Dean Smith, who won a gold medal as a sprinter at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics before becoming a top-notch Hollywood stunt performer who worked on a dozen films starring John Wayne, has died. He was 91.
Smith died Saturday at his home in Breckenridge, Texas, after a battle with cancer, his friend Rob Word told The Hollywood Reporter.
Smith, who got into the business with help from James Garner, appeared in seven Paul Newman films, including Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972), The Sting (1973) and The Towering Inferno (1974).
The tough Texan, who loved to say he could “ride, run and jump,” doubled for good friend Dale Robertson on the 1957-62 NBC series Tales of Wells Fargo, the 1964 film Blood on the Arrow and the 1966-68 ABC series Iron Horse.
He also did the dirty work for Ben Johnson...
Smith died Saturday at his home in Breckenridge, Texas, after a battle with cancer, his friend Rob Word told The Hollywood Reporter.
Smith, who got into the business with help from James Garner, appeared in seven Paul Newman films, including Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972), The Sting (1973) and The Towering Inferno (1974).
The tough Texan, who loved to say he could “ride, run and jump,” doubled for good friend Dale Robertson on the 1957-62 NBC series Tales of Wells Fargo, the 1964 film Blood on the Arrow and the 1966-68 ABC series Iron Horse.
He also did the dirty work for Ben Johnson...
- 6/25/2023
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
For the first time in more than 30 years, the Olympics has a repeat decathlon champion: Ashton EatonThe 28-year-old athlete on Thursday won the gold medal and the title of "World's Greatest Athlete" - for a second time - with a total score of 8,893, tying the Olympic record set by Roman Sebrle. It's the first back-to-back decathlon win since 1984. Only fellow American Bob Mathias (1958/1952) and Great Britain's Daley Thompson (1980/1984) have taken gold in consecutive Olympics. In the final of the competition's 10 events, the 1,500-meter, Eaton held off France's Kévin Mayer to clinch the gold medal. Mayer took silver in the decathlon...
- 8/19/2016
- by Karen Mizoguchi
- PEOPLE.com
For the first time in more than 30 years, the Olympics has a repeat decathlon champion: Ashton EatonThe 28-year-old athlete on Thursday won the gold medal and the title of "World's Greatest Athlete" - for a second time - with a total score of 8,893, tying the Olympic record set by Roman Sebrle. It's the first back-to-back decathlon win since 1984. Only fellow American Bob Mathias (1958/1952) and Great Britain's Daley Thompson (1980/1984) have taken gold in consecutive Olympics. In the final of the competition's 10 events, the 1,500-meter, Eaton held off France's Kévin Mayer to clinch the gold medal. Mayer took silver in the decathlon...
- 8/19/2016
- by Karen Mizoguchi
- PEOPLE.com
"Special From Next Avenue"
By Leah Rozen
Hollywood has long carried an Olympic torch for the Games and their charismatic champions
Before he wore a loincloth as Tarzan and yodeled while swinging across movie screens on a vine, Johnny Weissmuller was an Olympic swimming champ.
The strapping Weissmuller -- 6-foot-5, 190 pounds -- power-splashed his way to five gold medals in the 1924 and ‘28 Olympic Games. Recognizing a marketable hunk when it saw one, Hollywood snapped him up.
"It was like stealing," Weissmuller (1904-1984) once said of his Tarzan career, which included a dozen films between 1932 and ‘48. "There was swimming in it, and I didn't have much to say. How can a guy climb trees, say ‘Me Tarzan, you Jane,’ and make a million?"
I was a sucker for Weismuller’s Tarzan films -- as a kid, I used to watch the scratchy prints that repeatedly aired on Saturday afternoon TV.
In fact,...
By Leah Rozen
Hollywood has long carried an Olympic torch for the Games and their charismatic champions
Before he wore a loincloth as Tarzan and yodeled while swinging across movie screens on a vine, Johnny Weissmuller was an Olympic swimming champ.
The strapping Weissmuller -- 6-foot-5, 190 pounds -- power-splashed his way to five gold medals in the 1924 and ‘28 Olympic Games. Recognizing a marketable hunk when it saw one, Hollywood snapped him up.
"It was like stealing," Weissmuller (1904-1984) once said of his Tarzan career, which included a dozen films between 1932 and ‘48. "There was swimming in it, and I didn't have much to say. How can a guy climb trees, say ‘Me Tarzan, you Jane,’ and make a million?"
I was a sucker for Weismuller’s Tarzan films -- as a kid, I used to watch the scratchy prints that repeatedly aired on Saturday afternoon TV.
In fact,...
- 7/29/2012
- by Kristen Stenerson
- Huffington Post
Rosanna Schiaffino was the lovely Italian actress who starred opposite American Olympic athlete (and future Congressman) Bob Mathias in 1960’s The Minotaur, the Wild Beast of Crete. Schiaffino played the dual role of the evil Princess Fedra and her good twin, Arianna, in this filmic version of the legendary man-bull who roamed the Cretan maze searching from human sacrifices.
Schiaffino was born in Genoa, Liguria, Italy, on November 25, 1938. She won a local beauty contest in 1952, and soon embarked on a career in films. Her many film credits include Roland the Mighty (1956), the sword and sandal adventure Romulus and the Sabines (1961) starring Roger Moore, a segment of the episodic fantasy film RoGoPaG (1963), the adventure saga The Long Ships (1964) with Richard Widmark and Sidney Poitier, the sensual horror film The Witch in Love (1966) as the supernatural Aura, the bio-film of the mysterious 18th Century count Cagliostr” (1974), and the giallo horror film The Killer Reserved Nine Seats...
Schiaffino was born in Genoa, Liguria, Italy, on November 25, 1938. She won a local beauty contest in 1952, and soon embarked on a career in films. Her many film credits include Roland the Mighty (1956), the sword and sandal adventure Romulus and the Sabines (1961) starring Roger Moore, a segment of the episodic fantasy film RoGoPaG (1963), the adventure saga The Long Ships (1964) with Richard Widmark and Sidney Poitier, the sensual horror film The Witch in Love (1966) as the supernatural Aura, the bio-film of the mysterious 18th Century count Cagliostr” (1974), and the giallo horror film The Killer Reserved Nine Seats...
- 11/7/2009
- by Harris Lentz
- FamousMonsters of Filmland
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