R.I.P.2010
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- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
- Actor
- Producer
Gary Brockette was born on 13 September 1947 in Denton, Texas, USA. He was an assistant director and actor, known for The Last Picture Show (1971), The Philadelphia Experiment (1984) and Tammy and the T-Rex (1994). He was married to Sandra Louise Stevenson and Rebecca Diane Jarvis. He died on 1 January 2010 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Leni Lynn was born on 3 May 1923 in Waterbury, Connecticut, USA. She was an actress, known for Give Me the Stars (1945), Springtime (1946) and Hullabaloo (1940). She was married to Douglas Duke, Thomas Hopkin, Albert Landry and Bernard Hoffer. She died on 1 January 2010 in Croton-on-Hudson, New York, USA.- Bill Gleason was born on 16 November 1922 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He died on 3 January 2010 in Elmhurst, Illinois, USA.
- Actor
- Director
- Producer
Giorgos Kabanellis was born in 1930 in Naxos, Greece. He was an actor and director, known for The Cannon and the Nightingale (1968), Ymnon ti tafi Sou (1973) and Mia gynaika horis dropi (1965). He died on 3 January 2010 in Athens, Greece.- Actress
- Additional Crew
Margery Beddow was born on 13 December 1937 in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, USA. She was an actress, known for The Producers (2005), Enchanted (2007) and Doubt (2008). She died on 3 January 2010 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.- Donal Donnelly was an English actor best known in the cinema for roles in The Knack... and How to Get It (1965) and The Godfather Part III (1990) and on stage for his work in the plays of Brian Friel. He was born in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, on the 6th of July 1931, but raised in Dublin, Ireland. In Dublin, he went to a Christian Brothers School where he acted in school plays with classmates Jack MacGowran and Milo O'Shea. Subsequently, he toured Ireland with Anew McMaster's repertory company.
On-stage, he established professional reputation in 1964 playing Gar Private in the Friel's Philadelphia, Here I Come! (1974) at Dublin's Gate Theatre. He was nominated for a Tony Award when the show transferred to Broadway in 1966, where it was a hit, racking up 326 performances. Two years later, he replaced Albert Finney in the 1968 Broadway production of A Day in the Death of Joe Egg (1972). From 1969 through 1995, he appeared in an additional nine Broadway productions, including Sleuth (1972) and The Elephant Man (1980), and Friel's "The Mundy Scheme", Dancing at Lughnasa (1998), and "Translations".
In 1965, he co-starred with Michael Crawford and Rita Tushingham in Richard Lester's movie adaption of Ann Jellicoe's hit play "The Knack". It was a hit. He played the scheming Archbishop Gilday out to fleece Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) in "The Godfather Part III" and gave a critically acclaimed performance in John Huston's adaption of James Joyce's short story The Dead (1987). He also appeared on British television, most memorably in Z Cars (1962) and the 1970s situation-comedy Yes, Honestly (1976).
Donal Donnelly died from cancer on the 4th of January 2010 in Chicago. He was 78 years old. He and his wife Patsy had two children. - Nikolay Shutko was born on 19 December 1927 in Krivoy Rog, Ukrainian SSR, USSR [now Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Ukraine]. He was an actor, known for Vozdushnye piraty (1992), Zolotaya tsep (1988) and Zdes nam zhit (1972). He died on 4 January 2010 in Kiev, Ukraine.
- Casey Johnson was born on 24 September 1979 in Hollywood, Florida, USA. She died on 4 January 2010 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Maurice Rawlings was born on 16 May 1922 in the USA. He was a writer, known for Beyond Death's Door (1979), Les explorateurs de la mort (1988) and Death: The Ultimate Mystery (1975). He died on 5 January 2010 in Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA.
- Mila Ocampo was born on 14 March 1942 in Iriga City, Camarines Sur, Philippines. She was an actress, known for Dugo sa pantalan (1965), Zuma (1985) and Ang Mga lawin (1963). She was married to Von Serna. She died on 6 January 2010 in Makati City, Philippines.
- Blanca Sánchez was born on 2 March 1946 in Mexico City, Distrito Federal, Mexico. She was an actress, known for Quinceañera (1987), Los amores de Chucho el Roto (1970) and La vida de Chucho el Roto (1970). She was married to Garret J. Woodside, José Antonio Massad and Roberto Schlosser. She died on 7 January 2010 in Mexico City, Mexico.
- Writer
- Director
- Actor
Shibli Sadique was born on 9 January 1941 in Naogaon, Bengal Presidency, British India [now in Naogaon, Bangladesh]. He was a writer and director, known for Dolna (1990), Ochena (1991) and Mayer Odhikar (1996). He was married to Azmiri Sadick. He died on 7 January 2010 in Dhaka, Bangladesh.- Actor
- Stunts
- Soundtrack
Tony Halme was born on 6 January 1963 in Helsinki, Finland. He was an actor, known for Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995), Shadow Warriors (1995) and American Tigers (1996). He was married to Katja Talus. He died on 8 January 2010 in Helsinki, Finland.- Aleksey Poluyan is a Soviet and Russian theater and film actor, famous for the film Cargo 200 (2007).
Alexey Poluyan was born on April 4, 1965 in Leningrad.
Lived in St. Petersburg.
After graduating from high school he entered the vocational school, received the profession of a cook of the third level. He went to the cinema after an invitation from the assistant director Dinara Asanova, who happened to meet him on the street and invited to appear in the film Patsany (1983) . Until 2007, he was filming mostly in minor and episodic roles. Widely gained popularity after the release of the film Cargo 200 (2007) , where he played the role of militia maniac Zhurov. He worked in the theater: the Leningrad Theater of the Absurd and the Theater of Real Art.
A family He was married twice, had two daughters. The second wife is the daughter of actor Alexei Petrenko.
Death Because of alcohol abuse Alexei Poluyan had a severe form of pancreatitis. He died on January 8, 2010 in the village of Yarovskina, which is 250 km from St. Petersburg. He was buried there, seven days after his death. - Actor
- Soundtrack
Gösta Bredefeldt was born on 19 December 1935 in Gothenburg, Västra Götalands län, Sweden. He was an actor, known for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009), Millennium (2010) and Ture Sventon - Privatdetektiv (1972). He was married to Britt Örnehed and Sara Arnia. He died on 9 January 2010 in Stockholm, Sweden.- Director
- Writer
- Producer
Nadav Levitan was born on 21 April 1945 in Kfar Masaryk, Israel. He was a director and writer, known for No Names on the Doors (1997), Groupie (1993) and Stalin's Disciples (1986). He was married to Chava Alberstein. He died on 9 January 2010 in Petah Tikva, Israel.- Nadezhda Samsonova was born on 26 April 1924. She was an actress, known for Romeo, moy sosed (1964), Inoplanetyanka (1985) and Vremya, vperyod! (1965). She died on 9 January 2010 in Moscow, Russia.
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
- Writer
Saltuk Kaplangi was born on 15 June 1932 in Çorlu, Tekirdag, Turkey. He was an actor and assistant director, known for Murada erecegiz (1958), Sayili dakikalar (1965) and Siralardaki heyecanlar (1963). He was married to Birsen Kaplangi. He died on 9 January 2010 in Istanbul, Turkey.- Mina Bern was born on 5 May 1911 in Bielsk Podlaski, Podlaskie, Poland. She was an actress, known for It Could Happen to You (1994), Celebrity (1998) and Flawless (1999). She was married to Ben Bonus. She died on 10 January 2010 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.
- Brian C. Bethel was born on 14 December 1969 in the USA. He was an actor, known for Grayson (2004). He died on 10 January 2010 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA.
- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Admirers have always had difficulty explaining Éric Rohmer's "Je ne sais quoi." Part of the challenge stems from the fact that, despite his place in French Nouvelle Vague (i.e., New Wave), his work is unlike that of his colleagues. While this may be due to the auteur's unwillingness to conform, some have argued convincingly that, in truth, he has remained more faithful to the original ideals of the movement than have his peers. Additionally, plot is not his foremost concern. It is the thoughts and emotions of his characters that are essential to Rohmer, and, just as one's own states of being are hard to define, so is the internal life of his art. Thus, rather than speaking of it in specific terms, fans often use such modifiers as "subtle," "witty," "delicious" and "enigmatic." In an interview with Dennis Hopper, Quentin Tarantino echoed what nearly every aficionado has uttered: "You have to see one of [his movies], and if you kind of like that one, then you should see his other ones, but you need to see one to see if you like it."
Detractors have no problem in expressing their displeasure. They use such phrases as "tedious like a classroom play," "arty and tiresome" and "donnishly talky." Gene Hackman, as jaded detective Harry Moseby in Night Moves (1975), delivered a now famous line that sums up these feelings: "I saw a Rohmer film once. It was kind of like watching paint dry." Undeniably, his excruciatingly slow pace and apathetic, self-absorbed characters are hallmarks, and, at times, even his greatest supporters have made trenchant remarks in this regard. Said critic Pauline Kael, "Seriocomic triviality has become Rohmer's specialty. His sensibility would be easier to take if he'd stop directing to a metronome." In that his proponents will quote attacks on him, indeed Rohmer may be alone among directors. They revel in the fact that "nothing of consequence" happens in his pictures. They are mesmerized by the dense blocks of high-brow chatter. They delight in the predictability of his aesthetic. Above all, however, they are touched by the honesty of a man who, uncompromisingly, lays bear the human soul and "life as such."
Who is Eric Rohmer? Born Jean-Marie Maurice Scherer on December 1, 1920 in Nancy, a small city in Lorraine, he relocated to Paris and became a literature teacher and newspaper reporter. In 1946, under the pen name Gilbert Cordier, he published his only novel, "Elizabeth". Soon after, his interest began to shift toward criticism, and he began frequenting Cinémathèque Français (founded by archivist Henri Langlois) along with soon-to-be New Wavers Jean-Luc Godard, Jacques Rivette, Claude Chabrol and François Truffaut. It was at this time that he adopted his pseudonym, an amalgam of the names of actor/director Erich von Stroheim and novelist Sax Rohmer (author of the Fu Manchu series.) His first film, Journal d'un scélérat (1950), was shot the same year that he founded "Gazette du Cinema" along with Godard and Rivette. The next year, Rohmer joined seminal critic André Bazin at "Cahiers du Cinema", where he served as editor-in-chief from 1956 to 1963. As Cahiers was an influential publication, it not only gave him a platform from which to preach New Wave philosophy, but it enabled him to propose revisionist ideas on Hollywood. An example of the latter was "Hitchcock, The First Forty-Four Films", a book on which he collaborated with Chabrol that spoke of Alfred Hitchcock in highly favorable terms.
Rohmer's early forays into direction met with limited success. By 1958, he had completed five shorts, but his sole attempt at feature length, a version of La Comtesse de Ségur's "Les Petites filles modèles", was left unfinished. With Sign of the Lion (1962), he made his feature debut, although it was a decade before he achieved recognition. In the interim, he turned out eleven projects, including three of his "Six contes moraux" (i.e., moral tales), films devoted to examining the inner states of people in the throes of temptation. The Bakery Girl of Monceau (1963) and Suzanne's Career (1963) are unremarkable black-and-white pictures that best function as blueprints for his later output. They also mark the beginning of a business partnership with Barbet Schroeder, who starred in the former of the two. The Collector (1967), his first major effort in color, has been mistaken for a Lolita movie; on a deeper plane, it questions the manner in which one collects or rejects experience. Rohmer's first "hit" was My Night at Maud's (1969), which was nominated for two Oscars and won several international awards. It continues to be his best-known work. In it, on the eve of a proclaiming his love to Francoise, his future wife, the narrator spends a night with a pretty divorcée named Maud. Along with a friend, the two have a discussion on life, religion and Pascal's wager (i.e., the necessity of risking all on the only bet that can win.) Left alone with the sensual Maud, the narrator is forced to test his principles. The final parts in the series, Claire's Knee (1970) and Love in the Afternoon (1972) are mid-life crisis tales that cleverly reiterate the notion of self-restraint as the path to salvation.
"Comedies et Proverbs," Rohmer's second cycle, deals with deception. The Aviator's Wife (1981) is the story a naïve student who suspects his girlfriend of infidelity. In stalking her ex-lover and ultimately confronting her, we discover the levels on which he is deceiving himself. Another masterpiece is Pauline at the Beach (1983), a seaside film about adolescents' coming-of-age and the childish antics of their adult chaperones. Of the remaining installments, The Green Ray (1986) and Boyfriends and Girlfriends (1987) are the most appealing. The director's last series is known as "Contes des quatre saisons" (i.e., Tales of the Four Seasons), which too presents the dysfunctional relationships of eccentrics. In place of the social games of "Comedies et Proverbs", though, this cycle explores the lives of the emotionally isolated. A Tale of Springtime (1990) and A Tale of Winter (1992) are the more inventive pieces, the latter revisiting Ma Nuit chez Maud's "wager." Just as his oeuvre retraces itself thematically, Rohmer populates it with actors who appear and reappear in unusual ways. The final tale, Autumn Tale (1998), brings together his favorite actresses, Marie Rivière and Béatrice Romand. Like "hiver," it hearkens back to a prior project, A Good Marriage (1982), in examining Romand's quest to find a husband.
Since 1976, Rohmer has made various non-serial releases. Four Adventures of Reinette and Mirabelle (1987) and Rendez-vous in Paris (1995), both composed of vignettes, are tongue-in-cheek morality plays that merit little attention. The lush costume drama The Marquise of O (1976), in contrast, is an excellent study of the absurd formalities of 18th century aristocracy and was recognized with the Grand Prize of the Jury at Cannes. His other period pieces, regrettably, have not been as successful. Perceval le Gallois (1978), while original, is a failed experiment in stagy Arthurian storytelling, and the beautifully dull The Lady and the Duke (2001) is equally unsatisfying for most fans of his oeuvre. Nonetheless, the director has demonstrated incredible consistency, and that he was able to deliver a picture of this caliber so late in his career is astounding. The legacy that this man has bestowed upon us rivals that of any auteur, with arguably as many as ten tours de force over the last four decades. Why, then, is he the least honored among the ranks of the Nouvelle Vague and among all cinematic geniuses?
Stories of Rohmer's idiosyncrasies abound. An ardent environmentalist, he has never driven a car and refuses to ride in taxis. There is no telephone in his home. He delayed the production of Ma Nuit chez Maud for a year, insisting that certain scenes could only be shot on Christmas night. Once, he requested a musical score that could be played at levels inaudible to viewers. He refers to himself as "commercial," yet his movies turn slim profits playing the art house circuit. Normally, these are kinds of anecdotes that would endear a one with the cognoscenti. His most revealing quirk, however, is that he declines interviews and shuns the spotlight. Where Hitchcock, for instance, was always ready to talk shop, Rohmer has let his films speak for themselves. He is not worried about WHAT people think of them but THAT, indeed, they think.
It would be dangerous to supplant the aforementioned "je ne sais quoi" with words. Without demystifying Rohmer's cinema, still there are broad qualities to which one may point. First, it is marked by philosophical and artistic integrity. Long before Krzysztof Kieslowski, Rohmer came up with the concept of the film cycle, and this has permitted him to build on his own work in a unique manner. A devout Catholic, he is interested in the resisting of temptation, and what does not occur in his pieces is just as intriguing as what occurs. Apropos to the mention of his spirituality is his fascination with the interplay between destiny and free will. Some choice is always central to his stories. Yet, while his narrative is devoid of conventionally dramatic events, he shows a fondness for coincidence bordering on the supernatural. In order to maintain verisimilitude, then, he employs more "long shots" and a simpler, more natural editing process than his contemporaries. He makes infrequent use of music and foley, focusing instead on the sounds of voices. Of these voices, where his narrators are male (and it is ostensibly their subjective experience to which we are privy), his women are more intelligent and complex than his men. Finally, albeit deeply contemplative, Rohmer's work is rarely conclusive. Refreshingly un-Hollywood, rather than providing an escape from reality, it compels us to face the world in which we live.- Barry Cox was an actor, known for The Italian Job (1969) and Mini Adventures (2009). He died on 12 January 2010.
- Actor
- Stunts
Stuntman and actor Fred Krone was born on June 19, 1930 in Kentucky. Krone grew up in California and attended Hollywood High School in the 1940s. Fred originally planned on being a concert violinist, but an accident in 1946 that resulted in some of his fingers getting blown off ended that choice. Krone started out doing stunt work with his sister as a youth and began his career as a professional stuntman in earnest in the early 1950s after actress Carolina Cotton introduced Krone to fellow stuntman Jock Mahoney. Fred's career as both an actor and stuntman spanned three decades altogether. Among the notable actors that Krone doubled are Steve McQueen, David Janssen, Myron Healey, Kirby Grant, Steven Hill, Gene Barry, and Efrem Zimbalist Jr.. In 1974 Fred voluntarily quit the film industry and went on to operate a very successful clock repair business that he eventually sold in 1992. A lifetime member of the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures, Fred died of cancer at age 79 on January 12, 2010 in Santa Paula, California.- Elizabeth Moody was born on 29 October 1939 in Worthing, Sussex, England, UK. She was an actress, known for Dead Alive (1992), The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) and Heavenly Creatures (1994). She was married to Terence Moody. She died on 12 January 2010 in Christchurch, New Zealand.
- Ann Prentiss was born on 27 November 1939 in San Antonio, Texas, USA. She was an actress, known for My Stepmother Is an Alien (1988), The Out of Towners (1970) and California Split (1974). She died on 12 January 2010 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Olga Khorkova was born on 19 June 1922 in Moscow, RSFSR [now Russia]. She was an actress, known for Strogaya zhenshchina (1959), Alyoshkina lyubov (1961) and Gore ot uma (1952). She died on 13 January 2010 in Moscow, Russia.
- Actor
- Composer
- Soundtrack
Teddy Pendergrass was born on 26 March 1950 in Kingstree, South Carolina, USA. He was an actor and composer, known for The Nutty Professor (1996), Undercover Brother (2002) and 40 Days and 40 Nights (2002). He was married to Joan Pendergrass and Karen Still. He died on 13 January 2010 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, USA.- Petra Schürmann was born on 15 September 1933 in Mönchengladbach, Germany. She was an actress and writer, known for Seven Blood-Stained Orchids (1972), Angels of Terror (1971) and Verkehrsgericht (1983). She was married to Gerhard Freund. She died on 13 January 2010 in Munich, Bavaria, Germany.
- Actress
- Art Director
- Costume and Wardrobe Department
A beautiful young ingénue with roots from Guizhou province, Fang Yin graduated from the Southern Drama Group in the early 60s with the talented class that included Lee Ching, Lily Ho, Chin Ping, Cheng Pei Pei and Margaret Hsing Hui, an elite group that was groomed by Shaw Brothers in the old Hollywood studio tradition.- Charles Nolte was born on 3 November 1923 in Duluth, Minnesota, USA. He was an actor, known for Schlitz Playhouse (1951), Ford Star Jubilee (1955) and Tales of Tomorrow (1951). He died on 14 January 2010 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.
- Actor
- Producer
Leslie Linder was born on 31 August 1924 in Highgate, London, England, UK. He was an actor and producer, known for The Men of Sherwood Forest (1954), See No Evil (1971) and 10 Rillington Place (1971). He was married to Dorothy Alison. He died on 16 January 2010 in London, England, UK.- Actor
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
Carl Smith was born on 15 March 1927 in Maynardville, Tennessee, USA. He was an actor, known for I, Robot (2004), Ghostbusters II (1989) and Date Night (2010). He was married to Goldie Hill and June Carter Cash. He died on 16 January 2010 in Franklin, Tennessee, USA.- Actress
- Additional Crew
Ursula Kubler was born on 6 September 1928 in Zurich, Switzerland. She was an actress, known for The Fire Within (1963), Merci Natercia! (1960) and L'écume des jours (1968). She was married to Boris Vian. She died on 18 January 2010 in Eus, Pyrénées-Orientales, France.- Writer
- Additional Crew
- Actor
Robert B. Parker was born on 17 September 1932 in Springfield, Massachusetts, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Jesse Stone: Night Passage (2006), B.L. Stryker (1989) and Spenser: For Hire (1985). He was married to Joan H. Parker. He died on 18 January 2010 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.- Jennifer Lyon was born on 27 February 1972 in Boulder City, Nevada, USA. She was an actress, known for Long Pig (2008), Daddy Day Camp (2007) and Cannibal Feast (2011). She died on 19 January 2010 in Sublimity, Oregon, USA.
- Actress
- Soundtrack
Demure British beauty Jean Simmons was born January 31, 1929, in Crouch End, London. 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). She had a small part as a harpist in the high-profile Caesar and Cleopatra (1945), produced by Gabriel Pascal, starring Vivien Leigh, and co-starring her future husband Stewart Granger. Pascal saw potential in Simmons, and in 1945 he signed her to a seven-year contract to the J. Arthur Rank Organization, and she went on to make a name for herself in such major British productions as Great Expectations (1946) (as the spoiled, selfish Estella), Black Narcissus (1947) (as a sultry native beauty), Hamlet (1948) (playing Ophelia to Laurence Olivier's great Dane and earning a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination), The Blue Lagoon (1949) and So Long at the Fair (1950), among others.
In 1950, she married Stewart Granger, and that same year, she moved to Hollywood. While Granger was signed to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Rank sold her contract to Howard Hughes, who then owned RKO Pictures. Hughes was eager to start a sexual relationship with Simmons, but Granger put a stop to his advances. Her first Hollywood film was Androcles and the Lion (1952), produced by Pascal and co-starring Victor Mature. It was followed by Angel Face (1952), directed by Otto Preminger with Robert Mitchum. To further punish Simmons and Granger, Hughes refused to lend her to Paramount, where William Wyler wanted to cast her in the female lead for his film Roman Holiday (1953); the role made a star of Audrey Hepburn. A court case freed Simmons from the contract with Hughes in 1952. They settled out of court; part of the arrangement was that Simmons would do one more film for no additional money. Simmons also agreed to make three more movies under the auspices of RKO, but not actually at that studio - she would be lent out. MGM cast her in the lead of Young Bess (1953) playing a young Queen Elizabeth I with Granger. She went back to RKO to do the extra film under the settlement with Hughes, titled Affair with a Stranger (1953) with Mature; it flopped.
Simmons went over to 20th Century Fox to play the female lead in The Robe (1953), the first CinemaScope movie and an enormous financial success. Less popular was The Actress (1953) at MGM alongside Spencer Tracy, despite superb reviews; it was one of her personal favorites. Fox asked Simmons back for The Egyptian (1954), another epic, but it was not especially popular. She had the lead in Columbia's A Bullet Is Waiting (1954). More popular with moviegoers was Désirée (1954), where Simmons played Désirée Clary to Marlon Brando's Napoleon Bonaparte. Simmons and Granger returned to England to make the thriller Footsteps in the Fog (1955). She then starred in the musical Guys and Dolls (1955) with Brando and Frank Sinatra; she used her own singing voice and earned her first Golden Globe Award. Simmons played the title role in Hilda Crane (1956) at Fox, a commercial failure. So, too, were This Could Be the Night (1957) and Until They Sail (1957), both at MGM. Simmons had a big success, though, in The Big Country (1958), directed by Wyler. She starred in Home Before Dark (1958) at Warner Bros. and This Earth Is Mine (1959) with Rock Hudson at Universal.
Simmons divorced Granger in 1960 and almost immediately married writer-director Richard Brooks, who cast her as Sister Sharon opposite Burt Lancaster in Elmer Gantry (1960), a memorable adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel. That same year, she co-starred with Kirk Douglas in Stanley Kubrick's Spartacus (1960) and played a would-be homewrecker opposite Cary Grant in The Grass Is Greener (1960).
Off the screen for a few years, Jean captivated moviegoers with a brilliant performance as the mother in All the Way Home (1963), a literate, tasteful adaptation of James Agee's "A Death in the Family". However, after that, she found quality projects somewhat harder to come by, and took work in Life at the Top (1965), Mister Buddwing (1966), Divorce American Style (1967), Rough Night in Jericho (1967), The Happy Ending (1969) (a Richard Brooks film for which she was again Oscar-nominated, this time as Best Actress).
Jean continued making films well into the 1970s. In the 1980s, she appeared mainly in television miniseries, such as North & South: Book 1, North & South (1985) and The Thorn Birds (1983). She made a comeback to films in 1995 in How to Make an American Quilt (1995) co-starring Winona Ryder and Anne Bancroft, and most recently voiced the elderly Sophie in the English version of Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle (2004). She now resided in Santa Monica, California, with her dog, Mr. Gates, and her two cats, Adisson and Megan. Jean Simmons died of lung cancer on January 22, 2010, nine days before her 81st birthday.- Bobby Gale was born on 9 May 1916. He was an actor, known for Super Fuzz (1980), Nobody's Perfekt (1981) and King Frat (1979). He died on 22 January 2010.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
James Mitchell was an American actor and dancer of English descent. He was one the leading dancers for choreographer Agnes de Mille (1905-1993). As an actor, Mitchell is primarily remembered for his role as diabolical businessman Palmer Cortlandt in the long-running soap opera "All My Children". Mitchell played this role from 1979 to 2010, and Cortlandt was one of the series' major characters until 2002.
In 1920, Mitchell was born in Sacramento, California. His parents were English immigrants who operated a fruit farm in Turlock, an agricultural settlement in Stanislaus County, California. In 1923, his parents separated. His mother returned to England, and took Mitchell's siblings with her. Unable to raise Mitchell on his own, his father entrusted him to the care of vaudevillians Gene and Katherine King. While the senior Mitchell eventually reclaimed custody over his son, Mitchell became interested in a show business career of his own.
Mitchell left Turlock in 1937, in order to seek education as an actor. He studied drama at Los Angeles City College, and was trained in modern dance by famed choreographer Lester Horton (1906-1953). Following his graduation, Mitchell formally joined the Lester Horton Dancers (1932-1944), Horton's own dance company.
In 1944, Horton dissolved his dance company and moved to New York City, taking Mitchell with him. Horton attempted to form a new dance company there for dancer Sonia Shaw, and his main investor was Shaw's husband. The investor reneged on the deal, and Horton's company went bankrupt before its debut performance. Mitchell was left unemployed for the first time in his career.
Mitchell had trouble finding acting or dancing jobs in New York City, where there were many available performers. Mitchell himself had no connections in the city. He eventually applied for a job as a dancer in the musical "Bloomer Girl" (1944), where Agnes de Mille was the choreographer. She asked him to perform ballet moves, unaware that Mitchell had little to no training in ballet. Instead Mitchell performed a dance improvisation. De Mille was sufficiently impressed by his style to offer him the dual position of principal dancer and assistant choreographer in the show. He took the offer.
Mitchell's professional relationship with de Mille lasted from 1944 to 1969. In her autobiography, she praised Mitchell, commenting that he gad "probably the strongest arms in the business, and the adagio style developed by him and his partners has become since a valued addition to ballet vocabulary."
Mitchell remained primarily a theatrical actor in the 1940s, though he appeared as a dancer and uncredited extra in film musicals and westerns. He was eventually offered a contract with Warner Brothers by producer Michael Curtiz (1886-1962). Mitchell only appeared in two Warner Brothers-produced film. His most notable there was playing gangster Duke Harris in the Western "Colorado Territory" (1949).
Mitcell was next signed to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), where he played supporting roles in films from 1949 to 1955. His film appearances included the film noir "Border Incident" (1949), the Western "Stars in My Crown" (1950), and the musical comedy "The Band Wagon" (1953). His last MGM-produced film was the Biblical epic "The Prodigal" (1955), a notorious box office flop that resulted in losses of 771,000 dollars by the company. Mitchell's contract was terminated shortly afterward.
In 1956, Mitchell gained his first lead role in a film, playing gunfighter Terrall Butler in the Western "The Peacemaker" (1956). It was a low-budget production by independent producer Hal R. Makelim, and the film eventually only had a limited release. It was Mitchell's last film role for decades.
Mitchell was able to find steady work as an actor in television productions. In 1964, he gained the recurring role of corrupt Captain Lloyd Griffin in the soap opera "The Edge of Night" (1956-1975). He eventually gained the lead role of professor of literature Julian Hathaway in another soap opera, "Where the Heart Is" (1969-1973). The series had "fairly healthy ratings" for its entire run, but it was typically the lowest-rated soap on CBS' daytime schedule. It was eventually canceled and replaced by a more successful soap opera, called "The Young and the Restless" (1973-).
For much to the 1970s, Mitchell was reduced to sporadic guest star appearances in television. He financially supported himself as an acting teacher at Juilliard, Yale University, and Drake University. He was eventually offered the new role of businessman Palmer Cortlandt in the soap opera "All My Children", a role he played for 31 years.
By 2008, Mitchell was forced to reduce his television appearances due to health problems. He was suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, an obstructive lung disease characterized by long-term breathing problems and poor airflow. He formally retired from acting in 2009, but made return appearances in 2010. He died in January 2010, his death caused by his chronic disease and complications by pneumonia. He was 89-years-old.- Actor
- Director
- Producer
Prolific American character actor Johnny Seven was born John Anthony Fetto in the Italian section of Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, New York, to Marie and John Fetto. He was the only boy in a family of six children, with sisters Lillian, Terry, Connie, Dolores, and Jean. Considering that much of his future acting work consisted of playing tough gangsters and criminals, it may come as a surprise to discover that, until the age of 14, he was a boy soprano. He served 2-1/2 years in the US Army, with the 187th Field Artillery Battalion, and was bitten by the acting bug when he appeared in several USO shows during his military hitch. He married Edith Piselli on October 8, 1949, and they had two children, John Jr. and Laura. Seven worked in the New York theater community and did much live television until he was brought to Hollywood in 1958 by Universal Pictures to work in their many television series. He has since appeared in more than 600 TV shows, over 25 films, and numerous Broadway and off-Broadway productions. In addition to acting, he has also written and directed for the stage (his first play, "Salvage", was written in 1958), television and movies (he produced, directed and starred in a 1964 western, Navajo Run (1964), and has directed several TV shows and shorts since then). He enjoys gardening, golf and all kinds of fishing, ocean, lake and especially fly fishing.- Actor
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Roger Pierre was born in Le-Port Marly, France 1923. In 1946 he had made his stage debut in a cabaret and was an extra in the war drama Le Père tranquille/Mr. Orchid (1946, René Clément) starring Noël-Noël. In 1947, he worked as a presenter of commercials at Radio-Luxembourg. There he met Jean-Marc Thibault whose texts he had to read. It was the start of a long career as a comedy duo in Parisian cabarets such as le Tabou, le Caveau de la Terreur, l'Amiral, and le Moulin-Rouge. The men wrote some 3,000 sketches and songs together. They appeared in many TV shows of Maritie and Gilbert Carpentier and also co-starred in several film comedies. These films included La Vie est belle/Life is Beautiful (1956, Roger Pierre, Jean-Marc Thibault), Vive les vacances/Gimme A Break (1958, Jean-Marc Thibault) written by Thibault and Pierre, Les Motards/The Motorcycle Cops (1959, Jean Laviron) also with Francis Blanche and co-written by Thibault and Pierre, Un cheval pour deux/A Horse for Two (1961, Jean-Marc Thibault) and Faites donc plaisir aux amis/So Be Happy with Friends (1969, Francis Rigaud). Together they also appeared in supporting parts in many other film comedies such as Nous irons à Deauville/We Go to Deauville (1962, Francis Rigaud) with Louis de Funès, and Les Baratineurs/The Talkers (1965, Francis Rigaud) starring Jean Poiret. Between 1967 and 1970, Thibault and Pierre presented the TV show Les Grands Enfants/ Big Kids. From 1972 rill 1975 they made everybody in France laugh with their historical comedy shows Les maudits rois fainéants/The Damned Lazy Kings and Les z'heureux rois z'Henri/The Happy Kings Henry. Their final films together were the comedies En grandes pompes/With Great Fanfare (1974, André Teisseire) with Ginette Leclerc, and Gross Paris (1974, Gilles Grangier).
In 1976 and after 28 years together, the artistic ways of Jean-Marc Thibault and Roger Pierre parted. In the following years Pierre appeared without Thibault in Comme sur des roulettes (1976, Nina Companeez), Mon oncle d'Amérique/My American Uncle (1980, Alain Resnais) with Gérard Depardieu, and Camera d'albergo/Hotel Room (1981, Mario Monicelli) starring Vittorio Gassman and also continued to work on stage and television. During the 1980's, he participated in Jeux de 20 heures; he cooperated on the cult TV show Grosses Têtes by Philippe Bouvard and also appeared in the TV show Incroyable mais vrai! At the age of 80 he played in the TV film L'Ami d'enfance de Maigret/The childhood friend of Maigret (2003, Laurent Heynemann), with Bruno Crémer as inspector Jules Maigret. He had his final film role in Les Herbes folles/Wild Grass (2009, Alain Resnais) with Sabine Azéma. Pierre and Thibault twice reunited. In 1984 they worked together for the spectacle Nos premiers adieux at the Théâtre Antoine in Paris and again in 1990 at l'Olympia. Roger Pierre, died of cancer in 2010 at the age of 86.- Ben Gardiner was born on 11 July 1921 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor, known for The Tripper (2006) and BBS: The Documentary (2005). He died on 23 January 2010 in San Francisco, California, USA.
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Best recalled as the eldest son and first member of the "Bonanza" Cartwright clan to permanently leave the Ponderosa in the hopes of greener acting pastures, dark, deep-voiced and durably handsome Pernell Roberts' native roots lay in Georgia. Born Pernell Elvin Roberts, Jr. on May 18, 1928, in North Carolina and moved to Waycross as an infant, he was singing in local USO shows while still in high school (where he appeared in plays and played the horn). He attended both Georgia Tech and the University of Maryland but flunked out of both colleges, with a two-year stint as a Marine stuck somewhere in between. He eventually decided to give acting a chance and supported himself as a butcher, forest ranger, and railroad riveter during the lean years while pursuing his craft.
On stage from the early 1950s, he gained experience in such productions as "The Adding Machine," "The Firebrand" and "Faith of Our Fathers" before spending a couple of years performing the classics with the renowned Arena Stage Company in Washington, DC. Productions there included "The Taming of the Shrew" (as Petruchio), "The Playboy of the Western Word," "The Glass Menagerie," "The Importance of Being Earnest," and "Twelfth Night." He made his Broadway debut in 1955 with "Tonight in Samarkind" and that same year won the "Best Actor" Drama Desk Award for his off-Broadway performance as "Macbeth," which was immediately followed by "Romeo and Juliet" as Mercutio. Other Broadway plays include "The Lovers" (1956) with Joanne Woodward, "A Clearing in the Woods" (1957) with Kim Stanley, a return to Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew" (1957) and "The Duchess of Malfi" (1957). He returned to Broadway fifteen years later as the title role opposite Ingrid Bergman in "Captain Brassbound's Conversion" (1972).
Pernell then headed for Hollywood and found minor roles in films before landing the pivotal role of Ben Cartwright's oldest and best-educated son Adam in the Bonanza (1959) series in 1959. The series made Roberts a bona fide TV star, while the program itself became the second longest-running TV western (after "Gunsmoke") and first to be filmed in color. At the peak of his and the TV show's popularity, Pernell, displeased with the writing and direction of the show, suddenly elected not to renew his contract and left at the end of the 1964-1965 season to the utter dismay of his fans. The show continued successfully without him, but a gap was always felt in the Cartwright family by this abrupt departure. The story line continued to leave open the possibility of a return if desired, but Pernell never did.
With his newfound freedom, Roberts focused on singing and the musical stage. One solo album was filled with folks songs entitled "Come All Ye Fair and Tender Ladies." Besides such standard roles in "Camelot" and "The King and I," he starred as Rhett Butler to Lesley Ann Warren's Scarlett O'Hara in a musical version of "Gone with the Wind" that did not fare well, and appeared in another misguided musical production based on the life of "Mata Hari." During this period he became an avid civil rights activist and joined other stalwarts such as Dick Gregory, Joan Baez and Harry Belafonte who took part in civil rights demonstrations during the 60s, including the Selma March.
The following years were rocky. He never found a solid footing in films with roles in rugged, foreign films such as Tibetana (1970) [The Kashmiri Run], Four Rode Out (1969), making little impression. He maintained a viable presence in TV, however, with parts in large-scale mini-series and guest shots on TV helping to keep some momentum. In 1979 he finally won another long-running series role (and an Emmy nomination) as Trapper John, M.D. (1979) in which he recreated the Wayne Rogers TV M*A*S*H (1972) role. Pernell was now heavier, bearded and pretty close to bald at this juncture (he was already wearing a toupee during his early "Bonanza" years), but still quite virile and attractive. The medical drama co-starring Gregory Harrison ran seven seasons.
The natural-born Georgia rebel was a heavily principled man and spent a life-time of work fighting racism, segregation, and sexism, notably on TV. He was constantly at odds with the "Bonanza" series writers of his concerns regarding equality. He also kept his private life private. Married and divorced three times, he had one son, Jonathan Christopher, by first wife Vera. Jonathan was killed in a motorcycle crash in 1989. In the 1990s, Pernell starred in his last series as host of FBI: The Untold Stories (1991). It had a short life-span.
Retiring in the late 1990s, Roberts was diagnosed with cancer in 2007 and died about two years later at age 81 on January 24, 2010, survived by fourth wife Eleanor Criswell. As such, the rugged actor, who never regretted leaving the "Bonanza" series, managed to outlive the entire Cartwright clan (Dan Blocker died in 1972; Lorne Greene in 1987); and Michael Landon in 1991).- Gummadi was born in 1926 in Tenali, Andhra Pradesh, India. He was an actor, known for Kurukshetramu (1977), Jyothi (1976) and Bhishma (1962). He died on 26 January 2010 in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India.
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Argentine actress of cinema and theater, and also forming of out-standing actors. Born in a little town of the province of Buenos Aires (Cnel. Suárez), Ledesma established herself in the city of Buenos Aires to very early age to initiate his formation actoral. At the age of 16 she joined the National Conservatory of Scenic Art (Escuela de Teatro), remaining two years there until the beginning of his career in 1945 with the work greedy one, of Moliere, which developed in the National Comedy Argentina. Her teachers were Antonio Cunill Cabanellas and Augusto Fernández. Ledesma - somehow induced by the anarchistic ideology of his ancestors - had an attitude compromised in favor of the rights of the actors. Along his career she was a participant of 24 Argentine movies; the last one, invisible City, in coproduction with Italy. Her most out-standing performances have been in the movies "Viaje sin regreso (Trip without return), "El hombre de las sorpresas" (The man of the surprises, by Leopoldo Torres Ríos), "Los días que me diste" (The days that I gave myself, by Fernando Siro). After the fall of the government peronist in 1955, Ledesma was prohibited by the Liberating Revolution (Revolución Libertadora) of the military government, and newly in 1957 could return to the cinema. She achieved important awards, between them that of Best Actress of Share-out for her role in "Todo sea para bien" (Everything is for good, by Carlos Rinaldi), Best Actress of the Year for the National Institute of Cinematography for "A puerta cerrada" (A closed door, by Pedro Escudero) and Best Actress and for the Franco-Argentine coproduction Section eliminated. In the middle of the decade of 1960 she was nominated an artistic director of the Argentine Theater (Tearo Argentino), where she directed important stagings of famous authors like Bretch, Shaw, Miller and Jacobo Langsner. Also prizewinner directed works of theater, standing out "Israfel" (by Abelardo Castillo), "Medea" (by Eurípides), and "El zoo de cristal" (The crystal zoo, by Tennesse Williams). For her united stamp and social commitment for which, in 1975, she was threatened with death on the part of the Triple A (Anti-communist alliance Argentina) and, censured in almost a decade by the Process of Military Reorganization (1976-1983), which affected her career. In television she took part of the famous Argentine titled cycle "Alta Comedia" (High comedy), along with actors of the height of the asturian Narciso Ibáñez Menta, the actress China Zorrilla and the actor Pepe Soriano.
In the last few years she played notable parts as that of the mother of Jorge Luis Borges, Mrs Leonor Acevedo, in "A love of Borges". On January 26, 2010, to little of fulfilling her 84 years, Inda Ledesma died of a cardiorespiratory unemployment, in an old people's home of the City of Buenos Aires where she was interned.- Writer
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Barry E. Blitzer was born on 29 April 1929. He was a writer and producer, known for Get Smart (1965), The Phil Silvers Show (1955) and Land of the Lost (1974). He was married to Elsie. He died on 27 January 2010 in Santa Monica, California, USA.- Stunts
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Martin Grace was born on 12 September 1942 in Lisdowney, County Kilkenny, Ireland. He was an actor, known for Brazil (1985), Enemy Mine (1985) and Moonraker (1979). He was married to Anna. He died on 27 January 2010 in Spain.- Actress
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Betty Lou Keim was born, in 1938, in Malden, Massachusetts. She made her debut as Peggy Allison in the television series, My Son Jeep (1953). She later appeared on The Philco Television Playhouse (1948) and The Alcoa Hour (1955). Two movie roles followed in 1956, those being These Wilder Years (1956) and Teenage Rebel (1956). Betty's best performance was in Some Came Running (1958). In this fine film, she played Dawn Hirsh, the pretty, out of control daughter of a small town jeweler and his wife, played by Arthur Kennedy and Leora Dana. After appearing in the TV series The Deputy (1959) as Fran McCord in 1959, Betty married Warren Berlinger in 1960 and left show business. They have four children.- A marvelously quirky and distinctive 4' 3" character actress, with a larger-than-life presence on film and TV, Zelda Rubinstein gave up a long and stable career in the medical field as a lab technician in order to strive for something more self-fulfilling as middle age settled in. At the age of 45, the feisty lady gave up the comfort of a stable paycheck and attempt an acting career, a daunting task for anyone but especially someone of her stature and type. Within a few years, she had beaten the odds and became a major movie celebrity thanks to one terrific showcase in a Steven Spielberg horror classic. In the process, she served as an inspiration to all the "little people" working in Hollywood who are forced to toil in cruel and demeaning stereotypes.
Zelda May Rubinstein was born on May 28, 1933 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Dolores and George Rubinstein, who were Polish Jewish immigrants. Zelda was the youngest of three children, and the only "little person" in the family. Her childhood and teenage years were decidedly difficult in terms of coping with her "interesting variation," which was caused by a pituitary gland deficiency. With no designs on acting at the time, she went the normal route of college and received a scholarship to study at the University of Pittsburgh. She earned her degree in bacteriology and worked for a number of years as a lab technician in blood banks. In 1978, Zelda, in a pursuit of something more creative in her life, abandoned her cushy but mundane job and threw herself completely into acting. She made her movie debut as one of the little people in the Chevy Chase slapstick comedy Under the Rainbow (1981). It all came together so quickly with her second film Poltergeist (1982) in the scene-stealing role of Tangina, the saucy, self-confident, prune-faced "house cleaner" with the whispery, doll-like voice who is brought in to rid a suburban home of demonic possession. Co-writer/producer Spielberg claims he designed the psychic role specifically for a "little person". The film became an instant summertime hit and Zelda created absolute magic and wonderment with the testy role, receiving some of the movie's best reviews. The character actress went on to appear in the two "Poltergeist" sequels. The "Poltergeist" movie projects were eventually dubbed "cursed" due to the untimely deaths of some of its performers, particularly two of the three children of film parents Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams. 22-year-old Dominique Dunne was slain in 1982 by a jealous ex-boyfriend only a few months after the first film's release, and angelic little Heather O'Rourke, age 12, died of an intestinal obstruction just months before Poltergeist III (1988) made it to the screen.
Although Zelda would not find a role quite up to the standards and popularity of Tangina, her subsequent career remained surprisingly active with a number of weird parts woven into both comedies and chillers -- often variations of her eccentric Tangina role. She played a mental patient in the Frances Farmer biopic Frances (1982), which showcased Jessica Lange in the Oscar-nominated title role; a squeaky-shoed organist in John Hughes sweet-sixteen comedy classic Sixteen Candles (1984) co-starring Brat Packers Molly Ringwald and Anthony Michael Hall; the demented mom in the gruesome, Spanish-made horror-thriller Anguish (1987) [aka Anguish], which has since reached cult status; a mentor witch in the comic fantasy Teen Witch (1989); a hermit in a National Lampoon-based slapstick Last Resort (1994); a betting clerk in the Sci-Fi adventure Timemaster (1995); an ill-fated nun in the thriller Little Witches (1996), and; a theatre director in the flick Critics and Other Freaks (1997).
Into the millennium, she made some odd, slapdash appearances in such minor fare as Maria & Jose (2000), Wishcraft (2002), Cages (2005), Angels with Angles (2005), Unbeatable Harold (2006) and Southland Tales (2006). In her last film, she furthered her horror icon status with a small cameo in the slim-budgeted indie Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006) that also featured Robert Englund of "Freddy Krueger" fame. Zelda also found an "in" doing voiceovers, her doll-like tones ideal for cartoons and such, and in commercials promoting such items as Skittles candy. She enjoyed extended popularity on TV with a regular series role on the first couple of seasons of Picket Fences (1992). Her character later was killed off in a freakish accident (fell into a freezer!). In her last years she narrated, and "Exorcist" child star Linda Blair hosted, TV's Scariest Places on Earth (2000). The actress also appeared on stage in such productions as "Deathtrap" (as a psychic, of course), "To Kill a Mockingbird," "Suddenly, Last Summer," "The Slab Boys" and "Black Comedy". She also appeared as Yente in a production of "Fiddler on the Roof".
An outspoken social activist, Zelda was a staunch advocate for the rights of little people who formed the nonprofit Michael Dunn Memorial Repertory Theater Company in Los Angeles in 1985. The actress gained additional attention and respect, if not popularity (her career suffered for a time as a result), as an early and outspoken HIV/AIDS activist. As the poster mom for AIDS awareness, she valiantly appeared in a series of maternal newspaper/billboard advertisements imploring her gay son to practice safe sex. The series of ads ran from the mid-to-late 1980s. Zelda also participated in the first AIDS Project Los Angeles AIDS Walk and attended the 25th Anniversary Walk on October 12, 2009.
A couple of months before her death on January 27, 2010, Zelda suffered a heart attack. Complications set in (kidney and lung failure) and she passed away at age 76 on January 27, 2010, at Barlow Respiratory Hospital in Los Angeles, California. - Writer
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U.S. writer whose novel "The Catcher in the Rye" (1951) won critical acclaim and devoted admirers, especially among the post-World War II generation of college students. His entire corpus of published works consists of that one novel and 13 short stories, all originally written in the period 1948-59. Salinger was the son of a Jewish father and a mother who adopted Judaism, and, like Holden Caulfield, the hero of "The Catcher in the Rye", he grew up in New York City, attending public schools and a military academy. After brief periods at New York and Columbia universities, he devoted himself entirely to writing, and his stories began to appear in periodicals in 1940. After his return from service in the U.S. Army (1942-46), Salinger's name and writing style became increasingly associated with "The New Yorker" magazine, which published almost all of his later stories. Some of the best of these made use of his wartime experiences: "For Esmé - With Love and Squalor" (1950) describes a U.S. soldier's poignant encounter with two British children; "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" (1948) concerns the suicide of the sensitive, despairing veteran Seymour Glass. Major critical and popular recognition came with the publication of "The Catcher in the Rye", whose central character, a sensitive, rebellious adolescent, relates in authentic teenage idiom his flight from the "phony" adult world, his search for innocence and truth, and his final collapse on a psychiatrist's couch. The humor and colorful language of "The Catcher in the Rye" place it in the tradition of Mark Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and the stories of Ring Lardner, but its hero, like most of Salinger's child characters, views his life with an added dimension of precocious self-consciousness. "Nine Stories" (1953), a selection of Salinger's best work, added to his reputation. The reclusive habits of Salinger,an obsessively private man especially over the last half-century of his life, made his personal life a matter of speculation among devotees, while his small literary output was a subject of controversy among critics. "Franny and Zooey" (1961) brought together two earlier New Yorker stories; both deal with the Glass family, as do the two stories in "Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters"; and "Seymour: An Introduction" (1963).- Additional Crew
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Howard Zinn, the author of the best seller "A People's History of the United States", is a historian, political scientist and social activist well-known for his involvement in progressive causes. Zinn was born on August 24, 1922 in Brooklyn, New York, the son of immigrant Jewish parents. During the early years of World War Two, Zinn worked as a defense industry worker in the Brooklyn shipyards and became a labor union organizer. He subsequently served as a bombardier in U.S. Army Air Force's 490th Bomb Group, which conducted bombing missions in Europe. Zinn came to question the value of the strategic bombing of France and Germany, which caused millions of civilian casualties.
After the war, Zinn too his B.A. in history at New York University and received his M.A. and Ph.D. from Columbia University. His doctoral dissertation on Fiorello LaGuardia's career as a Congressman was published as "LaGuardia in Congress" by the Cornell University Press. Zinn's book concluded that LaGuardia's progressive political platform "was an astonishingly accurate preview of the New Deal."
In 1956, Zinn was appointed chairman of the department of history and social sciences at Spelman College, a woman's college in Atlanta, Georgia that served African American women. Zinn joined the faculty two years after the Supreme Court had outlawed segregation in education with its Brown v. Board of Education decision. The home of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Atlanta was one of the centers of the modern Civil Rights movement, and many of his students became involved in pushing for an end to segregation and for equality under the law for African Americans.
Zinn has recollected that he began to question the traditional interpretations of American history when he was required to teach his African American students from books which ignored the true experiences of black folk in America. He realized that the "official" histories of the United States during that Cold War period had little connection to the reality of life as lived by ordinary people in the United States. It opened his eyes to the gulf between the socially sanctioned histories and the reality of the experiences of ordinary American citizens, particularly those of color and dissidents.
Zinn said that while he at Spelman, he observed 30 violations of the rights of students under the First and Fourteenth amendment rights in protests in Atlanta. The police abridged the student protesters' freedoms of speech, of assembly and of equal protection under the laws. Zinn's intellectual and spiritual development would transform him into a radical and progressive historian, part of a new class of intellectuals who began to give voice to those who were not heard from in official historiographies.
Despite being a tenured professor, Zinn was dismissed in June 1963 after siding with students in their desire to challenge Spelman's traditional emphasis of turning out "young ladies". Many of the Spellman students were involved in civil rights protests, and Zinn, or course, was encouraging this venue of political expression. In 1964, he joined the political science faculty at Boston University, where he taught until 1988 and where he currently maintains an office as professor emeritus. B.U.'s political science department was dominated by progressives and leftists. It was during his first decade at B.U. that Zinn became known as a vocal critic of war, and of the Vietnam War in particular. Zinn had come to the conclusion that warfare was wrong, and that nonviolent resistance was the answer to aggression.
Zinn was involved in one of the seminal moments in the domestic opposition to the Vietnam War, the "Pentagon Papers" case, when Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the papers, entrusted a copy of them with Zinn. Zinn's publishing house, the Beacon Press, published what has come to be known as the Senator Gravel edition of "The Pentagon Papers", four volumes of Pentagon documents plus a fifth containing an analysis by Zinn and and Noam Chomsky. Zinn was called by the defense as an expert witness at Ellsberg's criminal trial for conspiracy and espionage in connection with the publication of the "Pentagon Papers" by the "The New York Times". Zinn testified that "...there was nothing in the papers of military significance that could be used to harm the defense of the United States" but that they were embarrassing to the United States government, which had blundered into Vietnam and had tried to cover up the hopelessness of the situation. The case against Ellsberg was dismissed it on the grounds that it had been prejudiced by the burglary of Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office under the direction of the Richard Nixon administration.
As a historian, Zinn - dismayed by the point of view expressed in traditional history books - published his most famous work (and a watershed in American historiography), "A People's History of the United States", in 1980 to provide other perspectives on American history. The text depicts the struggles of Native Americans against the European and American conquests of their land, of slaves against slavery, of unionists and labor against capitalists, of women against patriarchy, of allegedly "free" African-Americans against racism and for civil rights, and of others who were disenfranchised and whose stories are not often told in mainstream histories. A classic of populist history, "A People's History" has been assigned reading both as a high school and college textbook. The most widely known example of critical pedagogy, "A People's History" sold its one millionth copy in 2003.
Howard Zinn currently resides in the Boston suburb of Newton, Massachusetts with his wife Roslyn. The couple have two children, Myla and Jeff, and five grandchildren. In addition to his histories, Zinn is a playwright: His first play, "Daughter of Venus", was produced in 1985, and his most famous play, "Emma", based on the life of anarchist Emma Goldman, has been staged five times since its initial production in 1986. His most recent play, "Marx in Soho" (1999), is still being performed in small theaters throughout the United States.- Tom Brookshier was born on 16 December 1931 in Roswell, New Mexico, USA. He was an actor, known for Black Sunday (1977), The NFL on CBS (1956) and This Is the NFL (1967). He was married to Barbara Brookshier. He died on 29 January 2010 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
- Ralph McInerny was born on 24 February 1929 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA. Ralph was a writer, known for Fatal Confession: A Father Dowling Mystery (1987) and Father Dowling Mysteries (1989). Ralph was married to Constance Kunert. Ralph died on 29 January 2010 in Mishawaka, Indiana, USA.
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Karen Schmeer was born on 20 February 1970 in Portland, Oregon, USA. Karen was an editor, known for Sergio (2009), My Father, the Genius (2002) and The Fog of War (2003). Karen died on 29 January 2010 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.- Born Helen Darling, she was adopted by the Smith family in 1937 and lived with them until 1941, when she left to live with her brother, Dan Darling's family, a milkman in West Los Angeles, and the Smiths moved to Rochester, New York. She attended Emerson Jr. High in Westwood Village, California and University High School in West Los Angeles, CA 1936-1941. Actress Faith Domergue (Kelli Garner portrayed her in The Aviator (2004)) was in the same class and lived across the street from them on S. Carmelina Avenue in Brentwood. Helen was under contract with Paramount in 1942 and 1943, then Republic, and was Don 'Red' Barry's leading lady in a few Westerns, then became Republic's Queen of the Serials.
Helen married Richard M. "Dick" Hearn, a UniHi classmate and returning Navy fighter pilot veteran, in 1945; they moved to South Bend, Indiana, where he attended Notre Dame University and earned his degree in Corporate Law before they returned to West Los Angeles. They had one daughter before Dick died about 1965. In 1969, Helen married Larry Bailey, owner of a bakery in Northridge, CA. Larry died about 1980 and Helen still lives in Northridge. - Actress
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Donna Jean Young was born on 29 May 1936 in East McKeesport, Pennsylvania, USA. She was an actress, known for ABC Stage 67 (1966), Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (1967) and The Beverly Hillbillies (1962). She was married to James. She died on 29 January 2010 in Sydney, Australia.- Patricia Gage was born on 3 March 1940 in Glasgow, Scotland, UK. She was an actress, known for American Psycho (2000), Highlander: The Raven (1998) and Secret Service (1992). She was married to Paxton Whitehead. She died on 31 January 2010 in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada.
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David Brown was born on 28 July 1916 in New York City, New York, USA. He was a producer, known for The Player (1992), Cocoon (1985) and Deep Impact (1998). He was married to Helen Gurley Brown. He died on 1 February 2010 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.- Actor
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Rodolfo de Anda was born on 6 July 1943 in Mexico City, Distrito Federal, Mexico. He was an actor and director, known for Mil millas al sur (1978), El macho bionico (1981) and El robo imposible (1981). He was married to Claudia Elena Moran Ize, Mariagna Prats and Patricia Conde. He died on 1 February 2010 in Mexico, Distrito Federal, Mexico.- Peter Martell was born on 30 September 1938 in Bolzano, Italy. He was an actor, known for Two Brothers, One Death (1968), Desert of Fire (1971) and Omicidio per appuntamento (1967). He died on 1 February 2010 in Bolzano, Trentino-Alto Adige, Italy.
- Jack Brisco was born on 21 September 1941 in Blackwell, Oklahoma, USA. He was an actor, known for WWF Championship Wrestling (1972), WCW Worldwide (1975) and Saturday Night's Main Event (1985). He was married to Jan Carol Bateman and Sandra Lee Riney. He died on 1 February 2010 in Tampa, Florida, USA.
- Justin Mentell was born on 16 December 1982 in Austin, Texas, USA. He was an actor, known for G-Force (2009), Boston Legal (2004) and 5-25-77 (2008). He died on 1 February 2010 in Blanchardville, Wisconsin, USA.
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Cochin Hanifa was born on 22 April 1951 in Kochi, Travancore-Cochin, India. He was an actor and writer, known for Enthiran (2010), Paasa Paravaigal (1988) and Moonnu Masangalkku Munpu (1986). He was married to Fasila. He died on 2 February 2010 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.- Writer
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Jens-Anton Poulsson was a Norwegian officer, born in Rjukan, Norway. He became world famous as one of the twelve saboteurs which stood behind the Heavy water sabotages during the 2WW. He was an officer in Comany Linge, and was trained by allied forces in Britain. Poulsson started off his military schools in 1939, and experienced the German invasion being ordered to retreat back to Sweden in stead of battling against the invaders. In October he went to England, and started training as a saboteur, and in 1942-44 he participated as one of the main men in stopping Adolf Hitler getting Germany the nuclear bomb. He later used his life to work in the military forces, and has written several books about the second world war.- Producer
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- Writer
John McCallum was born on 14 March 1918 in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. He was a producer and actor, known for Nickel Queen (1971), Bailey's Bird (1977) and A Boy, a Girl and a Bike (1949). He was married to Googie Withers. He died on 3 February 2010 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.- Born in Wichita Falls, Texas, and was raised in Berkeley, California, she attended/graduated at The Pasadena Community Playhouse where her major was acting, and she pursued her career immediately. The Emmy Award nominee who has played Alice Horton for the entire 37 years that Days of Our Lives has been on the air, is daytime's television's most beloved mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. As one of the two remaining original cast members, she is indisputably one of the most revered veterans in soap opera history. She has won the Soap Opera Digest Award for Outstanding Actress/Mature Role in 1978, 1979, 1984 and 1985, and was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 1986-87, and for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 1978-79. It should come as a surprise that many longtime fans that watched Days who knew her as Alice that Frances had an accomplished acting career prior to her debut on November 8, 1965. Her Broadway appearances include Hamlet with Maurice Evans, Cyrano de Bergerac with Jose Ferrer, Twelfth Night and a Theater Hill production of The Rivals with Mary Boland. Her first radio job was at NBC as Ann Rutledge in Prologue To Glory, which was followed by her role of Mrs. Moonlight in Mrs. Moonlight and Charlotte Corday in Charlotte Corday. Little did she know at that time how the name Corday was to play an important role in her life. Her television credits include "The Eleventh Hour," "Little Mister," "Wagon Train," and the movie-of-the-week, "Mercy Or Murder?"
- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Director
Georges Wilson was born on 16 October 1921 in Champigny-sur-Marne, Seine [now Val-de-Marne], France. He was an actor and director, known for The Three Musketeers (1973), Mesrine: Public Enemy No. 1 (2008) and La vouivre (1989). He was married to Nicole. He died on 3 February 2010 in Rambouillet, Yvelines, France.- Actor
- Music Department
- Writer
Unassuming, innocent-eyed and undeniably ingratiating, Brit comedy actor Ian Carmichael was quite the popular chap in late 50s and early 60s film. He was born in Hull, Yorkshire, England on June 18, 1920, the son of Arthur Denholm Carmichael, an optician, and his wife Kate (Gillett). After receiving his schooling at Bromsgove High School and Scarborough College, he was accepted into the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and trained there, making his stage debut as a mute robot in "RUR". in 1939. That same year he also appeared as Claudius in "Julius Caesar" and was appearing a revue production of "Nine Sharp" (1940) when his young career was interrupted by WWII. He served in Europe for many years with the Royal Armoured Corps as a commissioned officer in the 22nd Dragoons.
Ian returned to the theatre in 1947 with roles in four productions: "She Wanted a Cream Front Door", "I Said to Myself", "Cupid and Mars" and "Out of the Frying Pan". He also sharpened his farcical skills in music hall revues where he worked with such revue legends as Hermione Baddeley and Dora Bryan. Given his first film bit as a waiter in Bond Street (1948), he continued in rather obscure roles for several years. While he was sincerely capable of playing it serious, which would include roles in the U.S. film Betrayed (1954) starring Clark Gable and Lana Turner, as well as the war-themed adventures The Colditz Story (1955) and Storm Over the Nile (1955), it was his association with late 50s "silly-ass" comedy that gave his cinematic career a noticeable boost. After repeating his stage success (the only cast member to do do) playing David Prentice in the film version of Simon and Laura (1955) opposite Kay Kendall and Peter Finch, he co-starred in a series of droll satires for the Boulting Brothers and Ealing Studios. While he might have been upstaged on occasion by a motley crew of scene-stealers (Terry-Thomas, Peter Sellers, Raymond Huntley, Margaret Rutherford), Ian was sublimely funny himself as the hapless klutz caught up in their shenanigans. Private's Progress (1956), the service comedy which got the whole ball rolling, and its sequel, I'm All Right Jack (1959), along with the Boulting's Lucky Jim (1957) Brothers in Law (1957) and Happy Is the Bride (1958) firmly established Ian as a slapstick movie star.
The inane fun continued into the 60s with ripe vehicles in Skywatch (1960), School for Scoundrels (1960), Double Bunk (1961), The Amorous Mr. Prawn (1962) and Heavens Above! (1963). During the late 1960s and 1970s, he found more fulfillment playing wry, bemused, upper-crust characters on comedy TV, particularly his Bertie Wooster in The World of Wooster (1965) which reunited him with frequent Boulting Brothers co-star Dennis Price as Jeeves, Wooster's chilly-mannered personal valet. Ian's leading role as the Bachelor Father (1970), based on the story of a real-life perennial bachelor who took on several foster children, only added to his popularity. In later years, he was frequently heard on the BBC radio.
Ian made vigilant returns to the comedy stage whenever possible in such lightweight vehicles as "The Tunnel of Love", "The Gazebo", "Critic's Choice", "Birds on the Wing", "Darling, I'm Home", "Springtime for Henry" and appeared in his last musical "I Do! I Do!" in 1968. Earlier, in 1965, he made his Broadway debut starring in "Boeing-Boeing", which lasted only a few weeks. A more successful revival of this show showed up on Broadway in 2008.
Semi-retired since the mid-1980s, Ian continued to show elderly spryness here and there with a smattering of films including The Magnificent Seven Deadly Sins (1971), From Beyond the Grave (1974), The Lady Vanishes (1979) and Diamond Skulls (1989). On TV, he was quite popular in the role of the gentleman detective Lord Peter Wimsey in several crime mystery mini-series: Clouds of Witness (1972), The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1972), Murder Must Advertise (1973), The Nine Tailors (1974) and Five Red Herrings (1975), and had a recurring role on the TV series Strathblair (1992).
To cap his career off, he was honored as an OBE in the 2003 Queen's Birthday Honours List. Made a widower after 40 years by his first wife Jean (Pym) McLean, he married novelist/radio producer Kate Fenton, who is over thirty years his junior, in 1992. He has two daughters, Lee and Sally, from his first marriage. In 1979, his autobiography, "Will the Real Ian Carmichael?...", was published.
A charmer to the end, his last (recurring) appearance was on the TV series The Royal (2003) in 2009. The actor died on February 7, 2010, following a month-long illness.- Actor
- Producer
- Additional Crew
Actor and producer Sujit Kumar was born as Shamsher Bahadur Singh on June 26 1934 in Benares, British India. As a film actor, he worked in the Hindi-language film industry for more than four decades and is particularly well-known for his roles in Aradhana (1969), Ittefaq (1969) and Dharam Veer (1977). As a producer, he is known for Anubhav (1986), Asmaan Se Ooncha (1989) and Khel (1992). Sujit was also regarded as the first superstar of Bhojpuri films.
Sujit was married to Kiran Singh with whom he had a son (Jatin Kumar) and a daughter (Henna Nathani). Sujit died on February 5, 2010 in Mumbai, India.
Sujit is a part of the Varma family, which includes members that have had careers in the Bollywood industry as producers, distributors, actors, film directors, writers and film editors. The Varma family began working in the film industry in the late 1940s and continues into the 2020s; the family has had a staying power that has extended to more than seven decades.
Sujit joined the Varma Family when he married Kiran Singh née Varma, the daughter of Santram Varma, a founder of Varma Films and a patriarch of the Varma family.- Actress
- Music Department
Hénia Suchar was born on 15 January 1932 in Cernauti, Romania [now Chernivtsi, Ukraine]. She was an actress, known for Aux frontières du possible (1971), The Last Metro (1980) and The Wise Guys (1965). She was married to Jacques Bouvier. She died on 5 February 2010 in Paris, France.- Farukh Kasymov was born on 17 September 1948. He was an actor, known for Mirazhi lyubvi (1987), Pervaya lyubov Nasreddina (1978) and Chelovek menyaet kozhu (1982). He died on 7 February 2010.
- Vladimir Osipov was born on 8 February 1958. He was an actor, known for Doroga v Paradiz (1991), Sto soldat i dve devushki (1990) and Stalingrad (1990). He died on 7 February 2010.
- Maria Brenes was born on 11 January 1921 in Cuba. She was an actress, known for Cuban Confidential (1956) and East Side/West Side (1963). She died on 8 February 2010 in Dix Hills, New York, USA.
- Actor
- Stunts
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Robert F. Hoy was equally at home as a stuntman and as an actor. He appeared as Joe Butler on the acclaimed TV Western, The High Chaparral. He stunt-doubled for such actors as Charles Bronson, Tony Curtis, Robert Forrester, Ross Martin, Tyrone Power, David Jansen, and Telly Savalas. He appeared in such films as The Outlaw Josey Wales, The Lone Ranger, Gambler II, Nevada Smith, Bronco Billy, and The Enforcer, and on television in such programs as Wanted Dead or Alive, Walker Texas Ranger, JAG, Dallas (recurring role), The Wild Wild West, Magnum P.I. (five episodes), and The Young Riders. Aside from appearing in front of the cameras, he was the 2nd Unit Director and Stunt Coordinator in Spain on the TV series Zorro and on the pilot episode of The Three Musketeers.
In his work as a stuntman, Bob specialized in horse work, although he was also called upon to double in fight scenes, do car work and handle high falls. The films in which lead actors and others were doubled for stunts are too numerous to mention but include: Operation Petticoat, The Defiant Ones, Spartacus, Tobruk, They Call Me Bruce, River of No Return, To Hell and Back, Drumbeat, Wings of the Hawk, and Revenge of the Creature From the Black Lagoon.
He held lifetime membership in the Stuntmen's Association, of which he was a founding member. He was also a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Sciences, Directors Guild of America, AFTRA, and the Screen Actors Guild (later SAG-AFTRA).- Anna Samokhina was born on 14 January 1963 in Guryevsk, Kemerovo Oblast, Russian SFSR, USSR [now Russia]. She was an actress, known for Don Sezar de Bazan (1989), Zhenskiy den (1990) and Gangstery v okeane (1991). She was married to Dmitry Konorov and Aleksandr Samokhin. She died on 8 February 2010 in St. Petersburg, Russia.
- Alfred Gregory was born on 12 February 1913 in Blackpool, Lancashire, England, UK. He died on 9 February 2010 in Melbourne, Australia.
- Writer
- Script and Continuity Department
- Actor
Marc London was born on 30 September 1927 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (1967), The Muppet Show (1976) and Sinatra and Friends (1977). He died on 9 February 2010 in Hyannis, Massachusetts, USA.- Sound Department
David Weinstock was born on 1 February 1961 in Los Angeles, California, USA. David is known for The Search for the Next Elvira (2007), The Jenny McCarthy Show (1997) and Death Valley Memories (1994). David died on 9 February 2010 in Van Nuys, California, USA.- Phil Harris was born on 19 December 1956 in Bothell, Washington, USA. He was married to Mary Harris. He died on 9 February 2010 in Anchorage, Alaska, USA.
- Charlie Wilson was born on 1 June 1933 in Trinity, Texas, USA. He was married to Barbara Alberstadt and Jerry Wilson. He died on 10 February 2010 in Lufkin, Texas, USA.
- Actress
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Irina Arkhipova was a mezzo-soprano in the great Russian tradition, best known as Carmen in the classical opera.
She was born Irina Konstantinova Arkhipova on December 2, 1925, in Moscow, Russia. Her father, Konstantin Ivanovich Vetoshkin, was a renown construction engineer in Moscow. Her mother, Evdokia Efimovna, sang at a church choir. Young Arkhipova was fond of music, she studied piano under Olga Gnesina at the Gnesin Institute. During WWII her family narrowly escaped from the advancing Nazi Armies and she was evacuated for 4 years in Tashkent. There she studied as an architect while taking singing lessons at the same time. In 1945, she was back in Moscow and continued her studies in both architecture and music. In 1951 she made her radio debut singing traditional Russian romances on the Moscow Radio. At the same time Arkhipova's architectural plans for the Moscow University and the Moscow Institute of Finance were approved and both projects were successfully built, thus propelling Arkhipova's stellar career as an accomplished architect.
But music won her heart and soul. At the age of 28, Arkhipva entered the Moscow Conservatory, where she studied with Leonid Savranski. Her first professional engagement was with the Yekaterinburg (then Sverdlovsk) opera from 1954 to 1956. In 1955, she won an international singing competition in Warsaw, which led to her joining the ensemble at the Bolshoi in Moscow, and she made her debut there in 1956 as Bizet's Carmen. For the next two decades Arkhipova dominated the mezzo repertory there, as much because of her versatility and intelligence as her exceptional qualities of voice. Among her roles were Azucena in Il trovatore, Marina in Boris Godunov, Marfa in Khovanshchina, Amneris in Aïda, Eboli in Don Carlo, Charlotte in Werther, Lyubasha in The Tsar's Bride, Pauline in The Queen of Spades, Lyubov in Mazeppa, Helen in the Bolshoi premiere of Sergei Prokofiev's War and Peace, as well as roles in the premieres of Prokofiev's The Story of a Real Man and of operas by Tikhon Khrennikov and Rodion Schedrin.
She made her first appearance in the West in the 1960-61 season as Carmen at the Teatro San Carlo, Naples and in Opera of Rome. In 1963 she made a sensational tour across Japan. Although European opera houses slowly adopted the stagione system with its reliance on employing guest singers ad hoc, the political exigencies of the Cold War meant that her appearances outside the communist bloc in the years of her prime, the 1960s and 1970s, were fewer than her admirers would have liked. Her debut at La Scala, Milan, followed in 1964 when she appeared with the Bolshoi company as Helen, Marina and Pauline. In 1967 she returned there to sing Marfa and Marina, this time alongside mainly Italian casts, and again in 1971 (Marfa) and 1973 (Marina). The Bolshoi company's visit to Paris in 1969 was the occasion of her first appearances at the Paris Opéra.
In 1972 she made her US debut in San Francisco as Amneris, and the same year she sang Azucena at Orange County. Her reception at Covent Garden in 1975 at her debut there, also as Azucena, was equally enthusiastic. Alan Blyth wrote: "In countless phrases . . . she pierced beneath the surface of a star-studded performance to what Verdi and the music really mean." Sadly, Arkhipova was not heard again in London until 1988, by when she had had the best of her voice, and sang a "rather muted" Mine Arvidson in Un ballo in maschera. In 1992 she made a belated debut at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, with the Kirov Opera company as the old Countess in The Queen of Spades.
During her 40-year career, Arkhipova sung in over 40 different operatic roles. She recorded over twenty operas and also made several solo albums, which sold millions of copies. Of one of her records the critic J. B. Steane commented: "Her voice rings out strong and clear, without divisions of register and with complete freedom from throaty constrictions . . . a gloriously healthy sound." He thought her the best Russian singer of the 1960s, and the chance of hearing her a more than adequate reason on its own for facing the inconveniences that then beset the traveler to Russia.
Despite an addiction, common in Russian singers of her time, to a distinctly old-fashioned range of gesture, Arkhipova came vividly to life on stage. Her voice, in its best days, was a magnificent mezzo-soprano of a weight and range that made her consistently successful also in the darkest contralto parts. She was a master of the art of acting with the voice; her early recording of Carmen's Seguedille was called by Rodney Milnes "quite wonderful: light, playful yet forceful ... and gloriously musical". Her Marina with the Bolshoi was described as "authoritatively sung, sharply characterized".
Irina Arkhipova is in the Russian national hall of fame as the singer with most prizes, awards and decorations. A small planet No 4424 is named Arkhipova in her honor. She was designated Honorable Actress of Russia and People's Actress of the USSR, and also received numerous awards and decorations from the Soviet state and from the Russian government. Arkhipova was active in various cultural projects in Russia and internationally. She sang for dignitaries and politicians, such as Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev, Queen Elizabeth II, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pope John Paul II and other international figures. Among the highlights of her career were performances at the Bolshoi Theatre, Kirov Opera, Covent Garden Opera, Paris Opera, Metropolitan Opera and at many other classical venues across the world.
Arkhipova was president of the Tchaikovsky International Competition for 30 years. In addition, she was a jury member of international competitions in Athens (Maria Callas), Barcelona (Francisco Vinas), Munich, Sofia, New York (Rosa Ponselle), Tokyo (Minon), Brussels (Queen Elizabeth), Bussetto (Voci Verdiane), Treviso (Mario del Monaco) and Cardiff (BBC). For 40 years she was professor at the Moscow Conservatory and many of her students have become prize-winners in international competitions and are performing in opera houses around the world. She was vice president of The Academy of the Creative Arts and president of both the International Union of Musicians and the Irina Arkhipova Foundation in Moscow.
Irina Arkhipova wrote three books: 'My Muzes' (1992), 'Music of My Life' (1997) and 'I am the brand' (2005). She was married to singer Vladislav Piavko and the couple had one son. She died of a heart failure on February 11, 2010, aged 84, and was laid to rest next to Russian culture luminaries in Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow, Russia.- Director
- Writer
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Umetsugu Inoue was a director of over a hundred films in a wide variety of genres; working with all six major Japanese film production companies over his 35 year career. He was first noticed early on at Nikkatsu Studios for establishing a new genre of high action musical films, charged with the impulsive energy of the young Jazz culture of 1950s Japan. Just after the war, these 'Nikkatsu Action' films created by Inoue, catapulted Yujiro Ishihara into becoming the most popular singing film star in Japan. As a scriptwriter, Inoue wrote 101 screenplays and the original story for five films.- Actress
- Director
- Writer
Caroline McWilliams was born on 4 April 1945 in Seattle, Washington, USA. She was an actress and director, known for Mermaids (1990), Benson (1979) and Beverly Hills, 90210 (1990). She was married to Michael Keaton. She died on 11 February 2010 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Director
- Costume and Wardrobe Department
- Writer
Alexander McQueen was born on 16 March 1969 in Lewisham, London, England, UK. He was a director and writer, known for Björk: Alarm Call (1998), Björk: Volumen (1999) and Björk: Volumen Plus (2002). He died on 11 February 2010 in Mayfair, London, England, UK.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Lisa Daniels was born on 31 December 1930 in Birmingham, England, UK. She was an actress, known for One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961), Shirley Temple's Storybook (1958) and Matinee Theatre (1955). She was married to Roger H. Lewis and Peter Daniels. She died on 12 February 2010 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Marjorie Nelson was born on 2 November 1923 in Seattle, Washington, USA. She was an actress, known for Inheritance (2004), Twin Peaks (1990) and The Slender Thread (1965). She was married to Victor Eugene Steinbrueck and Howard Da Silva. She died on 12 February 2010 in Seattle, Washington, USA.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Ronnie Cosby was born on 22 December 1927 in Alhambra, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Boulder Dam (1936), Little Men (1934) and Telephone Operator (1937). He died on 13 February 2010 in Huntington Beach, California, USA.- Actor
- Stunts
- Additional Crew
Max Faulkner was born in 1931 in Croydon, Surrey, England, UK. He was an actor, known for Willow (1988), Far and Away (1992) and Nightbreed (1990). He was married to Ann Gow. He died on 13 February 2010 in Havefordwest, Pembrokeshire, Wales, UK.- Actor
- Writer
Yvon Leroux was born on 22 April 1929 in Saint-Eustache, Québec, Canada. He was an actor and writer, known for One Man (1977), Les brûlés (1959) and Montserrat (1967). He died on 13 February 2010 in Montréal, Québec, Canada.- Actor
- Director
- Editor
Andrew Koenig was born on 17 August 1968 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was an actor and director, known for InAlienable (2007), Batman: Dead End (2003) and Growing Pains (1985). He died on 14 February 2010 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.- Jerzy Turek was born on 17 January 1934 in Tchórzowa, Mazowieckie, Poland. He was an actor, known for Pieklo i niebo (1966), Lalka (1978) and Kogel-mogel (1988). He died on 14 February 2010 in Warsaw, Mazowieckie, Poland.
- Actor
- Composer
- Music Department
Doug Fieger was born on 20 August 1952 in Detroit, Michigan, USA. He was an actor and composer, known for Super 8 (2011), Reality Bites (1994) and The Next Karate Kid (1994). He died on 14 February 2010 in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA.- Character actor John Davis Chandler was born on January 28, 1935, in Hinton, West Virginia. He was raised in Charleston, West Virginia. Tall and thin, with fair hair, piercing blue eyes, a pale complexion and a nasal, whiny voice, Chandler specialized in portraying mean, neurotic and dangerous villains. He made an impressive film debut in his sole starring part as the titular sniveling, psychotic, homicidal weasel gangster in Mad Dog Coll (1961). He acted in a trio of Westerns for director Sam Peckinpah, and is especially memorable (and frightening) as the creepy Jimmy Hammond in the magnificent Ride the High Country (1962). He was excellent as vicious punk Arthur Reardon in The Young Savages (1961). He made an effectively loathsome appearance as a vile bushwhacker in the supremely spooky horror-western The Shadow of Chikara (1977) and had a nice bit as a bounty hunter in Clint Eastwood's terrific The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976). He even played a good guy--of sorts--in Peckinpah's Major Dundee (1965).
Chandler popped up in three entertaining drive-in exploitation features for director William Grefé: at his wacky best as the crazed, doped-up Acid in The Hooked Generation (1968), a foul shark poacher in the fun Jaws (1975) copy Mako: The Jaws of Death (1976) and an evil pot farmer in Whiskey Mountain (1977). Among the many TV shows John did guest spots on are Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993), Walker, Texas Ranger (1993), Chicago Hope (1994) ER (1994), Simon & Simon (1981), Hunter (1984), Murder, She Wrote (1984), Hill Street Blues (1981), T.J. Hooker (1982), Fantasy Island (1977), The Incredible Hulk (1978), Police Woman (1974), Gunsmoke (1955), Adam-12 (1968), The Fugitive (1963), Combat! (1962), The Rifleman (1958), Route 66 (1960) and The Virginian (1962). In real life he was an avid practitioner of yoga. Chandler died at age 75 on February 16, 2010 in Toluca Lake, California. - Agnès Laurent was born on 28 January 1936 in Lyon, Rhône, France. She was an actress, known for The Night of the Great Attack (1959), Girl in His Pocket (1957) and Mary Had a Little... (1961). She died on 16 February 2010 in Grenoble, Isère, France.
- Actress
- Soundtrack
Kathryn Grayson was born Zelma Kathryn Elisabeth Hedrick in Winston-Salem, NC, on February 9, 1922. This pretty, petite brunette with a heart-shaped face was discovered by MGM talent scouts while singing on the radio. The studio quickly signed her to a contract, and she was given acting lessons along and had to pose for countless publicity photos. Kathryn, a coloratura soprano, made her first film in 1941, a "B" picture called Andy Hardy's Private Secretary (1941). She soon was cast opposite some of MGM's top musical stars of the 1940s, such as Gene Kelly and Mario Lanza. She was paired with Lanza a few times, but the two never got along due mostly to Lanza's hot temper and alcohol abuse. The pairing of Lanza and Grayson would never match the success of lyrical soprano Jeanette MacDonald and baritone Nelson Eddy, although Kathryn and MacDonald did become great friends. Jeanette became a mentor and an older sister figure for Kathryn.
Grayson's most memorable roles came in the early 1950s. They were Show Boat (1951), where she played "Magnolia", opposite Ava Gardner and Howard Keel; Kiss Me Kate (1953), playing actress "Lilli Vanessi", who portrayed "Katherine" in the movie's "show within a show", a musical version of "The Taming of the Shrew". In 1953 she exited MGM, then made only one more film, The Vagabond King (1956), at Paramount. She later worked in nightclubs and on stage.- Witold Skaruch was born on 11 January 1930 in Ciechanów, Mazowieckie, Poland. He was an actor, known for Night Train (1959), Ostatnia akcja (2009) and Pogranicze w ogniu (1991). He was married to Janina Traczykówna. He died on 17 February 2010 in Konstancin-Jeziorna, Mazowieckie, Poland.
- Actor
- Music Department
Nirmal Pandey was born on 10 August 1962 in Nainital, Uttar Pradesh, India. He was an actor, known for Pyaar Kiya To Darna Kya (1998), Bandit Queen (1994) and Auzaar (1997). He was married to Archana Sharma and Kausar Munir. He died on 18 February 2010 in Andheri, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India.- David Joll was a New Zealand actor who appeared in the Whangarei Short Film "Still Small Voice" in 2009. He played 'Jonah'. This was David's first debut movie appearance. He passed away in Feb 2010, two months after "Still Small Voice" was released.
David Joll is brothers with New Zealand TV Personality "Steve Joll" who appeared on the NZ Childrens Show 'What Now' in the late 1990s. - Actor
- Writer
- Director
With his bald head, firm jawline and bristling moustache, Lionel Jeffries played a nice line of English eccentrics. This belied his RADA training. Following military service in WWII, he played his major roles - everything from Grandpa Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968) to the Marquis of Queensberry in The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960) - in the 1960s.
His surprisingly brief career as a director included the highly popular family films The Railway Children (1970) and The Amazing Mr. Blunden (1972).- Gorgeous, dark-haired, luscious-lipped, shapely-legged, not afraid of showing as much of her body as could be, Elli Parvo was THE femme fatale of post-war Italy. Revealed by "Desiderio" (1943-1946), started in 1943 by Roberto Rossellini and completed in 1946 by Marcello Pagliero, she appeared as a sex-hungry vamp men had better not mix with. In her next film, directed by her husband Aldo Vergano, "Il sole sorge ancora" (1946), an important work about Italian Resistance, she was once again on the wrong side of morality as the provocatively beautiful noblewoman who tries to seduce her lover out of right-minded Lea Padovani's arms. However this ability to embody the ruthless seductress proved a mixed blessing. Indeed, as she grew older, Elli Parvo had the same problem as her French look alike Ginette Leclerc: either she was reduced to parody herself, like the comical vamp she played in "Toto terzo uomo" (1951), or she got more and more insignificant supporting parts in the films of the nineteen fifties. As no director or producer gave her a real opportunity to express all her talent, she finally called it quits after a last foray into an Italian comedy. She can nevertheless be seen in Antonioni's heart-rending "Il grido" (1957).
- Nixon's Chief of Staff, 1973-74. Finally urged Nixon to resign. NATO Commander from 1975 to 1979. Secretary of State for Ronald Reagan. Got himself in hot water after the assassination attempt against the President in March 1981 when he appeared in the Press Room in the White House and announced "As of now, I'm in charge here." Vice-President George Bush was on an airplane en-route from Texas at this time. Constitutionally, the next in line in the order of succession is the Vice-President, then the Speaker of the House, then the Senate Pro Tempore, THEN the Secretary of State. His tenure as Secretary of State ended in June 1982, after his unsuccessful attempts to broker a peace settlement between Britain and Argentina in the Falklands War.