Literotica Cemetary

[JennyOHill2]

Gene Kiniski was a mean, nasty, vicious scoundrel

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(From Toronto Globe and Mail

Fans threw shoes and chairs at him. One stabbed him in the back with a shiv.

More than once, a Kiniski match began in the ring only to be settled in the parking lot. He once drove an opponent’s head into a parked car, leaving a large dent and bent chrome featured prominently in a photograph in the next morning’s newspaper.

His favourite move was known as the back-breaker. For nearly four decades, he was hated in three lands as the worst villain in professional wrestling. In 1960, the Toronto Shoe Repairmen named him Heel of the Year. Everyone called him Mean Gene.

Gosh, but he was a swell fellow.

A crew-cut behemoth with a baked-potato nose, cauliflower ears and fingers as thick as kielbasa, Mr. Kiniski brought to his sport a wit as sharp as a hidden razor. He knew how to ballyhoo. He was under no illusions about the wrestling racket.

Mr. Kiniski succumbed to cancer last week, his own body defeating him as no rival ever could.

He was an unforgettable character on television, standing 6 foot 4, weighing 275 pounds, his speaking voice a rasp that sounded like he gargled with crushed glass.

Even his name was tough, those Polish consonants grinding against the vowels.

Mr. Kiniski claimed the championships of the two major pro wrestling circuits, becoming one of the most familiar, if infamous, sporting figures of the 1960s.

Mr. Kiniski was the youngest of six children born to a poor family in hardscrabble rural Alberta. His father worked as a $5-a-week barber, while his Polish-born mother sold cosmetics door to door and managed a cafe. When Gene was 15, she went back to school to complete her education, interrupted in Grade 7. She contested 11 elections before winning a seat on Edmonton City Council, where she proved a formidable advocate for the poor. Every year, on her birthday, Gene made sure she received a bottle of Joy perfume. Long after her death, her son said even the slightest rose-and-jasmine whiff of her favourite perfume reduced him to tears.

He spent three seasons with the Edmonton Eskimos, earning a scholarship with the University of Arizona Wildcats. He learned he could make lots of money in the ring. Incredibly, his first ring nickname was Skinny Gene Kiniski.

Mean Gene settled in Vancouver in the early 1960s, touting the city’s beauty at every opportunity. He was a proud Canadian, even after establishing his residence just across the border. He owned the Reef Tavern in Point Roberts, a popular watering hole for thirsty Canadians, especially on Sunday in the days when British Columbia’s liquor laws were still influenced by Prohibition.

Mr. Kiniski finally retired from the ring at age 64 because he said no one wanted to see an old guy beat the crap out of a young guy.

Wrestling World magazine once featured a full-colour photograph on its cover of Mr. Kiniski using a ring rope to choke into submission some hapless opponent. The headline read, “I’m Not Afraid Of Anything, by Gene Kiniski.”

 

[JennyOHill2]

Peter Steele, Brooklyn-born singer for Type O Negative, is dead at 48

Peter Steele, the frontman for the heavy metal band Type O Negative, has died.

"As of now it appears to have been heart failure," Mike Renault wrote in an email to CBSNews.com. "That's all the details we have right now."

Steele had a history of medical problems since 2004. That year the band announced they were cancelling their U.S. tour so that the singer could be tested for "undisclosed anomalies" found during a medical exam.

A year later, reports circulated that Steele had died. The rumor started after Type O Negative posted an image on its Web site of a tomb stone with Steele's name and the dates "1962-2005" written on it.

The post turned out to be a joke to promote the band signing with SPV Records.

Steele also struggled with psychiatric problems. In an interview on the band's 2006 DVD "Symphony for the Devil," Steele said he spent time at Kings County Hospital for substance abuse.

The singer, whose real name is Petrus T. Ratajczyk, hailed from Brooklyn and was known for his heavy bass-baritone. Prior to joining Type O Negative, Steele was a member of the metal group Fallout and the band Carnivore.

Steele also appeared nude in Playgirl in 2005, which he later told Decibel Magazine was a simple publicity stunt.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Prolific TV Comedy Writer Myles Wilder Dies

Myles Wilder, whose resume includes scores of classic '60s TV comedies and Hanna-Barbera shows in the '70s, died April 20 of complications of diverticulitis in Temecula, Calif., according to Variety. He was 77.

Wilder was the nephew of famed director Billy Wilder and the son of director W. Lee Wilder. He was nominated for an Emmy twice for his work on the Ernest Borgnine comedy 'McHale's Navy' from 1963-66 and also wrote for 'Wagon Train,' 'Bachelor Father,' 'The Lucy Show,' 'The Doris Day Show,' 'Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.,' 'My Three Sons' and 'Get Smart.'

In the '70s and '80s, Wilder wrote and produced 'The Dukes of Hazzard' and also wrote for 'The Brady Bunch,' 'The Tim Conway Comedy Hour,' 'Love Boat' and 'Diff'rent Strokes.'

His Hanna-Barbera work includes writing and producing 'Inch High, Private Eye' and 'Hong Kong Phooey' and he also had a hand in 'Partridge Family 2200 AD,' 'Devlin,' 'These Are the Days,' and 'Valley of the Dinosaurs.'

Wilder got his start by developing, writing and producing the 1956 NBC series 'The Adventures of Marco Polo.' He retired in 1989.

He is survived by his wife of 53 years, Bobbe; daughter Kim Wilder-Lee and two grandchildren.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Hollywood's Barkeeper Shay Duffin Dies at 79

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Character actor Shay Duffin, whose Irish background made him a natural to play bartenders, boxing announcers, cops and priests in hit films like 'Titanic,' 'The Departed' and 'Raging Bull,' died April 22 from complications to heart surgery. He was 79.

The Dublin native played the drink slinger who looked on as Leonardo DiCaprio won two tickets on the doomed Titanic, as well as bartenders in 'The Departed,' also starring DiCaprio, TV's 'Cagney & Lacey' and 'The Still Life.'

In 2003, he played legendary horse trainer Sunny Fitzsimmons in the hit 'Seabiscuit.' Other credits include 'Leprechaun,' 'Newsies' and most recently, the animated film 'Beowulf.'

Aside from film and television, Duffin enjoyed a distinguished stage career, and in 2006 wrote and performed a one-man play about oft-drunk Irish poet Brendan Behan, 'Confessions of an Irish Rebel.'

In that production, Duffin sidled up to a bar on stage, downing Guiness after Guiness. He told the New York Times in 2006 that decades ago, drinking too much was hardly frowned upon in Ireland.

"To get enough to eat was regarded as an achievement," he said. "To get drunk was a victory."

Duffin died at UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles. He is survived by daughters Laura, Linda, Ruth and Susan.

 

[CaptainKirk]

"He should've, hadn't've, oughtin've, swing on me!"

Dorothy Provine, an actress who was equally at home playing a blonde bombshell or the girl next door, died April 25 from emphysema at Hospice of Kitsap County in Bremerton, Wash. She was 75.

Provine was probably best-known for her role as Pinky Pinkham in "The Roaring '20s," a Chicago-set period crime drama that ran on ABC from 1960-62, in which she played a leggy flapper in the fictitious Charleston Club in New York City, and for starring roles in 'The Bonnie Parker Story' (1958) and Stanley Kramer's 'It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World' (1963).

Provine was born in Deadwood, S.D., on January 30, 1935, and attended the University of Washington. After moving to Los Angeles in 1957, she won the role of Bonnie Parker, then went on to a series of movies and TV shows, including 'The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock' (1959), 'Good Neighbor Sam' (1964), 'The Alaskans,' '77 Sunset Strip,' 'The Man from U.N.C.L.E.,.' Singing 'He Shouldn't've, Hadn't've, Oughtin've Swing On Me' for Tony Curtis in 'The Great Race' (1965) and 'That Darn Cat!' (1965).

In 1968 she married TV director Robert Day and soon retired from acting. In the late '70s the pair moved to Bainbridge Island in Washington state.

Provine is survived by her husband and one son.

 

[JennyOHill2]

'As the World Turns' Matriarch Wagner Dies at 91

AP NEW YORK (May 2) -- Actress Helen Wagner, who played mild-mannered Nancy Hughes on the CBS soap opera "As the World Turns" for more than a half-century and spoke its first words, has died at age 91.

She died Saturday, said the show's New York-based production company, TeleNext Media Inc., which didn't say where she died or what was the cause of her death.

Wagner opened "As the World Turns" when it premiered on April 2, 1956, with the words: "Good morning, dear." She held the Guinness World Record for playing the same role on television for the longest amount of time, TeleNext Media said.

"All of us at 'As the World Turns' are deeply saddened by Helen's passing," executive producer Christopher Goutman said in a statement. "She is loved by generations of fans, and while we will miss her greatly Helen will always remain the heart and soul of 'As the World Turns.'"

While Wagner, who was born in Lubbock, Texas, was seen less often in later decades, no other network television performer came close to her run playing a single character.

"It has been fun to keep the character true to herself, no matter who is writing it at the moment," she said in 1998.

She was still part of the cast, though with a small presence, in December 2009, when CBS announced that "As the World Turns" was being canceled and its last episode would air in September 2010.

"As the World Turns" was the first daytime TV drama to run a full half-hour rather than 15 minutes. It rose to No. 1 in the daytime ratings and, in the 1970s, was expended to an hour.

In a 1968 New York Times interview, Wagner called Nancy "a tentpole character."

"Nothing ever happens to Nancy," Wagner said. "She's the one the others come and talk to."

Nancy was morally upright, too: The soap opera website soaps.com put a one-word entry under her "flings and relationships": None.

Fans often mixed up Wagner with the character she portrayed, sending her letters carping about Nancy's homemaking or what they saw as her meddling in her children's lives.

But the many fans who liked Nancy/Wagner could also be a problem. She told the Times in 1977 that a woman once ran up and kissed her as she shopped at a suburban supermarket. "She said, 'Oh, Nancy, I've loved you so long I really must kiss you again,' but at that point I managed to escape."

Real life intruded on the show in historic fashion on Nov. 22, 1963, when "As the World Turns" was still performed live on air. Wagner's character was talking about upcoming Thanksgiving plans ("I've thought about it, and I gave it a great deal of thought ...") when the broadcast was interrupted midsentence with a "CBS News Bulletin" sign.

Viewers then heard Walter Cronkite announcing that President John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas. The actors themselves weren't told at the time.

In a 1998 Associated Press interview, Wagner said she wished her character hadn't receded into the background in later years while most of the plot developments happened to the younger characters.

"I don't like the making of Nancy into only an extra figure at parties," she said. "She is too dynamic a person to be made into a ghost."

She thought Nancy, by then twice-widowed, could provide a moral compass for younger characters on the show, giving another generation's perspective.

"The characters now are destructive, mean, immoral, unattractive and selfish," she said. "They care about nothing but themselves - me, me, me. That's a dead end. That's no life."

Still, she loved the storytelling of daytime television and remembered the maze of complex plots from decades earlier.

Don MacLaughlin, who played Nancy's first husband, Chris Hughes, died in 1986 at age 79, not long after the show celebrated its 30th anniversary with a special program devoted to Chris and Nancy Hughes' 50th wedding anniversary.

Chris' death was then written into the plotline, and Nancy later married a detective named Dan McClosky, played by Dan Frazer. McClosky's battle with Alzheimer's disease gave Wagner/Hughes a meaty problem onscreen for a few years, but the producers eventually killed him off, too.

Wagner, born in 1918, studied drama and music at Monmouth College in Illinois, graduating in 1938. She later helped the college raise money for a new theater.

She appeared on Broadway in the 1940s including a small role in the musical "Oklahoma!" and in off-Broadway and summer stock productions.

In 2002 Wagner received a plaque on the Buddy Holly Walk of Fame in her hometown, TeleNext Media said, and in 2004 she was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Before gaining her "As the World Turns" gig, she also appeared on early television shows such as "The Philco Television Playhouse" and a series called "The World of Mr. Sweeney."

She married producer Robert Willey in 1954, and over the years he served as her manager and agent as well as producing some of her stage appearances.

 

[Beco]

Actress Lynn Redgrave has died at age 67

Actress Lynn Redgrave has died at age 67


Lynn Redgrave, an introspective and independent player in her family's acting dynasty who became a 1960s sensation as the freethinking title character of "Georgy Girl" and later dramatized her troubled past in such one-woman stage performances "Shakespeare for My Father" and "Nightingale," has died.
She was 67.

Her publicist Rick Miramontez, speaking on behalf of her children, said Redgrave died Sunday night at her Manhattan apartment. In 2003, Redgrave had been treated for breast cancer.

Her death comes a year after her niece Natasha Richardson died from head injuries sustained in a skiing accident and just a month after the death of her older brother, Corin Redgrave.

The youngest child of Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, Lynn Redgrave never quite managed the acclaim -- or notoriety -- of elder sibling Vanessa Redgrave, but received Oscar nominations for "Georgy Girl" and "Gods and Monsters," and Tony nominations for "Mrs. Warren's Profession," "Shakespeare for My Father" and "The Constant Wife."

 

[JennyOHill2]

Actress Lynn Redgrave has died at age 67


Lynn Redgrave, an introspective and independent player in her family's acting dynasty who became a 1960s sensation as the freethinking title character of "Georgy Girl" and later dramatized her troubled past in such one-woman stage performances "Shakespeare for My Father" and "Nightingale," has died.
She was 67.

Her publicist Rick Miramontez, speaking on behalf of her children, said Redgrave died Sunday night at her Manhattan apartment. In 2003, Redgrave had been treated for breast cancer.

Her death comes a year after her niece Natasha Richardson died from head injuries sustained in a skiing accident and just a month after the death of her older brother, Corin Redgrave.

The youngest child of Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, Lynn Redgrave never quite managed the acclaim -- or notoriety -- of elder sibling Vanessa Redgrave, but received Oscar nominations for "Georgy Girl" and "Gods and Monsters," and Tony nominations for "Mrs. Warren's Profession," "Shakespeare for My Father" and "The Constant Wife."

Such a tragic year for this theatrical dynasty.

R.I.P.

 

[KindaKinky]

Actress Lynn Redgrave has died at age 67

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By MICHAEL KUCHWARA and HILLEL ITALIE, Associated Press Writers Michael Kuchwara And Hillel Italie, Associated Press Writers – 46 mins ago

NEW YORK – Lynn Redgrave, an introspective and independent player in her family's acting dynasty who became a 1960s sensation as the unconventional title character of "Georgy Girl" and later dramatized her troubled past in such one-woman stage performances as "Shakespeare for My Father" and "Nightingale," has died. She was 67.

Her publicist Rick Miramontez, speaking on behalf of her children, said Redgrave died peacefully Sunday night at her home in Connecticut. Children Ben, Pema and Annabel were with her, as were close friends.

"Our beloved mother Lynn Rachel passed away peacefully after a seven year journey with breast cancer," Redgrave's children said in a statement Monday. "She lived, loved and worked harder than ever before. The endless memories she created as a mother, grandmother, writer, actor and friend will sustain us for the rest of our lives. Our entire family asks for privacy through this difficult time."

Redgrave was diagnosed with breast cancer in December 2002, had a mastectomy in January 2003 and underwent chemotherapy.

Her death comes a year after her niece Natasha Richardson died from head injuries sustained in a skiing accident and just a month after the death of her older brother, Corin Redgrave.

The youngest child of Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, Lynn Redgrave never quite managed the acclaim — or notoriety — of elder sibling Vanessa Redgrave, but received Oscar nominations for "Georgy Girl" and "Gods and Monsters," and Tony nominations for "Mrs. Warren's Profession," "Shakespeare for My Father" and "The Constant Wife." In recent years, she also made appearances on TV in "Ugly Betty," "Law & Order" and "Desperate Housewives."

"Vanessa was the one expected to be the great actress," Lynn Redgrave told The Associated Press in 1999. "It was always, 'Corin's the brain, Vanessa the shining star, oh, and then there's Lynn.'"

In theater, the ruby-haired Redgrave often displayed a sunny, sweet and open personality, much like her ebullient offstage personality. It worked well in such shows as "Black Comedy" — her Broadway debut in 1972 — and again two years later in "My Fat Friend," a comedy about an overweight young woman who sheds pounds to find romance.

Tall and blue-eyed like her sister, she was as open about her personal life as Vanessa has been about politics. In plays and in interviews, Lynn Redgrave confided about her family, her marriage and her health. She acknowledged that she suffered from bulimia and served as a spokeswoman for Weight Watchers. With daughter Annabel Clark, she released a 2004 book about her fight with cancer, "Journal: A Mother and Daughter's Recovery From Breast Cancer."

Redgrave was born in London in 1943 and despite self-doubts pursued the family trade. She studied at London's Central School of Speech and Drama, and was not yet 20 when she debuted professionally on stage in a London production of "A Midsummer's Night Dream." Like her siblings, she appeared in plays and in films, working under Noel Coward and Laurence Olivier as a member of the National Theater and under director/brother-in-law Tony Richardson in the 1963 screen hit "Tom Jones."

"Before I was born, my father was a movie star and a stage star," the actress told the AP in 1993. "I was raised in a household where we didn't see our parents in the morning. We lived in the nursery. Our nanny made our breakfast, and I was dressed up to go downstairs to have tea with my parents, if they were there."

True fame caught her with "Georgy Girl," billed as "the wildest thing to hit the world since the miniskirt." The 1966 film starred Redgrave as the plain, childlike Londoner pursued by her father's middle-aged boss, played by James Mason.

Dismissed by critic Pauline Kael as a false testament to free thinking, the movie was branded "cool" by moviegoers on both side of the Atlantic and received several Academy Award nominations, including one for Redgrave and one for the popular title song performed by the Australian group The Seekers.

"All the films I've been in — and I haven't been in that many attention-getting films — no one expected anything of, least of all me," Redgrave said in an AP interview in 1999.

"Georgy Girl" didn't lead to lasting commercial success, but did anticipate a long-running theme: Redgrave's weight. She weighed 180 pounds while making the film, leading New York Times critic Michael Stern to complain that Redgrave "cannot be quite as homely as she makes herself in this film.

"Slimmed down, cosseted in a couture salon, and given more of the brittle, sophisticated lines she tosses off with such abandon here, she could become a comedienne every bit as good as the late Kay Kendall," he wrote.

Films such as "The Happy Hooker" and "Every Little Crook and Nanny" were remembered less than Redgrave's decision to advocate for Weight Watchers. She even referenced "Georgy Girl" in one commercial, showing a clip and saying, "This was me when I made the movie, because this is the way I used to eat."

At age 50, Redgrave was ready to tell her story in full. As she wrote in the foreword to "Shakespeare for My Father," she was out of work and set off on a "journey that began almost as an act of desperation," writing a play out of her "passionately emotional desire" to better understand her father, who had died in 1985.

In the 1993 AP interview, Redgrave remembered her father as a fearless stage performer yet a shy, tormented man who had great difficulty talking to his youngest daughter.

"I didn't really know him," Redgrave said. "I lived in his house. I was in awe of him and I adored him, and I was terrified of him and I hated him and I loved him, all in one go."

Redgrave credited the play, which interspersed readings from Shakespeare with family memories, with bringing her closer to her relatives and reviving her film career. She played the supportive wife of pianist David Helfgott in "Shine" and received an Oscar nomination as the loyal housekeeper for filmmaker James Whale in "Gods and Monsters." She also appeared in "Peter Pan," "Kinsey" and "Confessions of a Shopaholic."

On stage, she looked at her mother's side of the family in "The Mandrake Root" and "Rachel and Juliet." In 2009, her play "Nightingale" touched upon her health, the life of her grandmother (Beatrice Kempson) and the end of her 32-year marriage to actor-director John Clark, who had disclosed that he had fathered a child with the future wife of their son Benjamin.

"Redgrave, a cancer survivor, sits at a desk ... and works from a script because of what has been described as an unspecified medical ailment — but not a recurrence of cancer — requiring immediate treatment. It doesn't affect her touching, beautifully realized performance," the AP wrote last year.

"And reading gives the evening an almost storybook quality in which it seems as if the actress, buoyed by a radiant smile, has gathered a few good friends to hear her reminisce about this formidable woman — mother of Rachel, mother-in-law of Michael and grandmother to Lynn, Vanessa and Corin."

Lynn Redgrave is survived by six grandchildren, her sister Vanessa, and four nieces and nephews.

A private funeral with be held later this week.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Baseball world mourns voice of the Tigers

DETROIT - Ernie Harwell, the acclaimed Detroit Tigers broadcaster whose eloquence and kindness made him a beloved Michigan institution, died Tuesday night after a nearly yearlong bout with cancer. He was 92.

He died in his apartment in Novi, Mich., with Lulu, his wife of 68 years, at his side. His death came eight months to the day after he revealed in an interview with the Detroit Free Press that he had a cancerous tumor in the area of his bile duct and that in late July he had been given only a few months to live.

"I'm ready to face what comes," he said at the time. "Whether it's a long time or a short time is all right with me because it's up to my Lord and savior."

In the ensuing months, in an emotional farewell ceremony at Comerica Park, in his columns for the Free Press, and in interviews with national media, Mr. Harwell referred to death as his next great adventure, a gift handed down by God.

"I've had so many great ones," he said. "It's been a terrific life."

Mr. Harwell had one of the longest runs by a broadcaster with one major league club, calling Tigers games for 42 seasons (1960-1991 and 1993-2002). For the first 32 of those seasons, he made and cemented his legacy by doing play-by-play on the radio. His Southern voice - rich and authoritative but not overbearing - became as distinctive to Michigan listeners as baseball itself.

Unlike some announcers in recent decades, Mr. Harwell didn't litter his broadcasts with shouting, excessive talking, or all-knowing pronouncements about players and managers. As he fell silent between pitches, listeners got to hear the sounds of the ballpark and absorb the rhythm of the game.

At home games, Mr. Harwell would report that a foul ball had been caught by "a man from Ypsilanti" or "a lady from Muskegon." Of course he couldn't know where the fan lived, but pretending that he did added a distinct local feel to his broadcasts.

In 2005, author and historian Curt Smith ranked Mr. Harwell as the third-greatest baseball announcer ever, placing him behind only Dodgers legend Vin Scully and Yankees stalwart Mel Allen. Just behind Mr. Harwell were Jack Buck and Red Barber.

Mr. Harwell's popularity never became more evident than when Tigers management and its flagship radio station fired him after the 1990 season. It immediately became the most unpopular move in club history.

After a so-called farewell season with the club in 1991, Mr. Harwell was off Tigers broadcasts in 1992. During that season, Mike Ilitch bought the club from Tom Monaghan and quickly arranged for Mr. Harwell to return to the air the next season. He would remain on radio or television until his self-declared retirement following the '02 season.

Mr. Harwell's big break came in unorthodox fashion.

Dodgers radio broadcaster Barber fell ill in 1948, and general manager Branch Rickey needed a replacement. After learning that the minor-league Atlanta Crackers needed a catcher, Rickey swapped catcher Cliff Dapper to Atlanta and Mr. Harwell joined the Dodgers. The two finally met in 2002.

 

[LiFeNdEaTh]

j. cash is the man

 

[JennyOHill2]

Former IOC President Samaranch Dies at 89

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) -Juan Antonio Samaranch, a reserved but shrewd dealmaker whose 21-year term as president of the International Olympic Committee was marked by both the unprecedented growth of the games and its biggest ethics scandal, died at a hospital. He was 89.

Samaranch, a courtly former diplomat who served as Spanish ambassador in Moscow, led the IOC from 1980 to 2001. He was considered one of the defining presidents for building the IOC into a powerful global organization and firmly establishing the Olympics as a world force.

Samaranch was admitted to the Quiron Hospital in Barcelona on Sunday after experiencing heart trouble. The hospital said he died at 1:25 p.m.

"If there is a good way to die, I guess it was this way," Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr. told The Associated Press. "He had a full life and career."

Small in stature and shy by nature, Samaranch appeared uncomfortable appearing or speaking in public. But behind the scenes, he was a skilled and sometimes ruthless operator who could forge consensus in the often fractious Olympic movement and push IOC members to deliver exactly what he wanted.

Samaranch was also a lightning rod for critics, who attacked him for his ties to the Franco era in Spain, his autocratic style and the IOC's involvement in the Salt Lake City corruption scandal.

The Samaranch era was perhaps the most eventful in IOC history, spanning political boycotts, the end of amateurism and the advent of professionalism, the explosion of commercialization, a boom in growth and popularity of the games, the scourge of doping, and the Salt Lake crisis.

Samaranch had been bothered by health problems ever since stepping down nine years ago. He was hospitalized for 11 days in Switzerland with "extreme fatigue" in 2001 after returning from the IOC session in Moscow, where Rogge was elected as his successor.

Samaranch was hospitalized shortly afterward in Barcelona for what was described as high blood pressure. He received regular dialysis treatment for kidney trouble. He spent two days in a hospital in Madrid in 2007 after a dizzy spell, and underwent hospital checks in Monaco in October 2009 after feeling ill at a sports conference.

Despite the advancing age and medical troubles, Samaranch continued to travel to IOC meetings around the world. He looked increasingly frail in recent months. Attending the IOC session at the Winter Games in Vancouver in February, he walked with the aid of a female assistant.

Even in retirement, Samaranch remained active in Olympic circles and tried to help Madrid secure the games of 2012 and 2016. Madrid finished third behind winner London and Paris in the 2005 vote for the 2012 Olympics, and second to Rio de Janeiro for 2016.

Samaranch spoke during Madrid's presentation in Copenhagen on Oct. 2, 2009, essentially asking IOC members to send the games to the Spanish capital as a parting gift for an old man close to his final days.

"Dear colleagues, I know that I am very near the end of my time," Samaranch said. "I am, as you know, 89 years old. May I ask you to consider granting my country the honor and also the duty to organize the games and Paralympics in 2016."

In Moscow in 1980, as a little-known Spanish diplomat, Samaranch was elected the seventh president of the IOC, taking the most powerful job in global sports.

Twenty-one years later, as a well-known world figure, Samaranch returned to Moscow to finish his term - basking in the unprecedented popularity and riches of the games but still bearing the scars of the scandal that led to the ouster of 10 IOC members for receiving improper benefits from the 2002 Salt Lake bid committee.

While his closest friends said Samaranch was extremely emotional and sentimental, outwardly he remained cool and philosophical in his final days in office.

"I'm feeling OK," he said. "Life is life. There is a beginning and an end. This is the end of my presidency. I've known for a long time that this day was coming."

Even at the end of his Olympic reign in 2001, Samaranch worked hard to achieve three electoral victories as part of his final legacy: the awarding of the 2008 Olympics to Beijing, the election of Rogge as the new president, and the appointment of his son, Juan Antonio Jr., as an IOC member.

Samaranch retired as the second-longest serving president in the history of the IOC. Only Pierre de Coubertin, the French baron who founded the modern Olympics, was in office longer, serving for 29 years (1896-1925). American Avery Brundage served for 20 years (1952-72).

Samaranch was the last IOC leader to stay in office for so long. Under new rules, the maximum term for the president is 12 years (one eight-year mandate, plus the possibility of an additional four-year term). Rogge was re-elected unopposed to a second term in Copenhagen on Oct. 9, 2009, extending his period in office until 2013.

"After de Coubertin, there is no question that Samaranch stands head and shoulders above the other presidents in terms of his impact, not only on the Olympic Games but the place of the Olympic movement in the world," Olympic historian John MacAloon said.

Longtime Canadian IOC member Dick Pound, who finished third in the voting to Rogge, said Samaranch was one of three "great or defining presidents."

"De Coubertin to get it going, Brundage to hold it together through a very difficult period, and Samaranch to bring it from the kitchen table to the world stage," Pound said.

Samaranch spoke of the dramatic changes himself.

"You have to compare what is the Olympics today with what was the Olympics 20 years ago - that is my legacy," he said before his retirement. "It is much more important. Also, all our sources of finances are coming from private sources, not a single dollar from the government. That means we can assure our independence and autonomy.

"And the most important thing - it is easy to say but not to get - is the unity with the national Olympic committees and mainly with the international federations."

When Samaranch came to power in 1980, the IOC was virtually bankrupt and the Olympics were battered by boycotts, terrorism and financial troubles.

When he left, the IOC's coffers were bulging from billions of dollars in commercial revenues, the boycott era was over, and the games were firmly established as the world's favorite sports festival.

Samaranch's presidency was also clouded by controversy. He was hounded by critics who said the games were over-commercialized and riddled with performance-enhancing drugs, and that he perpetuated the IOC image of a private club for a pampered elite.

Samaranch's reputation was scarred most of all by the Salt Lake City scandal, which led to the expulsion of six IOC members and resignation of four others who benefited from more than $1 million in cash, gifts, scholarships and other favors doled out during the Utah capital's winning bid for the 2002 Winter Games.

"What I regret, really regret, is what happened in Salt Lake City," he said.

"It obviously was a terrible blow to the organization, a terrible blow to him," MacAloon said. "He helped select many of the members who were found guilty of bribe-taking. ... It will be a lasting footnote to his presidency."

Samaranch used the crisis to push through a package of reforms designed to make the IOC more modern, open and democratic, including a ban on member visits to bid cities.

"We used this crisis to change the structure of the IOC," he said. "Maybe without this crisis, this would not have been possible."

In December 1999, Samaranch became the first IOC president to testify in Congress, enduring three hours of grilling on Capitol Hill from lawmakers skeptical of the reforms.

Samaranch's past was also a target for critics. Jennings and others denounced him for serving the Franco dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s.

Samaranch angrily defended himself, saying it was up to Spaniards, not foreign journalists, to judge his record. He said he had only a modest role as director general of sports and parliamentary leader of the Falangist movement.

"Maybe some critics pushed me to be president for 21 years," Samaranch said. "I have to thank the critics. Maybe without the critics, I had to leave the IOC before."

Looking back, Samaranch acknowledged he could have retired earlier.

He considered stepping down after the 1992 Olympics in his home city of Barcelona and again after the centennial games in Atlanta in 1996. Each time, encouraged by his supporters, he chose to continue. Twice, he had the age limit changed to allow him to stay on.

As honorary IOC president for life, Samaranch remained active in the Olympic movement even after he stepped down. He chaired the board of the Olympic Museum in Lausanne and regularly attended IOC meetings around the world.

His wife, Maria Teresa, died from cancer in 2000 at 67, shortly after Samaranch presided over the opening ceremony of the Sydney Olympics. Samaranch flew to Barcelona to be at her bedside, but she died while he was still in the air. He later returned to Sydney for the remainder of the games.

In addition to his 50-year-old son, Samaranch is survived by a daughter, Maria Teresa. Both of his children and his partner, Luisa Sallent, were by his side when he passed.

As a youth, Samaranch competed in field hockey, boxing and soccer. He became an IOC member in 1966 and was vice president from 1974-78.

Samaranch served as honorary chairman of La Caixa savings bank in Spain.

 

[KindaKinky]

Barrier-breaking jazz star Lena Horne dies at 92

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AP, May 10, 2010 3:35 pm PDT
Lena Horne, the enchanting jazz singer and actress known for her plaintive, signature song "Stormy Weather" and for her triumph over the bigotry that allowed her to entertain white audiences but not socialize with them, has died. She was 92.

Horne died Sunday at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, said hospital spokeswoman Gloria Chin, who would not release details.

Quincy Jones, a longtime friend and collaborator, was among those mourning her death Monday. He called her a "pioneering groundbreaker."

"Our friendship dated back more than 50 years and continued up until the last moment, her inner and outer beauty immediately bonding us forever," said Jones, who noted that they worked together on the film "The Wiz" and a Grammy-winning live album.

"Lena Horne was a pioneering groundbreaker, making inroads into a world that had never before been explored by African-American women, and she did it on her own terms," he added. "Our nation and the world has lost one of the great artistic icons of the 20th century. There will never be another like Lena Horne and I will miss her deeply."

"I knew her from the time I was born, and whenever I needed anything she was there. She was funny, sophisticated and truly one of a kind. We lost an original. Thank you Lena," Liza Minnelli said Monday. Her father, director Vincente Minnelli, brought Horne to Hollywood to star in "Cabin in the Sky," in 1943.

Horne, whose striking beauty often overshadowed her talent and artistry, was remarkably candid about the underlying reason for her success: "I was unique in that I was a kind of black that white people could accept," she once said. "I was their daydream. I had the worst kind of acceptance because it was never for how great I was or what I contributed. It was because of the way I looked."

In the 1940s, Horne was one of the first black performers hired to sing with a major white band, to play the Copacabana nightclub in New York City and when she signed with MGM, she was among a handful of black actors to have a contract with a major Hollywood studio.

In 1943, MGM Studios loaned her to 20th Century-Fox to play the role of Selina Rogers in the all-black movie musical "Stormy Weather." Her rendition of the title song became a major hit and her most famous tune.

Horne had an impressive musical range, from blues and jazz to the sophistication of Rodgers and Hart in such songs as "The Lady Is a Tramp" and "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered." In 1942's "Panama Hattie," her first movie with MGM, she sang Cole Porter's "Just One of Those Things," winning critical acclaim.

In her first big Broadway success, as the star of "Jamaica" in 1957, reviewer Richard Watts Jr. called her "one of the incomparable performers of our time." Songwriter Buddy de Sylva dubbed her "the best female singer of songs."

"It's just a great loss," said Janet Jackson in an interview on Monday. "She brought much joy into everyone's lives — even the younger generations, younger than myself. She was such a great talent. She opened up such doors for artists like myself."

Horne was perpetually frustrated with racism.

"I was always battling the system to try to get to be with my people. Finally, I wouldn't work for places that kept us out. ... It was a damn fight everywhere I was, every place I worked, in New York, in Hollywood, all over the world," she said in Brian Lanker's book "I Dream a World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America."

While at MGM, Horne starred in the all-black "Cabin in the Sky," but in most movies, she appeared only in musical numbers that could be cut when shown in the South and she was denied major roles and speaking parts. Horne, who had appeared in the role of Julie in a "Show Boat" scene in a 1946 movie about Jerome Kern, seemed a logical choice for the 1951 movie, but the part went to a white actress, Ava Gardner, who did not sing.

"Metro's cowardice deprived the musical (genre) of one of the great singing actresses," film historian John Kobal wrote.

"She was a very angry woman," said film critic-author-documentarian Richard Schickel, who worked with Horne on her 1965 autobiography.

"It's something that shaped her life to a very high degree. She was a woman who had a very powerful desire to lead her own life, to not be cautious and to speak out. And she was a woman, also, who felt in her career that she had been held back by the issue of race. So she had a lot of anger and disappointment about that."

Early in her career, Horne cultivated an aloof style out of self-preservation. Later, she embraced activism, breaking loose as a voice for civil rights and as an artist. In the last decades of her life, she rode a new wave of popularity as a revered icon of American popular music.

Her 1981 one-woman Broadway show, "Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music," won a special Tony Award, and the accompanying album, produced by Jones, earned her two Grammy Awards. (Horne won another Grammy, in 1995 for "An Evening With Lena Horne.") In it, the 64-year-old singer used two renditions — one straight and the other gut-wrenching — of "Stormy Weather" to give audiences a glimpse of the spiritual odyssey of her five-decade career.

Lena Mary Calhoun Horne was born in Brooklyn on June 30, 1917, to a leading family in black society. Her daughter, Gail Lumet Buckley, wrote in her 1986 book "The Hornes: An American Family" that among their relatives was Frank Horne, an adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

She was largely raised by her grandparents as her mother, Edna Horne, who pursued a career in show business and father Teddy Horne separated. Lena dropped out of high school at age 16 and joined the chorus line at the Cotton Club, the fabled Harlem night spot where the entertainers were black and the clientele white. She left the club in 1935 to tour with Noble Sissle's orchestra, billed as Helena Horne, the name she continued using when she joined Charlie Barnet's white orchestra in 1940.

A movie offer from MGM came when she headlined a show at the Little Troc nightclub with the Katherine Dunham dancers in 1942.

Her success led some blacks to accuse Horne of trying to "pass" in a white world with her light complexion. Max Factor even developed an "Egyptian" makeup shade especially for her. But she refused to go along with the studio's efforts to portray her as an exotic Latina.

"I don't have to be an imitation of a white woman that Hollywood sort of hoped I'd become," Horne once said. "I'm me, and I'm like nobody else."

Horne was only 2 when her grandmother, a prominent member of the Urban League and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, enrolled her in the NAACP. But she avoided activism until 1945 when she was entertaining at an Army base and saw German prisoners of war sitting up front while black American soldiers were consigned to the rear.

That pivotal moment channeled her anger into something useful.

She got involved in various social and political organizations and, partly because of a friendship with singer-actor-activist Paul Robeson, was blacklisted during the red-hunting McCarthy era.

By the 1960s, Horne was one of the most visible celebrities in the civil rights movement, once throwing a lamp at a customer who made a racial slur in a Beverly Hills restaurant and, in 1963, joining 250,000 others in the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom when Martin Luther King Jr. gave his "I Have a Dream" speech. Horne also spoke at a rally that year with another civil rights leader, Medgar Evers, just days before his assassination.

The next decade brought her first to a low point, then to a fresh burst of artistry. She appeared in her last movie in 1978, playing Glinda the Good in "The Wiz," directed by her son-in-law, Sidney Lumet.

Horne had married MGM music director Lennie Hayton, a white man, in Paris in 1947 after her first overseas engagements in France and England. An earlier marriage to Louis J. Jones had ended in divorce in 1944 after producing daughter Gail and a son, Teddy.

Her father, her son and Hayton all died in 1970 and 1971, and the grief-stricken singer secluded herself, refusing to perform or even see anyone but her closest friends. One of them, comedian Alan King, took months persuading her to return to the stage, with results that surprised her.

"I looked out and saw a family of brothers and sisters," she said. "It was a long time, but when it came I truly began to live."

And she discovered that time had mellowed her bitterness.

"I wouldn't trade my life for anything," she said, "because being black made me understand."

 

[KindaKinky]

Check out Shugahhhh's Thread too.

 

[Weird Harold]

Barrier-breaking jazz star Lena Horne dies at 92

Yet another adolecent crush gone. Getting old sucks.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Doris Eaton Travis, Among the Last of the Ziegfeld Girls, Dead at 106

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Doris Eaton Travis, the former Ziegfeld Follies dancer who inspired 21st century audiences with her pluck, good will — and fancy footwork — at 12 of 13 annual Easter Bonnet Competition performances for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, died May 11 at the age of 106, according to Tom Viola, executive director of BC/EFA.

Ms. Eaton was thought to be "the last of the Ziegfeld Girls"—as were known the bejeweled ensemble of women who graced the stage of the New Amsterdam Theatre (and elsewhere) in producer Flo Ziegfeld's revues in the first quarter of the 20th century.

Eight decades after her initial bout of fame, she again found an audience on the stage of the New Amsterdam. She danced for a 1998 audience when she appeared with four other graying Ziegfeld veterans in the first Easter Bonnet fundraiser at the theatre, then newly restored, on West 42nd Street.

"She was truly our good luck charm," Viola told Playbill.com. "In 1998, at 94, she was in incredible shape — in amazing shape. We brought her back every year, and she would dance in the opening number. She taught Sutton Foster how to dance 'The Black Bottom,' she danced with the 'Cagelles' from the previous revival, we celebrated her 100th birthday on stage, she appeared with the cast of Billy Elliot."

Ms. Travis had lived recently with her nephew Joe Eaton and his wife outside of Chicago. She previously lived in Norman, OK, where she ran a horse ranch with her husband for 40 years.

Viola told Playbill.com that she took ill Sunday and was taken to the hospital to be rehydrated and was released, but was brought back to the hospital on May 11. She was reportedly talkative in the car, then chatting with the nurses about being a Ziegfeld girl and having just returned from the Bonnet Competition in New York City.

She slipped away quietly, without incident, at the hospital. Viola said, "I'll bet the sound of the extraordinary ovation she received on stage at the Minskoff just two weeks ago today was ringing in her ears."

Doris Eaton was born March 14, 1904, in Norfolk, VA. Four of her seven siblings would eventually go onto the stage, including sisters Mary and Pearl, who were also Ziegfeld Girls, and brothers Charles and Joseph, though Joe, disliking show business, left the theatre at a tender age. For a short period in the early 1920s, the three Eaton girls were famous enough that their heart-shaped faces graced the covers of celebrity magazines.

Mama Eaton encouraged the stage ambitions of her children early on, and ambitious older sister Evelyn pushed her brothers and sisters to achieve. Mary, the family's greatest beauty, was the most famous, headlining the 1926 musical Lucky and receiving top billing with Eddie Cantor in Kid Boots. Pearl split her time between acting and choreographing, becoming quite accomplished at the latter.

Doris Eaton took her first step on Broadway in the 1917 play Mother Carey's Chickens. She got her big break in the serendipitous manner often seen in Hollywood films. Her sister Pearl had been employed to rehearse a group of dancing girls for a road show of the Follies for producer Ned Wayburn. Doris tagged along to watch.

"During the break, Mr. Wayburn came over to give Pearl some instructions and he kept looking at me. He finally said, 'Who's this?' Pearl said, 'It's my youngest sister, Doris.' 'Can she dance? I'm looking for somebody to understudy Ann Pennington on the road.' Pearl knew Pennington's routines and knew my capacity and she said, 'She could do that. But, Mr. Wayburn, she's only 14 and I don't think her mother would let her go on the road.' He said, 'You tell your mother I want Doris to do this and she can travel with her and I'll pay her mother's way.'"

Young Doris was the youngest girl featured in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1918. She also appeared in the 1920 edition of the Follies.

"Florenz Ziegfeld, to us and our family, was just a delightful person," she told Playbill.com in 2004. "My sisters Mary and Pearl, my brother Charlie and I all worked for him, and he treated us just beautifully, almost like a father. When I went with my mother up to his office, he was always gentlemanly and kindly. He was sort of a quiet person. He was always well-groomed, sort of natty."

Ms. Eaton modestly admitted she was never the star of the family. Still, she had her moments. She executed a rhythm tap dancing routine in the 1928 musical Cross My Heart which stopped the show cold every night. In the 1929 show The Hollywood Music Box Revue, she introduced the song "Singing in the Rain," months before Cliff Edwards would deliver it in the film "Hollywood Revue." And then there was that love affair with Nacio Herb Brown, the composer of "Singin' in the Rain" and many other standards.

The Eatons' heyday was short. Offers from both Broadway and Hollywood dried up with the arrival of the Great Depression. Suddenly, the fabulous family business was finished. The clan didn't handle the reversal in fortunes well. Charlie, Mary and Pearl all battled alcoholism. Glamorous Mary married "three drunks in a row," as her brother Joe put it, and died of severe metamorphosis of the liver in 1948.

"Ballet dancing and the theatre was really my sister's whole life," remembered Doris when discussing Mary in 2004. "It was something inward with her. With Pearl, she liked it but it was a job. With me, it was just a job. I never had stars in my eyes about the theatre."

Pearl also ended badly. She died in 1958 in her Manhattan Beach apartment, the victim of a bizarre murder which remains unsolved. The sturdy and cheerful Charlie fared best at carving out a long career, often joining Doris as half of a dance team. He died in 2004.

Asked why she survived the seeming tragedy of being shut out of show business while still in the bloom of youth, Ms. Eaton said, "I reached the age of 32 and I took a good look at myself and said 'What's going on here? This is nothing. This is not life.' I went back to church and began to study and find myself. I got some inner strength from that."

Ms. Eaton left show business, but later became the owner of 18 Arthur Murray dance studios in Michigan, which she operated for 30 years. She also ran a horse ranch in Oklahoma with her late husband, Paul travis, and graduated from the University of Oklahoma at the age of 88.

In 2003, she published "The Days We Danced," a frank biography of her family's history on and off the stage—a tale replete with glory and heartbreak in even amounts.

Ms. Eaton took her last bow April 27, during the opening number of the 2010 Easter Bonnet show. She rode onstage in a giant Easter basket, giving the initial impression that she could no longer walk. But Ms. Travis brought the audience to its feet when she rose to her own feet and took center stage. Steadied by two shirtless young male dancers, she executed a kick or two and thanked the audience for the love they had shown her over the 12 years of her appearances at the Bonnet event. She then headed into the wings under her own power.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Dana Plato's Son Tyler Lambert Commits Suicide

Son of "Diff'rent Strokes" Star Follows Mom and Commits Suicide in Oklahoma

(CBS) Tyler Lambert committed suicide on May 6, just days before the anniversary of his mother's death.

The 25-year-old died from a self-inflicted shotgun wound to the head in Kellyville, Okla., almost 11 years after his mom Dana Plato took her own life.

His grandmother, Joni Richardson tells PEOPLE that Lambert was experimenting with drugs and alcohol at the time, which she believes were contributing factors to his death.

"It's a shame that such a talented human being would do this with his life," Richardson said. "He had all the opportunities in the world and we just can't understand it."

Plato was a child actress and star of NBC's sitcom "Diff'rent Strokes." Her career was short-lived after the series ended and had a few run-ins with the law. She was arrested in 1991 for robbing a video store in Las Vegas.

While visiting her family in Moore, Okla., Plato died from an overdose of prescription medication on May 8, 1999.

Lambert was 14 when his mom died.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Relatives and Friends 'Shocked' by Death of Pro Golfer Erica Blasberg

Family and friends of Erica Blasberg say they are baffled by the 25-year-old golfer's sudden death Sunday inside her suburban Las Vegas home.

Greg Allen, Blasberg's former coach at the University of Arizona, said Erica was a "happy-go-lucky kid" whose death has stunned those who knew her best.

"I'm shocked," Allen said in an interview with FoxNews.com on Wednesday. "We lost a part of our family."

A native of Southern California, Blasberg was in her sixth season on the Ladies Professional Golf Association tour.

Police are investigating her death after her body was discovered Sunday inside her three-bedroom home in Henderson, Nev. Authorities said they found the body at approximately 3 p.m. after responding to a 911 call.

Police are not discounting suicide, said Henderson Police Department spokesman Keith Paul. No cause of death has been disclosed.

Blasberg's father, Mel, told the Riverside Press-Enterprise in California that his daughter may have committed suicide. But in an interview with FoxNews.com on Tuesday, he said the circumstances surrounding his daughter's death "don't add up."

Blasberg, of Corona, Calif., said his daughter, who had just returned from the Tres Marias Championship in Morelia, Mexico, had been in high spirits in recent weeks.

"It doesn't add up, knowing how excited she was about playing," he said. "She was at the prime of her life and in a career she loved."

Blasberg lived alone in her home, which she purchased three years ago. Her father said authorities told him that the 911 call was made by a local male golfer. Police have not released the caller's identity.

Blasberg said his daughter had been planning to travel to Alabama on Saturday to compete in Monday's qualifying event for this week's LPGA tournament in Mobile. He said he last saw Erica on Thursday, when he visited her home, and that "she couldn't have been more up." Her bags were packed inside her car, he said.

Caddie Missy Pederson, who would have carried Blasberg's bag Monday, received a text message from her early Sunday, saying she would not be attending the Alabama event, according to the New York Times.

Pederson reportedly replied to the message, asking Blasberg if she was OK, but never received a response.

Blasberg won six college tournaments in two years. She was named Golfweek's 2003 Player of the Year after finishing the season No. 1 in the rankings. She also was 2003 NGCA Freshman of the Year, Pac-10 Player of the Year and competed on the victorious 2004 Curtis Cup team. She enjoyed a stint as the face of Puma Golf, appearing in a television commercial, and also represented Cleveland Golf and Casio.

Blasberg's dedication to her sport was commendable, her father said, noting that she would attend practices and tournaments even when she was ill.

"Never ever has Erica not gone to an event -- amateur or professional -- even if she were deathly sick," Blasberg said.

By outward appearances, the pro golfer seemed optimist about her future in the sport.

"It's exciting," Blasberg said of her sport to a group of students two weeks ago at Universidad Latina de America in Mexico. "It's fun to see a young person play because they just, they have so much more excitement in the way they play. They take chances and they challenge things."

The Clark County coroner's office told FoxNews.com that a cause of death will not be released for another four to six weeks.

A May 19 memorial service has been scheduled for Blasberg.

"This is a horrible story about a wonderful girl and we need answers," her father said. "As a professional golfer, you have your ups and downs, but Erica was intrigued by the challenge."

Fox Sports contributed to this report.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Former big leaguer Lima dead at 37

Former Major League pitcher Jose Lima died of a massive heart attack at his California home early Sunday morning. He was 37.

Lima's wife, Dorca Astacio, told ESPN Deportes' Enrique Rojas that she thought Lima was having nightmares, so she called the paramedics, but their efforts to revive him were unsuccessful.

According to Astacio, Lima was not experiencing any health problems prior to the heart attack.

Lima, a native of the Dominican Republic, pitched in the Major Leagues for 13 seasons, from 1994-2006. After breaking into the big leagues with the Tigers in 1994, Lima went on to compile an 89-102 career record to go with a 5.26 ERA. His best season came in 1999 as a member of the potent Houston Astros rotation. Lima posted a 21-10 record that season, along with a 3.58 ERA.

Astros Chairman and CEO Drayton McLane remembered Lima in a statement released by the club.

"It saddened me greatly to hear of Jose's passing. He had an outstanding career with the Astros and won 21 games in 1999 on one of our greatest teams ever. He was truly a gifted person both on the field and off of it. He could dance, he could sing, but his best gift of all was that he was an extremely happy person. He just lit up our clubhouse with his personality, which was his greatest asset. Jose was not shortchanged in life in any way. He lived life to the fullest every day."

The fiery right-hander also spent time with the Royals, Dodgers, and Mets. In his final year in the big leagues, 2006, Lima went 0-4 for the Mets.

In 2004, as a member of the Dodgers, Lima fired a five-hit shutout against the Cardinals for L.A.'s only win in the National League Division Series. Lima remained a beloved figure in Los Angeles, often attending Dodgers games. He took in Friday's Interleague game against the Tigers with his son Jose Jr.

Dodgers owner Frank McCourt spoke highly of Lima in a statement released by the team on Sunday.

"We are shocked and saddened to learn of the tragic loss of Jose Lima. Though he was taken from us way too soon, he truly lived his life to the fullest and his personality was simply unforgettable. He had the ability to light up a room and that's exactly what he did every time I saw him. His memorable contributions to the Dodgers in 2004 and throughout baseball will always be remembered. Our deepest condolences and prayers go out to his family during this extremely difficult time."

Lima continued to play baseball after his departure from the Majors, appearing in 22 games in 2007 for the Saltillo Saraperos of the Mexican League and making 11 appearances with the Camden Riversharks of the independent Atlantic League in 2008. He also pitched in the Golden League in 2009, playing for the Long Beach Armada before being traded to the Edmonton Capitals.

Lima never gave up his hope of returning to the big leagues.

"I'm just waiting for that phone call," Lima told MLB.com while playing for the Armada last season. "I know that break is coming."

 

[JennyOHill2]

Slipknot Bassist Paul Gray Found Dead in Iowa Hotel at 38

Slipknot bassist Paul Gray was found dead in a hotel near Urbandale, Iowa. He was 38. According to the Des Moines Register, police found no evidence of foul play in Gray's death, but the investigation is ongoing. The Polk County, Iowa Medical Examiner's Office will conduct an autopsy and toxicology test to determine the cause of his premature death.

Gray's body was found by a hotel employee at around 10:50 this morning and witnesses report seeing items removed from his room early in the afternoon. Slipknot's manager confirmed the death to Rolling Stone but did not offer further details.

Gray, known to fans as "#2" and "The Pig," co-founded Slipknot in 1995 with drummer Joey Jordison and percussionist Shawn Crahan and the band released their debut Mate. Feed. Kill. Repeat in 1996. The group has gone on to become one of the most successful and beloved acts in metal, earning legions of fans for their electric shows, over-the-top costumes and dark, anthemic brand of thrash music. Their 2008 album All Hope is Gone went to Number One and the band, who have been nominated for seven Grammys, took home an award in 2006 for Best Metal Performance.

Gray had his share of troubles in the past. In 2003, he was arrested in Des Moines for possession of cocaine, marijuana and drug paraphernalia following a car accident. But Gray seemed to turn his life around in recent years, reportedly marrying girlfriend Brenna Paul two years ago

 

[Denae]

5-28-2010 Gary Coleman dies at 42; 1968-2010 AP

PROVO, Utah – Gary Coleman, the adorable, pint-sized child star of the smash 1970s TV sitcom "Diff'rent Strokes" who spent the rest of his life struggling on Hollywood's D-list, died Friday after suffering a brain hemorrhage. He was 42.

Coleman was taken off life support and died with family and friends at his side, Utah Valley Regional Medical Center spokeswoman Janet Frank said.

He suffered the brain hemorrhage Wednesday at his Santaquin home, 55 miles south of Salt Lake City. Frank said Coleman was hospitalized because of an accident at the home, but she had no further details.

Coleman's family, in a statement read by his brother-in-law Shawn Price, said information would be released shortly about his death.

Best remembered for "Diff'rent Strokes" character Arnold Jackson and his "Whatchu talkin' 'bout?" catchphrase, Coleman chafed at his permanent association with the show but also tried to capitalize on it through reality shows and other TV appearances.

His adult life was marked with legal, financial and health troubles, suicide attempts and even a 2003 run for California governor.

"I want to escape that legacy of Arnold Jackson," he told The New York Times during his gubernatorial run. "I'm someone more. It would be nice if the world thought of me as something more."

A statement from the family said he was conscious and lucid until midday Thursday, when his condition worsened and he slipped into unconsciousness. Coleman was then placed on life support.

"It's unfortunate. It's a sad day," said Todd Bridges, who played Coleman's older brother, Willis, on "Diff'rent Strokes."

"Diff'rent Strokes" debuted on NBC in 1978 and drew most of its laughs from Coleman, then a tiny 10-year-old with sparkling eyes and perfect comic timing.

He played the younger of two African-American brothers adopted by a wealthy white man. Race and class relations became topics on the show as much as the typical trials of growing up.

"He was the reason we were such a big hit," co-star Charlotte Rae, who played the family's housekeeper on the show, said in an e-mail. "He was the centerpiece and we all surrounded him. He was absolutely enchanting, adorable, funny and filled with joy which he spread around to millions of people all over the world."

Coleman's family thanked fans for their continued support.

"Thousands of e-mails have poured into the hospital. This is so comforting to the family to know how beloved he still is," Price said.

"Diff'rent Strokes" lasted six seasons on NBC and two on ABC; it lives on thanks to DVDs and YouTube. But its equally enduring legacy became the troubles in adulthood of its former child stars.

In 1989, Bridges was acquitted of attempted murder in the shooting of a drug dealer. The then 24-year-old Bridges testified he became depressed and turned to drugs after "Diff'rent Strokes" was canceled.

Dana Plato, who played the boys' white, teenage sister, pleaded guilty in 1991 to a robbery charge. She died in 1999 of an overdose of painkiller and muscle relaxer. The medical examiner's office ruled the death a suicide.

"It's sad that I'm the last kid alive from the show," Bridges said.

Singer Janet Jackson, who appeared on several episodes of "Diff'rent Strokes," tweeted that, "I want to remember him as the fun, playful, adorable and affectionate man he was. He has left a lasting legacy. I know he is finally at peace."

Coleman was born Feb. 8, 1968, in Zion, Ill., near Chicago.

His short stature added to his child-star charm but stemmed from a serious health problem, kidney failure. He got his first of at least two transplants at age 5 and required dialysis. Even as an adult, his height reached only 4 feet 8 inches.

In a 1979 Los Angeles Times profile, his mother, Sue Coleman, said he had always been a ham. He acted in some commercials before he was signed by T.A.T., the production company that created "Diff'rent Strokes."

After the show was canceled, Coleman continued to get credits for TV guest shots and other small roles over the years, but he never regained more than a shadow of his old popularity. At one point he worked as a security guard.

Coleman played upon his child-star image as he tried to resurrect his entertainment career in recent years, appearing on late-night shows and "The Surreal Life," a VH1 show devoted to fading celebrities.

His role as a car-washing plantation slave in the 2008 conservative political satire "An American Carol" was cut from the final print. The actor also appeared in last year's "Midgets vs. Mascots," a film that pits little people against mascots in a series of silly contests for a chance to win $1 million. Coleman met with producers of the film earlier this year to ask them to remove a brief scene of frontal nudity that he says he didn't authorize.

Coleman was among 135 candidates who ran in California's bizarre 2003 recall election to replace then-Gov. Gray Davis, whom voters ousted in favor of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Coleman came in eighth place with 12,488 votes, or 0.2 percent, just behind Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt.

Running for office gave him a chance to show another side of himself, he told The Associated Press at the time.

"This is really interesting and cool, and I've been enjoying the heck out of it because I get to be intelligent, which is something I don't get to do very often," he said.

Coleman's health problems went beyond kidney failure. Last fall, he had heart surgery complicated by pneumonia, said his Utah attorney Randy Kester. In February, he suffered a seizure on the set of "The Insider."

Legal disputes also dogged him. In 1989, when Coleman was 21, his mother filed a court request trying to gain control of her son's $6 million fortune, saying he was incapable of handling his affairs. He said the move "obviously stems from her frustration at not being able to control my life."

In a 1993 television interview, he said he had twice tried to kill himself by overdosing on pills.

He moved to Utah in fall 2005, and according to a tally in early 2010, officers were called to assist or intervene with Coleman more than 20 times in the following years. They included a call where Coleman said he had taken dozens of Oxycontin pills and "wanted to die."

Some of the disputes involved his wife, Shannon Price, whom he met on the set of the 2006 comedy "Church Ball" and married in 2007.

In September 2008, a dustup with a fan at a Utah bowling alley led Coleman to plead no contest to disorderly conduct. The fan filed a lawsuit claiming that the actor punched him and ran into him with his truck; the suit was settled out of court.

In February — on his 42nd birthday — he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor criminal mischief charge related to an April 2009 domestic violence incident at his home.

Coleman remained estranged from his parents, Sue and Willie Coleman, who said they learned about his hospitalization and death from media reports.

Sue Coleman said she wanted to reconcile and had been patiently waiting for her son to be ready.

"One of the things that I had prayed for was that nothing like this would happen before we could sit with Gary and Shannon and say, 'We're here and we love you,'" Sue Coleman said. "We just didn't want to push him."

She would not discuss the cause of the estrangement.

 

[JennyOHill2]

'Diff'rent Strokes' Star Gary Coleman Dies

Gary Coleman, best known for his portrayal of the lovable, wisecracking Arnold Jackson on Diff’rent Strokes, died today in a Utah hospital. The 42-year-old actor suffered an intracranial hemorrhage after falling at his Santaquin, Utah, home on Wednesday.

Coleman’s manager released the following statement today: “We are very sad to have to report Mr. Gary Coleman has passed away as of 12:05 PM Mountain Time. He was removed from life support; soon thereafter, he passed quickly and peacefully. By Gary’s bedside were his wife and other close family members. Thanks to everyone for their well-wishing and support during this tragic time. Now that Gary has passed, we know he will be missed because of all the love and support shown in the past couple of days. Gary is now at peace and his memory will be kept in the hearts of those who were entertained by him throughout the years.”

The Illinois-born Coleman, who suffered from a kidney disease that stunted his growth and required him to undergo two transplant operations, found fame early in life, guest starring on The Jeffersons and Good Times before scoring a starring role in 1978 at the age of 10 on the NBC sitcom Diff’rent Strokes as one of two adopted sons of a rich widower. Coleman delighted audiences with his vibrant, seasoned performance, and “Whatchoo talkin’ about, Willis?”—his rapid-fire exclamation of disbelief uttered to his on-screen brother (Todd Bridges)—became one of TV’s most memorable catchphrases. During Diff’rent Strokes eight-season run, Coleman starred in feature films such as 1981’s On the Right Track and 1982’s Jimmy The Kid, as well as TV movies like 1982’s The Kid with the Broken Halo, which served as the basis for the 1982 NBC animated series The Gary Coleman Show. In the 1990s and 2000s, he popped up on a number of TV shows, including The Ben Stiller Show, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Simpsons, The Drew Carey Show, and Son of the Beach. Coleman—who also ran for governor during California’s recall election in 2003, finishing in eighth place—most recently starred in the 2009 mockumentary Midgets Vs. Mascots.

Coleman had been plagued with financial issues (he filed for bankruptcy in 1999) as well as legal ones in later years, including citations for disorderly conduct following incidents with his wife, Shannon Price, whom he met on the set of the 2006 movie Church Ball. In January, after pleading guilty to misdemeanor criminal mischief, he was ordered to pay a fine and attend a domestic violence class. Coleman had been struggling with his health as well, suffering two seizures in 2010; one of them occurred on the set of The Insider in February. Coleman is survived by his wife, Shannon.

 

[Denae]

Dennis Hopper dead at 74
Two-time Academy Award nominee was battling prostate cancer updated 5/29/2010 11:18:01 AM

LOS ANGELES — Dennis Hopper, the high-flying Hollywood wild man whose memorable and erratic career included an early turn in "Rebel Without a Cause," an improbable smash with "Easy Rider" and a classic character role in "Blue Velvet," has died. He was 74.

Hopper died Saturday at his home in the Los Angeles beach community of Venice, surrounded by family and friends, family friend Alex Hitz said. Hopper's manager announced in October 2009 that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

The success of "Easy Rider," and the spectacular failure of his next film, "The Last Movie," fit the pattern for the talented but sometimes uncontrollable actor-director, who also had parts in such favorites as "Apocalypse Now" and "Hoosiers." He was a two-time Academy Award nominee, and in March 2010, was honored with a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.

After a promising start that included roles in two James Dean films, Hopper's acting career had languished as he developed a reputation for throwing tantrums and abusing alcohol and drugs. On the set of "True Grit," Hopper so angered John Wayne that the star reportedly chased Hopper with a loaded gun.

He married five times and led a dramatic life right to the end. In January 2010, Hopper filed to end his 14-year marriage to Victoria Hopper, who stated in court filings that the actor was seeking to cut her out of her inheritance, a claim Hopper denied.

"Much of Hollywood," wrote critic-historian David Thomson, "found Hopper a pain in the neck."

A major hit
All was forgiven, at least for a moment, when he collaborated with another struggling actor, Peter Fonda, on a script about two pot-smoking, drug-dealing hippies on a motorcycle trip through the Southwest and South to take in the New Orleans Mardi Gras.

On the way, Hopper and Fonda befriend a drunken young lawyer (Jack Nicholson, whom Hopper had resisted casting, in a breakout role), but arouse the enmity of Southern rednecks and are murdered before they can return home.

"'Easy Rider' was never a motorcycle movie to me," Hopper said in 2009. "A lot of it was about politically what was going on in the country."

Fonda produced "Easy Rider" and Hopper directed it for a meager $380,000. It went on to gross $40 million worldwide, a substantial sum for its time. The film caught on despite tension between Hopper and Fonda and between Hopper and the original choice for Nicholson's part, Rip Torn, who quit after a bitter argument with the director.

The film was a hit at Cannes, netted a best-screenplay Oscar nomination for Hopper, Fonda and Terry Southern, and has since been listed on the American Film Institute's ranking of the top 100 American films. The establishment gave official blessing in 1998 when "Easy Rider" was included in the United States National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant."

Crashing failure
Its success prompted studio heads to schedule a new kind of movie: low cost, with inventive photography and themes about a young, restive baby boom generation. With Hopper hailed as a brilliant filmmaker, Universal Pictures lavished $850,000 on his next project, "The Last Movie."

The title was prescient. Hopper took a large cast and crew to a village in Peru to film the tale of a Peruvian tribe corrupted by a movie company. Trouble on the set developed almost immediately, as Peruvian authorities pestered the company, drug-induced orgies were reported and Hopper seemed out of control.

When he finally completed filming, he retired to his home in Taos, N.M., to piece together the film, a process that took almost a year, in part because he was using psychedelic drugs for editing inspiration.

When it was released, "The Last Movie" was such a crashing failure that it made Hopper unwanted in Hollywood for a decade. At the same time, his drug and alcohol use was increasing to the point where he was said to be consuming as much as a gallon of rum a day.

Shunned by the Hollywood studios, he found work in European films that were rarely seen in the United States. But, again, he made a remarkable comeback, starting with a memorable performance as a drugged-out journalist in Francis Ford Coppola's 1979 Vietnam War epic, "Apocalypse Now," a spectacularly long and troubled film to shoot. Hopper was drugged-out off camera, too, and his rambling chatter was worked into the final cut.

He went on to appear in several films in the early 1980s, including the well regarded "Rumblefish" and "The Osterman Weekend," as well as the campy "My Science Project" and "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2."

More trouble, another comeback
But alcohol and drugs continued to interfere with his work. Treatment at a detox clinic helped him stop drinking but he still used cocaine, and at one point he became so hallucinatory that he was committed to the psychiatric ward of a Los Angeles hospital.

Upon his release, Hopper joined Alcoholics Anonymous, quit drugs and launched yet another comeback. It began in 1986 when he played an alcoholic ex-basketball star in "Hoosiers," which brought him an Oscar nomination for best supporting actor.

His role as a wild druggie in "Blue Velvet," also in 1986, won him more acclaim, and years later the character wound up No. 36 on the AFI's list of top 50 movie villains.

He returned to directing, with "Colors," "The Hot Spot" and "Chasers."

From that point on, Hopper maintained a frantic work pace, appearing in many forgettable movies and a few memorable ones, including the 1994 hit "Speed," in which he played the maniacal plotter of a freeway disaster. In the 2000s, he was featured in the television series "Crash" and such films as "Elegy" and "Hell Ride."

"Work is fun to me," he told a reporter in 1991. "All those years of being an actor and a director and not being able to get a job — two weeks is too long to not know what my next job will be."

For years he lived in Los Angeles' bohemian beach community of Venice, in a house designed by acclaimed architect Frank Gehry.

In later years he picked up some income by becoming a pitchman for Ameriprise Financial, aiming ads at baby boomers looking ahead to retirement. His politics, like much of his life, were unpredictable. The old rebel contributed money to the Republican Party in recent years, but also voted for Democrat Barack Obama in 2008.

The early years
Dennis Lee Hopper was born in 1936, in Dodge City, Kan., and spent much of his youth on the nearby farm of his grandparents. He saw his first movie at 5 and became enthralled.

After moving to San Diego with his family, he played Shakespeare at the Old Globe Theater.

Scouted by the studios, Hopper was under contract to Columbia until he insulted the boss, Harry Cohn. From there he went to Warner Bros., where he made "Rebel Without a Cause" and "Giant" while in his late teens.

Later, he moved to New York to study at the Actors Studio, where Dean had learned his craft.

Hopper's first wife was Brooke Hayward, the daughter of actress Margaret Sullavan and agent Leland Hayward, and author of the best-selling memoir "Haywire." They had a daughter, Marin, before Hopper's drug-induced violence led to divorce after eight years.

His second marriage, to singer-actress Michelle Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas, lasted only eight days.

A union with actress Daria Halprin also ended in divorce after they had a daughter, Ruthana. Hopper and his fourth wife, dancer Katherine LaNasa, had a son, Henry, before divorcing.

He married his fifth wife, Victoria Duffy, who was 32 years his junior, in 1996, and they had a daughter, Galen Grier.

 

[KindaKinky]

Between Lena, Gary, Corey, and Dennis, it seems that the string of A-Listers and B-Listers dropping like flies since '09 still continues.

And those we wish dead still breathe.

 

[JennyOHill2]

Frank Frazetta, Illustrator, Dies at 82

Helped Define Comic Book Heroes

Frank Frazetta, an illustrator of comic books, movie posters and paperback book covers whose visions of musclebound men fighting with swords and axes to defend scantily dressed women helped define fantasy heroes like Conan, Tarzan and John Carter of Mars, died on Monday in Fort Myers, Fla. He was 82.

The cause was complications from a stroke, said Rob Pistella and Stephen Ferzoco, Mr. Frazetta’s business managers.

Mr. Frazetta was a versatile and prolific comic book artist who, in the 1940s and ’50s, drew for comic strips like Al Capp’s “Lil’ Abner” and comic books like “Famous Funnies,” for which he contributed a series of covers depicting the futuristic adventurer Buck Rogers.

A satirical advertisement Mr. Frazetta drew for Mad earned him his first Hollywood job, the movie poster for “What’s New Pussycat?” (1965), a sex farce written by Woody Allen that starred Peter Sellers. In 1983 he collaborated with the director Ralph Bakshi to produce the animated film “Fire and Ice.”

His most prominent work, however, was on the cover of book jackets, where his signature images were of strikingly fierce, hard-bodied heroes and bosomy, callipygian damsels in distress. In 1966, his cover of “Conan the Adventurer,” a collection of four fantasy short stories written by Robert E. Howard and L. Sprague de Camp, depicted a brawny long-haired warrior standing in repose on top of a pile of skeletons and other detritus, his sword thrust downward into the mound, an apparently naked young woman lying at his feet, hugging his ankle.

The cover created a new look for fantasy adventure novels and established Mr. Frazetta as an artist who could sell books. He illustrated many more Conan books (including “Conan the Conqueror,” “Conan the Usurper” and “Conan the Avenger”) and works by Edgar Rice Burroughs (including “John Carter and the Savage Apes of Mars” and “Tarzan and the Antmen”).

“Paperback publishers have been known to buy one of his paintings for use as a cover, then commission a writer to turn out a novel to go with it,” The New York Times reported in 1977, the same year that a collection of his drawings, “The Fantastic Art of Frank Frazetta,” sold more than 300,000 copies.

Frank Frazzetta was born in Brooklyn on Feb. 9, 1928, and as a boy studied painting at a local art school. (Early in his career, he excised one z from his last name because “with one z it just looked better,” Mr. Pistella said. “He said the two z’s and two t’s was too clumsy.”)

Mr. Frazetta began drawing for comic books of all stripes — westerns, mysteries, fantasies — when he was still a teenager. He was also a good enough baseball player to try out for the New York Giants.

The popularity of Mr. Frazetta’s work coincided with the rise of heavy metal in the early 1970s, and his otherworldly imagery showed up on a number of album covers, including Molly Hatchet’s “Flirtin’ With Disaster” and Nazareth’s “Expect No Mercy.” Last year, Kirk Hammett, the lead guitarist for Metallica, bought Mr. Frazetta’s cover artwork for the paperback reissue of Robert E. Howard’s “Conan the Conqueror” for $1 million.

Mr. Frazetta married Eleanor Kelly, known as Ellie, in 1956. She served as his occasional model and as his business partner; in 2000 she started a small museum of her husband’s work on their property in East Stroudsburg, Pa. She died last year.

Mr. Frazetta is survived by three sisters, Carol, Adel and Jeanie; two sons, Alfonso Frank Frazetta, known as Frank Jr., and William Frazetta, both of East Stroudsburg; two daughters, Heidi Grabin, of Englewood, Fla., and Holly Frazetta, of Boca Grande, Fla.; and 11 grandchildren.

After Ellie Frazetta’s death, her children became embroiled in a custodial dispute over their father’s work, and in December, Frank Jr. was arrested on charges of breaking into the family museum and attempting to remove 90 paintings that had been insured for $20 million. In April, the family said the dispute over the paintings had been resolved, and the Monroe County, Pa., district attorney said he would drop the charges.