better than before.
That's very interesting about your mom. At least you have the newspaper. I'm wondering if, before there's any more potential damage, there's a way to preserve it? You've probably already thought of that, though, right? It is unfortunate about the date and name of the paper. Still, memories are priceless and we have those. Even when the occasional negative memory resurfaces I don't mind and don't dwell, just happy to even have the memory because it's better than not having it at all.
Australian acting legend Bill Hunter dies from cancer at 71
Hunter's acting career has spanned more than 50 years and 100 film and television productions, with roles in iconic Australian films including Strictly Ballroom and Gallipoli.
"Gunsmoke" and "How The West Was Won" star James Arness has passed on. He was 88
http://jamesarness.com/
R.I.P. James Arness :(
PARIS (AFP) – Spanish writer, left-wing activist and former culture minister Jorge Semprun died in Paris on Tuesday aged 87, his grandson Thomas Landman said.
Semprun, who went into exile in France with his family after the Spanish Civil War, died "very peacefully" at home, Landman said.
Semprun was born on December 10, 1923, in Madrid, the son of a leading politician and the grandson of a former prime minister.
Living most of his life in France, where his family eventually settled after the Republicans were driven out of Madrid in 1937, Semprun adopted French as his working language.
He also wrote for the cinema and contributed major screenplays for Alain Resnais, with "La Guerre est Finie" (The War is Over) and "Stavisky", and for Costa Gavras, with the classic political dramas "Z" and "L'Aveu" (The Confession).
All but "Stavisky" starred Yves Montand, about whom Semprun later wrote an acclaimed biography.
Clarence Clemons, the saxophonist in Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, whose jovial onstage manner, soul-rooted style and brotherly relationship with Mr. Springsteen made him one of rock’s most beloved sidemen, died on Saturday at a hospital in Palm Beach, Fla. He was 69.
The cause was complications of a stroke he suffered last Sunday at his home in Singer Island, Fla., a spokeswoman for Mr. Springsteen said.
In a statement released Saturday night, Mr. Springsteen called Mr. Clemons “my great friend, my partner.”
“With Clarence at my side, my band and I were able to tell a story far deeper than those simply contained in our music,” he added. “His life, his memory and his love will live on in that story and in our band.”
Peter Falk, Rumpled and Crafty Actor on ‘Columbo,’ Dies at 83
(And special condolences to Christopher.)
http://www.nytimes.com/?emc=na
Good-bye Columbo........ :'(
Mr. Falk had a glass eye, resulting from an operation to remove a cancerous tumor when he was 3 years old.
Peter Michael Falk was born in Manhattan on Sept. 16, 1927, and lived for a time in the Bronx, near Yankee Stadium, but grew up mostly in Ossining, N.Y, where his father owned a clothing store and where, in spite of his missing eye, he was a high school athlete. In one story he liked to tell, after being called out at third base during a baseball game, he removed his eye and handed it to the umpire.
“You’ll do better with this,” he said.
He returned to the stage as well, as Stalin, the title role, in Paddy Chayefsky’s “Passion of Joseph D,” which earned him solid reviews in spite of the show’s brief run (14 performances). Mr. Falk played Stalin “with brilliant unsmiling ferocity,” Howard Taubman wrote in his largely positive review in The Times.
Things I did not know about Peter Falk:;D Yeah, he wasn't cross-eyed or anything.
Quote
Mr. Falk had a glass eye, resulting from an operation to remove a cancerous tumor when he was 3 years old.
Quote
Peter Michael Falk was born in Manhattan on Sept. 16, 1927, and lived for a time in the Bronx, near Yankee Stadium, but grew up mostly in Ossining, N.Y, where his father owned a clothing store and where, in spite of his missing eye, he was a high school athlete. In one story he liked to tell, after being called out at third base during a baseball game, he removed his eye and handed it to the umpire.
“You’ll do better with this,” he said
Acclaimed choreographer Roland Petit, whose creations dazzled stages from Paris to Hollywood and inspired dancers, writers and designers has died in Geneva, aged 87.
The Paris National Opera announced Petit's death Sunday after getting word from his wife, Zizi Jeanmaire, a ballerina turned music hall performer who collaborated with her husband.
France's Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand paid tribute to him, deeming Petit "one of the major choreographers of the 20th Century."
Petit is credited with creating more than 100 ballets.
Mitterrand also noted Petit's works brought together designers like Yves Saint-Laurent for costumes, Picasso for decor and writer and poet Jacques Prevert.
Betty Ford, Former First Lady, Dies at 93
By ENID NEMY
Betty Ford, the outspoken and much-admired wife of President Gerald R. Ford who overcame alcoholism and an addiction to pills and helped found one of the best-known rehabilitation centers in the nation, died Friday in Palm Springs, Calif. She was 93.
Her death was confirmed by Chris Chase, Mrs. Ford’s biographer.
The news of her death at Eisenhower Medical Center brought statements of condolence from President Obama, former Presidents George Bush, George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter, and Nancy Reagan, the former first lady.
“She was Jerry Ford’s strength through some very difficult days in our country’s history,” Mrs. Reagan said, “and I admired her courage in facing and sharing her personal struggles with all of us.”
Few first ladies have been as popular as Betty Ford, and it was her frankness and lack of pretense that made her so. She spoke often in support of the Equal Rights Amendment, endorsed legalized abortion, discussed premarital sex and revealed that she intended to share a bed with her husband in the White House.
When her husband’s voice failed him the morning after he was defeated by Jimmy Carter in 1976, it was she who read the official concession statement with smiling grace. And when Mr. Ford died in December 2006, it was Mrs. Ford who announced his death. The six days of national mourning returned her to a spotlight she had tried to avoid in her later years, living in Rancho Mirage, Calif., a golf community southeast of Palm Springs, and tending to her clinic there, the Betty Ford Center.
Hmm, I thought someone would have posted about Betty Ford by now ...
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/09/us/politics/betty-ford-dies.html
R.I.P.
Chilean singer/actor Antonio Prieto passed away from heart failure July 14, 2011, at the age of 85 in Santiago, Chile and will be buried in Vina del Mar, Chile, July 16. During his 50-year career Prieto recorded over 1000 songs, acted in more than 33 films and had the first variety television show in South America. As an actor, he is best known internationally for the role of Don Miguel Rojo, the eldest of the bandit brothers in Sergio Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars with Clint Eastwood. Considered by music critics as an icon of the Latin Bolero genre, his biggest international hit was “La Novia” (“The Wedding”).
British actress Googie Withers passed away in Sydney over the weekend. She was 94.
SMH (http://www.smh.com.au/national/obituaries/best-british-bad-girl-with-a-haughty-sexuality-20110716-1hjjh.html)
Wow, I had no idea he was a singer! Too bad they didn't do a musical remake of Fistful while there was still time!
Otto von Hapsburg is dead at the age of 98. His father was the last emperor of Austria-Hungary.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/world/europe/05hapsburg.html
Here he is in 1936, in the uniform of a captain of the Tyrolean rifleman's regiment.
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/07/05/world/habsberg-1/habsberg-1-popup.jpg)
R.I.P.
Otto, who stopped appearing in public after the death of his wife, Regina, last year, is survived by his younger brother, Felix, as well as 7 children, 22 grandchildren and 2 great-grandchildren.
Could you imagine!? :D
I don't get why they call him the "last prince of the house of Habsburg" ... from the Times obit quoted above:
Otto von Habsburg (20 November 1912 – 4 July 2011),also known by his royal name as Archduke Otto of Austria, was the last Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary from 1916 until the dissolution of the empire in 1918, a realm which comprised modern-day Austria, Hungary, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, and parts of Italy, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Ukraine. He remained the Crown Prince of Hungary until 1921. He was the head of the House of Habsburg and the Sovereign of the Order of the Golden Fleece between 1922 and 2007,and at the same time, the Habsburg pretender to the former thrones.
On November 11, 1918, with his empire collapsing around him, the last Habsburg ruler, Charles I (who also reigned as Charles IV of Hungary) issued a proclamation recognizing Austria's right to determine the future of the state and renouncing any role in state affairs. Two days later, he issued a separate proclamation for Hungary. Even though he did not officially abdicate, this is considered the end of the Habsburg dynasty. In 1919, the new republican Austrian government subsequently passed a law banishing the Habsburgs from Austrian territory until they renounced all intentions of regaining the throne and accepted the status of private citizens. Charles made several attempts to regain the throne of Hungary, and in 1921 the Hungarian government passed a law which revoked Charles' rights and dethroned the Habsburgs.
The Habsburgs did not formally abandon all hope of returning to power until Otto von Habsburg, Emperor Charles' eldest son, renounced all claims to the throne.
Amy Winehouse dead at 27.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2018020/Amy-Winehouse-dead--Found-dead-London-flat.html
Amy Winehouse dead at 27.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2018020/Amy-Winehouse-dead--Found-dead-London-flat.html
I was listening to an interveiw with Tony Bennett yesterday when he praised her amazing voice and ability to sing some brilliant jazz numbers. She is on the latest Bennett album.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ7J_KQDUUg At about 2.25 mins.
Be at peace now Amy.
War heroine Nancy Wake dies
Australia's most decorated World War II servicewoman Nancy Wake has died.
Wake, known as the White Mouse, died on Sunday in a hospital in London, where she had lived since 2001. She was 98.
Francesco was only 48 and is probably best remembered as Rhah from Platoon.
A couple of appreciations of Jerry Leiber from the New York Times:
Lawrence Downes (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/24/opinion/an-american-songbook-from-jerry-leiber.html)
Stephen Holden (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/24/arts/music/jerry-leiber-rock-n-roll-hero-an-appraisal.html)
Rest in Peace, Nick Ashford!
Eve Brent, a veteran character actress whose most recognizable role was Jane to Gordon Scott’s Tarzan, died on Aug. 27 in Sun Valley, Calif. She was 81.
Her death was confirmed by a representative of Pacifica Hospital of the Valley.
Ms. Brent rebooted the character of Jane, Tarzan’s civilized love interest, in the 1958 films “Tarzan and the Trappers” and “Tarzan’s Fight for Life,” after Jane was left out of the two previous Tarzan movies. She said she took the part to please her son, who was around 6 at the time. But although it raised her profile, she later concluded that it had been a disastrous career move.
“I really couldn’t get work as an actress because of Jane,” Ms. Brent told a Tarzan fan site in 2007. “You get stereotyped, at least in the business at that time.”
She spent the next 10 years or so acting in theater and playing bit parts in movies like the comedy “A Guide for the Married Man” (1967), in which her character was Blowsy Blonde, and the Clint Eastwood action movie “Coogan’s Bluff” (1968), in which she played a prostitute.
Charles S. Dubin, whose career as a daring director in television’s early years stalled after he refused to answer questions before Congress about Communist involvement, then robustly rebounded as he went on to direct more episodes of “M*A*S*H” than anyone else, died on Monday at his home in Los Angeles. He was 92.
Andy Whitfield died at 39. RIP, Andy.
http://tv.yahoo.com/news/spartacus-star-whitfield-dies-lymphoma-39-004301065.html
NEW YORK (AP) — President John F. Kennedy had just one critique when he saw photos of the actor set to play him in a World War II drama.
The year was 1963 and actor Cliff Robertson looked convincing in his costume for "PT-109," the first film to portray a sitting president. Kennedy had favored Robertson for the role, but one detail was off.
Robertson's hair was parted on the wrong side.
The actor dutifully trained his locks to part on the left and won praise for a role he'd remain proud of throughout his life.
Robertson, who went on to win an Oscar for his portrayal of a mentally disabled man in "Charly", died of natural causes Saturday afternoon in Stony Brook, a day after his 88th birthday, according to Evelyn Christel, his secretary of 53 years.
Robertson never elevated into the top ranks of leading men, but he remained a popular actor from the mid-1950s into the following century. His later roles included kindly Uncle Ben in the "Spider-Man" movies.
John Calley, who ran three Hollywood studios that made such hits as "The Exorcist" and "Spider-Man," died Tuesday. He was 81.
Calley died at his home in Los Angeles after a lengthy illness, Sony Pictures Entertainment said.
Among the other varied and influential films produced under his tenure as a studio head were "All the President's Men," "Dirty Harry," "A Clockwork Orange" and "The Da Vinci Code."
After working his way up through the ranks in the network's early years, he eventually moved to Warner Bros. in 1969, a groundbreaking time for cinema. Over the years he worked with top directors including Stanley Kubrick, Clint Eastwood and Sydney Pollack.
At the Academy Awards in 2009, Calley received the honorary Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, with the academy praising him for his "intellectual rigor, sophisticated artistic sensibilities and calm, understated manner." He was called one of the most trusted and admired figures in Hollywood.
Steven P. Jobs, the visionary co-founder of Apple who helped usher in the era of personal computers and then led a cultural transformation in the way music, movies and mobile communications were experienced in the digital age, died Wednesday. He was 56.
Diane Cilento, the dusky-voiced stage and film actress whose forthright sensuality was best displayed as the wench Molly in “Tom Jones” and who endured a tempestuous marriage to actor Sean Connery, died Oct. 6 in Queensland, Australia. She was 79.
But with his formidable jaw, gruff demeanor and growling bass voice, Mr. Napier was typically cast in rugged parts. He played Tucker McElroy, the irate frontman for the country band the Good Ole Boys, in “The Blues Brothers” (1980); Murdock, the villain in “Rambo: First Blood Part II” (1985); and Lt. Bill Boyle, who is murdered by Hannibal Lecter in “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991).
He appeared on television shows like “The Rockford Files,” “B. J. and the Bear” and, more recently, “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” He provided voices for “The Simpsons,” “The Critic” and other animated series. His most high-profile role was the contemplative Judge Garnett in “Philadelphia” (1993).
“I always felt I played myself or some kind of version of myself,” he told The Bakersfield Californian last March. “If you think about it, old actors probably don’t even have a self.”
Joe Frazier, the relentless slugger who became the heavyweight champion of the world and earned boxing immortality with three epic battles against Muhammad Ali, has died aged 67.
"Smokin' Joe" Frazier, who was the first boxer to beat Ali, died in Philadelphia on Monday (local time) a month after being diagnosed with liver cancer.
'Drift Away' Singer Dobie Gray Dead at 71
Harry Morgan, the prolific character actor best known for playing the acerbic but kindly Colonel Potter in the long-running television series “M*A*S*H,” died on Wednesday morning at his home in Los Angeles.
Harry Morgan has passed away aged 96.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/08/arts/television/harry-morgan-mash-and-dragnet-actor-dies-at-96.html
Barbara Orbison, widow of the rock singer Roy Orbison, who managed his career in the 1980s and worked to keep his legacy alive, died in Los Angeles on Tuesday. She was 60.
The cause was pancreatic cancer, said a family spokeswoman, Sarah McMullen. Ms. Orbison died on the 23rd anniversary of her husband’s death.
Wow, God bless him. And Dobie Gray. R.I.P. sirs.
My dad used to watch Dragnet and that's when I first came across Harry Morgan. He was great in M*A*S*H.
Harry Morgan has passed away aged 96.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/08/arts/television/harry-morgan-mash-and-dragnet-actor-dies-at-96.html
RIP Harry. :'(
Believe it or not, Harry Morgan also once worked on a film with Clint Eastwood. Does anyone know which one?
My guess was Tarantula but I'm wrong. I know what it is but I had to look it up so I won't give it away. :)
I knew without looking it up because I have the film on DVD. ^-^
It's actually TwoMules who has the film on DVD ... I didn't even know you could get it on DVD.
I've no idea.. and havn't checked.. Gotta be an early one. Is it the Travelling Saleslady movie ..? Or Tarantula..?
It's actually TwoMules who has the film on DVD ... I didn't even know you could get it on DVD.
No but it is an early one, Gant. :)
KC, I have it in my Classic Clint Eastwood collection. :)
(http://i1020.photobucket.com/albums/af323/TWOMULES/DSCI1501.jpg?t=1323799567)
... the writer and dissident whose eloquent dissections of Communist rule helped to destroy it in revolutions that brought down the Berlin Wall and swept Havel himself into power.
^ The above DVD is part of a collection for Eastwood "completists," sold in the UK and Australia by an Italian firm, DeAgostini.
Vaclav Havel, the Czech dissident playwright and political leader, has died. The New York Times calls him:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/19/world/europe/vaclav-havel-dissident-playwright-who-led-czechoslovakia-dead-at-75.html
R.I.P.
TCM Remembers pays tribute to the many people we lost this year who were connected to the cinema. Len Lesser is mentioned at the 1:47 mark with a clip from The Outlaw Josey Wales.
TCM Remembers "Before You Go" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1ZOlXXwhe0)
¨¨:... and Bill McKinney was there too,¨¨:........
^ The above DVD is part of a collection for Eastwood "completists," sold in the UK and Australia by an Italian firm, DeAgostini. No reason to berate the studio for the placement of Eastwood's name on the packaging.
We've had a couple of threads about it here on the Board, most recently here: http://www.clinteastwood.org/forums/index.php?topic=7997.0
Jed, have you got a link that would explain who this person is? ???
Very cool, 2M. It would be nice to have all of Eastwood's minor appearance in one set.
Thanks, Jed. :)
Revenge of the Creature, Tarantula, Francis in the Navy, Lady Godiva, Star in the Dust and Never Say Goodbye are all in this UK collection.
I've seen many a title released on dvd (and vhs) with actors that are major stars today that had only minor parts in them, with their names in larger, bolder print than the movie title (more often than not above the title), misleading the potential buyer not in the know into believing said actor played a major role whereas in truth it was minimal. That's what I call shameless. So, whomever is responsible for marketing is to be blamed. On the other side of the same token, I can see it as a smart business move. There are many films like this out there with movie stars of today that had minor roles that completists would love to have. A perfect example of informing them of this is the dvd packaging for Away All Boats. Clint's name isn't splashed across the top and above the title, but rather he is mentioned on the back cover as this being one of his earliest appearances. Very respectful.
Hey man, would you mind forwarding me a copy and some details such as a website link for this info? It's probably not available in the U.S. but I'd like to read up on it where it is available. Thanks!
http://www.deagostini.com.au/eastwood/index.php
http://www.deagostini.com.au/eastwood/index.php
Hi, The Schofield Kid, I am a new member called TWOMULES from England. It's great to see you have started getting the DeAgostini magazine and DVD/ The Classic Clint Eastwood Collection. My wife got me every issue in the UK,a total of 50 issues plus two special editions. Most of the films I had on Vhs but what I enjoyed about this collection was the fact that it included most of Clint's early bit part roles. The Revenge of the Creature,Tarantula,Francis in the navy,Lady Godiva,Star in the Dust and Never Say Goodbye are all part of the uk collection. The 2 Special Editions are The Man From Malpaso and Piano Blues. The magazines are also a joy to read and give you some great information on each film. The uk collection started with Dirty Harry and ended with the film Never Say Goodbye. take care TWOMULES
December 28, 2011, 9:53 am
Cheetah, Chimpanzee in ‘Tarzan’ Movies, Has Died
By DAVE ITZKOFF
Cheetah, a chimpanzee who was one of the most famous animal stars of the 1930s and appeared with Johnny Weissmuller in such Depression-era adventure films as “Tarzan the Ape Man” and “Tarzan and His Mate,” has died, The Tampa Tribune reported. Debbie Cobb, the outreach director at the Suncoast Primate Sanctuary in Palm Harbor, Fla., where Cheetah lived, told The Tribune that Cheetah was about 80 years old and died of kidney failure on Saturday.
In the Tarzan film series, whose golden age spanned 1932 to 1948, Cheetah was said to have appeared in the films made between 1932 and 1934, as a comic and sympathetic animal sidekick whose intelligence sometimes seemed to rival that of his human co-stars, Weissmuller (who played the titular jungle lord) and Maureen O’Sullivan (who portrayed his civilized love interest, Jane).
Ms. Cobb told The Tribune that the Suncoast Primate Sanctuary received Cheetah from Weissmuller’s Ocala estate around 1960. Of the 15 chimpanzees kept at the sanctuary, Cheetah, she said, was the most famous and an outgoing ape with a gentle personality, who had long outlived the 35 to 45 years that chimpanzees typically survive in captivity.
“He was very compassionate,” Ms. Cobb said. “He could tell if I was having a good day or a bad day. He was always trying to get me to laugh if he thought I was having a bad day. He was very in tune to human feelings.”
She said Cheetah was soothed by Christian music and also enjoyed fingerpainting and football, though she was unsure if the chimpanzee had any favorite teams.
“I couldn’t ask him that,” Ms. Cobb told The Tribune. “I’m not a chimp psychic.”
In a post on her Twitter account, Mia Farrow, who is O’Sullivan’s daughter, wrote: “Cheetah the chimp in Tarzan movies died this week at 80. My mom, who played Jane, invariably referred to Cheetah as ‘that bastard.’ ”
Back to topic.
R.I.P. Cheetah!
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/28/cheetah-chimpanzee-in-tarzan-movies-has-died/
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/12/28/arts/cheetah/cheetah-articleInline.jpg)
Associated Press Cheetah the chimpanzee with Maureen O’Sullivan and Johnny Weissmuller in a scene from the 1932 film “Tarzan the Ape Man.”
Bob Anderson, an Olympic swordsman who staged fights for films including the Star Wars and Lord of the Rings series, has died at the age of 89.
Say it isn't so! No, not Cheetah!
RIP, Cheetah...
Etta James, the earthy blues and R&B singer whose anguished vocals convinced generations of listeners that she would rather go blind than see her love leave, then communicated her joy upon finding that love at last, died Friday morning, said her son, Donto James. She was 73.
She died of complications from leukemia at a hospital in Riverside, said Dr. Elaine James, her personal physician.
LONGWOOD, Fla. — Back, way back, before King Tut was born and Alexander the Great roamed his empire, the Senator sprouted in a swamp here in central Florida, one of thousands of its kind.
So on Monday, when word got out that the huge, 3,500-year-old bald cypress had burned and collapsed, people from the area who thought that nothing — not hurricanes, not loggers, not disease — could fell the Senator, sank into disbelief. In a state known for its sprawl and its zeal for pouring concrete, the Senator stood as a testament to nature and ancient history. It was one of the oldest trees in the country and, at 118 feet, one of the tallest east of the Mississippi.
Award-winning Greek film director Theo Angelopoulos died Tuesday after being hit by a motorcycle while filming scenes on his latest movie.
Angelopoulos was rushed to an Athens hospital where he died hours later of head injuries. He was 76 years old. The motorcyclist was an off-duty policeman.
Angelopoulos was Greece's most honored contemporary director, winning numerous awards at European film festivals.
He is best known for his 1998 film, Eternity and a Day, which won the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival.
At the time of his death, he was directing The Other Sea, a film about the impact of Greece's economic crisis on its citizens.
James Farentino, a tall, dark and dashing actor who in his nearly 100 roles on stage, screen and television often defied the stereotype of the leading man, even though he fit the picture, died on Tuesday in Los Angeles. He was 73.
As a Navy officer in the 1980 science-fiction film “The Final Countdown,” Mr. Farentino stood beside Kirk Douglas and Martin Sheen on the deck of a modern aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Nimitz, as it passed through a time warp to Pearl Harbor, hours before the Japanese attack on Dec. 7, 1941. They had to decide whether to use the full power of their supercarrier to destroy the Japanese fleet or allow history to take its course.
Nicol Williamson, a Scottish-born actor whose large, renegade talent made him a controversial Hamlet, an eccentric Macbeth, an angry, high-strung Vanya and, on the screen, a cocaine-sniffing Sherlock Holmes — and whose querulous temperament could make his antics as commanding as his performances — died on Dec. 16 in Amsterdam, where he had lived for more than 20 years. He was 75.
Don Cornelius, the smooth-voiced television host who brought black music and culture into America’s living rooms when he created the dance show “Soul Train,” was found dead at his home in Los Angeles early Wednesday in what appeared to be a suicide, the authorities said. He was 75.
Ben Gazzara, an intense actor whose long career included playing Brick in the original “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” on Broadway, roles in influential films by John Cassavetes and work with several generations of top Hollywood directors, died on Friday in Manhattan. He was 81.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/04/movies/ben-gazzara-actor-of-stage-and-screen-dies-at-81.html
Kelly also played a vicar in The Italian Job
Irish stage and screen actor David Kelly, known for films such as Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, has died aged 82.
Irish actor David Kelly dies aged 82
Oscar-winning costume designer Eiko Ishioka, who made costumes for Broadway actors, Olympians and big stars like Jennifer Lopez, died in Tokyo at 73.
I just heard that Davy Jones from the Monkees has passed. That's sad, I was a big fan of their tv series when
I was a kid. Jones was only 66... too young.
R.I.P Davy
He and his brother penned many tunes for Disney, including songs from “Mary Poppins” and “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.”
Songwriter Robert Sherman, best known for penning the infectious Disney tunes “It’s a Small World After All” and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious," died Monday, March 5 in London.
Rome - Italian author and Portuguese language scholar Antonio Tabucchi, who was tipped several times as a possible Nobel literature prize winner, died Sunday in Lisbon, Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported. He was 68.
Born in Pisa on September 23, 1943, Tabucchi was best known for his 1994 novel Sostiene Pereira (Periera Maintains), which has been widely translated and adapted to film.
Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, who conceived one of the world’s most recognizable sports cars, died Thursday in Salzburg, Austria, at age 76. The cause of death was not disclosed by Porsche, which issued a statement on Thursday, but he was known to have been ill in recent months.
Luke Askew, a character actor perhaps best remembered as the wayward stranger who brings Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper to a hippie commune in the 1969 motorcycle odyssey “Easy Rider,” died on March 29 at his home in Lake Oswego, Ore. He was 80.
The dual Olympian will be remembered for his historic display at the 1956 Games in Melbourne, where he won three gold medals. He went on to win gold, silver and a bronze at the 1960 Rome Olympics.
Dick Clark died today at age 82. http://todayentertainment.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/18/11270165-dick-clark-dead-at-82?lite/ (http://todayentertainment.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/18/11270165-dick-clark-dead-at-82?lite/)
Greg Ham found dead in house
Men at Work flautist Greg Ham has been found dead in a house in Melbourne’s inner north.
Police were called to the house in Canning Street, North Carlton, soon after midday and are trying to determine the cause of the man's death.
The body was found by a friend after he went to the house to check on the man's welfare and there was no answer at the door. He then returned with another friend and found the body in the front of the house.
I just saw that Jonathan Frid, the guy who played Barnabas Collins on Dark Shadows, died a few days ago at 87. I've never seen the show but remember it coming on Sci-Fi channel several years back. And certainly it's getting more attention in the media now with the new movie set to come out in a few weeks (Frid has a cameo in it too).
http://theclicker.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/19/11287058-jonathan-frid-who-played-barnabas-collins-in-dark-shadows-show-dead-at-87?chromedomain=todayentertainment (http://theclicker.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/04/19/11287058-jonathan-frid-who-played-barnabas-collins-in-dark-shadows-show-dead-at-87?chromedomain=todayentertainment)
Adam Yauch, one-third of the pioneering hip-hop group the Beastie Boys, has died at the age of 47, Rolling Stone has learned. Yauch, also known as MCA, had been in treatment for cancer since 2009. The rapper was diagnosed in 2009 after discovering a tumor in his salivary gland.
Maurice Sendak, widely considered the most important children’s book artist of the 20th century, who wrenched the picture book out of the safe, sanitized world of the nursery and plunged it into the dark, terrifying and hauntingly beautiful recesses of the human psyche, died on Tuesday in Danbury, Conn. He was 83.
"In Europe they'd ask me, 'What's it like to play with a black man?' I never knew what to say; we didn't think that way — we just played," Dunn said. "We got the soul sound by blending our country and blues influences. I grew up with the Grand Ole Opry. When we mixed that feel with the blues, we got something new."
It wasn't unusual for Dunn's bass lines to lead the way when the MG's went to record. His sinuous, pulsing notes set a foreboding tone in their hit rendition of "Hang 'Em High," the theme from the 1968 western starring Clint Eastwood. His funky, hopping rhythmic melody line is featured at the start of the MG's' 1967 hit "Hip Hug-Her." And Dunn nimbly doubled Cropper's signature guitar lead on the propulsive "Time Is Tight," adding low-end muscle to the song's insistent groove.
Of the many tributes he received over the decades, perhaps none was more heartfelt than that of the British music critic John Amis:
“Providence gives to some singers a beautiful voice, to some musical artistry, to some (let us face it) neither, but to Fischer-Dieskau Providence has given both. The result is a miracle, and that is just about all there is to be said about it.”
Mr. Amis continued, “Having used a few superlatives and described the program, there is nothing else to do but write ‘finis,’ go home, and thank one’s stars for having had the good luck to be present.”
ROBIN Gibb, whose soaring vocals formed part of the unique Bee Gees sound, has died at the age of 62, leaving Barry as the sole surviving member from the band of brothers.
"The family of Robin Gibb, of the Bee Gees, announce with great sadness that Robin passed away today following his long battle with cancer and intestinal surgery," said a family statement.
The greatest Lieder singer of the twentieth century has passed away at the age of 86: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/19/arts/music/dietrich-fischer-dieskau-german-baritone-dies-at-86.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyxMMg6bxrg
May you rest in peace!
Doc Watson, the guitarist and folk singer whose flat-picking style elevated the acoustic guitar to solo status in bluegrass and country music, and whose interpretations of traditional American music profoundly influenced generations of folk and rock guitarists, died on Tuesday in Winston-Salem, N.C. He was 89.
Kaneto Shindo, April 22, 1912 – May 29, 2012 was a Japanese film director, screenwriter, film producer, and author. He directed 48 films and wrote 238 scripts. His best known films as a director include Children of Hiroshima, The Naked Island, Onibaba, Kuroneko and A Last Note. His scripts have been filmed by such directors as Kon Ichikawa, Keisuke Kino$#!ta, Fumio Kamei and Tadashi Imai.
Shindo made several films about Hiroshima and the atomic bomb. Like his early mentor Kenji Mizoguchi, many of his works feature strong female characters.
Something Wicked This Way Comes is a favourite of mine.Mine too--really love that novel. Fahrenheit 451 is another favorite.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Ann Rutherford, the demure brunette actress who played the sweetheart in the long-running Andy Hardy series and Scarlett O'Hara's youngest sister in "Gone With the Wind," has died. She was 94.
Victor Spinetti, Favorite in Beatles Films, Dies at 82
Victor Spinetti, who was an established British film star in 1963 when he agreed to make a movie with a pop group called the Beatles and who became famous ever after as the only person besides the four Beatles to appear in all of their movies — “A Hard Day’s Night,” “Help!” and “Magical Mystery Tour” — died on Tuesday in London. He was 82.
LeRoy Neiman, whose brilliantly colored, impressionistic sketches of sporting events and the international high life made him one of the most popular artists in the United States, died on Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 91.
Galápagos National Park announces the death of conservation icon believed to have been about 100 years old
"His life cycle came to an end."
Andrew Sarris, one of the nation’s most influential film critics and a champion of auteur theory, which holds that a director’s voice is central to great filmmaking, died on Wednesday at St. Luke’s Hospital in Manhattan. He was 83.
Oscar-nominated director, screenwriter and producer behind films including When Harry Met Sally and Sleepless in Seattle
“I remember her typing hard on a story, so deep into it that she could have been alone in the growly crowd,” Mr. Hamill recalled. He added, “She never wrote down to anybody. She didn’t think her task was to make the audience dumber, while reading or sitting in a movie house. She certainly did not add a single sentence to the long dismal history of human lousiness.”
America’s sheriff Andy Griffith dead at 86
Actor Andy Griffith, who won the hearts of 1960s TV viewers with his role as gentle Sheriff Andy Taylor in “The Andy Griffith Show,” then returned as a 1980s country lawyer in “Matlock,” died Tuesday at 86. The news was confirmed to North Carolina television station WITN by Bill Friday, former president of the University of North Carolina and a Griffith friend.
I guess Sheriff Andy was sort of the polar opposite of Dirty Harry! ;D;D Yeah, the whole not carrying a gun thing sorta does that.
Thanks for the links, Lin. I edited your post to insert a shorter link to the YouTube.
R.I.P., Eric Sykes.
Ernest Borgnine, Oscar winner, has died at 95
Ernest Borgnine, who created an array of memorable characters over the years and won the best actor Oscar for his role in 1955's "Marty," has died. Borgnine was 95.
His longtime spokesman, Harry Flynn, said that Borgnine died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center with his family by his side.
As the cruel, vicious Sgt. Fatso Judson in 1953's "From Here to Eternity," the sweet, lonely butcher in 1955's "Marty" and the carefree con artist in the 1962-66 ABC comedy series "McHale's Navy," Borgnine was among the most recognizable faces on both the big and small screens.
and not forgetting his voice work in Spongebob Squarepants :)
Zanuck's many films ranged from "The Sting" and "Jaws" to "Driving Miss Daisy" and "Alice in Wonderland."
Richard D. Zanuck, whose distinguished producing career included the best picture Oscar winners The Sting and Driving Miss Daisy, the blockbuster Jaws and such well-regarded films as The Verdict and Cocoon, died Friday of a heart attack at his home in Beverly Hills. He was 77.
More recently, Zanuck produced Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland and Dark Shadows.
Regarded as one of the more progressive producers in Hollywood, Zanuck was partnered with his wife, Lili Fini Zanuck, in the Zanuck Co.
Celeste Holm, the versatile actress who achieved fame on Broadway in the original production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's hit musical "Oklahoma!" in 1943 and five years later won an Oscar for best supporting actress in the landmark movie-drama "Gentleman's Agreement," died Sunday. She was 95.
Susanne Lothar, one of Germany's best-known film actresses with roles in such international hits as The Reader and The White Ribbon, has died aged 51.
DARRYL Cotton, the lead singer and founding member of '60s and '70s band Zoot, died early today in a Melbourne hospital.
He was 62 and had recently been diagnosed with liver cancer. Shortly before his falling ill he had been enthusiastically planning a Zoot reunion tour for later this year. The band played together for the first time in 40 years last November on a cruise shipe off Florida. Zoot guitarist Rick Springfield, who found fame in the US after the band broke up and has lived there since, said today that Cotton "was lead singer of the best band I was ever in".
Gore Vidal, the elegant, acerbic all-around man of letters who presided with a certain relish over what he declared to be the end of American civilization, died on Tuesday at his home in the Hollywood Hills section of Los Angeles, where he moved in 2003, after years of living in Ravello, Italy. He was 86.
Japanese actress Keiko Tsushima who was in Akira Kurosawa's " Seven Samurai " (1952) died 1 August. She was 86.
And Isuzu Yamada who worked with Kurosawa died on July 9 in Tokyo. She was 95.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/movies/isuzu-yamada-actress-who-worked-with-kurosawa-dies-at-95.html
R.I.P. Mme Keiko Tsushima.
R.I.P. Mme Isuzu Yamada.
Japanese actress Keiko Tsushima who was in Akira Kurosawa's " Seven Samurai " (1952) died 1 August. She was 86.
And Isuzu Yamada who worked with Kurosawa died on July 9 in Tokyo. She was 95.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/16/movies/isuzu-yamada-actress-who-worked-with-kurosawa-dies-at-95.html
R.I.P. Mme Keiko Tsushima.
R.I.P. Mme Isuzu Yamada.
Marvin Hamlisch, Film and Stage Maestro, Dies at 68
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/08/07/theater/07hamlisch3/07hamlisch3-articleInline.jpg)
Marvin Hamlisch, the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer who imbued his movie and Broadway scores with pizazz and panache and often found his songs in the upper reaches of the pop charts, died on Monday in Los Angeles. He was 68 and lived in New York.
I was also saddened to read Robert Hughes had died.
He was an art critic who wrote in many papers and magazines. He also wrote the best selling book The Fatal Shore.
Born in Australia Robert finally moved to New York.
RIP Robert.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2184861/Robert-Hughes-Australian-art-critic-author-The-Fatal-Shore-dies-aged-74-long-illness.html
Renowned Italian special effects artist Carlo Rambaldi, who created ET the Extra Terrestrial, has died aged 86 after a long illness.
Helen Gurley Brown, who as the author of “Sex and the Single Girl” shocked early-1960s America with the news that unmarried women not only had sex but thoroughly enjoyed it — and who as the editor of Cosmopolitan magazine spent the next three decades telling those women precisely how to enjoy it even more — died on Monday in Manhattan. She was 90, though parts of her were considerably younger.
" Cosmopolitan, Helen Gurley Brown, Who Gave ‘Single Girl’ a Life in Full, Dies at 90
By MARGALIT FOX
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/business/media/helen-gurley-brown-who-gave-cosmopolitan-its-purr-is-dead-at-90.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/08/13/obituaries/13brown_span/13brown_span-articleLarge.jpg)
R.I.P. Mme Gurley Brown.
I don't believe anybody posted about Robert Hegyes. Surprising that Cheetah's passing got recognition, but not Mr. Hegyes.
It's the same with a lot of celebrities though. I may not know their name and if someone asked me what Robert Hegyes was best remembered for, for a million dollars, I couldn't answer them. If they showed me a picture, then I'd recognise him.
I never heard of about half the people who are memorialized in here, and their pictures don't help.
Well, no more birthdays for him, then.
Jerry Nelson, the puppeteer who taught innumerable children to count over the years as the voice of one of Sesame Street’s most popular characters, died Thursday in his Cape Cod home. He was 78.
Nelson succumbed after a long battle with emphysema, the L.A. Times reported.
Best known as the voice of Count von Count - the vampire with an unquenchable thirst for rattling off numbers - Nelson honed his skills under the tutelage of Bill Baird, the legendary puppeteer behind the marionettes in 1965’s “The Sound of Music.”
Hal David, the Oscar- and Grammy-winning lyricist who in the 1960s and ’70s gave pop music vernacular the questions “What’s It All About?,” “What’s New, Pussycat?,” “Do You Know the Way to San Jose?” and “What Do You Get When You Fall in Love?,” died on Saturday in Los Angeles. He was 91.
Max Bygraves, one of the household names of British entertainment for more than 50 years, has died at the age of 89.
The star, whose catch phrase was ‘I wanna tell you a story...’, died at his daughter’s home in Australia after battling Alzheimer’s disease.
Bygraves, who enjoyed enormous success as a singer, comedian, film star and quiz show host, emigrated to Australia from Bournemouth four years ago, hoping the warmer climate would help his wife Blossom overcome her health problems.
54 is still quite young. Amazing.
RIP, Michael Clarke Duncan.
http://movies.yahoo.com/news/actor-michael-clarke-duncan-dead-54-214440462.html
Ron Taylor, the Australian marine conservation pioneer who helped film some of the heart-stopping, iconic underwater footage in the movie Jaws, has died. He was 78.
Wildlife conservationists led the tributes for Taylor, who died at a private hospital in Sydney on Sunday.
He had battled myeloid leukaemia for two years, the ABC reported.
LeGault's first three feature films he starred in were three Elvis Presley movies, Girls! Girls! Girls! (1962) in which he was a stunt double for Elvis Presley, Kissin' Cousins (1964), and Viva Las Vegas (1964). He also appeared in Elvis Presley's groundbreaking 1968 NBC television special Elvis (also known as Elvis' 68 Comeback Special), where he sat at the side of the stage playing a tambourine.
I did about a dozen movies with Elvis. Roustabout was not the first. By the time we did Roustabout, Elvis used to come see me in the nightclubs. The first time he came to see me, he was doing Wild In The Country, and he brought Tuesday Weld. I had a nightclub and a really good blues band and Elvis was a big blues fan. I had this nightclub 'The Cross Bow'. There was a rear entrance with stairs to a private balcony. And I could send food that way, too. He brought Tuesday and his group which of course all had dates.
And they all could sit up there and no one would bother them.
Clint Eastwood would come out to see me there.
It was a good club. And to have Elvis come out to see me there many times did not hurt. Elvis was very complimentary and generous. I did the original version of Hound Dog, One Night Of Sin, Kansas City and he liked all that. And then once word got out, that Elvis was coming to see Lance LeGault, you couldn't get a seat in that damn club.
So it was good.
Moon River crooner Andy Williams dies aged 84
Andy Williams, who has died aged 84, was one of the last great American crooners and had huge hits in the 1960s and 1970s with smooth renditions of such songbook standards as Can't Help Falling In Love and Days Of Wine And Roses; in a career spanning more than half a century he recorded 18 gold albums and hosted his own popular television show.
Williams died after a year-long battle with bladder cancer.
Well we'll forgive him for discovering the Osmonds...
But sad to hear of his passing. Ive been watching some of the duets from his tv series with the likes of
Ella Fitzgerald, Tony Bennett, Bing Crosby, Johnny Cash and Tony Newley.... he really was a very talented singer..
Herbert Lom, Frustrated Boss of Inspector Clouseau, Dies at 95
Alex Karras, a fierce and relentless All-Pro lineman for the Detroit Lions whose irrepressible character frequently placed him at odds with football’s authorities but led to a second career as an actor on television and in the movies, died Wednesday at his home in Los Angeles. He was 77.
To those under 50, Karras may be best known as an actor. He made his film debut in 1968, playing himself in “Paper Lion,” an adaptation of George Plimpton’s book about his experience as an amateur playing quarterback for the Lions, which starred Alan Alda as Plimpton.
His rendering of his own roguish personality led to several appearances on “The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson,” and in the 1970s he played numerous guest roles on series television, on shows like “McMillan & Wife,” “Love, American Style,” “M*A*S*H” and “The Odd Couple,” in which he played a comically threatening man-mountain, the jealous husband of a woman who had become friendly with Felix (Tony Randall). Perhaps most memorably, he played Mongo, a hulking subliterate outlaw who delivers a knockout punch to a horse, in the Mel Brooks Western spoof “Blazing Saddles.”
Gary Collins, 74, an actor who was the host of the syndicated TV show "Hour Magazine" and a former master of ceremonies for the Miss America Pageant, died early Saturday in Biloxi, Miss. Collins died of natural causes soon after arriving at Biloxi Regional Medical Center, Harrison County Coroner Gary Hargrove told the Associated Press.
In 2011 Collins moved to Mississippi, the home state of his wife, Mary Ann Mobley, who was Miss America 1959 before embarking on an acting career.
From 1980 to 1988, Collins served as host of the daytime TV talk show "Hour Magazine," a gentler version of the genre that avoided some of the controversial topics tackled by Phil Donahue, Geraldo Rivera and other programs.
He was a great actor and appeared in one of my all time fave movies Hell Drivers
R.I.P Mr Lom
He was one of Australia's most prolific and best-selling authors.
Bryce Courtenay churned out a book almost every year since his first and most popular book, The Power of One, was released in 1989.
He sold more than 20 million books since then, and recently released his last, Jack of Diamonds, but there'll be no more.
Bruce Courtenay has died at the age of 79.
Very sad to hear of Brubeck's passing.
Here's a link to the New York Times obit:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/06/arts/music/dave-brubeck-jazz-musician-dies-at-91.html?pagewanted=all
R.I.P.
Listening to Dave Brubeck
Jazz legend Dave Brubeck sits next to his his wife Iola on their 65th wedding anniversary on the terrace of Clint Eastwood's Mission Ranch hotel in Carmel, California, September 19, 2007.REUTERS/Adam ...
Oscar Niemeyer, the celebrated Brazilian architect whose flowing designs infused Modernism with a new sensuality and captured the imaginations of generations of architects around the world, died on Wednesday in Rio de Janeiro. He was 104.
Dave Brubeck has died.
http://news.sky.com/story/1021232/dave-brubeck-iconic-jazz-artist-dies-at-91
(http://www.schirmer.com/images/composer/gs-brubeck.jpg)
Ravi Shankar, the Indian sitarist and composer whose collaborations with Western classical musicians as well as rock stars helped foster a worldwide appreciation of India’s traditional music, died Tuesday in a hospital near his home in Southern California. He was 92.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/17/politics/obit-inouye/index.html
RIP, Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii!
LCat
A hero of World War II who lost his right arm in combat in Europe, Mr. Inouye, a Democrat, served two terms in the House of Representatives early in his career and was first elected to the Senate in 1962. He was the first Japanese-American elected to both the House and the Senate.
Daniel Ken Inouye was born in Honolulu on Sept. 7, 1924, the oldest of four children of Hyotaro and Kame Imanaga Inouye, who had immigrated from Japan. He graduated from McKinley High School, enrolled in premedical studies at the University of Hawaii and was a medical volunteer at Pearl Harbor when the Japanese attacked in 1941.
In 1943, when the United States Army lifted its ban on Japanese-Americans, Mr. Inouye joined the new 442nd Regimental Combat Team, the first all-nisei volunteer unit. It became the most decorated unit in American military history. In 1944, fighting in Italy and France, he won a battlefield commission to second lieutenant. He was shot in the chest, but the bullet was stopped by two silver dollars in his pocket.
On April 21, 1945, weeks before the end of the war in Europe, he led an assault near San Terenzo, Italy. His platoon was pinned down by three machine guns. Although shot in the stomach, he ran forward and destroyed one emplacement with a hand grenade and another with his submachine gun. He was crawling toward the third when enemy fire nearly severed his right arm, leaving a grenade, in his words, “clenched in a fist that suddenly didn’t belong to me anymore.” He pried it loose, threw it with his left hand and destroyed the bunker. Stumbling forward, he silenced resistance with gun bursts before being hit in the leg and collapsing unconscious.
His mutilated right arm was amputated in a field hospital. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, which was upgraded to the Medal of Honor, America’s highest military award, by President Bill Clinton in 2000. (Members of the 442nd were believed to have been denied proper recognition because of their race.)
R.I.P Jack.... The last of the 12 angry men...
Then came World War II, and he enlisted in the Army. His combat experiences were harrowing. He was in the first wave of troops to land on Omaha Beach on D-Day and his unit’s lone survivor of a machine-gun ambush. In Belgium he was stabbed in hand-to-hand combat with a German soldier, whom he bludgeoned to death with a rock. Fighting in the Battle of the Bulge, he and the rest of his company were captured and forced to march through a pine forest at Malmedy, the scene of an infamous massacre in which the Germans opened fire on almost 90 prisoners. Mr. Durning was among the few to escape.
By the war’s end he had been awarded a Silver Star for valor and three Purple Hearts, having suffered gunshot and shrapnel wounds as well. He spent months in hospitals and was treated for psychological trauma.
Mr. Durning was also remembered for his combat service, which he avoided discussing publicly until later in life. He spoke at memorial ceremonies in Washington, (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0GVUXh4tQQ) and in 2008 France awarded him the National Order of the Legion of Honor.
In the Parade interview, he recalled the hand-to-hand combat. “I was crossing a field somewhere in Belgium,” he said. “A German soldier ran toward me carrying a bayonet. He couldn’t have been more than 14 or 15. I didn’t see a soldier. I saw a boy. Even though he was coming at me, I couldn’t shoot.”
They grappled, he recounted later — he was stabbed seven or eight times — until finally he grasped a rock and made it a weapon. After killing the youth, he said, he held him in his arms and wept.
Mr. Durning said the memories never left him, even when performing, even when he became, however briefly, someone else.
“There are many secrets in us, in the depths of our souls, that we don’t want anyone to know about,” he told Parade. “There’s terror and repulsion in us, the terrible spot that we don’t talk about. That place that no one knows about — horrifying things we keep secret. A lot of that is released through acting.”
Besides being an extremely versatile character actor on stage and screen, Charles Durning (like the late Senator Inouye) was a hero of World War II. His account of the worst of his combat experiences, included in his obituary in the New York Times, reminded me of both Flags of Our Fathers and the haunted past of Clint's character in Gran Torino:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/movies/charles-durning-prolific-character-actor-dies-at-89.html?pagewanted=all (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/movies/charles-durning-prolific-character-actor-dies-at-89.html?pagewanted=all)
R.I.P.
FORMER England captain and cricket commentator Tony Greig has died after a battle with lung cancer, the Nine Network has announced. He was 66. Greig first became aware he had a problem during Australia's one-day series against Pakistan in Dubai in August and September. Initially diagnosed with bronchitis in May, the condition lingered and, by the time of the ICC World Twenty20 that finished in Sri Lanka in October, Greig had tests that revealed a small lesion at the base of his right lung. On his return to Australia he had fluid removed from the right lung and testing revealed he had lung cancer.
Harry Carey Jr., who was a member of John Ford's stock company of actors and played in a number of the director's classic Westerns, has died of natural causes in Santa Barbara, the Associated Press reported Friday. He was 91.
She has charted a staggering 111 hits on pop, country and r&b charts ('Tennessee Waltz' was # 1 concurrently on all three charts), a feat no other artist in recording history can claim!
RIP Gerry Anderson.
Brought me and many others hours of joy and excitement
(http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2012/12/26/1356543480399/Gerry-Anderson-in-2000-006.jpg)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2012/dec/26/gerry-anderson (http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2012/dec/26/gerry-anderson)
Her work — drafting language that gave women a set of legal rights pertaining to marriage, divorce, property and inheritance that they had long been without in Japan’s feudal society — had an effect on their status that endures to this day.
“It set a basis for a better, a more equal society,” Carol Gluck, a professor of Japanese history at Columbia University, said Monday in a telephone interview.
For decades, Ms. Gordon said nothing about her role in postwar Japan, at first because the work was secret and later because she did not want her youth — and the fact that she was an American — to become ammunition for the Japanese conservatives who have long clamored for constitutional revision.
But in the mid-1980s, she began to speak of it publicly. The release of her memoir, “The Only Woman in the Room,” published in Japanese in 1995 and in English two years later, made her a celebrity in Japan, where she lectured widely, appeared on television and was the subject of a stage play and a documentary film, “The Gift From Beate.”
In recent years, amid renewed attacks on the Constitution by Japanese conservatives, Ms. Gordon spoke out ardently in its defense.
Ms. Gordon was awarded the Order of the Sacred Treasure, a high honor bestowed by the Japanese government, in 1998. But perhaps the greatest accolade she received came from Japanese women themselves.
“They always want their picture taken with me,” Ms. Gordon told ABC News in 1999. “They always want to shake my hand. They always tell me how grateful they are.”
Wilkinson first met Elvis Presley when he was 10 years old after sneaking into his dressing room before a show at the Shrine Mosque in Springfield. He amused Presley when he told him, "You can't play guitar worth a damn."
Family friend and spokesman Gary Ellison said a Springfield history museum recalled the pair's meeting in an exhibit that ran until about three weeks ago.
"John loved to tell that story," Ellison, a fellow musician, said Friday.
After the chance meeting, Wilkinson developed a name for himself as a singer and guitarist, performing with such groups as The New Christy Minstrels.
He was 23 when Presley saw him perform on a television show in Los Angeles in 1968, and asked him to join the TCB Band — not knowing he was the youngster who insulted his playing a decade earlier, Ellison recalled.
Wilkinson went on to play 1,200 shows as Presley's rhythm guitar player until the legendary singer's death in 1977.
Nagisa Oshima, the iconoclastic filmmaker who challenged and subverted the pieties of Japanese society and the conventions of Japanese cinema and who gained international notoriety in 1976 for the sexually explicit “In the Realm of the Senses,” died on Tuesday at a hospital near Tokyo. He was 80.
Among other later films, “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence” (1983), a prisoner-of-war drama starring David Bowie and Ryuichi Sakamoto, was shot mainly in New Zealand. Mr. Oshima, collaborating with Luis Buñuel’s frequent screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, also put a twist on the French sex farce with “Max Mon Amour” (1986), which paired Charlotte Rampling and a chimpanzee.
His final film, the 19th-century samurai drama “Taboo” (1999), which he directed after suffering his first stroke, continued his late-career theme of forbidden love, bringing to the surface the homoerotic currents of “Mr. Lawrence.”
Dear Abby: I have always wanted to have my family history traced, but I can’t afford to spend a lot of money to do it. Have you any suggestions? — M. J. B. in Oakland, Calif.
Dear M. J. B.: Yes. Run for a public office.
Dear Abby: Are birth control pills deductible? — Bertie
Dear Bertie: Only if they don’t work.
Dear Abby: Two men who claim to be father and adopted son just bought an old mansion across the street and fixed it up. We notice a very suspicious mixture of company coming and going at all hours — blacks, whites, Orientals, women who look like men and men who look like women. This has always been considered one of the finest sections of San Francisco, and these weirdos are giving it a bad name. How can we improve the neighborhood? — Nob Hill Residents
Dear Residents: You could move.
Charlotte Rae, who played Edna Garrett on both “Diff'rent Strokes,” and its spin-off “Facts of Life,” says she will “always cherish” working with her co-star Conrad Bain who passed on Monday at the age of 89.
Conrad Bain who appeared briefly in one Clint Eastwood film and more notably the TV series Diff'rent Strokes passed away earlier in the week.
MAN: One of your cowboys step outta line in our fair city?
COOGAN: No, one of your boys stepped outta line in ours.
A signature Musial image endures: He waits for a pitch in a left-handed crouch, his knees bent and close together, his body leaning to the left as he peers over his right shoulder, the red No. 6 on his back. The stance was likened to a corkscrew or, as the White Sox pitcher and Dodger coach Ted Lyons once described it, “a kid peeking around the corner to see if the cops are coming.”
Swinging from that stance, Musial won seven batting championships, hit 475 home runs and amassed 3,630 hits. His brilliance lay in his consistency. He had 1,860 hits at home and 1,860 on the road. He drove in 1,951 runs and scored 1,949 runs. And his power could be explosive: he set a major league record, equaled only once, when he hit five home runs in a doubleheader.
“There is only one way to pitch to Musial — under the plate,” Leo Durocher, the manager of the Brooklyn Dodger and New York Giant teams that Musial often victimized, once said.
He was renowned for his concentration at the plate, and his patience: he struck out only 696 times in 10,972 at-bats — a 6 percent ratio — in his 22 major league seasons, all as a Cardinal. A gentlemanly and sunny figure — he loved to play “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” on his harmonica — he was never ejected from a game. When admirers approached him, he chatted them up with his familiar “whattayasay, whattayasy.”
The internationally acclaimed French designer Andree Putman, whose many achievements include revamping the interior of the Concorde supersonic jet, died Saturday at her Paris home aged 87, her family said.
Putman helped coin the concept of the boutique hotel, gave her name to a skyscraper in Hong Kong, and designed movie sets and stores for luxury goods in a career that spanned nearly seven decades.
Seen by many as the Grande Dame of French design, the chic Parisienne was the subject of a retrospective at Paris city hall in 2010.
" Nagisa Oshima, Iconoclastic Filmmaker, Dies at 80 "
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/16/movies/nagisa-oshima-iconoclastic-filmmaker-dies-at-80.html
All of us who have had the privilege of working with Oshima-san will miss his spirit tremendously.
David Bowie
There are a lot of “boys clubs” in baseball. The players. The media. Management. If you had to come up with a prototypical old boys club, though, you could do worse than naming scouts. Thanks to popular culture and various anecdotes it’s almost impossible for the first image that pops in your head when you hear the words “baseball scout” NOT to be an old guy. Maybe a grouchy one like Clint Eastwood.
But Edith Houghton cracked that boys club. Not last year or in the 1970s or something. She did it in 1946, holding the job until she left to go fight in the Korean freakin’ War. She severed in the Navy during World War II as well. Before that she played baseball on a number of industrial and semi-pro teams.
Edith Houghton: tougher and more accomplished than most of us put together.
Sadly, she died earlier this month at age 100. The beginnings of her story can be read here. Some more in depth information can be found here. There’s probably a much longer story to be told as well.
Lavonne Paire Davis, Baseball Pioneer, Dies at 88
By WILLIAM YARDLEY
Lavonne Paire Davis, a star in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League of the 1940s and 1950s and a consultant for the hit movie “A League of Their Own,” died on Saturday in the Van Nuys section of Los Angeles. She was 88.
Her death was confirmed by Jeneane Lesko, a board member of the league’s players association.
Davis, who was known as Pepper Paire in her playing days, entered the league in 1944, the year after it was formed by Philip W. Wrigley, the chewing-gum magnate and owner of the Chicago Cubs. Wrigley had worried that World War II would deplete professional baseball of male players and force it to fold. That never happened, but his women’s pro league became popular anyway, and Davis became one of its most enduring players.
" Baseball’s first woman scout dies at 100 "
By Craig Calcaterra
http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/02/11/baseballs-first-woman-scout-dies-at-100/related/
(http://nbchardballtalk.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/edith-houghton.jpg?w=242)
R.I.P. Edith.
Houghton, who died on Feb. 2 in Sarasota, Fla., at 100, liked to say that she was the first woman hired as a major league scout on her own. Her one known predecessor, Bessie Largent, had worked for many years in tandem with her husband, Roy, as a scout for the Chicago White Sox. But as Houghton pointed out to interviewers, although she never made a fuss about it, she worked solo for the Phillies from 1946 to 1951.
There are different accounts about why Houghton got the job. Some say she bowled over the Phillies’ president, Robert Carpenter, with an uncanny grasp of the game. Others mention the scrapbook she brought along, bulging with newspaper clippings documenting her impressive career as a player in the 1920s and ’30s on the women’s national baseball circuit known as the Bloomer Girls league.
Philadelphia sportswriters, bitter at the team’s decade-long swoon at or near the bottom of the standings, said the Phillies had hired her simply because they had nothing to lose.
But that she got the job at all constitutes one of the most unusual accomplishments by any woman in American sports.
Frank Marcos, senior director of the Major League Baseball Scouting Bureau, baseball’s cooperative scouting service, said that in addition to being one of the first female scouts in baseball, Houghton was apparently also the last.
“We have been talking about this all day, making calls to clubs all over the country,” Marcos said in an interview Thursday, after news of Houghton’s death had begun to circulate widely. “And we know of no other part-time or full-time women scouts in baseball since then.”
He added: “Would I like to change that? Darn right.”
The Newe York Times finally got around to publishing an obituary for Edith Houghton. She was not only apparently the first independently hired female Major League Baseball scout ... she seems to have been the last! (Well, not counting Mickey Lobel's probable future career after Trouble with the Curve.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/16/sports/baseball/edith-houghton-rarity-as-baseball-scout-dies-at-100.html
(Well, not counting Mickey Lobel's probable future career after Trouble with the Curve.)
In 1925, the Bobbies toured Japan, playing men's college teams for $800 a game. As a team they were less than spectacular, but the Japanese press had only good things to say about Edith.
The Philadelphia Inquirer interviewed Houghton in 1986 for an article about the discovery of a Philadelphia woman’s journal in the archives of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Written by one of Houghton’s teammates on the Bobbies, it described their two-month tour of Japan.
“For young women in 1925 — to be playing baseball and to be going to Japan — well, that was pretty exciting,” Houghton told the interviewer. “I wish I could remember more about it. But I was so young then.”
Like many Germans involved in efforts to kill Hitler, Mr. von Kleist was a soldier — a lieutenant in the German Army — but his family had long been active in the German resistance. In January 1944, he was 22 and recuperating in Berlin from wounds he suffered in combat when he was approached by Col. Claus von Stauffenberg to join an assassination plot.
At the time, Lieutenant von Kleist led a unit that was scheduled to meet with Hitler to show him new Army uniforms. Colonel von Stauffenberg asked Lieutenant von Kleist to take along hidden explosives, which he would then detonate at the meeting.
“I found it a very difficult decision, I must say,” Mr. von Kleist recalled in an interview for a 1992 documentary, “The Restless Conscience.”
He asked for a day to decide, and he traveled home from Berlin to talk with his father, Ewald von Kleist-Schmenzin. His father had been arrested many times for resistance activity.
“The next morning, my father said, ‘Why are you here again?’ “ Mr. von Kleist recalled. “I said, ‘Well, I have difficult decisions I have to make.’ He said, ‘What is it?’ And I told him. And he said at once, ‘Yes, of course you have to do it,’ and I said, ‘Yes, but I have to blow up with the colonel.’
“He got up from his chair, went to the window, looked out of the window for a moment, and then he turned and said: ‘Yes, you have to do that. A man who doesn’t take such a chance will never be happy again in his life.’ ”
Lieutenant von Kleist agreed to go through with the plan, but Hitler canceled at the last moment — he frequently changed his schedule late in the war — and Colonel von Stauffenberg and others began devising a new plan.
In July 1944, as other conspirators in the plot were being discovered and arrested, Colonel von Stauffenberg, whose Army role gave him access to top leaders, decided to leave a bomb under a table during a meeting of Hitler and his aides at Wolf’s Lair, his field headquarters in East Prussia. Lieutenant von Kleist was among several conspirators whose job was to wait in Berlin to be ready to stage a coup once Hitler’s death was confirmed.
LONDON — Richard Griffiths was one of the great British stage actors of his generation, a heavy man with a light touch, whether in Shakespeare or Neil Simon. But for millions of movie fans, he will always be grumpy Uncle Vernon, the least magical of characters in the fantastical "Harry Potter" movies.
Griffiths died Thursday at University Hospital in Coventry, central England, from complications following heart surgery, his agent, Simon Beresford, said. He was 65.
"Harry Potter" star Daniel Radcliffe paid tribute to the actor Friday, saying that "any room he walked into was made twice as funny and twice as clever just by his presence."
"I am proud to say I knew him," Radcliffe said.
Critic With the Golden Thumb
This has been interpreted in conservative circles as an attack by me, "a liberal mouthpiece." Not my intention. I tweeted out of love. If I'd had more words, I might have said he choose the wrong place and the wrong time. I was NOT implying that Clint Eastwood is "old and senile," as one right-wing blog charged.
He is old. I am old. Once we were both young and drank Guinness in a bar in Chicago, when he was still The Man With No Name. He was to move on from that evening and achieve, as actor and director, undeniable greatness. He is the opposite of senile. He is brave. He has a supremely intelligent artistic sensibility. He knows his instrument. Backstage in the briefing, he was handed the wrong sheet music.
Roger Ebert has died. He just announced that his cancer had returned, but I really didn't expect him to die so soon. This is tremendously sad. He died so young, and he was such an inspiration to so many people. Roger Ebert was an amazing man. He lost his ability to eat, to speak, to live life normally. Facing what he faced on a daily basis, most of us, myself included, would become bitter, collapsing under the weight of the enormity of of the problems which we faced each and every day. Not Roger Ebert. No matter what he was going through, he maintained a positive attitude, his zest for life, and his love for movies. He was first diagnosed with cancer in 2002, so he fought this horrible disease for 10 year. When celebrities die, it doesn't usually affect me but this really is devastating. Rest in Peace Roger Ebert. We will not see the likes of you again. You were one of the good ones.
http://variety.com/2013/film/news/roger-ebert-dies-at-70-1200333136/
Margaret Thatcher, who has died following a stroke, was one of the most influential political figures of the 20th Century
Today is a sad day, because the father of cinema fantasy has left this world. Ray Harryhausen died today. He lived a rich life and enriched the lifes of countless cinema lovers and film makers. I was lucky to have known him, years ago he ha...d invited me and Christiane to a wonderful evening at his house. Over the years we had exchanged letters which resulted in discussing a possible project. It wasn't meant to be but the memories will never fade away.
(http://i953.photobucket.com/albums/ae15/peckinpah69/uk-ray-mike-k.jpg) (http://s953.photobucket.com/user/peckinpah69/media/uk-ray-mike-k.jpg.html)
Today is a sad day, because the father of cinema fantasy has left this world. Ray Harryhausen died today. He lived a rich life and enriched the lifes of countless cinema lovers and film makers. I was lucky to have known him, years ago he ha...d invited me and Christiane to a wonderful evening at his house. Over the years we had exchanged letters which resulted in discussing a possible project. It wasn't meant to be but the memories will never fade away.
Author Richard Matheson has died at age 87. http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/richard-matheson/26143/richard-matheson-dies-aged-87 He's always been a favorite of mine!
Author Richard Matheson has died at age 87. http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/richard-matheson/26143/richard-matheson-dies-aged-87 He's always been a favorite of mine!
Dennis Farina, a former Chicago cop who as an actor played a TV cop on Law & Order during his wide-ranging career, has died. He was 69.
The stuntman who parachuted in to the London 2012 opening ceremony as James Bond has been killed in an accident.
Julie Harris, the unprepossessing anti-diva who, in the guises of Joan of Arc, Mary Todd Lincoln, Emily Dickinson and many other characters both fictional and real, became the most decorated performer in the history of Broadway, died on Saturday at her home in Chatham, Mass. She was 87.
Elmore Leonard, the great crime novelist, died on Tuesday at the age of 87.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/21/books/elmore-leonard-master-of-crime-fiction-dies-at-87.html?pagewanted=all
At the beginning of his writing career, Leonard's specialty was Westerns. His best-known Western short story, 3:10 to Yuma, was twice adapted as a film, but Clint Eastwood fans will also recall him as the author of the screenplay of Joe Kidd.
Here's an appreciation by New York Times book reviewer (and former film critic) Janet Maslin:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/22/books/elmore-leonard-a-man-of-few-yet-perfect-words.html
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/08/22/arts/22ELMORE/22ELMORE-popup.jpg)
R.I.P.
Ken Norton, who fought three memorable fights with Muhammad Ali, breaking his jaw in winning their first bout, then losing twice, and who went on to become the World Boxing Council heavyweight champion, died Wednesday in the Las Vegas suburb of Henderson, Nev. He was 70.
TOKYO — Hiroshi Yamauchi, who transformed his great-grandfather’s playing-card company, Nintendo, into a global video game powerhouse, died on Thursday in Kyoto, Japan. He was 85.
In the early 1990s, Mr. Yamauchi found himself in the middle of an international dispute when he offered to buy a majority stake in the Seattle Mariners. The team, established in 1977, had been threatening to leave Seattle if it could not find a new owner willing to keep it there. Nintendo had its United States headquarters in Seattle.http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/business/global/hiroshi-yamauchi-who-helped-drive-nintendo-into-dominance-dies-at-85.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&ref=obituaries&adxnnlx=1379773517-s5ctNj/+lRYH0GRrutDObg
The team’s owners approved the deal but the commissioner of Major League Baseball, Fay Vincent, and a four-man M.L.B. owners’ committee initially opposed it. They relented and approved the sale in 1992 after Mariners fans and the Seattle news media rallied in favor of it. In 2001, the Mariners signed the star Japanese outfielder Ichiro Suzuki, now with the Yankees, helping to open the door for many more Japanese players to join major league teams in the United States.
Italian spaghetti western film star Giuliano Gemma was killed in a car crash on Tuesday.
The 75 year old was involved in a collision near Rome, Italy. He was taken to hospital but died shortly after his arrival.
After working as a stuntman, he began acting in 1962. He became famous for his roles in spaghetti westerns, appearing in films such as A Pistol for Ringo, Blood for a Silver Dollar and Day of Anger.
He went on to win the David di Donatello, Italy’s equivalent of the Oscar, for his performance in Desert of Tartars in 1976.
Tom Clancy, whose complex, adrenaline-fueled military novels spawned a new genre of thrillers and made him one of the world’s best-known and best-selling authors, died on Tuesday in Baltimore. He was 66.
Hitlers bodyguard Rochus Misch (he was born 1917 I believe)......he was last remaining in the bunker , quite a life he had : pre-WW2/Hitler elected , WW2 , Hitler bombed , Hitlers death/end of war , Cold War , Berlin Wall torn , fall of Saddam , 9/11.....all these things he lived to see.He must've thought of Hitler when he saw dictators like Saddam and Gadaffi & just like Hitler it all came back to them.
" Hiroshi Yamauchi, Who Steered Nintendo to Dominance, Dies at 85 "
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/business/global/hiroshi-yamauchi-who-helped-drive-nintendo-into-dominance-dies-at-85.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&ref=obituaries&adxnnlx=1379773517-s5ctNj/+lRYH0GRrutDObg
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/hiroshi-yamauchi-death-seattle-mariners-owner-nintendo-president-signficant-legacy-091913
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/09/20/business/19yamauchi-inline/19yamauchi-inline-popup.jpg)
R.I.P. Mr. Yamauchi.
really sad news......
Spaghetti Western Legend Giuliano Gemma dies in car crash age 75 / Breaking News
(http://www.nationalturk.com/en/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Spaghetti-Western-Legend-Gulliano-Gemma-Dies.jpg)
It seems bizarre that a stuntman would die in an accident; it's also bizarre that he would die in an accident at such an age! RIP
LCat
" Hiroshi Yamauchi, Who Steered Nintendo to Dominance, Dies at 85 "
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/business/global/hiroshi-yamauchi-who-helped-drive-nintendo-into-dominance-dies-at-85.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&ref=obituaries&adxnnlx=1379773517-s5ctNj/+lRYH0GRrutDObg
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/hiroshi-yamauchi-death-seattle-mariners-owner-nintendo-president-signficant-legacy-091913
(http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/09/20/business/19yamauchi-inline/19yamauchi-inline-popup.jpg)
R.I.P. Mr. Yamauchi.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Veteran character actor Ed Lauter, whose long, angular face and stern bearing made him an instantly recognizable figure in scores of movies and TV shows during a career that stretched across five decades, died Wednesday. He was 74.
He was in "Trouble With the Curve" in 2011 with Clint Eastwood and in "Born on the Fourth of July" with Tom Cruise. He was also in "The New Centurions" with George C. Scott and in "My Blue Heaven," ''Revenge of the Nerds 2" and "Not Another Teenage Movie," among many other films.
Mr. Ed Lauter passed away yesterday. I remember him from Death Wish 3 and more recently, Trouble With The Curve. I've seen him in other films as well but can't recall the titles.
Death hunt ????
Always loved that film.
Yes, and The White Buffalo, too, another Bronson movie. He's had a long career, having appeared many times on television and numerous films. Looks like he played Frank Morris in a tv movie entitled Alcatraz: The Whole Shocking Story (1980). There's a few still yet to come and you can see more here: Ed Lauter/IMDB (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0491590/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1)
Apparently, lime green is the new black for obituaries.
" Tom Clancy, Best-Selling Master of Military Thrillers, Dies at 66 "
R.I.P. Mr. Tom Clancy.
Sad to hear of Lou Reeds passing... Ive got some of his records...
Doris Lessing the author has died aged 94.
This is sad news. An interview by Woman's Hour was replayed this morning on radio 4. She was a remarkable woman.
RIP
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/10455485/Doris-Lessing-Nobel-Prize-winning-author-dies-at-94.html
I don't find this news that sad. The woman was 94 years old. How long do you think women can realistically live?
I'm willing to bet her family thinks so. :-\
R.I.P. to all the recently departed mentioned here. :'(
I agree, and their feelings would be understandable, but since we are not members of her family, we don't have to express the same sentiments ;)
But there's absolutely nothing wrong with doing so. We can agree to disagree and end this with this post. If you care to continue, there's always PM's; dragging this out here is not an option.
Surely it's always sad when someone whose work we admire dies, no matter how old he or she is? Let Lin be sad about Lessing's passing if that's how she feels.
Do I understand, from your post above, that it is not sad when anyone who is not a family member dies?
From my point of view, the woman was 94 years old, and everyone has to die at some point in time. If I was an admirer of hers, I would be so thankful and so grateful that she was fortunate enough to live for 94 years. To put this in perspective, a little more than half a percent of the American population lives to be 90 or above. 99.5% of the population dies before age 90. I'm sure the statistics in the UK and Europe are similar. I think that death is part of the life cycle, and I don't find it particularly sad when someone who I don't have a personal connection to dies when they are 94. I understand that not everyone shares that perspective, and I respect that as well.
I think it's sad if we consider the amazing and so important things she wrote and said all her life long : try to read one of her books maybe ... or listen to one of her interviews.
It's always sad to loose someone as intelligent and interesting personn as Doris Lessing was.
The fact that she was 94 can't be seen as insignificant to me : only respect for this Great Lady.
When it comes to ones' demise it matters not to me if they lived to 80, 90 or 100. Yes, they've lived a long life but regardless, it's sad to lose them.Yes, exactly what I think Jed
When it comes to ones' demise it matters not to me if they lived to 80, 90 or 100. Yes, they've lived a long life but regardless, it's sad to lose them.
I agree with you and Sylvie, Jed. Age is just a number.
If age is just a number, why is it that my great-aunt, who is 90, is still lying about her age? :)
JOHANNESBURG — Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first black president and an enduring icon of the struggle against racial oppression, died on Thursday, the government announced, leaving the nation without its moral center at a time of growing dissatisfaction with the country’s leaders.
“Our nation has lost its greatest son,” President Jacob Zuma said in a televised address on Thursday night, adding that Mr. Mandela had died at 8:50 p.m. local time. “His humility, his compassion and his humanity earned him our love.”
Mr Zuma called Mr. Mandela’s death “the moment of our greatest sorrow,” and said that South Africa’s thoughts were now with the former president’s family. “They have sacrificed much and endured much so that our people could be free,” he said.
Mr. Mandela spent 27 years in prison after being convicted of treason by the white minority government, only to forge a peaceful end to white rule by negotiating with his captors after his release in 1990. He led the African National Congress, long a banned liberation movement, to a resounding electoral victory in 1994, the first fully democratic election in the country’s history.
The world has lost a remarkable man. He will never be forgotten.
Rest in Peace, Madiba.
The world has lost a remarkable man. He will never be forgotten.
Rest in Peace, Madiba.
“It is impossible to sum up the impact Nelson Mandela had on South Africa and the world. I will never forget the day I met him and experienced firsthand his indomitable spirit and warm, charismatic smile. What he went through and what he accomplished will never be forgotten.” — Clint Eastwood (Invictus)
*Sorry about this, I just remembered this information was posted earlier. Still, I don't believe a link was provided.Yeah, the link is there. I've seen a couple movies with Walker in them, but have actually only seen the first Fast and Furious movie.
“I will not be a common man. I will stir the smooth sands of monotony. I do not crave security. I wish to hazard my soul to opportunity.”
Sisters Fontaine and De Havilland were Hollywood rivals
The sisters' difficult relationship continued for decades.
Speaking to the Hollywood Reporter in 1978, Fontaine said: "I married first, won the Oscar before Olivia did, and if I die first, she'll undoubtedly be livid because I beat her to it."
In her autobiography, the actress said: "I adore, respect and like my sister. But we don't seek out each other's company. We're such complete opposites."
“On the ninth of my planned 15 bomb runs, at 1,200 feet, an enemy antiaircraft shell exploded in the cockpit. Instinctively, I pulled back on the stick to gain altitude. Then I passed out. When I came to a short time later, I couldn’t see a thing. There was stinging agony in my face and throbbing in my head. I felt for my upper lip. It was almost severed from the rest of my face. I called out over the radio through my lip mike (which miraculously still worked), ‘I’m blind! For God’s sake, help me! I’m blind!’ ”
The writer of those words, Kenneth A. Schechter, who died on Dec. 11 at 83, was no novelist. A graduate of Stanford and Harvard Business School, he spent most of his professional life as an insurance agent. But on March 22, 1952, as a Navy pilot over Wongsang-ni, North Korea, Mr. Schechter, then Ensign Schechter, was at the heart of an astonishing real-life thriller, one of the most electrifying air rescues in American military history.
Eleanor Parker lived to 91. She passed away a few days ago, on December 9: The Hollywood Reporter (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/actress-eleanor-parker-dies-664340?mobile_redirect=false)
The actress was known for her roles in Caged, Detective Story, Interrupted Melody and The Sound Of Music.
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c6/Sound_of_music.jpg/220px-Sound_of_music.jpg) (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a1/Interrupted_Melody.jpg/220px-Interrupted_Melody.jpg) (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/8/87/Detective-Story-Poster.jpg/220px-Detective-Story-Poster.jpg) (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f9/Caged1_1950.jpg/250px-Caged1_1950.jpg)
R.I.P. Ms. Parker
(http://ts4.mm.bing.net/th?id=H.4510996803880187&pid=15.1)
Phil appeared in Eastwood's comedy Every Which Way But Loose and credited with songs it's soundtrack as well as the sequel, Any Which Way You Can.
Don't Say You Don't Love Me No More
Written by Phil Everly (as P. Everly) and J. Paige
Sung by Sondra Locke and Phil Everly
"I was listening to one of my favorite songs that Phil wrote and had an extreme emotional moment just before I got the news of his passing," he said. "I took that as a special spiritual message from Phil saying good-bye."
Phil & Don produced some of the greatest early rock & roll songs. Bye Bye Love, Wake Up Little Susie and All I Have To Do Is Dream just to name a few.I didn't recognize the name when I heard that he'd passed, but I do know those songs. Definitely some good songs they sang!
Claudio Abbado, a conductor whose refined interpretations of a large symphonic and operatic repertory won him the directorships of several of the world’s most revered musical institutions — including La Scala, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Vienna State Opera and the Berlin Philharmonic — died on Monday at his home in Bologna, Italy. He was 80.
Dave Madden, who played band manager Reuben Kincaid on “The Partridge Family,” died Thursday in Jacksonville, Florida of congestive heart and kidney failure. He was 82.
Madden’s character was typically aggravated by the mischievous Partridge kids and tangled frequently with Danny Bonaduce’s character.
While the series starred Shirley Jones, with her real-life son David Cassidy as the resident heartthrob, it was Madden and the freckle-faced Bonaduce who became the reigning comic duo.
R.I.P. Philip Seymour Hoffman.I liked him in every part he played, but especially in "The Big Lebowsky", "Magnolia" and "Good Morning England"
He is a loss to movie making. The reason for his death is so sad. Why do such talented people do these things to themselves?
R.I.P., Philip Seymour Hoffman. It's always sad when one so talented dies so young, and this time it's even sadder because addiction has claimed another victim.
This really is very sad. It is made all the more tragic because Philip Seymour Hoffman has three young children who will now grow up without a father :( I usually have a hard time feeling sympathetic for drug addicts, but in this particular case, it really does appear that Hoffman really tried to get clean. According to news reports he was clean for 23 years before relapsing recently. After his relapse, he went to rehab after becoming addicted to prescription medication and then moving onto heroin. We have so much more work to do to turn people away from these poisons that increasing number of people are turning to to medicate away the problems of life. Drugs are never the answer.
Ralph Waite the father on the Waltons John Walton has passed away at the age of 85. Great actor and even greater person from what I've read. He will be missed!
Well, there were a couple of guys named Nicholas who were Czars (the word is derived from Caesar), so you sort of have it both ways.
Shirley Temple Black has passed away: Entertainment Weekly (http://insidemovies.ew.com/2014/02/11/shirley-temple-died/)
Belatedly...
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/12/arts/shirley-temple-black-screen-star-dies-at-85.html?emc=edit_na_20140211
When I was a child, she was my idol! In particularly I was a fan of her television series “Shirley Temple’s Storybook”. :)
Rest in peace, Shirley Temple. :(
Alain Resnais, the French filmmaker who helped introduce literary modernism to the movies and became an international art-house star with nonlinear narrative films like “Hiroshima Mon Amour” and “Last Year at Marienbad,” died on Saturday in Paris. He was 91.
His death was confirmed by the French president, François Hollande, who called Mr. Resnais one of France’s greatest filmmakers.
Although his name was often associated with the French New Wave directors — notably Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut, whose careers coalesced around the same time his did — Mr. Resnais actually belonged to a tradition of Left Bank intellectualism that drew on more established, high-culture sources than the moviecentric influences of the New Wave. Where Godard’s 1960 film, “Breathless,” was a pastiche of low-budget American gangster films, Mr. Resnais’s breakthrough feature, “Hiroshima Mon Amour,” in 1959, took on two subjects weighted with social and political significance: the American nuclear destruction of Hiroshima, Japan, and the German occupation of France.
His last film, “The Life of Riley,” had its premiere last month at the Berlin International Film Festival, where it won the Alfred Bauer Prize. This particular Silver Bear award celebrates a film that “opens new perspectives on cinematic art.”
Renais was probably the oldest working filmmaker alive after Portugal's Manoel de Oliveira. Those of his films that I've seen have always been thought-provoking, even if some were more enjoyable than others.
From the Times obit linked to above:
Still opening new perspectives at 91! What more could you wish for?
R.I.P.
The flexibility of his voice, and the longevity of his career — he worked steadily until two years ago — made him a “one name” phenomenon in Hollywood, said Marice Tobias, a consultant and voice coach to many A-list actors. “When you go past superstar status, you reach icon status in this business, where people know you by one name only,” she said. “That was Hal.”
Mr. Douglas, who never lived in Hollywood, preferring to work from studios in New York, took a more relaxed view of his work. “I’m not outstanding in any way,” he told The New York Times in 2009. “It’s a craft that you learn, like making a good pair of shoes. And I just consider myself a good shoemaker.”
Actor James Rebhorn, seen most recently in turns on “White Collar” and as the father of Claire Danes’ character Carrie Mathison on “Homeland,” died Friday. He was 65.
Along with his supporting role on the Showtime CIA hit, he recently played Special Agent Reese Hughes on USA Network’s “White Collar.” He has a special place in “Seinfeld” history as well, having played the district attorney who sent the gang to jail in the 1998 series finale.
The character actor appeared in several big screen hits, including “Meet the Parents,” (2000) “Scent of a Woman” (1992) and “Independence Day,” (1996) where he had a memorable role as the Secretary of Defense. Other notable credits include “The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle,” (2000) David’s Fincher’s “The Game” (1997) and comedy “My Cousin Vinny.” (1992)
He retained his sense of humor to the end. “In David’s final request,” his family said in a statement on Saturday, “he asked that $100 in small bills be placed in his left sock ‘just in case tipping is recommended where I’m going.’ ”
Mickey Rooney, a celebrated child actor who embodied the All-American boy in the "Andy Hardy" films of the 1930s and '40s and became one of the era's top box-office draws, has died. He was 93.
Marilyn Burns, star of the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre, has died at 65. :( http://www.eonline.com/news/566588/texas-chainsaw-massacre-star-marilyn-burns-dead-at-65
Yeah, he was in the newest one. I haven't seen it yet.
According to IMDB, Marilyn was 64.
Oh, that's interesting. IMDb has her birthday as being July 5, 1950. Hopefully all the websites will get that straightened out with the correct info.
The original Chain Saw is my favorite horror movie of all time. It's been a long time since I've seen it, but I think it's due for another with this news. She was really terrific in that role.
Lorin Maazel, a former child prodigy who went on to become the music director of the New York Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Vienna State Opera and several other ensembles and companies around the world, and who was known for his incisive and sometimes extreme interpretations, died on Sunday at his home in Castleton, Va. He was 84.
I'm sorry to say that I just learned that Robin Williams has passed away. I apologize for not posting any links or sources but I'm a little upset at this news. Could somebody else, please? I tuned in to CNN and this is how I learned of this very sad news.
Williams' publicist Mara Buxbaum told The Hollywood Reporter: "Robin Williams passed away this morning. He has been battling severe depression of late. This is a tragic and sudden loss. The family respectfully asks for their privacy as they grieve during this very difficult time."
Suspected suicide ... he was only 63.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/robin-williams-dies-suspected-suicide-724724
R.I.P.
“You know you don’t have to act with me, Steve,” her character says to Bogart’s in the movie’s most memorable scene. “You don’t have to say anything, and you don’t have to do anything. Not a thing. Oh, maybe just whistle. You know how to whistle, don’t you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow.”
That would be Lauren Bacall, Christopher ... oh well, you're too young. ;)
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/movies/lauren-bacall-sultry-movie-star-dies-at-89.html
(http://static01.nyt.com/images/2014/08/13/arts/BACALL-obit/BACALL-obit-master675.jpg)
Humphrey Bogart's Muse, on and offscreen. As in their first film together, To Have and Have Not
R.I.P.
Re "Lauren Bacall: 1924-2014: In a Bygone Hollywood, She Purred Every Word" (obituary, front page, Aug. 13):
As a cabdriver in college, I once drove Lauren Bacall home from the Broadway theater where she was appearing in “Applause.”
A man came out of a door on a deserted street in the theater district and hailed me. He said, “Wait here.”
A woman got in the back seat.
I paid her no heed until she said, “The Dakota, please.”
That unmistakable voice sent shivers down my spine. We had a lovely talk, and she tipped well.
She was a quintessential New Yorker. She is missed.
BOB LIFF
New York, Aug. 13, 2014
The writer is senior vice president of George Arzt Communications, the public relations firm.
Richard Attenborough, who after a distinguished stage and film acting career in Britain reinvented himself to become the internationally admired director of the monumental “Gandhi” and other films, died on Sunday. He was 90.
Oscar-winning British film director Richard Attenborough has died at the age of 90, his son has said.
Lord Attenborough was one of Britain's leading actors, before becoming a highly successful director.
In a career that spanned six decades, he appeared in films including Brighton Rock, World War Two prisoner of war thriller The Great Escape and later in dinosaur blockbuster Jurassic Park.
As a director he was perhaps best known for Gandhi, which won him two Oscars.
Sir Ben Kingsley, who played the title role, said he would "miss him dearly".
"Richard Attenborough trusted me with the crucial and central task of bringing to life a dream it took him 20 years to bring to fruition.
"When he gave me the part of Gandhi it was with great grace and joy. He placed in me an absolute trust and in turn I placed an absolute trust in him and grew to love him."
Richard Attenborough, who after a distinguished stage and film acting career in Britain reinvented himself to become the internationally admired director of the monumental “Gandhi” and other films, died on Sunday. He was 90.
His death was confirmed by his son, Michael, according to the BBC.
Until the early 1960s, Mr. Attenborough was a familiar actor in Britain but little known in the United States. In London he was the original detective in Agatha Christie’s play “The Mousetrap.” On the British screen, he made an early mark as the sociopath Pinkie Brown in an adaptation of Graham Greene’s “Brighton Rock” (1947).
Hollywood Breakthroughhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/25/arts/richard-attenborough-actor-director-and-giant-of-british-cinema-dies-at-90.html?_r=0
But it was not until he appeared with his friend Steve McQueen and a sterling ensemble cast in the 1963 war film “The Great Escape,” his first Hollywood feature, that he found a trans-Atlantic audience. His role, as a British officer masterminding an escape plan from a German prisoner-of-war camp, was integral to one of the most revered and enjoyable of all World War II films.
Music legend Bob Crewe, whose work can be heard in the Broadway musical Jersey Boys, died on September 11, 2014, according to Frontiers LA. He was 82 years old.
Stefan Gierasch, Actor in 'Jeremiah Johnson' and 'Carrie,' Dies at 88
He also appeared in 'High Plains Drifter,' 'The Hustler,' 'Silver Streak' and 'Dave'
Stefan Gierasch, a character actor for nearly six decades who stood out opposite Robert Redford in Sydney Pollack’s poetic 1972 Western Jeremiah Johnson, has died. He was 88.
Gierasch died Sept. 6 at his home in Santa Monica of complications from a stroke, his wife, Hedy Sontag, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Gierasch also played the mayor of Lago who Clint Eastwood ousts in favor of a dwarf in High Plains Drifter (1973).
Theatre, film and TV actor Sir Donald Sinden has died at his home aged 90 following a long illness.
He made his name on stage as a Shakespearean actor and appeared in more than 70 film and TV productions.
He had been suffering from prostate cancer for several years, and died of the disease at his home in Kent.
The Society of London Theatre has announced that the West End will dim its lights at 19:00 BST in the actor's memory.
QuoteMusic legend Bob Crewe, whose work can be heard in the Broadway musical Jersey Boys, died on September 11, 2014, according to Frontiers LA. He was 82 years old.
http://www.broadway.com/buzz/177434/hit-making-jersey-boy-bob-crewe-dead-at-82/
http://www.tmz.com/2014/10/20/wrestling-legend-ox-baker-dead-dies-escape-from-new-york/I saw a terrific video yesterday of Ox on The Price is Right back in 1981. Here's a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcLfDM_Frq4
Another person in his 80's passes. I'm surprised that a wrestling legend lived so long.
RIP, Ox!
Legendary supergroup Cream, which also included Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker, are now considered one of the most important bands in rock history.
They sold 35 million albums in just over two years and were given the first ever platinum disc for Wheels of Fire.
Bruce wrote and sang most of the songs, including "I Feel Free" and "Sunshine Of Your Love".
Jack Bruce was said to be one of the best bass guitarists in rock history
Can you find us a link, Gant? :)
Glen A. Larson, the writer and producer behind a series of hit television shows in the 1970s and ’80s, including the original “Battlestar Galactica,” ‘'Knight Rider,” ‘'Magnum, P.I.” and “Quincy, M.E.,” died on Friday. He was 77.
Ken Takakura, who became a star playing outlaws and stoic heroes in scores of Japanese films, died on Nov. 10 in Tokyo. He was 83.
His office said he died at a hospital where he was being treated for lymphoma.
Mr. Takakura, who because of his quiet, brooding screen presence was often compared to Clint Eastwood, made his screen debut in 1956 and rose to fame in the 1960s in crime films like “Abashiri Prison” (1965). Much of his appeal stemmed from his image as a hero fighting authority figures on behalf of the poor and weak.
Mike Nichols, one of America’s most celebrated directors, whose long, protean résumé of critic- and crowd-pleasing work earned him adulation both on Broadway and in Hollywood, died on Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 83.
The family settled in Cambridge when she was 11, and before she left the Cambridge High School for Girls, at 16, she already knew that she wanted to be a writer and that mysterious death intrigued her.
“When I first heard that Humpty Dumpty fell off the wall,” she was fond of saying, “I immediately wondered: Did he fall — or was he pushed?”
Joe Cocker, the gravelly British singer who became one of pop’s most recognizable interpreters in the late 1960s and ’70s with passionate, idiosyncratic takes on songs like the Beatles’ “With a Little Help From My Friends,” died on Monday at his home in Crawford, Colo. He was 70.
The cause was lung cancer, his agent, Barrie Marshall, said.
Buddy DeFranco, the innovative clarinetist who rose from the remains of the swing era to forge new and lasting prominence as the instrument’s pre-eminent interpreter of bebop, died on Wednesday in Panama City, Fla. He was 91.
Aussie actor Rod Taylor has passed away aged 84.
SMH (http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/australian-actor-rod-taylor-dies-aged-84-20150109-12kx7z.html)
I didn't know Rod was an Aussie
Lizabeth Scott, a sultry blonde with a come-hither voice cut out for the seething romantic and homicidal passions of her Hollywood film noir roles in the late 1940s and early ’50s, died on Jan. 31 in Los Angeles. She was 92.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center confirmed the death, but did not give a cause.
Ms. Scott was billed as another Lauren Bacall or Veronica Lake, and in many of her 22 films she portrayed a good-bad girl with love in her head and larceny in her heart, or vice versa. Her co-stars were Humphrey Bogart, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster and other tough gents, and her movies’ titles were lurid stuff: “The Strange Love of Martha Ivers,” “Dead Reckoning,” “Pitfall,” “Dark City,” “I Walk Alone” and “Bad for Each Other.”
In a career that spanned more than 50 years, Jourdan played key roles in scores of films and TV shows, but felt he was too often stereotyped as the European lover, complete with charming accent.http://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-louis-jourdan-20150215-story.html
"That ooh-la-la, conventional, embarrassing character," he complained in a 1965 interview with the Associated Press. "I'm proud to be a Frenchman, but I resent the image people have of the stupid, continental charmer.
"Against that type of role I fight pitilessly."
Robert Osborne, film historian and host of the Turner Classic Movies cable channel, said Jourdan was indeed capable of serious work in roles such as the callous concert pianist he played in the 1948 movie "Letter From an Unknown Woman" that has become a film-buff favorite.
But at the time it came out, the film didn't do Jourdan's career much good. "Audiences didn't want to see him in that kind of role," Osborne said in an interview with The Times. "I think he's right that he was stereotyped.
"He was hired for his profile."
Leonard Nimoy, the sonorous, gaunt-faced actor who won a worshipful global following as Mr. Spock, the resolutely logical human-alien first officer of the Starship Enterprise in the television and movie juggernaut “Star Trek,” died on Friday morning at his home in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He was 83.
For much of the past 25 years Mr. Oliveira was known among cinephiles as the world’s oldest active filmmaker. Unable to work for decades under the repressive right-wing government of António de Oliveira Salazar, who came to power in 1932, Mr. Oliveira started making up for lost time in his 60s, at an age when most directors are entering their creative twilight.
Almost as old as cinema itself, Mr. Oliveira often seemed like a filmmaker out of time, or perhaps of many times, a 20th-century modernist drawn to the themes and traditions of earlier eras. He was known for ruminative, melancholic, often eccentric movies about grand subjects like the nature of love and the ever-present specter of death.
Maya Plisetskaya, who has died aged 89, was one of the most important ballerinas of the Soviet era
Ben E. King dies at 76; singer-songwriter behind classic 'Stand By Me'
Sad news that Christopher Lee has died at 93. He's my favorite Dracula, and did lots of other great things, of course. http://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/news/christopher-lee-legendary-movie-villain-and-horror-icon-dies-at-93/ar-BBkXkal?ocid=iehp#page=1
Ornette Coleman, the great jazz saxophonist and composer, has died at 85:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/arts/music/ornette-coleman-jazz-saxophonist-dies-at-85-obituary.html
(http://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/06/12/arts/12coleman-web2/12coleman-web2-blog427.jpg)
R.I.P.
Ornette Coleman, the great jazz saxophonist and composer, has died at 85:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/12/arts/music/ornette-coleman-jazz-saxophonist-dies-at-85-obituary.html
(http://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/06/12/arts/12coleman-web2/12coleman-web2-blog427.jpg)
R.I.P.
Patric Macnee is dead.
http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/jun/25/patrick-macnee
Omar Sharif, the Egyptian actor who rode out of the desert in the 1962 screen epic “Lawrence of Arabia” into a glamorous if brief reign as an international star in films like “Doctor Zhivago” and “The Night of the Generals,” died on Friday in Cairo. He was 83.
His death, at a hospital, was caused by a heart attack, said his agent, Steve Kenis.
Mr. Sharif — who later became as well known for his mastery of bridge as he was for his acting — was a commanding, darkly handsome presence onscreen. He was multilingual as well, and comfortable in almost any role or cultural setting.
He had appeared in a number of Egyptian films before the British director David Lean added him to the cast of “Lawrence of Arabia,” a freewheeling depiction of the real-life exploits of the British adventurer T. E. Lawrence, who led Arab fighters in a series of battles against Turkish occupiers. Peter O’Toole starred in the title role.
Tributes have poured in for Cilla Black, one of Britain's best-loved television presenters, following her death at the age of 72.
Born Priscilla White, she started out working in the cloakroom at the Cavern club, where The Beatles were first spotted, before taking to the stage herself.
The band championed Black and introduced her to their manager Brian Epstein, who signed her.
Black released her first single in 1963 and the following year had two number one hits, You're My World and Anyone Who Had a Heart. She went on to release 14 albums.
Sadly, the lovely Yvonne Craig has passed away.
The Hollywood Reporter: Yvonne Craig, TV's Sexy Batgirl of the 1960s, Dies at 78 (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/yvonne-craig-dead-batgirl-1960s-816226)
Variety: TV’s Batgirl Yvonne Craig Dies at 78 (https://www.yahoo.com/tv/s/tv-batgirl-yvonne-craig-dies-78-045445765.html)
May God Bless you, Ms. Craig. Rest In Peace.
Director Wes Craven has died at 76. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/wes-craven-horror-maestro-dies-818806
I've often written about my love of various movies he made over the years on this board, Wes Craven's New Nightmare being my favorite.
His patients have lost an erudite and compassionate doctor. The world has lost a writer of immense talent and heart, a writer who helped illuminate the wonders, losses and consolations of the human condition.
Martin Milner has passed away.
'Adam-12' and 'Route 66' Star Martin Milner Dies (https://www.yahoo.com/tv/s/adam-12-route-66-star-191100421.html)
Mr. Milner had no illusions about his place in the Hollywood firmament and seemed not to be particularly concerned about it.
“The really big stars have a drive that made them into superstars,” he said in an interview with The Toronto Star in 1994. “They can’t turn it off when they have that success. I certainly was not driven by a great dedication that made me succeed or else.”
He wondered aloud if that made him a bum. Then he added, “It’s terrible, but it’s true.”
Who wants to be the first to name the movie Maureen O'Hara and Clint were in together?
(http://www.trbimg.com/img-562be539/turbine/la-et-mn-maureen-ohara-governors-awards-oscars-001/750/750x422)
Maureen O'Hara accepts her honorary Oscar from Clint Eastwood and Liam Neeson at the 2014 Governors Awards. (Chris Pizzello / Invision)
R.I.P.
Bruce Hyde, Actor in Two Early 'Star Trek' Episodes, Dies at 74 (http://news.yahoo.com/bruce-hyde-actor-two-early-star-trek-episodes-012517822.html;_ylt=A0LEV12f2SJW1VcANnTBGOd_;_ylu=X3oDMTByMjB0aG5zBGNvbG8DYmYxBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzYw--)
Kurt Masur, the music director emeritus of the New York Philharmonic, who was credited with transforming the orchestra from a sullen, lackluster ensemble into one of luminous renown, died on Saturday in Greenwich, Conn. He was 88.
The death, from complications of Parkinson’s disease, was announced by the Philharmonic, which said it would dedicate its Saturday night performance of Handel’s “Messiah” to Mr. Masur’s memory.
Wow, rest in peace Mr. Macnee.
Patric Macnee is dead.
(http://i.guim.co.uk/static/w-620/h--/q-95/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2015/6/25/1435261762861/patrick-macnee-007.jpg)
http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/jun/25/patrick-macnee
Yogi Berra has died at the age of 90. Yogi Berra was not only one of the greatest players ever but he was one of the greatest human beings ever. A true legend, icon, whatever word you want to use about him. He was truly one of a kind. Everybody loved him and nobody ever said a bad word about him. That is really rare. Usually theres always somebody out there who isnt going to like you. But not with Yogi. Everybody liked him! Even Red Sox fans liked him! According to Tim Kirkjan Ted Williams told him a long time ago that Yogi Berra was the man he feared the most. Not Dimaggio and not Mantle. That says a lot right there. Baseball will never be the same without him! Yogi will be missed by all!
A couple of Elvis-related passings recently, Mary Ann Mobley and Millie Kirkham December 9 & 14, respectively.
Former Miss America Mary Ann Mobley dies at 77 (http://www.dailynews.com/obituaries/20141209/former-miss-america-mary-ann-mobley-dies-at-77)
Nashville singer Millie Kirkham dies at 91 (http://www.tennessean.com/story/entertainment/music/2014/12/15/nashville-singer-millie-kirkham-dies/20440143/)
Kirkham was a singer and can be heard on Elvis' best known holiday classic, Blue Christmas, as well as The Wonder Of You, Surrender, How Great Thou Art, Polk Salad Annie, Bridge Over Troubled Water, Don't, Just Pretend, (You're The) Devil in Disguise, C.C. Rider and many others. Mobley was a former Miss America (1959), married to film actor & tv personality Gary Collins and appeared in the Presley films Girl Happy and Harum Scarum.
RIP and God Bless
Former actor Wayne Rogers, who played wisecracking US Army surgeon "Trapper" John McIntyre in the acclaimed Korean War television comedy MASH before leaving after three seasons in a contract dispute, has died in Los Angeles, a spokeswoman says. He was 82.
Natalie Cole, the Grammy-winning daughter of Nat 'King' Cole' who carried on her late father's musical legacy and, through technology, shared a duet with him on Unforgettable, has died aged 65.Cole died on Thursday evening at Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles due to complications from ongoing health issues, her family said in a statement on Friday.'Natalie fought a fierce, courageous battle, dying how she lived ... with dignity, strength and honour. Our beloved Mother and sister will be greatly missed and remain UNFORGETTABLE in our hearts forever,' read the statement from her son Robert Yancy and sisters Timolin and Casey Cole.
Dan Haggerty who played Grizzly Adams has passed away. I remember watching reruns of that show growing up as a kid. Always enjoyed watching it. Just a real nice peaceful show to watch. I actually bought the entire series which is only 2 seasons and the movie for my brother last Christmas.
Got another to report... :(
(http://ichef-1.bbci.co.uk/news/304/media/images/50192000/jpg/_50192598_000136408-1.jpg)
Leslie Nielsen, comic actor and Airplane! star, dies (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-11860014)
Yes, I'm serious. And stop calling me Shirley. :(
R.I.P. Mr. Nielsen.
January, 2016 has been a rough month.
The double Oscar nominated Italian director and writer Ettore Scola has died aged 84, Italian media reports.
He had been in a coma since Sunday after being admitted to the cardiac surgery unit of a hospital in Rome, according to the reports.
His 1974 work A Special Day, which he wrote and directed, received Best Foreign Film and Best Actor nominations for star Marcello Mastroianni.
Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said Scola was a screen "master".
His death left a "huge void in Italian culture", Mr Renzi tweeted (in Italian).
Scola directed 41 films and wrote the screenplay for almost 90, according to the Internet Movie Database.
He performed both roles in A Special Day, which saw Mastroianni and Sophia Loren develop a relationship against the backdrop of fascist 1930s Italy.
Other works include We All Loved Each Other So Much, The Family and Ugly, Dirty and Bad - for which he won best director at the Cannes film festival in 1976.
I used to love Barney Miller.....
Well he had a good run R.I.P
A local celebrity, sort of.
Mary Fiumara, Mother From Classic Prince Spaghetti TV Commercial, Dies (http://boston.cbslocal.com/2016/02/04/prince-spaghetti-tv-commercial-mother-mary-fiumara-dies-anthony-martigetti/)
I remember the commercial on tv when I was a kid. Never knew, until now, she was from Boston.
God Bless You, Ms. Fiumara, may you Rest In Peace.
"In the North End of Boston, Wednesday is Prince spaghetti day."
[img]http://www.wcvb.com/image/view/-/26527768/medRes/1/-/maxh/460/maxw/620/-/otrr7t/-/prince-jpg.jpg[
/
Here's someone who may be recalled by a few more people:
Bob Elliott, Half of the Deadpan Bob and Ray Comedy Team, Dies at 92 (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/arts/television/bob-elliott-of-bob-and-ray-comedy-fame-dies-at-92.html)
Recalling Bob and Ray, Who Paved the Way for Today’s Deadpan Humor (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/arts/television/recalling-bob-and-ray-who-paved-the-way-for-todays-deadpan-humor.html)
R.I.P.
Tony Burton, actor from Rocky and The Shining, dies at 78
Tony Burton, who drew on his career as a prizefighter to play boxing trainer Tony "Duke" Evers in all six Rocky films, has died aged 78.
Sylvester Stallone, who stars in the franchise, led the tributes after relatives announced Burton's death in a southern California hospital from suspected pneumonia, following a long illness.
Burton, who had been living in California for 30 years, played the trainer of Apollo Creed, the antagonist of the first two Rocky films, before switching to Rocky's corner in the subsequent movies.
"Tony Burton who played the character of Duke brilliantly in all six Rocky movies... Rest in peace," Stallone said on Instagram, posting a still from Rocky IV of the pair with Apollo Creed actor Carl Weathers.
"Sad news. RIP Tony Burton. His intensity and talent helped make the Rocky movies successful," Weathers tweeted.
Country Music Singer Sonny James Dies at 87 (http://variety.com/2016/music/news/sonny-james-dead-dies-country-music-singer-1201712712/#)
(https://cdn.discogs.com/KwBJsaWZALuW9AxXY9u1gJXrAEY=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb()/discogs-images/A-364540-1236620832.jpeg.jpg)
Joe Santos, known as Lt. Dennis Becker on “The Rockford Files,” died Friday morning at the age of 84, according to multiple reports.
Patty Duke has died at the age of 69! I remember watching The Patty Duke Show as a kid, though I don't remember much about it other than I know she played two cousins in the show. I watched The Miracle Worker in school as well.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2016/03/29/oscar-winning-former-child-star-patty-duke-dies-age-69/82382666/
http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/06/entertainment/merle-haggard-country-music-dies/
Mr. Haggard also appeared in several movies, including the 1980 Clint Eastwood film “Bronco Billy.” “Bar Room Buddies,” a duet with Mr. Eastwood from the film’s soundtrack, became a No. 1 country hit.http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/07/arts/music/merle-haggard-country-musics-outlaw-hero-dies-at-79.html
Anne Jackson, who collaborated extensively with husband Eli Wallach, together comprising one of the best-known acting couples of the American theater, died Tuesday at her home in Manhattan. She was 90.
I never meant to cause you any sorrow
I never meant to cause you any pain
I only wanted to one time to see you laughing
I only wanted to see you
Laughing in the purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
I only wanted to see you
Bathing in the purple rain
I never wanted to be your weekend lover
I only wanted to be some kind of friend
Baby, I could never steal you from another
It's such a shame our friendship had to end
Purple rain, purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
I only wanted to see you
Underneath the purple rain
Honey, I know, I know
I know times are changing
It's time we all reach out
For something new, that means you too
You say you want a leader
But you can't seem to make up your mind
I think you better close it
And let me guide you to the purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
Purple rain, purple rain
If you know what I'm singing about up here
C'mon, raise your hand
Purple rain, purple rain
I only want to see you
Only want to see you
In the purple rain
But to this taste, his work seems a calculated, not very original pastiche of several rock styles, of note mostly because what its success says about black attitudes toward white rock. If George Clinton, in a visual sense, represents a black extension of late-60's acid rock, then Prince is essentially a similar equivalent for early 70's glitter rock, with a bit of punk thrown in for contemporaneity.
ONE: MICHAEL JACKSON DID NOT SEXUALLY ASSAULT CHILDREN!!!! Let me be clearer on that....HE DID NOT. Anyone that is a parent that reasonably gives a sh*t knows that if you sexually assault a child....there is NO AMOUNT OF MONEY that will pay off the vengence of that childrens parents. These parents sent their kids to Michael knowing he was a caring guy as he never got to have a childhood and then later threatened to blackmail him...pure and simple. Its pretty much enough that most of those kids, now adults, recanted those statements and one committed suicide because of all this.
Elvis gave credit to the people that "influenced him"? Thats funny. Because when Little Richard was asked about Elvis' rendition of Hound dog, a song that Little Richard had done before and gotten NO MONIES from after the fact....his very subtle words were "F8CK Elvis Presley".
I guess he said that because of Elvis' great respect for him.
I do love revisionist history. Its a nortorious fact that blacks during the fifties had their music suppressed to their own markets while whites ripped them off blind. But oh not "the great one" Elvis. He respected them so much that he ripped them off...sorry didnt rip off "was influenced word for word note for note". Too bad Vanilla Ice didnt think to say that about ripping off the "Under pressure" loop for ICE ICE BABY, could have saved him alot of money in legal fees.
Look you can believe that "crossover" concept all you want...but dont say he even TOUCHED R&B, he recycled it and packaged it as his own creation. Its not "respect" if you dont pay the artist you took it from, its robbery.
Tell you what, if you think Elvis respected them so much, go to ANY blues house in New Orleans or anywhere else for that matter....a real one. Show me where the picture of Elvis hangs.
Also, since we are on revisionist history...why not mention Elvis and his little problem with pedophilia. Lets please remember he got married as SOON as his gf turned legal age to do so...and they had been seeing each other for awhile. They met when she was what...14? 15?
Elvis gave credit to the people that "influenced him"? Thats funny. Because when Little Richard was asked about Elvis' rendition of Hound dog, a song that Little Richard had done before and gotten NO MONIES from after the fact....his very subtle words were "F8CK Elvis Presley".
I guess he said that because of Elvis' great respect for him.
I do love revisionist history. Its a nortorious fact that blacks during the fifties had their music suppressed to their own markets while whites ripped them off blind. But oh not "the great one" Elvis. He respected them so much that he ripped them off...sorry didnt rip off "was influenced word for word note for note". Too bad Vanilla Ice didnt think to say that about ripping off the "Under pressure" loop for ICE ICE BABY, could have saved him alot of money in legal fees.
Look you can believe that "crossover" concept all you want...but dont say he even TOUCHED R&B, he recycled it and packaged it as his own creation. Its not "respect" if you dont pay the artist you took it from, its robbery.
Tell you what, if you think Elvis respected them so much, go to ANY blues house in New Orleans or anywhere else for that matter....a real one. Show me where the picture of Elvis hangs.
Im sure he was heavily influenced by them. He could take their music without paying them a dime, I would be too.
Once again, revisionist history....but I am one for letting people hold illusions.
LMAO, I dont have a clue because I dont have the hero worship for Elvis that you do?
I paraphrase Little Richard. And you quoting Elvis to say "Oh I respected them..." doesnt mean a SHRED to me. He sure as hell as didnt pay them (note I mentioned that Elvis outright stole Hound Dog and Little Richard had NO respect for it but you dont cite that).
I love how you act like this isnt documented history....R&B PREDATED Rock and Roll. Hell Rock and Roll in and of itself WOULD NOT EXIST without ....to use your phrase..."its influence".
The same can be said for Country music. It wouldnt exist if not for the Irish folk tunes that predated it.
I am not sure why you have such a problem with me NOT kissing Elvis a$$. Sorry I am not impressed with him.
And allow me to say, Elvis was not the first NOR THE LAST to rip off R&B. He just went furthest with it. And honestly THAT part I dont have a problem with.
But I am sorry, Elvis couldnt even carry Prince's bags. And I say that as someone who spent most of his life NOT A FAN OF PRINCE!!!!
Jed, I have NO PROBLEM with you being a fan. But I cite fact after fact, you disregard them and keep trying to post over me like Im an insubordinate child and that by you insulting me you will throw me off my game.
FACT: You came here gently saying respect for Prince's death and gently "bringing in the drug thing" and belittling his efforts by comparison to Elvis and MJ.
FACT: You have been disputed by points you cant argue. That he did rip off Little Richard (no harm no foul) that he was a pedophile (he was having sex with Priscilla when she was a budding 14 years old) and the funniest portion of your post which I find hysterical....
Are you really saying that drugs could cloud Prince's legacy and using ELVIS as the barometer against it?? Seriously??? Elvis didnt have an orafice he didnt stick a drug or food into. His OWN BAND, and best friends said he was a slobbering drunk and a stoned slob at the end....at his terrible old age of what.....42?
I dont sh*t on Elvis accomplishments at all, they are point of record and my opinion of him good or bad doesnt negotiate it. If me saying that Elvis was fallable, human and in many cases WRONG....bothers you I apologize that it bothers you.
But those are points of fact.....and respectfully Ill drop off on this because it is pointless to argue with die hard fans.
I'm trying to keep an open mind... but I just can't see the point that without Elvis, we wouldn't have Prince.
I'm not sure that Elvis didn't do a lot more than perform black music in a white man's body. So, the music was already there.... wasn't it? How much was changed by him? Was it just that he made it acceptable for white people to buy it? And if that's the case, then no I can't thank Elvis for paving the way for Michael Jackson and Prince.
Several posts have been removed from this discussion about Prince as they breached our community standards.
The former drummer with the US thrash metal band Megadeth, Nick Menza, has died after collapsing on stage at a gig in California. Menza, who was 51, is said to have suffered a heart attack during one of his regular sessions with his band OHM at a small Los Angeles jazz club, the Baked Potato.
Burt Kwouk, who was best known for playing Inspector Clouseau's manservant Cato in the Pink Panther films, has died aged 85.
He appeared in seven Pink Panther films opposite Peter Sellers as Clouseau's servant who regularly attacked his employer to keep him alert.
He also starred in BBC sitcom Last of the Summer Wine from 2002 to 2010.
Muhammad Ali, the three-time world heavyweight boxing champion who helped define his turbulent times as the most charismatic and controversial sports figure of the 20th century, died on Friday. He was 74.
His death was confirmed by Bob Gunnell, a family spokesman.
Ali was the most thrilling if not the best heavyweight ever, carrying into the ring a physically lyrical, unorthodox boxing style that fused speed, agility and power more seamlessly than that of any fighter before him.
A bunch of my friends and I knocked on his door. Not only did he welcome us but we spent almost 2 hours with him! Magic tricks, signed autographs, a tour of the house, his aunt played piano, saw his car collection and showed the boys boxing moves. He was so generous of his time with a bunch of 13-15 year olds. Great man!
Met him when my buddy and I drove by on motorcycles in 1971.(senior year in HS) . He was in his yard and invited us in. He gave us some chocolate cake. Great guy! He signed a one $ bill for me.
Met him at that house August of 1971.A gal pal & I were cruising and decided to pay a visit. He drove up in a jalopey. .My gal pal was afraid to get out of the car. I said "Mr Ali, I have a girl friend in my car who wants to spar with you." He said: "I'll spar with any girl any time ." He looked really really TALL. Finally he said :"Excuse me but I have to get to bed I'm really tired. Please stop by again."Ii'll never forget that night !
I have his autograph in my yearbook.
I was in that house and met him in 1974.he had a living room that was all white and a fountain in the middle of the house.lived in willowdale across the road.met his kids they were watching reel to reel movies.
Such a nice guy. I remember seeing him in the front yard. When my husband was a kid he wrestled Muhammad Ali in that driveway.
One day in April '71 Sadye Faye Henson, a friend of hers who was visiting from out of town and I went up to the house, knocked on the door and asked if Mohamad Ali was home. The person who answered the door said yes and invited us in. He then led us to the kitchen where Ali was sitting around along with some friends. We asked for his autograph. He signed a Pabst Blue ribbon cocktail napkin for each of us and then we left. We laughed and giggled all the way home. I now have it framed and hanging in my home. Still don't believe we had the nerve to do it but I'm glad we did!
He used 2 pick me up thumbin' 2 East on Kresson Rd in the mornings,....in a white Silver Ghost Rolls Royce....we became quite friendly,...& he admired me that I was Up Front with him that I was a Smokinin Joe Frazier Fan,....He was The Greatest,....!!!!
I had an experience similar to yours. My friends and I rode our bikes to see where he lived. We were at the top of the driveway and he came out. We thought he was going to chase us away but he invited us in and spent an hour with us.
He would occasionally come out to the gate and sign autographs. I was fortuneate enough, one day, to be at my cousins house, 3 or 4 doors away, when Ali made of these appearences. Remember, Randy Noble?
I took the same picture last fall (of his house) when I was visiting. House was for sale. We used to ask my dad to drive by after church. One Day Muhammad Ali was out front...talked to us and gave his autograph. Great memory.
I remember seeing Ali jogging in the park by the creek behind the Music Fair. No bodyguards, no entourage. Just him and his dog. Smiling and waving to people as he pa