Literotica Cemetary

[JennyOmanHill]

Eric Blau, Creator of Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well, Dies at 87

24 Feb 2009

Eric Blau, an industrious jack-of-all-trades who help introduce Belgian songwriter Jacques Brel to American audiences through the long-lived musical revue with the endlessly parodied name of Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, died Feb. 17 in Manhattan. He was 87.

With composer Mort Shuman, Mr. Blau helped shape a couple dozen of Brel's melancholy, sarcastic, sentimental and bitingly comic songs into a theatrical evening which opened at the Village Gate in Manhattan in 1968 and ran for four-and-a-half years. It then played on Broadway for two months. The title has never quite disappeared from the theatrical landscape since then, forever revived by regional and community theatres, as well as Off-Broadway. It most recently played a year-long run at the Zipper Theatre, ending in February 2007. The title, meanwhile, has become part of the common language, adapted for the headlines of countless personality profiles.

Eric Blau, who was born on June 1, 1921, in Bridgeport, CT, to Hungarian-immigrant parents, first heard Jacques Brel when his friend Nat Shapiro, who worked at Columbia Records, played some songs for him. Mr. Blau was impressed by the composer's work. He and Shuman began translating some of the songs. Some of the resultant translations were used in a revue called O, Oysters! starring Mr. Blau's wife Elly Stone. Stone and Shuman also starred in Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well….

The revue was Mr. Blau's greatest achievement in the arts — not that he ever stopped trying. In his time, he wrote novels ("The Beggar's Cup," "The Hero of the Slocum Disaster"), books, created other Off-Broadway musicals, was a children's television producer, a ghost writer and was a founder of the Communist-leaning journals Masses and Mainstream.

Mr. Blau's tribute to Brel came just in time; by 1978, the title of the revue was no longer accurate — Brel died that year at the age of 49. The Belgian, incidentally, was not able to attend the opening of the show that made him a worldwide household name. Opposed to American involvement in Vietnam, he stayed home. He finally attended a performance in 1970.

Mr. Blau's first marriage ended in divorce. He is survived by his wife and his son Matthew, who lives in Brattleboro, VT, he is survived by two other sons, John, of Forest Hills, NY, and Peter, of Brooklyn; four grandchildren; and a great-granddaughter.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Brad Van Pelt, 57, Longtime Giants Lb

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February 19, 2009

The NY Giants lost a member of their family when former linebacker Brad Van Pelt died of an apparent heart attack at age 57 in his home state of Michigan.

Van Pelt was a five-time Pro Bowler and a member of the Giants' famed "Crunch Bunch" group of linebackers that also included Hall of Famers Lawrence Taylor and Harry Carson along with Brian Kelley.

Van Pelt played 11 of his 14 NFL seasons with the Giants and remained very close to his former teammates, with whom he used to travel and play in golf outings.

Kelley spoke of the bond the four linebackers shared, saying, "The four of us have been very, very close for a long time. We vacation together and do everything together. It is sort of like missing one of your limbs when he is not there now. I don't think it has really set in with us yet, and once it does I think it is going to be tough."

Taylor called Van Pelt "one of the greatest players I ever played with."

"I not only liked him as a player but he was one of my true friends, one of the original members of the 'Big Blue Wrecking Crew' and the 'Crunch Bunch'ñ" Taylor said. "We've done a lot together over the years and he will be sorely missed. If you knew Brad, you loved Brad. He was a very unique individual. He always put a smile on my face."

Giants president and CEO John Mara called yesterday "a very sad day for our organization and my family."

"Brad was one of the best players in our history and was a good person with a huge heart," Mara said.

After his 11 seasons with the Giants, Van Pelt played with the Los Angeles Raiders from 1984 to 1985 and the Browns in 1986. He played in 184 regular-season games and had 20 interceptions and (unofficially) 24.5 sacks.

He originally joined the Giants in 1973 as a second-round draft choice out of Michigan State.

Van Pelt, who was born on April 5, 1951, is the father of former Broncos and Texans quarterback Bradlee Van Pelt

 

[packersfan]

CHICAGO – Paul Harvey, the news commentator and talk-radio pioneer whose staccato style made him one of the nation's most familiar voices, died Saturday in Arizona, according to ABC Radio Networks. He was 90.

Harvey died surrounded by family at a hospital in Phoenix, where he had a winter home, said Louis Adams, a spokesman for ABC Radio Networks, where Harvey worked for more than 50 years. No cause of death was immediately available.

Harvey had been forced off the air for several months in 2001 because of a virus that weakened a vocal cord. But he returned to work in Chicago and was still active as he passed his 90th birthday. His death comes less than a year after that of his wife and longtime producer, Lynne.

"My father and mother created from thin air what one day became radio and television news," Paul Harvey Jr. said in a statement. "So in the past year, an industry has lost its godparents and today millions have lost a friend."

Known for his resonant voice and trademark delivery of "The Rest of the Story," Harvey had been heard nationally since 1951, when he began his "News and Comment" for ABC Radio Networks.

He became a heartland icon, delivering news and commentary with a distinctive Midwestern flavor. "Stand by for news!" he told his listeners. He was credited with inventing or popularizing terms such as "skyjacker," "Reaganomics" and "guesstimate."

"Paul Harvey was one of the most gifted and beloved broadcasters in our nation's history," ABC Radio Networks President Jim Robinson said in a statement. "We will miss our dear friend tremendously and are grateful for the many years we were so fortunate to have known him."

In 2005, Harvey was one of 14 notables chosen as recipients of the presidential Medal of Freedom. He also was an inductee in the Radio Hall of Fame, as was Lynne.

Former President George W. Bush remembered Harvey as a "friendly and familiar voice in the lives of millions of Americans."

"His commentary entertained, enlightened, and informed," Bush said in a statement. "Laura and I are pleased to have known this fine man, and our thoughts and prayers are with his family."

Harvey composed his twice-daily news commentaries from a downtown Chicago office near Lake Michigan.

Rising at 3:30 each morning, he ate a bowl of oatmeal, then combed the news wires and spoke with editors across the country in search of succinct tales of American life for his program.

At the peak of his career, Harvey reached more than 24 million listeners on more than 1,200 radio stations and charged $30,000 to give a speech. His syndicated column was carried by 300 newspapers.

His fans identified with his plainspoken political commentary, but critics called him an out-of-touch conservative. He was an early supporter of the late Sen. Joseph McCarthy and a longtime backer of the Vietnam War.

Perhaps Harvey's most famous broadcast came in 1970, when he abandoned that stance, announcing his opposition to President Nixon's expansion of the war and urging him to get out completely.

"Mr. President, I love you ... but you're wrong," Harvey said, shocking his faithful listeners and drawing a barrage of letters and phone calls, including one from the White House.

In 1976, Harvey began broadcasting his anecdotal descriptions of the lives of famous people. "The Rest of the Story" started chronologically, with the person's identity revealed at the end. The stories were an attempt to capture "the heartbeats behind the headlines." Much of the research and writing was done by his son, Paul Jr.

Harvey also blended news with advertising, a line he said he crossed only for products he trusted.

In 2000, at age 82, he signed a new 10-year contract with ABC Radio Networks.

Harvey was born Paul Harvey Aurandt in Tulsa, Okla. His father, a police officer, was killed when he was a toddler. A high school teacher took note of his distinctive voice and launched him on a broadcast career.

While working at St. Louis radio station KXOK, he met Washington University graduate student Lynne Cooper. He proposed on their first date (she said "no") and always called her "Angel." They were married in 1940 and had a son, Paul Jr.

They worked closely together on his shows, and he often credited his success to her influence. She was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1997, seven years after her husband was. She died in May 2008.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

'Oz' Munchkin Clarence Swensen Dies

(March 2) - Clarence Swensen, one of the marching Munchkin soldiers in 'The Wizard of Oz' and among the last surviving members of that beloved fraternity of actors, died Feb. 25 in Texas following years of poor health, the Austin American-Statesman reported. He was 91.

The Munchkin scenes lasted 14 and a half minutes in the classic 1939 film, but Swensen enjoyed decades of fame for his brief role as one of the uniformed soldiers.

It took eight weeks of production to shoot the scene and 124 little people as the Munchkins. "It was huge," Swensen told the Statesman, his hometown paper. "And we worked hard -- 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. -- but it was fun."
"You can point me out. The lead soldier was followed by six rows of four soldiers each," he said. "When we march from left to right across your screen, I’m the one at the end of the fourth row."

Along with eight of his costars, the 4 foot, 6 inch actor was honored in 2007 with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Swensen's health has been poor since he suffered a stroke in 2005, but before that the actor was a frequent face at 'Oz'-related festivals and reunions. "I just love it when people talk to me about the picture," Swensen said in 2007. "That movie will never die. It will go on long after the Munchkins have all passed away."

After his role in 'Oz,' Swensen left the entertainment industry and moved back to Austin where he worked as an electronics technician. He is survived by his wife Myrna and three daughters.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

EastEnder star Wendy Richard dies

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LONDON, Feb. 28 (UPI) -- Wendy Richard, a British TV star who spent more than 20 years in the soap opera, "EastEnders," has died of breast cancer at age 65.

Richard, who revealed in October she was terminally ill, died with her husband of four months at her side, The Telegraph reported.

In a career that began in 1960 and included movies as well as television, Richard was best known for her work in two long-running shows that were broadcast around the world. From 1972 to 1985, she played the sexy department store clerk Miss Shirley Brahms on the sitcom "Are You Being Served?" and from 1985 to 1986 she was Pauline Fowler, one of the matriarchs of Albert Square, on "EastEnders."

James Alexandrou, who played her young son Martin starting in 1996 when he was 11, told "What's On TV" that he collapsed when he heard of Richard's death. He said he called her "his second Mum."

Richard, an original cast member, left the show in 2006 because the screenwriters wanted her character to remarry after several years of widowhood.

She received an M.B.E. in 2000 for her services to drama.

A political conservative, Richard once refused to allow her character to criticize Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher during a scene on "EastEnders."

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Former Bulls Player, Commentator Van Lier Dies

CHICAGO (AP) -Former Chicago Bulls guard and broadcaster Norm Van Lier was found dead Thursday afternoon in his home, authorities said.
He was 61.

Firefighters went to his home, just blocks from the United Center, to respond to a request for a well-being check. They found Van Lier unresponsive shortly before 1 p.m. and he was pronounced dead at the scene, said Chicago Fire Department spokesman Quention Curtis.

The Cook County medical examiner's office confirmed his death.

Van Lier began his NBA career with Cincinnati in 1969. He later spent more than six seasons with the Chicago Bulls before finishing his career with Milwaukee in 1979.

The three-time All-Star played on five playoff teams.

Van Lier, from East Liverpool, Ohio, was drafted by Chicago in 1969, but debuted in the league with Cincinnati that year. He later spent more than six seasons with the Bulls before finishing his career with Milwaukee in 1979.

Van Lier was a defensive standout and a fan favorite who was given the nickname "Stormin' Norman" because of his fiery play. Picked to the NBA All-Defensive first team or second team eight times, he retired after the 1979 season with 8,770 points and 5,217 assists.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Howard Zieff, ‘a-Spicy’ Adman Who Became Director, Dies at 81

Howard Zieff, the commercial director and ad photographer who stuffed an actor with spicy meatballs in a memorable Alka-Seltzer spot and used an American Indian in print ads to convince people “You don’t have to be Jewish to love Levy’s real Jewish Rye,” then went on to direct movie comedies, died Sunday in Los Angeles. He was 81 and lived in Los Angeles.

The cause was complications of Parkinson’s disease, his wife, Ronda Gomez-Quinones, said.

“Mama mia, that’s a spicy meatball,” the middle-aged actor intones in Mr. Zieff’s 1970 Alka-Seltzer commercial. But because the actor repeatedly flubs the line, not quite getting the accent right, he has to chomp down on meatball after meatball. Finally, after many takes, the voice-over announcer declares: “Sometimes you eat more than you should. And when it’s spicy besides — mama mia, do you need Alka-Seltzer!”

That was, perhaps, Mr. Zieff’s best-known commercial, one of many in which he chose to cast common folk, not the stereotypically attractive. Throughout the 1960s and ’70s, Mr. Zieff (pronounced zeef) brought his comedic twist to concepts provided by prominent advertising agencies like Doyle Dane Bernbach and Wells Rich Greene.

To promote Braniff Airway’s freight division, he crammed a man into a shipping crate; upon arrival, the man emerged with not a hair out of place. A television spot for The Daily News shows a gas station attendant so absorbed while reading the front page that he inserts the gasoline hose into the customer’s pocket instead of the car.

As one of the most sought-after print-advertising photographers in the 1960s, Mr. Zieff composed shots with a chubby kid sitting on his back porch eating Kellogg’s Corn Flakes and a tattooed cowboy puffing on a Marlboro. He roamed in search of ordinary faces for his famous Levy’s Jewish Rye shoots: the American Indian, a Chinese man and a black child.

“I saw the Indian on the street; he was an engineer for the New York Central,” Mr. Zieff told The New York Times in 2002. “The Chinese guy worked in a restaurant near my Midtown Manhattan office, and the kid we found in Harlem. They all had great faces, interesting faces, expressive faces.”

A Time magazine article about Mr. Zieff in 1967 said he had “a zany sense of humor and an apparently limitless imagination” and called him “the leading practitioner of what the trade calls the indirect sell.”

In the early 1970s, at the behest of his friend Dan Melnick, who had just become head of MGM, Mr. Zieff took his comedic touch to Hollywood. He started with “Slither,” a 1973 comedy starring James Caan and Peter Boyle, and directed eight other comedies.

Among them were “The Dream Team” (1989), in which Mr. Boyle, Michael Keaton and Christopher Lloyd played mental patients; and “My Girl” (1991), with Dan Aykroyd.

Mr. Zieff’s best-received movie was “Private Benjamin” (1980), with Goldie Hawn as a suburban princess who forsakes a mansion with a live-in maid to find life’s meaning in the Army.

Howard B. Zieff was born in Chicago on Oct. 21, 1927, the son of Ted and Shirley Shudnow Zieff. His parents divorced when he was a child, and his mother married William Sass. Young Howard grew up in the Boyle Heights section of East Los Angeles, where his stepfather ran a club where neighborhood men played cards.

Mr. Zieff studied art for a year at Los Angeles City College, but dropped out in 1946 to join the Navy, eventually going to the naval photography school in Pensacola, Fla. After his discharge, he attended the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif.

By the 1950s he had moved to New York, hoping to find work as a television director. Running out of money, he got a job as a photographer’s assistant and soon began taking pictures for advertising agencies. By the time he was 25, he had his own studio, with 15 employees.

In 1997, Mr. Zieff married Ms. Gomez-Quinones, his companion of nearly 30 years. Besides his wife, he is survived by his sister, Margie Finn

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Playwright, screenwriter Horton Foote dies at 92

Horton Foote, the Oscar- and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and screenwriter revered for his tender evocations of small-town life, died Wednesday at 92.

Renowned for his subtle, wise and compassionate studies of ordinary lives — often set in a fictionalized version of his hometown of Wharton — Foote won a Pulitzer for The Young Man From Atlanta and Oscars for his screenplays for To Kill a Mockingbird and Tender Mercies.

His most widely produced play, The Trip to Bountiful, depicts an elderly woman’s quest to visit her fondly remembered hometown once more before her death, only to find that almost nothing of it remains.

Foote was in the midst of one of the most acclaimed and busiest times of his long career when he died in his sleep at his temporary home in Hartford, Conn.

Dividing the Estate, a much-revised version of a family saga first seen in the 1980s, played to raves on Broadway this season and is expected to be a contender for this year’s Tony Award for best play. Should he win posthumously, it will be Foote’s first Tony.

The Hartford Stage and off-Broadway’s Signature Theatre Company plan to premiere Foote’s nine-play epic The Orphans’ Home Cycle next season. Written in the 1970s and ’80s, it is based on the lives of Foote’s parents in the years 1902-28. The undertaking will mark the first time the cycle has been produced in its entirety.

In the past decade, Hartford Stage artistic director Michael Wilson, former associate director of Houston’s Alley Theatre, has emerged as the pre-eminent director of Foote’s work.

As a Texas playwright, Foote had long ties with the Alley Theatre.
“Horton Foote was an American artist like none other,” Alley artistic director Gregory Boyd said Wednesday. “He was a playwright of great subtlety and spirituality. This everyone knows. He was, alongside that great gift, practiced at such a high level for so many years, also a superb man of the theater in so many other ways, and a collaborator of such insight and imagination that those of us lucky enough to know him and share a stage or a rehearsal room with him could not fail to be enlivened by his insight and his grace.”

Foote left for Los Angeles at age 17, with dreams of becoming an actor. After two years of apprenticeship at the Pasadena Playhouse, he moved to New York.

Working on a dance-theater project with famed choreographer Agnes de Mille, Foote shared some of his tales about Texas. She suggested he write down those stories, which led to his first play in 1940, a one-act called Wharton Dance. The next year, he produced his first full-length play, Texas Town, in New York, launching a 70-year career.

The tales from his youth remained the bedrock of his writing. Even when most playwrights were dealing with trendy fare, Foote wrote with simple eloquence about the timeless concerns of ordinary people — the pull and pain of family connections, the search for home and roots.

Foote maintained homes in New York, New Hampshire and Wharton.

His wife, Lillian, sometimes a producer of his works, died in 1992.

Of their four children, three followed Foote into stage and film work. Actress Hallie Foote emerged as a premier interpreter of his works. Horton Foote Jr. became an actor, Daisy Foote is a playwright and screenwriter, and Walter Foote is a lawyer.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Country music star Hank Locklin dies at 91

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Reuters) - Country music star Hank Locklin, who helped pioneer the idea of the concept album and whose songs were popular from Ireland to Japan, has died at age 91, Grand Ole Opry officials said on Monday.

The singer, songwriter and guitarist died on Sunday at his home in Brewton, Alabama, of undisclosed causes.

Born Lawrence Hankins Locklin in 1918 in Florida's timber-rich Panhandle, he played guitar and sang on radio stations across the South as a teenager.

He scored his first top 10 country hit with "The Same Sweet Girls" in 1949 and scored another chart-topper with "Let Me Be the One" in 1953.

His 1957 recording of "Send Me the Pillow You Dream On" crossed over from the country to the U.S. and British pop charts and became a standard for many performers, including Dwight Yoakam and Dolly Parton.

His recording of "Please Help Me, I'm Falling" spent 14 weeks at the top of the country music charts in 1960, the same year Locklin joined the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville.

That song's "slip-note" piano style became Locklin's signature and his version was featured on the soundtrack of the 1993 movie, "A Perfect World," directed by Clint Eastwood.

Locklin was widely credited as one of the pioneers of the themed concept album with such recordings as "A Tribute to Roy Acuff, King of Country Music," "Foreign Love" and "Irish Songs Country Style," which led to tours in England and Ireland.

In 2001, he recorded "Generations in Song," which featured Parton and Vince Gill. His 65th album, "By the Grace of God," was a collection of gospel songs and released in 2006.

 

[KindaKinky]

Magoo creator Kaufman dies at 92

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The creator of the bumbling cartoon character Mr Magoo, Millard Kaufman, has died at the age of 92.

Kaufman wrote for television and film earning Oscar nominations for Bad Day at Black Rock and Take the High Ground.

He created weak-eyed elderly Magoo for the 1949 animated short Ragtime Bear, which was voiced by actor Jim Backus.

The screenwriter published his first novel aged 90. Bowl of Cherries was a surprise cult hit and his second novel is due out in late 2009.

Kaufman described his change of career to the Los Angeles Times in 2007: "I decided, knowing that nobody my age gets work in movies, and that I had to do something, otherwise I'd get into terrible trouble, that I would try writing a novel."

Comic romp

The nonagenarian was an unusual signing for McSweeney's publishers, which specialises in cutting edge young writers.

Bowl of Cherries was a comic coming-of-age romp where the 14-year-old hero moves between Yale university, a horse ranch, a porn studio and the war in Iraq.

Millard Kaufman worked as a merchant seaman and a newspaper journalist before serving with the Marine Corps during World War II.

He later worked on the 1955 film Bad Day at Black Rock, one of the first films to look at white racism toward Japanese Americans during WWII.

Respected as a writer and script doctor in Hollywood he also worked on Raintree County, Never So Few, Living Free and The Klansman.

But it was with Mr Magoo, created in conjunction with John Hubley, that he made an impact on popular culture. He claimed the character was based on a relative

"My uncle had no problem with his eyes," Kaufman told National Public Radio in 2007.

"He simply interpreted everything that came across his way in his own particular manner, and he could at times be a little bit difficult, but he would only see things the way they existed highly subjectively to him."

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Actor Ron Silver dies at 62

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Actor and University at Buffalo alumnus Ron Silver died Sunday at the age of 62 after enduring a two-year battle with esophageal cancer.

In 1988, Silver received a Tony Award for his performance as lead actor in the David Mamet Broadway play "Speed-the-Plow," portraying film producer Charlie Fox.

Silver was nominated for two Emmys, in 1999 for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for his role as Bruno Gianelli on The West Wing and in 1987 for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Special for Billionaire Boys Club.

Silver also received a nomination for a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Performer in a Children/Youth/Family special in the television show Jack in 2004.

Other notable small screen roles Silver made included roles on Veronica's Closet from 1998 to 1999 and Chicago Hope from 1996 to 1997.

Silver also appeared in several feature films, including Kathryn Bigelow's Blue Steel and Sidney Lumet's Find Me Guilty.

Born in New York City, Silver graduated from UB in 1967 with a bachelor's degree in modern language and literature. He went on to receive his master's degree in Chinese history from St. John's University before studying drama.

Away from the camera, Silver was well known for his strong political stances. After being a long-time advocate of liberal social and political causes, Silver became a vocal supporter of George W. Bush's military policies after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Silver went on to speak at the 2004 Republican National Convention and began referring to himself as a "9/11 Republican." Silver ultimately changed his political party affiliation from Democrat to Independent.

He also served as president of Actor's Equity (1991-2000).

Silver is survived by his son, Adam, and his daughter, Alexandra.

 

[Johnny_Ray_Wilson]

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Actor and University at Buffalo alumnus Ron Silver died Sunday at the age of 62 after enduring a two-year battle with esophageal cancer.

In 1988, Silver received a Tony Award for his performance as lead actor in the David Mamet Broadway play "Speed-the-Plow," portraying film producer Charlie Fox.

Silver was nominated for two Emmys, in 1999 for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series for his role as Bruno Gianelli on The West Wing and in 1987 for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Special for Billionaire Boys Club.

Silver also received a nomination for a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Performer in a Children/Youth/Family special in the television show Jack in 2004.

Other notable small screen roles Silver made included roles on Veronica's Closet from 1998 to 1999 and Chicago Hope from 1996 to 1997.

Silver also appeared in several feature films, including Kathryn Bigelow's Blue Steel and Sidney Lumet's Find Me Guilty.

Born in New York City, Silver graduated from UB in 1967 with a bachelor's degree in modern language and literature. He went on to receive his master's degree in Chinese history from St. John's University before studying drama.

Away from the camera, Silver was well known for his strong political stances. After being a long-time advocate of liberal social and political causes, Silver became a vocal supporter of George W. Bush's military policies after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Silver went on to speak at the 2004 Republican National Convention and began referring to himself as a "9/11 Republican." Silver ultimately changed his political party affiliation from Democrat to Independent.

He also served as president of Actor's Equity (1991-2000).

Silver is survived by his son, Adam, and his daughter, Alexandra.

Fuck. I was starting to like him.

 

[Denae]

Natasha Richardson

Thurs., March. 19, 2009
NEW YORK - Actress Natasha Richardson died from bleeding in her skull caused by the fall she took on a ski slope, an autopsy found Thursday. The medical examiner ruled her death an accident, and doctors said she might have survived had she received immediate treatment. However, nearly four hours elapsed between her lethal fall and her admission to a hospital.

Richardson suffered from an epidural hematoma, which causes bleeding between the skull and the brain’s covering, said Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the New York City medical examiner’s office.

Richardson, 45, died Wednesday at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan after falling at the Mont Tremblant resort in Quebec on Monday.

Details of her treatment have not been disclosed.

It remained unclear Thursday exactly how she was injured. Resort officials have said only that she fell on a beginner’s trail and later reported not feeling well.

Broadway dims lights in her honor
Richardson's husband Liam Neeson and mother Vanessa Redgrave were among family members who went to Broadway as theaters dimmed their lights in tribute to the Tony-winning actress Thursday night.

The theaters dimmed their lights for one minute at about 8 p.m., the traditional starting time for Broadway evening performances. Also present were Richardson’s sister, Joely, and actors Matthew Broderick, Sarah Jessica Parker and Ron Rifkin.

“The Broadway community is shocked and deeply saddened by the tragic loss of one of our finest young actresses, Natasha Richardson. Her theatrical lineage is legendary, but her own singular talent shined memorably on any stage she appeared,” said Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of The Broadway League, the trade organization for Broadway theaters and producers.

Sam Mendes, who directed the Broadway musical “Cabaret” for which Richardson won a Tony, said: “It defies belief that this gifted, brave, tenacious, wonderful woman is gone.”

Actress Judi Dench told the BBC that Richardson was “a really great actress” who had “an incredibly luminous quality, that you seldom see, and a great sense of humor.”

“She was a wonderful woman and actress and treated me like I was her own,” said Lindsay Lohan, who as a preteen starred with Richardson in a remake of “The Parent Trap” in 1998. “My heart goes out to her family. This is a tragic loss.”

Yves Coderre, director of operations at the emergency services company that sent paramedics to the Mont Tremblant resort, told The Globe and Mail newspaper that he reviewed the dispatch records and the first 911 call came at 12:43 p.m. Monday.

Coderre said medics arrived at the hill 17 minutes later. But the actress refused medical attention, he said, so ambulance staffers turned and left after spotting a sled taking the still-conscious actress away to the resort’s on-site clinic.

At 3 p.m., a second 911 call was made — this time from Richardson’s luxury hotel room — as her condition deteriorated. An ambulance arrived nine minutes later.

“She was conscious and they could talk to her,” Coderre said. “But she showed instability.”

The medics tended to her for a half-hour before transporting her to a hospital a 40-minute drive away.

On Thursday, the ski resort where Richardson had her fatal fall was subdued, as employees refused to speak about the accident. Still, the sunny slopes were crowded — and the gentle hill Richardson fell on was teeming with beginners, many of them children.

Like other family members, Richardson divided her time between stage and screen. On Broadway, she portrayed Sally Bowles in the 1998 revival of “Cabaret.” She also appeared in New York in a production of Patrick Marber’s “Closer” (1999) as well as the 2005 revival of Tennessee Williams’ “A Streetcar Named Desire,” in which she played Blanche DuBois opposite John C. Reilly’s Stanley Kowalski.

She met Neeson when they made their Broadway debuts in 1993, co-starring in “Anna Christie,” Eugene O’Neill’s drama about a former prostitute and the sailor who falls in love with her.

Her most notable film roles came earlier in her career. Richardson played the title character in Paul Schrader’s “Patty Hearst,” a 1988 biopic about the kidnapped heiress for which the actress became so immersed that even between scenes she wore a blindfold, the better to identify with her real-life counterpart.

Richardson was directed again by Schrader in a 1990 adaptation of Ian McEwan’s “The Comfort of Strangers” and, also in 1990, starred in the screen version of Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

She later co-starred with Neeson in “Nell” and with Mia Farrow in “Widows’ Peak.”

Her final feature film, “Wild Child,” has been released internationally but has not been released in the U.S., and Universal Pictures said one had not been scheduled.

Richardson was born in London in 1963, the performing gene inherited not just from her parents (Redgrave and director Tony Richardson), but from her maternal grandparents (Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson), an aunt (Lynn Redgrave) and an uncle (Corin Redgrave). Her younger sister, Joely Richardson, also joined the family business.

She also is survived by two sons, Micheal, 13, and Daniel, 12.

Friends and family members remembered Natasha as an unusually poised child, perhaps forced to grow up early when her father left her mother in the late ’60s for Jeanne Moreau. (Tony Richardson died in 1991).

Interviewed by The Associated Press in 2001, Natasha Richardson said she related well to her family if only because, “We’ve all been through it in one way or another and so we’ve had to be strong. Also we embrace life. We are not cynical about life.”

Her screen debut came at 4, when she appeared as a flower girl in “The Charge of the Light Brigade,” directed by her father, whose movies included “Tom Jones” and “The Entertainer.” The show business wand had already tapped her the year before, when she saw her mother in the 1967 film version of the Broadway show “Camelot.”

“She was so beautiful. I still look at that movie and I can’t believe it. It still makes me cry, the beauty of it,” Richardson said.

She studied at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama and was an experienced stage actress by her early 20s, appearing in “On the Razzle,” “Charley’s Aunt” and “The Seagull,” for which the London Drama Critics awarded her most promising newcomer.

She and her mother acted together, most recently on Broadway to play the roles of mother and daughter in a one-night benefit concert version of “A Little Night Music,” the Stephen Sondheim-Hugh Wheeler musical.

Before meeting up with Neeson, Richardson was married to producer Robert Fox, whose credits include the 1985 staging of “The Seagull” in which his future wife appeared.

She sometimes remarked on the differences between her and her second husband — she from a theatrical dynasty and he from a working-class background in Northern Ireland.

“He’s more laid back, happy to see what happens, whereas I’m a doer and I plan ahead,” Richardson told The Independent on Sunday newspaper in 2003. “The differences sometimes get in the way but they can be the very things that feed a marriage, too.”

She once said that Neeson’s serious injury in a 2000 motorcycle accident — he suffered a crushed pelvis after colliding with a deer in upstate New York — had made her really appreciate life.

“I wake up every morning feeling lucky — which is driven by fear, no doubt, since I know it could all go away,” she told The Daily Telegraph newspaper in 2003.

Funeral arrangements will be handled by the Greenwich Village Funeral Home, Borakove said. In lieu of flowers, the family asked that donations be made to the amfAR foundation for AIDS research, Nierob said. Richardson, whose father died of complications from the disease in 1991, was a longtime supporter of the charity and served on its board of trustees since 2006.


Still in shock

 

[Johnny_Ray_Wilson]

Thank you Denae. That was my next post.

 

[KindaKinky]

I remember her performance in Cabaret. "Start by admitting from cradle to tomb isn't that long a stay…"

Indeed.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Fuck. I was starting to like him.

He certainly was intense! I saw him in several Broadway plays, and I especially enjoy watching his performance in "Reversal of Fortune".

 

[JennyOmanHill]

...
Still in shock

Me too.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Reality TV Star Jade Goody Dies After Her Public Battle With Cancer

(March 22) - Jade Goody, a dental assistant turned reality-TV star whose whirlwind journey from poverty to celebrity to tragedy became a national soap opera and morality tale in Britain, has died. The 27-year-old, stricken with cervical cancer, died in her sleep early Sunday at her home in Essex, southeast England. The sad news was confirmed by her publicist Max Clifford.
Mocked as a slob, then celebrated as an everywoman, Goody lived one of the world's most public lives, with cameras capturing everything from her racial slurs to her cancer diagnosis and chemotherapy.

Goody gained fame in 2002 at age 21 when she joined the British version of the reality television show "Big Brother," in which contestants live together for weeks and are constantly filmed. She became a highly divisive star and something of a national touchstone who sparked debate about race, class and celebrity.

During filming of an Indian version of "Celebrity Big Brother" in the summer of 2008, Goody received a diagnosis of cervical cancer by telephone from a doctor in Britain. The camera captured the deeply personal moment, which was shown repeatedly on TV.

Bald and frail, Goody married fiancee Jack Tweed last month in an elaborate event staged at an elegant countryside hotel outside London. The wedding was shown on television and the photos were sold, prompting criticism.

Goody is survived by Tweed and her two sons, Bobby and Freddie, with an ex-boyfriend, television presenter Jeff Brazier. She also is survived by her mother, Jackiey Budden.

Budden told reporters Sunday: "Family and friends would like privacy at last."

 

[sutherngent985]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Dan Seals, who was England Dan in the pop duo England Dan and John Ford Coley and later had a successful country career, has died of complications from cancer. He was 61.

Longtime manager Tony Gottlieb said Seals, diagnosed with lymphoma two years ago, died Wednesday night at his daughter's home in Nashville.

With England Dan and John Ford Coley, Seals had hits including "I'd Really Like to See You Tonight" and "Nights Are Forever," both in 1976. His country hits in the '80s and '90s included "Bop," "You Still Move Me," "Love on Arrival," and a duet with Marie Osmond, "Meet Me in Montana."

"I've loved to play and sing from the moment I knew what it was," he told The Associated Press in 1992.

Seals, who is survived by his wife and four children, was in hospice care when he died.

"He was very positive," said Gottlieb, Seals' manager for about 30 years. "He participated in several clinical trials to assist with research on this type of lymphoma."

Gottlieb said a major misconception about Seals is that he was a pop singer who came to country music. In reality, he said, Seals grew up singing country music and crossed into pop.

"He was raised in a very rural part of West Texas. His father was an amateur country singer, and he used to play with his dad. They were Hank Williams, Grand Ole Opry people. He was much more of a country singer than a pop singer."

Seals' older brother, Jimmy, was the Seals in Seals & Crofts, who recorded the hits "Summer Breeze" and "Diamond Girl" in the 1970s.

Until Dan Seals got sick, the brothers were working as a duo, Seals & Seals. They performed some shows and were recording an album but never finished it. The songs they did complete, about eight in all, will be released.

"In the last two years he only did like three shows," Gottlieb said. "He just didn't have the energy."

Seals, whose father was a pipefitter, was born in McCamey, Texas, and grew up in Iraan, Texas, and Dallas.

His well-crafted songs tended to be insightful and graphic with lofty themes. In 1989, his music video for the song "Rage On" addressed a topic rare in country music: an interracial relationship. It showed angry youths smashing the windows of the car of a young man dating a girl of a different race. One boy hurled a beer bottle at the girl's father. The song itself was about small town values.

"When we record songs, we take chances," Seals said at the time. "We feel we are on the cutting edge of what we can do."

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Shane McConkey, Legendary Skier, Killed During Jump in Italian Dolomites

Shane McConkey, a decorated big mountain skier and BASE jumper, was killed Thursday in a ski-BASE accident in the Italian Dolomites. According to the ESPN Action Sports report, McConkey launched off a cliff with the expectation of deploying his parachute canopy and gliding to the ground. But he had problems in the air and died on impact when he hit the ground below the cliff.

Filmmaker Scott Gaffney told ESPN that McConkey was filming with Matchstick Productions and Red Bull at the time of the accident. "It had to be a sizable cliff, at least 400 feet, for him to be planning on flying his wing suit away from it," Gaffney said.

McConkey, 39, had racked up numberous accolades throughout his career and served as an inspiration for the entire freeskiing community. "With what Shane does," said Gaffney, "it's a call you always picture getting at some point, but you realistically don't ever expect it to happen."

He is survived by his wife, Sherry, and their 3 1/2-year-old daughter,

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Lou Saban dies at 87

March 30, 2009
If Lou Saban had crammed his résumé onto a single page, it would have been single-spaced. And in 8-point type.

Saban's football coaching career knew no bounds—high school, the Big Ten, lower college divisions, the NFL, the AFL, arena ball—nearly 30 jobs in all. He even worked under George Steinbrenner from 1981-82 as president of the New York Yankees.

Saban died early Sunday at 87 in North Myrtle Beach, S.C., apparently of congestive heart failure. He had suffered a few falls in recent years after having had both knees replaced.

"He had a lot of old football injuries," said his wife, Joyce. "He lived his whole life as if he were on the field: 'If you're going someplace, walk in a straight line. There's always a doctor on the sideline.' "

Saban grew up near La Grange and graduated from Lyons Township High School, then starred at Indiana. He helped the 1942 Hoosiers go 7-3 and was inducted into the IU Athletics Hall of Fame.

Saban played for the Cleveland Browns from 1946-49, then began his coaching career at Case Institute, now Case Western Reserve, in Ohio.

He landed at Northwestern in 1955 but went 0-8-1 and coached just one season, preceding Ara Parseghian. He coached at Western Illinois from 1957-59 before leaving Macomb, Ill., for the Boston Patriots of the American Football League.

"He felt the closest to Western Illinois—that was the job he enjoyed the most," his wife said. "They had three undefeated seasons, and he identified with the community. He always said he should have stayed there. But he wanted the challenge of the pros."

Saban later coached the Buffalo Bills and O.J. Simpson.

Joyce said: "His players adored him. We're getting phone calls like you can't believe."

It has been reported that Saban is a cousin of Alabama coach Nick Saban, but Joyce said that has never been confirmed.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

'Dr. Zhivago' Composer Maurice Jarre Dies

PARIS (March 30) - Oscar-winning composer Maurice Jarre, who captured the majesty of the desert in his music for "Lawrence of Arabia" and wrote the haunting "Lara's Theme" in his score for "Doctor Zhivago," has died. He was 84.
Jarre died in his villa in California, where he had lived for decades, Bernard Miyet, a friend of the composer and leader of the French musicians' guild SACEM, said Monday. No cause of death was given.
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Born in 1924 in Lyon, France, Jarre studied music at the Conservatoire de Paris, training initially as a kettledrum player. He started his career composing scores for theatrical productions and worked 12 years as permanent composer at the Theatre National Populaire.

He soon branched into composing soundtracks for movies, and in 1961 worked on director David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia," for which he won his first Oscar.

He won a second for his work on another Lean film "Doctor Zhivago," based on the novel by Boris Pasternak. The movie's song "Lara's Theme" became a hit single and earned him worldwide recognition.

Jarre collaborated with Lean again in 1984 on "A Passage to India," winning his third Academy Award.

Jarre's musical style was noted for his use of ethnic instruments, and later synthetic sounds.

He mixed traditional Indonesian instruments with electronic music in the score for Australian Peter Weir's 1982 film "The Year of Living Dangerously" — the story of an Australian journalist covering a military coup in Indonesia.
In 1989, he layered Celtic harp and flute over synthesizers in the soundtrack for "Dead Poet's Society."

After moving to California in the early 1960s, Jarre returned to Europe regularly, working in France with Rene Clement on the score for "Is Paris Burning?" in 1966 and with Franco Zefirelli on "Jesus of Nazareth" in 1977.
He received a lifetime achievement award at the Berlin Film Festival in February, after a career including more than 150 soundtracks. He worked with some of Hollywood's most well-known directors including William Wyler, John Huston, Michael Apted, Alfred Hitchcock and Alfonso Arau.

Jarre was made an officer in the French Legion of Honor for his contribution to culture. French President Nicolas Sarkozy hailed Jarre as "a great composer who bequeaths us a generous and majestic body of work."
"In choosing to work above all for the cinema ... Maurice Jarre broadened the public for symphonic music," Sarkozy said in a statement. "He showed everyone that music is just as important as images for the beauty and success of a film."

Jarre was married four times. He is survived by two sons, screenwriter Kevin and electronic musician Jean-Michel, as well as a daughter, Stefanie.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Former NHL player Poddubny dies

http://rangers.nhl.com/photos/AllTimeRoster/headshots/8450483.jpg

Former NHL right wing Walt Poddubny has passed away in his hometown of Thunder Bay. He was 49.

The cause of death is unknown, but - citing a source close to the family - the Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal reported Poddubny collapsed at the home of his sister.

Selected by Edmonton in the fifth round of the 1980 draft, Poddubny appeared in just four games with the Oilers before being traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs in March 1982.

Poddubny recorded 184 goals and 238 assists in 468 career games with the Oilers, Maple Leafs, New York Rangers, Quebec Nordiques and New Jersey Devils. He enjoyed his best seasons with the Rangers, scoring a career-high 40 goals in 1986-87 and notching a personal-best 88 points the following season.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Versatile Motown drummer Uriel Jones dies at 74

DETROIT (AP) - Uriel Jones, a drummer whose versatile style fueled many classic Motown hits, has died. He was 74.

Sister-in-law Leslie Coleman says Jones died at a Detroit-area hospital after complications from a heart attack he suffered last month.

Jones played on tracks by the Temptations, Four Tops, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles and others. He was part of the Funk Brothers, the talented house band on Motown recordings.

Paul Riser, a Motown arranger and musician, says Jones had "a pulse in his playing that nobody else had." But Riser said Jones also could play with finesse and restraint when the song called for it.

He is survived by his wife, June, and three children.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Andy Hallett dies at 33; green demon of TV's 'Angel'

http://tvmegasite.net/images/primetime/angel/hallett.jpg

Andy Hallett, a singer who gained fame portraying a green-skinned demon on the dark vampire series "Angel," died +Sunday night at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County coroner's office said Tuesday. He was 33.

Hallett had called 911 Sunday evening complaining of shortness of breath, said Ed Winter, a coroner's spokesman. The actor was rushed to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 8:35 p.m.

An autopsy is pending. His death was first reported by E!Online.

Hallett was born in 1975 in the village of Osterville, Mass., part of the town of Barnstable, on Cape Cod. He attended Assumption College in Worcester, Mass., and studied business.

Hallett told the Cleveland Plain Dealer in a 2003 interview that he loved singing while growing up on Cape Cod, but his friends discouraged his efforts. Then, Patti LaBelle invited him onstage to sing "Lady Marmalade" with her at a concert. When he received applause and requests for photographs, he realized, "It was really a life-changing experience."

Hallett moved to Los Angeles, where he worked as a runner for an agency, property manager and then personal assistant.

He was singing in a Universal City blues revue when he met and became friends with Joss Whedon, creator of the television shows, including "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and its spinoff, "Angel."

It was Whedon who asked Hallett to audition for the role of Krevlornswath of the Deathwok Clan, known as the Host and Lorne. The character was the consummate greeter at a karaoke bar named Caritas, where Lorne was able to read people by how they sang.

Hallett played Lorne for 76 episodes and sang in six of them. In one episode, he sang "Lady Marmalade."