Literotica Cemetary

[nitengale]

Comic Actor, Director Howard Morris Dies

LOS ANGELES - Howard Morris, the wry-faced comic who costarred with Sid Caesar and Carl Reiner on the TV classic "Your Show of Shows" before going on to success as a film director, and to fame as poetry-spouting Ernest T. Bass on "The Andy Griffith Show," has died. He was 85.
Morris died Saturday, according to his son, David.

He joined the cast of "Your Show of Shows" a year after it debuted in 1950, often playing the ambitious little guy whose grandiose plans go awry.

The 90-minute show, with scripts written by such luminaries as Mel Brooks, Neil Simon and Woody Allen, was one of the most heralded of television's Golden Era. It won Emmys as best variety show in its first two seasons, during which it also placed in the top 10 in audience ratings.

But as television's audience widened, viewers sought less sophisticated entertainment, and the series was canceled in 1954. Morris then joined Caesar and Reiner in another TV classic, "Caesar's Hour."

After that show ended in 1957, Morris moved to Hollywood where he played comedic characters in such films as "Boys' Night Out" and "40 Pounds of Trouble." He appeared with Jerry Lewis in "The Nutty Professor" and "Way... Way Out" and with Brooks in "High Anxiety" and "History of the World, Part I."

He also acted in sitcoms, perhaps most notably as Ernest T. Bass, his recurring role on "The Andy Griffith Show." Although he appeared in only a handful of episodes, his character remains warmly remembered.

He also played nebbish George P. Hanley on one memorable episode of "The Twilight Zone" entitled "I Dream of Genie." Hanley, hopelessly inept in social situations, is given one wish by a genie that appears after he rubs a lamp. After considering and rejecting numerous options, Hanley's wish is granted - he becomes the genie.

Morris eventually moved from acting to directing, and his 1967 feature film debut, "Who's Minding the Mint?" was hailed by Leonard Maltin's Movie and Video Guide as "hilarious fun in the classic comedy tradition."

Some of his other directing credits include the Doris Day-Brian Keith family comedy "With Six You Get Egg Roll," "Don't Drink the Water" with Jackie Gleason, and "Goin' Coconuts" with Donny and Marie Osmond. He also directed the pilot for the classic 1960s TV spy spoof "Get Smart," starring Don Adams and Barbara Feldon.

Also adept at doing wacky voices, Morris was placed under contract by Hanna-Barbara Productions in the 1960s and for decades he created voices for such shows as "The Jetsons," "The Flintstones," "The Archie Show," "My Favorite Martians," "Cow and Chicken" and "DuckTales."

**I loved his Ernest T Bass role!

 

[KindaKinky]

The Voice of Kellogg's Tony the Tiger Dies at 91

Thurl Ravenscroft Made 'They're Grrrrreeeat!' and Frosted Flakes Famous

AP
Ravenscroft's voice appeared in the first Frosted Flakes commercial in 1952.

FULLERTON, Calif. (May 24) - Thurl Ravenscroft, who provided the rumbling "They're Grrrrreeeat!" for Kellogg's Tony the Tiger ads and voiced a host of Disney characters, has died. He was 91.

Ravenscroft died Sunday of prostate cancer, said Diane Challis Davy, director of Laguna Beach's Pageant of the Masters.

For more than 50 years, Ravenscroft was the affable voice behind Tony the Tiger, TV's popular cartoon pitchman for Kellogg's Frosted Flakes.

"I'm the only man in the world that has made a career with one word: Grrrrreeeat!" Ravenscroft told the Orange County Register in 1996. "When Kellogg's brought up the idea of the tiger, they sent me a caricature of Tony to see if I could create something for them. After messing around for some time I came up with the `Grrrrreeeat!' roar, and that's how it's been since then."

He also narrated the summertime Pageant of the Masters at Laguna Beach for 20 years and lent his voice to characters on thrill rides at Disneyland, including the Pirates of the Caribbean, Splash Mountain, the Enchanted Tiki Room and the Haunted Mansion.

"Disneyland wouldn't have been, and wouldn't be, the same without him," the park's former president, Jack Lindquist, told the Register. "His voice was one of the things that made it all come alive."

Ravenscroft also did voices for the animated films "Cinderella," "The Jungle Book," "Mary Poppins," "Alice in Wonderland," "Lady and the Tramp" and many others.

Born in Norfolk, Neb., Ravenscroft moved to California in 1933 to study art. By the mid-1930s he was appearing regularly on radio, and by the late-1930s he was singing backup for Bing Crosby.

After military service during World War II, he returned to Hollywood, where he sang with the Mellomen, a group that performed with Frank Sinatra, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Elvis Presley.

In 1952, Ravenscroft's voice appeared in the first Frosted Flakes commercial.

Ravenscroft is survived by two children and four grandchildren. June, his wife of 53 years, died in 1999 at age 80.


05-24-05 07:09 EDT

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Ismail Merchant buried in hometwon Bombay

28/05/2005 - 16:55:10

Bombay-born Ismail Merchant, one of Hollywood’s top producers who mastered the period-piece genre in a 44-year filmmaking partnership with James Ivory, was buried today in his home town.

“It was ... his wish to be buried in India, and he wanted to be buried near his mum,” said production co-ordinator Jaya Ramachandran, who worked with Merchant for 10 years.

Merchant, 68, died on Wednesday at a London hospital. He had recently undergone surgery for abdominal ulcers, according to Indian television reports. He was unmarried and had no children.

Relatives and friends gathered at his ancestral home in downtown Bombay to pay their last respects. Several actors from the Indian film industry, who had worked with Merchant, also attended the funeral.

The Merchant-Ivory brand of costume drama spans some 40 films from The Householder, a 1963 film set in India, to Le Divorce in 2003, an art house hit. Their films won six Academy Awards, including the best-actress Oscar for Emma Thompson for the 1992 film Howards End.

They usually teamed up with screen writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala for movies filled with lush panoramas of the English and Indian countryside and told riveting stories of class, manners, desire and love.



Films produced by Ismail Merchant include:

The Householder (1963)
Shakespeare Wallah (1965)
Bombay Talkie (1970)
Savages (1972)
Mahatma and the Mad Boy (1974)
The Wild Party (1975)
Autobiography of a Princess (1975)
Sweet Sounds (1976)
Roseland (1977) (LOVED THIS FILM)
The Europeans (1979)
Jane Austen in Manhattan (1980)
Quartet (1981)
Heat and Dust (1983)
The Bostonians (1984) (Another great one.)
A Room with a View (1985) (Oscars for screenplay, art direction and costumes.)
(Loved it!)
My Little Girl (1986)
Sweet Lorraine (1987)
Maurice (1987)
The Perfect Murder (1988)
The Deceivers (1988)
Slaves of New York (1989)
Mr. & Mrs. Bridge (1990) (Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward were amazing in this one!)
The Ballad of the Sad Cafe (1991)
Howards End (1992) (Oscars for best actress, Emma Thompson; screenplay; art direction.)
The Remains of the Day (1993) (FANTASTIC!)
Street Musicians of Bombay (1994)
Feast of July (1995)
Jefferson in Paris (1995)
Surviving Picasso (1996)
Gaach (1998)
Side Streets (1998)
A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (1998)
Cotton Mary (1999)
The Golden Bowl (2000)
Refuge (2002)
Merci Docteur Rey (2002)
Le Divorce (2003)
Heights (2004)

Films directed by Merchant include:

Mahatma and the Mad Boy (1974)
In Custody (1993)
LumiGere et compagnie (1996)
The Proprietor (1996)
Cotton Mary (1999)
The Mystic Masseur (2001)

 

[KindaKinky]

'Green Acres' Star Eddie Albert Dies at 99

By RYAN PEARSON, Associated Press Writer
Sat May 28, 1:24 PM ET

LOS ANGELES - Eddie Albert was a versatile actor who moved smoothly from the Broadway stage to movies, but he found stardom as the constantly befuddled city slicker-turned-farmer in television's "Green Acres." Albert died of pneumonia Thursday at his home in the Pacific Palisades area, in the presence of caregivers including his son Edward, who was holding his hand at the time. "He died so beautifully and so gracefully that literally this morning I don't feel grief, I don't feel loss," Edward Albert told The Associated Press.

On "Green Acres," Albert played Oliver Douglas, a New York lawyer who settles in a rural town with his glamorous wife, played by Eva Gabor, and finds himself perplexed by the antics of a host of eccentrics, including a pig named Arnold Ziffel.
He was nominated for Academy Awards as supporting actor in "Roman Holiday" (1953) and "The Heartbreak Kid" (1972).

Besides the 1965-1971 run in "Green Acres," he costarred on TV with Robert Wagner in "Switch" from 1975 to 1978 and was a semi-regular on "Falcon Crest" in 1988. He was a tireless conservationist, crusading for endangered species, healthful food, cleanup of Santa Monica Bay pollution and other causes.

Albert's mother was not married when he was born, in 1906. After marrying, she changed his birth certificate to read 1908, the younger Albert said. Rarely the star of films, Albert often portrayed the wisecracking sidekick, fast-talking salesman or sympathetic father. His stardom came in television, especially with "Green Acres," in which, ironically, he played straight man. The show joined "The Beverly Hillbillies," "Petticoat Junction" and other high-rated CBS comedies of the 1960s and '70s.

"Some people think that because of the bucolic background `Green Acres' is corny," Albert told an interviewer in 1970. "But we get away with some of the most incredible lines on television." His break in show business came during the '30s in the Broadway hit "Brother Rat," a comedy about life at Virginia Military Institute. Warner Bros. signed him to a contract and cast him in the 1938 film.
According to Hollywood gossip, he was caught in a dalliance with the wife of Jack L. Warner and the studio boss removed him from a film and allowed him to languish under contract. The actor left Hollywood and appeared as a clown and trapeze artist in a one-ring Mexican circus. He escaped his studio contract by joining the Navy in World War II and served in combat in the South Pacific. He received a Bronze Star for his heroic rescue of wounded Marines at Tarawa, his son said. Albert managed to rehabilitate his film career after the war, beginning with "Smash-up" with Susan Hayward in 1947. Among his other films: "Carrie," "Oklahoma!" "The Teahouse of the August Moon," "The Sun Also Rises," "The Roots of Heaven," "The Longest Day," "Miracle of the White Stallions," "The Longest Yard" and "Escape to Witch Mountain."

Edward Albert Heimberger was born in Rock Island, Ill., grew up in Minneapolis and worked his way through two years at the University of Minnesota. Amateur theater led to singing engagements in nightclubs and on radio. During that time he dropped his last name "because most people mispronounced it as 'Hamburger.'" Moving to New York, Albert acted on radio and appeared in summer stock before he broke into Broadway and the movies.

"Green Acres" made Albert a rich man and allowed him to pursue his causes. He established Plaza de la Raza, a foundation in East Los Angeles that teaches arts to poor Hispanics. He helped Dr. Albert Schweitzer combat famine in Africa. He traveled the world for UNICEF. Concerned about seeing fewer pelicans on beaches where he was jogging, he went with ecologists and his son on a trip to Anacapa Island. "We discovered that in every nest all the eggs were crushed, and nobody knew why," the younger Albert said. "They took samples and tested them, and found DDT in all the eggs. ... An entire generation of species was being wiped out." Albert began speaking about the harmful effects of the pesticide at universities around the country, and in 1972 the federal government banned DDT.
He continued acting into his 80s, often appearing in television movies.

"Acting was a tenth of his life. The majority of his life was committed to helping other people," said his son, also an actor. "This guy was, from the absolute depth of his soul, one of the true heroes of our world."

Edward Albert, 54, who became a prominent actor in "Butterflies Are Free," "40 Carats" and other films, said he put his career on hold for the past eight years to aid his father, who suffered from Alzheimer's disease. On Friday, he remembered a moment several years ago in which the two sat in a garden together. "I said to him 'You're my hero.' I saw him struggling to put together the words, and he looked at me and said: 'You're your hero's hero.' I'll take that to my ... grave."

Albert was married to the dancer-actress Margo for 40 years until her death in 1985. In addition to his son, Albert is survived by a daughter, Maria Albert Zucht, and two granddaughters.

A private funeral was planned.

Associated Press Writer Bob Thomas contributed to this report.

Onto greener acres…

 

[JennyOmanHill]

- Eddie Albert

Onto greener acres…

http://www.maggiore.net/greenacres/images/anim_douglas_small.gif



Oman and I related to this fictional couple. I moved from the BIG apple to be with him in Omaha, but thankfully we're NOT on a farm!

Rest in peace; you were a gentle and kind man.

 

[happyparadox]

Green Acres we are there!

http://www.maggiore.net/greenacres/gatheme.asp

 

[JennyOmanHill]

NBA great George Mikan dies

ESPN.com news services
June 2 PHOENIX – George Mikan, the "gentle giant" who a half-century ago brought fame and stability to the fledgling world of professional basketball and literally transformed the game, has died 18 days shy of his 81st birthday.

Mikan died at a Scottsdale rehabilitation center following a long fight with diabetes and kidney ailments. His right leg was amputated below the knee in 2000, and he had undergone kidney dialysis treatment three times a week for five years, his son Terry said.

"George Mikan was the model for all big men that followed him. He won five championships and would have won six consecutive championships had he not gotten hurt one year," Heat president Pat Riley said in a statement. "He was truly a significant player from the standpoint that he was light years ahead of others from a size and fundamentals standpoint. A truly genuine human being as well as a great player. He made the game what it is today," Riley said.

A superstar decades before the term existed, Mikan was the first big man to dominate the sport. No one before had seen a 6-foot-10 player with his agility, competitiveness and skill.

When the Minneapolis Lakers came to New York in December, 1949, the marquee at Madison Square Garden read "Geo. Mikan vs. the Knicks."

"He literally carried the league," Boston Celtics great Bob Cousy said. "He gave us recognition and acceptance when we were at the bottom of the totem pole in professional sports. He transcended the game. People came to see him as much as they came to see the game."

College basketball instituted the goaltending rule because of him, and the NBA doubled the width of the free throw lane. Slowdown tactics used against him — his 1950 Lakers lost 19-18 to the Fort Wayne Pistons in the lowest-scoring game in NBA history — eventually led to the 24-second shot clock.

"George Mikan truly revolutionized the game and was the NBA's first true superstar," NBA commissioner David Stern said. "He had the ability to be a fierce competitor on the court and a gentle giant off the court. We may never see one man impact the game of basketball as he did, and represent it with such warmth and grace."

Shaquille O'Neal said on TNT that he wanted the Mikan family to contact the Heat so he could pay for the funeral.

"Without No. 99, there is no me," O'Neal said.

A private memorial service is planned in Scottsdale on Monday night. At some unspecified date, a public ceremony will be held in Minneapolis, where Mikan's ashes will be interred, Terry Mikan said.

Mikan led the Minneapolis Lakers to five league titles in the first six years of the franchise's history. Nearsighted with thick glasses, he was as rough on the court as he was mild-mannered off it. Mikan led the league in personal fouls three times and had 10 broken bones during his playing career. He averaged 23.1 points in seven seasons with Minneapolis before retiring because of injuries in 1956. Mikan was the league's MVP in the 1948-49 season, when he averaged 28.3 points in leading the Lakers to the title.

Born June 18, 1924, in Joliet, Ill., Mikan didn't play high school basketball, but when he entered DePaul, Meyer, the young new coach, recognized the potential.

Meyer said he worked with Mikan for six weeks alone, making him shoot left-handed and right-handed, a procedure still known as the "George Mikan drill."

He had him punch a speed bag, take some dancing lessons to improve his grace and also jump rope.

Mikan was two-time college player of the year and led DePaul to the 1945 National Invitation Tournament title. He scored 53 points in the semifinals against Rhode Island, a phenomenal number in that era, and was named the tourney's MVP.

Mikan played one season with the Chicago Gears before moving to the new Lakers franchise.

"George was a giant among men in the early days of the NBA," said Celtics president Arnold "Red" Auerbach, who coached against him. "He was one of the greatest players of all time. He was the first player to really be an imposing and intimidating figure on the court."

Mikan coached the Lakers for part of the 1957-58 season, and was commissioner of the American Basketball Association in 1967, introducing the 3-point line and the distinctive red, white and blue ball.

He practiced law and, in his later years, began pressing the NBA and the players' union to boost the tiny pensions given to those who played in the league before 1965. Terry Mikan said most of his father's awards and memorabilia has been sold. Mikan received a monthly pension check of $1,700, his son said. Under current rules, his widow will get half that much.

Mikan is survived by his wife of 58 years, Patricia; sons Larry, Terry, Patrick and Michael; daughters Trisha and Maureen, and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Leon Askin, 97; Actor in 'Hogan's Heroes,' Dozens of Movies

From Associated Press

VIENNA — Leon Askin, the actor who played Gen. Albert Burkhalter in the 1960s television comedy "Hogan's Heroes," has died, Austrian officials said Friday.

The actor was 97. Neither city officials nor the Vienna hospital where he died disclosed the cause or date of his death.

Askin was best known for his role as the Nazi general who constantly threatened to send the prisoner of war camp's inept commander, Col. Wilhelm Klink, to the Russian front because of his stupidity.

Born Leo Aschkenasy in Vienna on Sept. 18, 1907, Askin worked as a cabaret artist in the 1930s before fleeing to France and then to the United States to escape persecution by the Nazis.

He had roles in dozens of films, including director Billy Wilder's "One, Two, Three" and Henry Koster's "The Robe" starring Richard Burton.

In the course of his career, he also appeared with Elizabeth Taylor and Peter Ustinov.

Askin took up residence in Vienna again in 1994, returning to his roots in cabaret. He also took roles in Vienna's Festwochen and with the Volksoper, one of the city's opera companies. He received Vienna's Gold Medal of Honor, one of the city's most distinguished prizes.

"We have lost a huge actor and artist and a wonderful man," Vienna Mayor Michael Haeupl said in a statement.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Actress Anne Bancroft Dead at 73

Tony Award-winning actress Anne Bancroft, who played tough, warm and funny roles throughout a respected stage and screen career, died June 6 of uterine cancer at New York's Mt. Sinai Hospital, a spokesman for her husband, Mel Brooks, announced.

She was 73. Ms. Bancroft played Annie Sullivan in the Broadway and Hollywood takes on Helen Keller's story, The Miracle Worker, by William Gibson. She won a Best Actress Tony Award for the role in 1960. She won the Academy Award for the role on screen (as did stage and screen co-star Patty Duke, as Helen).

By the time of her Best Actress wins in New York and Hollywood, she already had a Tony on her shelf for her work in Two for the Seesaw. She would later be Tony nominated for the playing Israeli prime minister Golda Meir in Gibson's Golda in 1978.

One of her famous Hollywood roles was playing wealthy middle-aged seductress "Mrs. Robinson" in Mike Nichols' "The Graduate." She was Oscar nominated for the turn.

Broadway's marquees will be dimmed at 8 PM June 8 in tribute to Ms. Bancroft,

Ms. Bancroft was born Anna Maria Luisa Italiano in the Bronx in 1931. Her father was a dress-pattern maker, her mother a telephone operator.

She studied acting in the late 1940s and '50s and appeared in TV starting in 1950 (with "The Torrents of Spring"). She made her film debut (with a name change suggested by the Hollywood machine) in 1952's "Don't Bother to Knock," for Fox, followed by a number of pictures that didn't establish her as a household name. She reportedly chose the name "Bancroft" because it sounded "dignified."

The New York theatre, however, is where she seemed to earn legitimacy that would launch her into the wider world. For her 1958 Broadway debut, she won a Best Featured Actress Tony playing quirky Gittel Mosca in William Gibson's Two for the Seesaw.

After her work as sight-impaired teacher Annie Sullivan, who wrestled with, taught and tamed the more seriously sensory-impaired Helen Keller, in The Miracle Worker (directed by Arthur Penn on stage and screen), Ms. Bancroft returned to Broadway as Mother Courage in Jerome Robbins' staging of the Brecht play in 1963. A Hollywood career loomed — and would give her international fame and respect for decades.

She married filmmaker Mel Brooks in 1964 following an earlier marriage to building contractor Martin A. May.

One of her memorable turns in a Brooks film was playing his actress wife in the remake of Ernst Lubitsch's "To Be or Not to Be." In the picture, Brooks and Ms. Bancroft were the 1930s-era Polish acting couple The Bronskis, who were "world famous in Poland." For producer Brooks, she also appeared as Mrs. Kendal in the more serious David Lynch-directed film, "The Elephant Man."

Ms. Bancroft was Academy Award nominated for "The Pumpkin Eater" (for which she won the British Academy Award), "The Graduate" (in which she seduced young grad Dustin Hoffman even though she was the middle-aged mother of his girlfriend), "The Turning Point" (a ballet-world picture that also starred Shirley MacLaine) and "Agnes of God."

Her film credits also include "'night, Mother," "Torch Song Trilogy," "Garbo Talks," "Home for the Holidays," "GI Jane," "The Prisoner of Second Avenue," "Great Expectations," "Up at the Villa," "Keeping the Faith," "84 Charing Cross Road" and Mel Brooks' "Blazing Saddles" and "Dracula: Dead and Loving It," among many others.

For her TV work, Ms. Bancroft won Emmy Awards for 1970's "Annie: The Woman in the Life of a Man" and 1999's "Deep in My Heart." She was Emmy nominated for the TV film of Neil Simon's "Broadway Bound," as well as for "Haven" and "Mrs. Cage."

Ms. Bancroft's additional Broadway credits include The Devils in 1965, The Little Foxes in 1967, A Cry of Players in 1968, Golda in 1977 and Duet for One in 1981.) In 2002, she briefly appeared in the world premiere of Edward Albee's Occupant, for Off-Broadway's Signature Theatre. In it, she played artist Louise Nevelson. As a producer, she helmed Off-Broadway's Squeeze Box.

She appeared as herself in a 2004 episode of Larry David's HBO comedy series "Curb Your Enthusiasm," opposite Brooks. The show was an inside joke referencing the success of Brooks' film and stage musical, The Producers.

Ms. Bancroft is survived by writer-director-producer Mel Brooks, son Max Brooks, grandson Henry Michael and daughter Michelle. The funeral will be private.

The family requests donations to the American Cancer Society.



Such a gifted and multi-talented lady!

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Dana Elcar, 77, 'MacGyver' Co-Star, Is Dead

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: June 11, 2005

http://www.collinwood.net/cast/elcar.gif

VENTURA, Calif., June 10 (AP) - Dana Elcar, whose real-life struggle with blindness was written into his role on the television adventure series "MacGyver," died here on Monday. He was 77.

The cause was complications from pneumonia, his family said.

"MacGyver" ran on ABC from 1985 to 1992. Mr. Elcar played the best friend and boss of the crime-fighting title character, played by Richard Dean Anderson.

Mr. Elcar, who had glaucoma, told producers he was going blind after four seasons with "MacGyver," so they adapted his character to match his medical condition. By the end of the show's run, he had become almost completely blind.

"The fact that you are losing your eyesight does not mean you have forgotten how to act," Mr. Elcar, in a speech to the National Federation of the Blind in 1991, recalled producers telling him.

He acted in other series, including "Baretta," opposite Robert Blake, and the Robert Conrad show "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep."

Mr. Elcar also appeared in films, including "The Sting," "2010," "All of Me" and "The Learning Tree."

He starred in Off Broadway plays, including the first American productions of Harold Pinter's "The Dumb Waiter" and "The Caretaker," Dylan Thomas's "Under Milk Wood" and Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot."

Mr. Elcar is survived by his companion, Thelma M. Garcia; a son, Dane; three daughters, Nora Elcar Verdon, Chandra Elcar and Marin Elcar; a stepdaughter, Emily Prager; a sister, Marie E. Hewitt; and a half-sister, Janet K. Melville.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Lane Smith, longtime character actor, dies at 69

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/cinephemeride/images/IDENTITE/LANE%20SMITH.jpg

LOS ANGELES - Lane Smith, a longtime character who played a small-town district attorney who crossed words with Joe Pesci in "My Cousin Vinny," has died. He was 69.

Smith, who also played Richard Nixon in the TV movie "The Final Days" and Daily Planet editor Perry White in "Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman," died Monday at his home in Los Angeles, according to his wife, Debbie Benedict Smith.

Born in Memphis, Smith appeared in numerous films and television shows. Most recently, he appeared in the 2000 movie "The Legend of Bagger Vance," starring Will Smith and Matt Damon.

Lane Smith also appeared in the original stage production of "Glengarry Glen Ross" and the revival of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."

Film credits include "The Distinguished Gentleman," "Son in Law," "The Mighty Ducks" and "The Hi-Lo Country."

Besides his wife, Smith is survived by his son Robbie, 18, and a brother and sister. He also has a 19-year-old stepson.

 

[KindaKinky]

Soul Asylum Bassist Dies

By Charlie Amter
1 hour, 19 minutes ago

Soul Asylum cofounder Karl Mueller is, in the words of one of his songs, "Closer to the Stars."

The bassist for the hit-making alt-rock band died Friday in Minneapolis after a long battle with throat cancer. He was 41.

According to Mueller's longtime friend (and former Jayhawks manager) Maggie Macpherson, Mueller was due to have surgery Monday. Mueller had been fighting the cancer since the spring of 2004, prompting Soul Asylum, with Mueller, and fellow Minneapolis rock legend Hsker D to regropu for a special October benefit concert.

Mueller, along with frontman Dave Pirner, founded Soul Asylum in 1984. The band was a critically respected staple of college radio throughout the 1980s, and went on to platinum-selling success after the songs "Runaway Train" and "Somebody to Shove" off Grave Dancers Union went into heavy rotation on MTV during the grunge era.

Per the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Soul Asylum guitarist Dan Murphy, as well as members of the Jayhawks and Babes in Toyland joined Mueller at his home Friday for a bedside vigil.

Soul Asylum finished a number of new songs recently, which, the Tribune says, are currently being shopped to major labels for an early 2006 release. It will be the band's first new offering since 1998's Candy from a Stranger.

Funeral arrangements are set for Wednesday in Minneapolis. Mueller is survived by his wife, Mary Beth, and his mother, Mary.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Waitress From 'Five Easy Pieces' Dies

POSTED: 8:35 am CDT June 20, 2005

LOS ANGELES -- The actress Jack Nicholson drove crazy in the famous chicken salad scene in "Five Easy Pieces" has died.

Lorna Thayer was 85.

She died June 4 at the Motion Picture and Television Fund retirement home in Woodland Hills, Calif., after a long battle with Alzheimer's disease.

Thayer played the waitress at a restaurant where Nicholson was trying make subsitutions to his order.

She pointed to a sign that said "no substitutions." Nicholson then tried several different ways to order a side order of wheat toast.

He ended up ordering a childen salad sandwich on toasted wheat and told the Thayer to hold everything but the toast.

Eventually, she kicked him out.

Thayer appeared in more than 40 movies and had dozens of guest roles on television.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Phil Ford, Actor-Writer, Dead at 85

One of the "oldies" I remember watching on the "Ed Sullivan Show".

Phil Ford, the trouper who appeared on Broadway, in nightclubs and in summer stock for many years, died June 15 at age 85 in Nevada, the Associated Press reported.

Mr. Ford's name was often linked to Mimi Hines, his showbiz partner and former wife, whose appearance on "The Jack Paar Show" in the late 1950s led to a wider career in nightclubs. She took over for Barbra Streisand in Broadway's Funny Girl, and Mr. Ford was Fanny Brice's pal, Eddie Ryan, in the replacement company of the hit.

Ford and Hines were among top acts in Vegas, with Mr. Ford writing the routines. One of his more famous punchlines was "rotsa ruck," in an Asian dialect ("lotsa luck") that might not play as well today in a more enlightened showbiz era.

Mr. Ford died of natural causes, his sisters and daughter reported.

Although Mr. Ford and Hines divorced in 1972, they continued to perform together. Their names were known to new generations as they appeared regionally in musicals such as Hello, Dolly!

Mr. Ford also appeared in a 1981 Broadway musical revue, This Was Burlesque, inspired by the burlesque world inhabited by Ann Corio.

Mr. Ford was born in San Francisco and served in the U.S. Army during World War II. He and Hines (his second wife) reportedly met in 1952 in Alaska and married in 1954.

"We had an awful lot of fun together," Hines, who lives in Las Vegas, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. "Everybody loved Phil. He had a lot of charisma, a lot of sparkle."

He married twice after his split with Hines, who survives him. He is also survived by his sister, Treasure Ford, and daughter, Sally Ford, both of Las Vegas. A son predeceased him.

 

[Violette]

June's been a cruel a month as April; so many favorites have left us this year.
*bowing head in respect*

 

[breakwall]

Paul Winchell, ventriloquist, children's TV show host and long-time voice behind Tigger in animated versions of "Winnie the Pooh," has died.

He was 82.
Winchell died early Friday morning in his sleep at his home in Moorpark, Calif., Burt Du Brow, a television producer and close family friend, told the Los Angeles Times.

Winchell parlayed his talent for creating countless voices over six decades.

But he was perhaps best known for his work as the voice of the lovable animated tiger created by A.A. Milne.

Winchell first voiced Tigger in 1968 for Disney's "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day," which won an Academy Award for best animated short film.

Winchell also voiced memorable characters in many other animated features over the years. He was Gargamel in "The Smurfs" and Boomer in "The Fox and the Hound."

Before he began working on cartoons, Winchell started his career as a ventriloquist.

He eventually brought dummies Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smith to life on television.

Winchell was also an inventor who held 30 patents, including one for an early artificial heart he built in 1963.

He is survived by his wife of 31 years, the former Jean Freeman; five children and three grandchildren.

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Jack Kilby 81, Inventor of the semiconductor chip.

We wouldn't even be on a home computer if not for the "chip"

DALLAS - Nobel laureate Jack St. Clair Kilby, the engineer who set off the high-tech revolution with his invention of the semiconductor chip in 1958, died Monday of cancer at his Dallas home. He was 81.

Kilby's semiconductor put an entire electronic circuit on a single piece of material, an idea that ushered in a second industrial revolution. Although he shunned the thought, many put Kilby in the same league with Thomas Edison and Henry Ford.

During the 20 years after his discovery, products made possible by his semiconductor helped the electronics industry grow 20-fold, jumping to nearly $500 billion a year by 1988. Kilby won the Nobel Prize for physics in 2000.

Kilby's chip made it possible for man to travel to the moon and for personal computers to enter everyday life.

Despite the widespread changes spawned by his invention, the inventor avoided many of the byproducts of his idea. He didn't own a digital watch or a microwave oven. A conventional watch with its sweeping hands better conveyed the passage of time, he reasoned. And although he invented the hand-held calculator in 1965 to demonstrate a practical use for his semiconductor, Kilby continued to use his slide rule.

Desperation was the mother of Kilby's invention, if not the catalyst.

The 34-year-old engineer moved to Dallas from Milwaukee, wanting to work on what engineers referred to as the "tyranny of numbers." A computer made of conventional electronics would require tens of thousands of components with up to hundreds of thousands of interconnections. Such computers were limited by size, weight and cost.

Engineers were working on what they called the monolithic idea - a single block of semiconductor material containing an entire electronic circuit. Kilby's monolithic idea is known to laymen as the semiconductor chip.

In Dallas, Kilby, who already had a dozen patented inventions under his belt, hoped to work on the problem with a larger organization, Texas Instruments Inc.

But the Dallas company was pursuing a fundamentally different tack than he would have chosen to solve the problem.

While most Texas Instruments workers were on a mass summer vacation, Kilby, too new to the company to have a vacation, worked alone in TI's research labs.

"I felt it likely that I would be put to work on a proposal for the Micro-Module program when vacation was over unless I came up with a good idea very quickly," he said in T.R. Reid's book, "The Chip."

An inventor, Kilby said he simply looked for a solution to the industry's problem. Since Texas Instruments was already heavily committed to silicon for production of transistors, he focused on using that material.

Three universities gave Kilby honorary degrees. The University of Texas, with an endowment from TI, named a faculty fellowship in his honor.

Funeral arrangements are pending.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

One of my childhood favorites

Paul Winchell, ventriloquist, children's TV show host and long-time voice behind Tigger in animated versions of "Winnie the Pooh," has died.

He was 82.
Winchell died early Friday morning in his sleep at his home in Moorpark, Calif., Burt Du Brow, a television producer and close family friend, told the Los Angeles Times.

Winchell parlayed his talent for creating countless voices over six decades.

But he was perhaps best known for his work as the voice of the lovable animated tiger created by A.A. Milne.

Winchell first voiced Tigger in 1968 for Disney's "Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day," which won an Academy Award for best animated short film.

Winchell also voiced memorable characters in many other animated features over the years. He was Gargamel in "The Smurfs" and Boomer in "The Fox and the Hound."

Before he began working on cartoons, Winchell started his career as a ventriloquist.

He eventually brought dummies Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smith to life on television.

Winchell was also an inventor who held 30 patents, including one for an early artificial heart he built in 1963.

He is survived by his wife of 31 years, the former Jean Freeman; five children and three grandchildren.

http://www.big13.net/images/winch1.JPG


What a talent!!

http://www.cci3.com/~carromce/tigger.gif

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Music Promoter Who Launched Joplin Dies

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Chet Helms, the revered father of the 1967 Summer of Love and a music promoter who launched the career of singer Janis Joplin, has died of complications from a stroke. He was 62.

Helms, who once stood at the center of the 1960s Bay Area music scene, died Saturday surrounded by friends and family at San Francisco's California Pacific Medical Center.

"It was a beautiful death," said his wife Judy Davis. "It was a goodbye party. We all sang to him and told stories. He died as he lived - surrounded by love."

Helms was the founder and manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company with Joplin as its lead singer. He was a rock-'n'-roll impresario who helped stage free concerts and "Human Be-ins" at Golden Gate Park that became the backdrop for what became known as San Francisco's Summer of Love in 1967 at the height of anti-Vietnam War sentiment.

Helms was instrumental in helping to develop bands that delivered what became known as the San Francisco Sound.

"Without Chet, there would be no Grateful Dead, no Big Brother and the Holding Company, no Jefferson Airplane, no Country Joe & the Fish, no Quicksilver Messenger Service," said Barry Melton, the lead guitarist for Country Joe & the Fish.

Helms hooked Joplin up with Big Brother for jam sessions in a basement in the Haight Ashbury neighborhood. They debuted in June 1966 at the Avalon, officially launching the bluesy rock-'n'-roll diva's short career.

Helms eventually dropped out of the concert business for a time in 1970.

"Chet was a hippie," said Mickey Hart, drummer for the Grateful Dead. "We were all hippies. He hated to charge for the music."

 

[RoryN]

John Fiedler dies ~24 hours after Paul Winchell. Rather uncanny.

He was Piglet for as long as Winchell was Tigger.

Pooh Mourns Tigger, Piglet

by Josh Grossberg
Jun 28, 2005, 11:00 AM PT

'Twas a sad weekend in Hundred Acre Wood.

Paul Winchell, the early TV pioneer best remembered for creating a string of cartoon voices, most famously Winnie the Pooh's pal Tigger, died Friday. A day later, John Fiedler, the veteran stage and screen actor who voiced Piglet, passed away.

Somewhere Eeyore is even more glum than usual.

Winchell and Fiedler gave voice to the beloved characters in several animated Disney shorts and features, beginning with 1968's Oscar-winning, franchise-launching short, Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day, which also featured the vocal work of Sebastian Cabot as the narrator and Sterling Holloway as the honey-obsessed bear. (Cabot died in 1977; Holloway in 1992.)

Winchell provided the pipes for dozens of other 'toons, including Spider-Man in the 1980s TV version, the Hanna-Barbera heavy Dick Dastardly and Smurf nemesis Gargamel. He died in his sleep early Friday at his home in Moorpark, California, according to a Website operated by his daughter, actress April Winchell. He was 82.

Fiedler, meanwhile, died of undisclosed causes on Saturday in New York, per the New York Times. He was 80.

While both men will forever be celebrated as pals of Pooh, they achieved other notable successes in their careers.

Born in New York City on Dec. 21, 1922, Winchell faced adversity early in life, having contracted polio at age six and battling a stutter as a child. He overcame his speech impediment by mimicking his idol, ventriloquist Edgar Bergen, and learning to throw his voice.

After winning radio's Amateur Hour contest with a spot-on impersonation of Bergen and dummy Charlie McCarthy as a teen, Winchell made a joint appearance with Bergen on the game show Masquerade Party.

Following a successful stint on radio, Winchell became an early TV pioneer as one of the first children's show hosts. He appeared with his own dummy sidekicks, Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff, in several shows, including The Paul Winchell-Jerry Mahoney Show and Circus Time. (Both dummies are now on permanent display at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.)

A regular renaissance man, Winchell studied medicine at Columbia University, practiced acupuncture and hypnosis and was a prolific inventor. He held more than 30 patents on a variety of contraptions, including an artificial heart in the 1960s considered to be an early blueprint for the model developed by Robert K. Jarvick, the first to successfully implant one in humans in 1982. He also dreamed up a disposable razor, a flameless cigarette lighter, a fountain pen with a retractable tip and an invisible garter belt.

His channeled his chameleon-like vocal skills into numerous projects, including several voices in The Jetsons, Boomer in Disney's The Fox and the Hound, Marmaduke in the 1980s TV 'toon The Heathcliff and Marmaduke Show and Sam-I-Am in the TV classic Dr. Seuss on the Loose.

In 1974, Winchell shared a Grammy with Holloway and Cabot for Best Children's Recording for "The Most Wonderful Things About Tiggers" from Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too. The tune featured the famous lisping lyric: "The wonderful thing about tiggers, is tiggers are wonderful things! Their tops are made out of rubber, their bottoms are made out of springs!"

He also improvised Tigger's signature line "Ta-Ta for now!" or "TTFN" for short at the behest of his third wife, who was British. Winchell's last big-screen turn as Tigger was 1999's Winnie the Pooh: Seasons of Giving.

Winchell is survived by his wife of 31 years, Jean Freeman, five children and three grandchildren.


His longtime cohort Fiedler was born Feb. 3, 1925 in Platteville, Wisconsin. After serving in the Navy during World War II, he settled in New York. He delved into theater by joining the Neighborhood Playhouse. In 1954, he costarred with Montgomery Clift in an off-Broadway production of The Seagull.

He soon graduated to the Great White Way, playing opposite Sidney Poitier in A Raisin in the Sun and Walter Matthau in The Odd Couple and soon garnered the attention of Hollywood.

He racked up an impressive résumé: 12 Angry Men with Henry Fonda; True Grit opposite John Wayne; A Touch of Mink with Cary Grant; and the film versions of A Raisin in the Sun and The Odd Couple. He was also a go-to guy for quirky TV characters, making dozens of guest appearances on such shows as Star Trek, Get Smart, Bewitched, Cheers, Fantasy Island, Three's Company and L.A. Law, and was a regular on the short-lived sitcom Buffalo Bill. Perhaps his best known, non-Piglet part was as the mild-mannered patient Mr. Peterson on The Bob Newhart Show.

But Piglet proved to be his stock in trade. Fiedler would play the squeaky-voiced porker in dozens of films and TV shows, including Piglet's Big Movie in 2003 and his final turn, in Pooh's Heffalump Movie, which opened in February.

"Walt Disney heard [his voice] on a program and said, 'That's Piglet!' " Fiedler's brother, James, told the New York Times.

Disney was so enamored with Fiedler's pipes that the company also cast the actor in Robin Hood, The Fox and the Hound, The Rescuers and The Emperor's New Groove.

Along with his brother, Fiedler is survived by a sister, Mary Dean, and numerous nieces and nephews.

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Civil War historian, novelist Shelby Foote dies at 88

Civil War historian, novelist Shelby Foote dies at 88

June 28, 2005


BY WOODY BAIRD ASSOCIATED PRESS MEMPHIS, Tenn.-- Shelby Foote spent 20 years working alone on his three-volume, 3,000-page history of the Civil War. Then a 1990 PBS documentary on the war made him an instant celebrity and brought the world to his door. He liked it better alone. The celebrity, he said, was "a terrific disruption." "People keep wanting me to come somewhere and speak," Foote said soon after "The Civil War," an 11-hour series by Ken Burns, first aired. "I've always managed to do very little of that." Foote, who also wrote six novels, died Monday night at 88, said his wife, Gwyn. "He had a gift for presenting vivid portraits of personalities, from privates in the ranks to generals and politicians. And he had a gift for character, for the apt quotation, for the dramatic event, for the story behind the story," said James M. McPherson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Civil War historian. "He could also write a crackling good narrative of a campaign or a battle." On Burns' series, Foote became an immediate hit with his encyclopedic knowledge of the war, soft Southern accent and easy manner. With his pointy gray beard and gentlemanly carriage, he seemed to have stepped straight out of a Mathew Brady photograph. Later he would say that being a celebrity made him uneasy, and he worried it might detract from the seriousness of his work. Foote used his skills as a novelist to write the history of the war in a flowing, narrative style. "I can't conceive of writing it any other way," he once said. "Narrative history is the kind that comes closest to telling the truth. You can never get to the truth, but that's your goal." Burns said Foote gave the documentary a "sense of willing the past to life." "We had planned to film 30 or 40 historians. Shelby Foote was in it 89 times or something like that. The next closest was seven or eight times," Burns said. Though a native Southerner, Foote did not favor the South in his history or novels and was not counted among those Southern historians who regard the Civil War as the great Lost Cause. He publicly criticized segregationist politicians and abruptly abandoned a move to the Alabama coast in the 1960s because of the racist attitudes he found there. "He was a Southerner of great intellect who took up the issue of the Civil War as a writer with huge sanity and sympathy," said Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Richard Ford, a friend and fellow Mississippi native. Foote attended the University of North Carolina for two years and served in World War II, though he never saw combat. His first novel, "Tournament," was started before the war and published in 1949. Then came "Follow Me Down" in 1950, "Love in a Dry Season" in 1951, "Shiloh" in 1952 and "Jordan County" in 1954. That same year, Random House asked him to write a single-volume history of the Civil War. He took the job, but it grew into a three-volume project finally finished in 1974. In 1999, the Modern Library ranked Foote's "The Civil War: A Narrative" as No. 15 on its list of the century's 100 best English-language works of nonfiction. His final novel, "September, September," published in 1978, tells the story of an ignorant white couple who kidnap the son of a rich black businessman in the 1950s. It became the basis for a TV move starring fellow Memphis resident Cybill Shepherd. Foote was born Nov. 7, 1916, in Greenville, Miss., a small Delta town with a literary bent. Walker Percy was a boyhood and lifelong friend, and Foote, as a young man, served as a "jackleg reporter" for the crusading editor Hodding Carter on The Delta Star. As a young man, Foote got to know William Faulkner. During World War II, he was an Army captain of artillery until he lost his commission for using a military vehicle without authorization to visit a female friend and was discharged from the Army. He joined the Marines and was still stateside when the war ended. He tried journalism again after World War II, signing on briefly with The Associated Press in its New York bureau. Early in his career, Foote took up the habit of writing by hand with an old-fashioned dipped pen, and he continued that practice throughout his life. Foote said writing by hand helped him slow down to a manageable pace and was more personal than using a typewriter. In addition to his wife, he is survived by a daughter, Margaret Shelby, and a son, Huger Lee. A graveside service is planned in Memphis on Thursday.

I always meant to read his trilogy of the Civil War... That should be my next book project

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Domino Harvey, model and bounty hunter

The film Domino - scheduled for release this August but now likely to be put back while Tony Scott, its director, adds a new, tragic ending to it - is likely to further confound the world’s understanding of its subject, Domino Harvey.

Before she was found dead in the bath at her West Hollywood home, Harvey had made clear her hatred of the film, starring Keira Knightley. Proudly lesbian, Harvey disliked what she saw as soft-porn titillation in the film and she regretted selling the rights to her life story for just £26,000. The film cost £30 million.

Harvey could have enjoyed a life of idle celebrity. The daughter of the actor Laurence Harvey, star of The Manchurian Candidate and Room at the Top, and of the Vogue model Paulene Stone, Harvey was born into a world of luxury and emotional turmoil.

Her mother had been made pregnant by Harvey, who had bought her a house in Hampstead in London. Her father then divorced his American multi-millionairess wife Joan Cohn and married Stone, but died when Domino was just three. To complicate matters, he was widely believed to be having an affair with one of his male producers during Domino’s infant years.

Domino’s mother later married the Hard Rock Café entrepreneur Peter Morton and went to live with him in the US, leaving her daughter at boarding school in England. Harvey, an aggressive child, was frequently involved in fights with boys and was expelled from four public schools.

"When I was two, Dad bought me dungarees in every size," she recalled. "I was a tomboy who wanted to play only with Action Men. If I was given dolls I cut their hair and pulled their heads off." She settled down a little at the liberal Dartington Hall School in Devon, where she spent her time building canoes and studying martial arts. Upon leaving, though, she had little idea what to do next. Along with her father’s temper, she had inherited her mother’s languorous good looks. She tried modelling, with some success at the Ford model agency, but hated it. "They were trying to manipulate me," she said. "I realised I would never be able to take orders from idiots. I remember thinking one night that my life was meaningless."

She tried running a nightclub, while designing and selling T-shirts at a shop in the now-defunct Kensington Market. In 1989, "looking for the next thrill" she left for America and became a ranch hand in the San Diego mountains. Her companions there schooled her in the use of many kinds of weapons. She grew to love the confidence and sense of self-sufficiency she got from shooting and living in the wild, independent of her mother’s money.

Harvey worked next for the San Diego fire department, where her habit of carrying a 10in knife and her love of cream liqueur earned her the nickname Dagger Baileys. She was most comfortable around "macho" men and loved to be told that she was as tough and as fearless as them.

In 1994 it was revealed that Harvey had taken a job with the Celes King Bail Bond Agency in the district of South Central Los Angeles. Her job was to bring in fugitives facing trial by any means short of murder, in return for which she was paid 10 per cent of their bail bond. Her quarry usually consisted of lowly gang operatives and drug dealers, and her average earnings were just $300 a week. Harvey was, however, good at her job. Her approach was to capitalise on her Englishness, appearing vulnerable and flirtatious - a lost tourist who would inspire a protective instinct. By this means she would lure her prey away from a bar or strip club and push a gun into his ribs only once they were out of public view. Her partner, Ed Martinez, a Vietnam veteran, once said: "There’s no woman I know who’s got more balls. I think of her as a terrorist type. One minute she can be sweet and shy, and the next she’ll put the fear of God into you with one look."

She still enjoyed support, though, and when her mother moved to Hollywood Hills she went to live in an annex to her palatial home. Harvey’s bedroom there, with a leopard-skin carpet and racks of guns, knives, samurai swords and riot-gas cannisters, put her closest to the Lara Croft/Kill Bill fantasy figure that Knightley will portray in Domino. It seems that things became worse for Harvey when Stone returned to England in 1999 with her new husband, Mark Burns.

Harvey claimed to be addicted to her job, but another addiction - to heroin - was robbing her of the strength she needed to do it. When she sold her story to the film-makers she weighed little over seven stone, and in 1997 she disappeared, spending two years and more than £60,000 at the Habilitat centre on Oahu, Hawaii.

Harvey was arrested in Hollywood last month in connection with a drug trafficking sting in Gulfport, Mississippi. Millions of dollars were reportedly involved and she faced life imprisonment if found guilty. An inquest into her death is expected.

Domino Harvey, model and bounty hunter, was born on August 7, 1969. She died on June 27, 2005, aged 35.

 

[Violette]

Soul singer Luther Vandross dead at 54

By Dean Goodman
Sat Jul 2, 9:57 PM ET

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Grammy-winning soul singer and songwriter Luther Vandross, who suffered a serious stroke two years ago as he was about to relaunch his career, died on Friday in a New Jersey hospital, officials said. He was 54.

"Luther Vandross had a peaceful passing under the watchful eye of friends, family and the medical support team," said Rob Cavanaugh, a spokesman at JFK Medical Center in Edison, New Jersey.

Details on the exact cause of death were not immediately available, although Cavanaugh said the singer never fully recovered from his stroke. Vandross also had long battled diabetes and fluctuations in his weight.

Vandross was considered the premier soul balladeer of his generation, with a silky voice that seduced millions of fans and won over collaborators such as David Bowie and Aretha Franklin.

"There are vocalists, and then there's Luther," Motown singer-songwriter Smokey Robinson told Rolling Stone magazine in 1990. "Luther's in a class by himself."

Vandross' final album, "Dance With My Father," released shortly after his April 2003 stroke, debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. pop album charts. It yielded four Grammys, including song of the year for the title track, which Vandross described as "my 'Piano Man,' my signature song." But Vandross' Grammy success was a bittersweet affair because of the stroke.

"It should've been the biggest party ever," "Dance with my Father" co-writer Richard Marx told Newsweek last year. "It was not cause to celebrate."

His larger-than-life persona translated into a hugely successful, multifaceted career. He sold more than 20 million albums worldwide and influenced romantic crooners such as Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds.

Unlike other male singers, Vandross eschewed a macho posture, but did not come across as too wimpish, either. He was unafraid to express his insecurities, and his legions of female fans adored him for his honesty. But he also was sensitive about being perceived as someone who sang only about love.

"I don't want to be this great prophet of love," the lifelong bachelor told Britain's Q magazine in 1991.

BREAKTHROUGH WITH BOWIE

Vandross, born in a housing project in New York City, started out singing jingles and working as a backup singer for Bowie, Bette Midler and Carly Simon.

He was hanging out at the Philadelphia studio where Bowie was recording tracks for what would become his 1975 "Young Americans" album. The British rocker overheard Vandross improvising the line, "I heard the news today, oh boy" in the chorus of the title track, and pulled him into the vocal booth to join the backup singers.

At the urging of Roberta Flack, he took his savings and recorded the demos for what would be his first solo album, 1981's "Never Too Much." He signed with Epic Records -- only after insisting that he produce his material -- and the album became the first of a chain of million-sellers.

With its blend of swing and soul, "Never Too Much" put Vandross at the front of the "retronuevo" movement, deftly weaving modern studio production with classic vocal intimacy.

He became a fixture on the urban music charts, and wrote for artists like Franklin, Diana Ross and Dionne Warwick, but mainstream success eluded him until 1989, when he had his first Top 10 pop hit with "Here and Now," a track tacked onto a compilation album. That song has since become something of a classic wedding ballad.

His own life was less happy. He dealt with his loneliness by eating, and his weight fluctuated between 340 pounds (154 kg) and 190 pounds (86 kg) during his adult life.

"In other areas I'm strong," he told Rolling Stone. "I've never been high in my life -- never tasted wine, never puffed pot. I'm unbrainwashable and don't give in to peer pressure, but food is different."

He went on numerous diets, and even went to a fat farm where he managed to sneak in a pizza. In 1990, he appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" to celebrate the loss of 122 pounds on a liquid diet. But a year later, photographers were banned from shooting him below the chest.

He is survived by his mother, Mary Ida, a licensed nurse and Baptist evangelist, and numerous nieces and nephews.

Reuters/VNU

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Porn star Chloe Jones

Husband: Porn star Chloe Jones was raped
Jun 22, 2005, 4:32 GMT

NEW YORK, NY, United States (UPI) -- The husband of the late porn star Chloe Jones tells "A Current Affair" that she suffered from epileptic seizures caused by a vicious rape in Los Angeles.

In an interview to be aired Wednesday night on Fox, Mike Taylor says that Jones was hit on the head with a baseball bat as she left a photo shoot.

"It was after that blow to the head that she started suffering from epileptic seizures," he said.

Jones died earlier this month, and the cause has not yet been determined.

Jones and Taylor met when she appeared in a strip club he managed. The couple had three children.

Taylor also said that his wife and actor Charlie Sheen became friends after Sheen paid a photographer for her telephone number.

During her career, Jones appeared in hundreds of adult videos and in the pages of Playboy and Penthouse.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

'Obie' Benson, of Four Tops, Dies at 69

Jul 1, 7:41 PM (ET)

DETROIT (AP) - Renaldo "Obie" Benson, a member of the legendary Motown singing group the Four Tops, died Friday. He was 69.

Benson died at a Detroit hospital, said the group's road manager, Fred Bridges. His death also was confirmed by Craig Hankenson, president of Producers Inc., one of the agencies that books dates for the Four Tops.

"It was not unexpected. He has been ill," Hankenson said.

The Four Tops sold more than 50 million records and recorded hit songs such as "Baby I Need Your Loving,""Reach Out (I'll be There),""I Can't Help Myself" and "Standing in the Shadows of Love."

Benson's death leaves two surviving members of the original group: Levi Stubbs and Abdul "Duke" Fakir. The fourth original Top, Lawrence Payton, died of liver cancer in 1997.

They are members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The Four Tops began singing together in the 1950s under the name the Four Aims and signed a deal with Chess Records. They later changed their names to the Four Tops.

The group signed with Motown Records in 1963 and produced a string of hits over the next decade, making music history with the other acts in Berry Gordy's Motown lineup.