Living Stars born in 1913

London-born Douglas Slocombe has long been regarded as one of the film industry's premiere cinematographers, but he began his career as a photojournalist for Life magazine and the Paris-Match newspaper before World War II. During the war he became a newsreel cameraman, and at war's end he went to work for Ealing Studios as a camera operator, making his debut as a full-fledged cinematographer on Ealing's Dead of Night (1945). Slocombe is credited with giving Ealing's films the unique, realistic look it was famous for. He left Ealing and went freelance, not wanting to be tied down to a single studio, and divided his time between England and America. He won the BAFTA--the British equivalent of the Oscar--three times, for The Servant (1963), The Great Gatsby (1974) and Julia (1977). A favorite of director Steven Spielberg, he was noted for never having used a light meter while shooting Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), an almost indispensable tool for most cinematographers.

This velvet-toned jazz baritone and sometime actor was (and perhaps still is) virtually unknown to white audiences. Yet, back in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Herb Jeffries was very big...in black-cast films. Today he is respected and remembered as a pioneer who broke down rusted-shut racial doors in Hollywood and ultimately displayed a positive image as a black actor on celluloid.

The Detroit native was born Umberto Alejandro Ballentino on September 24, 1911 (some sources list 1914). His white Irish mother ran a rooming house, and his father, whom he never knew, was of mixed ancestry and bore Sicilian, Ethiopean, French, Italian and Moorish roots. Young Herb grew up in a mixed neighborhood without experiencing severe racism as a child. He showed definitive interest in singing during his formative teenage years and was often found hanging out with the Howard Buntz Orchestra at various Detroit ballrooms.

After moving to Chicago, he performed in various clubs. One of his first gigs was in a club allegedly owned by Al Capone. Erskine Tate signed the 19-year-old Herb to a contract with his Orchestra at the Savoy Dance Hall in Chicago. While there Herb was spotted by Earl 'Fatha' Hines, who hired him in 1931 for a number of appearances and recordings. It was during the band's excursions to the South that Jeffries first encountered blatant segregation. He left the Hines band in 1934 and eventually planted roots in Los Angeles after touring with Blanche Calloway's band. There he found employment as a vocalist and emcee at the popular Club Alabam. And then came Duke Ellington, staying with his outfit for ten years. Herb started his singing career out as a lyrical tenor, but, on the advice of Duke Ellington's longtime music arranger, Billy Strayhorn, he lowered his range.

The tall, debonair, mustachioed, blue-eyed, light-complexioned man who had a handsome, matinée-styled Latin look, was a suitable specimen for what was called "sepia movies" -- pictures that played only in ghetto and/or segregated theaters and were advertised with an all-black cast. Inspired by the success of Gene Autry, Herb made his debut as a crooning cowboy with Harlem on the Prairie (1937), which was considered the first black western following the inauguration of the talkies. Dark makeup was applied to his light skin and he almost never took off his white stetson which would have revealed naturally brown hair. A popular movie, Herb went on to sing his own songs (to either his prairie flower and/or horse) in both The Bronze Buckaroo (1939) and Harlem Rides the Range (1939). Outside the western venue, he starred in the crimer Two-Gun Man from Harlem (1938). As the whip-snapping, pistol-toting, melody-gushing Bronze Buckaroo, Jeffries finally offered a positive alternative to the demeaning stereotypes laid on black actors. Moreover, he refused to appear in "white" films in which he would have been forced to play in servile support.

In the midst of all this, Herb continued to impress as a singer and made hit records of the singles "In My Solitude", "I Got It Bad and That Ain't Good", "When I Write My Song", Duke Ellington's "Jump for Joy" and his signature song "Flamingo", which became a huge hit in 1941. Some of the songs he did miss out on which could have furthered his name, were "Love Letters" and "Native Boy". During the 1950s Herb worked constantly in Europe, especially in France, where he owned his own Parisian nightclub for a time. He also starred in the title film role of Calypso Joe (1957) co-starring Angie Dickinson and later appeared on episodes of "I Dream of Jeannie", "The Virginian" and "Hawaii Five-0".

Although he very well could have with his light skin tones, the man dubbed "Mr. Flamingo" never tried to pass himself off as white. He was proud of his heritage and always identified himself as black. In the mid-1990s, westerns returned in vogue and Herb recorded a "comeback album" ("The Bronze Buckaroo Rides Again") for Warner Western. During this pleasant career renaissance he has also been asked to lecture at colleges, headline concerts and record CDs. In 1999-2000, at age 88, he recorded the CD "The Duke and I", recreating songs he did with Duke. It also was a tribute honoring the great musician's 100th birthday.

His five marriages, including one to notorious exotic dancer Tempest Storm, produced five children. At age 90-plus, Herb "Flamingo" Jeffries, lived in the Palm Springs area with significant other (and later his fifth wife) Savannah Shippen, who is 45 years his junior, remaining one of the last of the original singing cowboys still alive (along with Monte Hale) until he finally passed away on May 25, 2014, having hit the century mark.

In 2003 he was inducted into the Cowboy Hall of Fame and was invited to sing for President Bush at the White House. He is also the last surviving member of The Great Duke Ellington Orchestra, and certainly deserves proper credit for his historic efforts in films and music.

The multifaceted Ellen Albertini was a student of dance and piano at the age of five, and obtained a B.A. and M.A. in theater from Cornell University. She moved to New York, and studied and worked with the legendary likes of Hanya Holm, Martha Graham, Michael Shurtleff, Uta Hagen, Marcel Marceau, and Jacques Lecoq in Paris. She was an acting coach before she made her debut film appearance in American Drive-in (1985), and later became memorable as the rapping grandmother in The Wedding Singer (1998), "Disco Dottie" in 54 (1998) and the homophobic grandmother in Wedding Crashers (2005).

Margery Mason was born on 27 September 1913 in Hackney, London, England, UK. She was an actress, known for The Princess Bride (1987), Love Actually (2003) and Les Misérables (1998). She was married to Peter Daminoff. She died on 26 January 2014 in Swiss Cottage, Camden, London, England, UK.

One of Hollywood's more high-flying dancers on film, dimpled, robust, fair-haired Marc Platt provided fancy footwork to a handful of "Golden Era" musicals but truly impressed in one vigorous 1950s classic.

Born to a musical family on December 2, 1913 in Pasadena, California as Marcel Emile Gaston LePlat, he was the only child of a French-born concert violinist and a soprano singer. After years on the road, the family finally settled in Seattle, Washington. Following his father's death, his mother found a job at the Mary Ann Wells' dancing school while young Marc earned his keep running errands at the dance school. He eventually became a dance student at the school and trained with Wells for eight years who saw great potential in Marc.

It was Wells who arranged an audition for Marc with the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo when the touring company arrived in Seattle. The artistic director Léonide Massine accepted him at $150 a week and changed his name to Marc Platoff in order to maintain the deception that the company was Russian. A highlight was his dancing as the Spirit of Creation in Massine's legendary piece "Seventh Symphony". Platt also choreographed during his time there, one piece being Ghost Town (1939), which was set to music by Richard Rodgers. While there he met and married (in 1942) dancer Eleanor Marra. They had one son before divorcing in 1947. Ted Le Plat, born in 1944, became a musician as well as a daytime soap and prime-time TV actor.

Anxious to try New York, Marc left the ballet company in 1942 and moved to the Big Apple where he changed his marquee name to the more Americanized "Marc Platt" and pursued musical parts. Following minor roles in the short run musicals "The Lady Comes Across" (January, 1942) with Joe E. Lewis, Mischa Auer and Gower Champion and "Beat the Band" (October-December, 1942) starring Joan Caulfield, Marc and Kathryn Sergava found themselves cast in a landmark musical, the Rodgers and Hammerstein rural classic "Oklahoma!" Choreographer Agnes de Mille showcased them in the ground-breaking extended dream sequence roles of (Dream) Curly and (Dream) Laurey. Platt stayed with the show for a year but finally left after Columbia Pictures signed him to a film contract.

Aside from a couple of short musical films, he made his movie feature debut with a featured role as Tommy in Tonight and Every Night (1945) starring Rita Hayworth. From there he appeared in the Sid Caesar vehicle Tars and Spars (1946) and back with Rita Hayworth in Down to Earth (1947). Columbia tried Marc out as a leading man in one of their second-string musicals When a Girl's Beautiful (1947) opposite Adele Jergens and Patricia Barry but did not make a great impression. Featured again in the non-musical adventure The Swordsman (1948) starring Ellen Drew and Larry Parks and the Italian drama Addio Mimí! (1949) based on Puccini's "La Boheme," Marc's film career dissipated.

After appearing on occasional TV variety shows such as "The Ed Sullivan Show" and "The Colgate Comedy Hour" and following a single return to Broadway in the musical "Maggie" (1953, Platt returned to film again after a five-year absence but when he finally did, he made a superb impression as one of Howard Keel's uncouth but vigorously agile woodsman brothers (Daniel) in MGM's Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954). The film still stands as one of the most impressive dancing pieces of the "Golden Age" of musicals. He followed this with a minor dancing role (it was James Mitchell who played Dream Curly here) in the film version of Oklahoma! (1955).

When the musical film lost favor in the late 1950's, Marc finished off the decade focusing on straight dramatic roles on TV with roles in such rugged series as "Sky King," "Wyatt Earp" and "Dante". By the 1960s Marc had taken off his dance shoes and turned director of the ballet company at New York's Radio City Music Hall. He and his second wife, Jean Goodall, whom he married back in 1951 and had two children (Donna, Michael), also ran a dance studio of their own. Following this they left New York and moved to Fort Myers, Florida where they set up a new dance school.

Marc moved to Northern California to be near family following his wife's death in 1994 and occasionally appeared at the Marin Dance Theatre in San Rafael. One of his last performances was a non-dancing part in "Sophie and the Enchanted Toyshop" at age 89. In 2000, Marc was presented with the Nijinsky Award at the Ballets Russe's Reunion. He appeared in the 2005 documentary Ballets Russes (2005). Platt died at the age of 100 at a hospice in San Rafael from complications of pneumonia. He was survived by his three children.

Born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Louise Currie attended Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York, became interested in acting and began taking courses at Max Reinhardt's drama school in Hollywood. Talent scouts spotted the aspiring actress in the acting workshop's stage productions and pressed her to make the rounds of the Hollywood studios, but Currie remained adamant about staying out of the limelight until she felt she was ready. After graduation, she found an agent (Sue Carol, wife of actor Alan Ladd) and began working in pictures, generally at smaller studios like Monogram and PRC. She appeared in Columbia two-reelers, many B-Westerns and two of Republic's "Golden Age" serials (Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941) and The Masked Marvel (1943)) before leaving the picture profession in the early '50s. With her husband, former actor John Good, she went into a new business: Good (an architectural designer) remodeled houses and Currie decorated them.

Richard L. Bare was born on 12 August 1913 in Turlock, California, USA. He was a director and writer, known for The Islanders (1960), 77 Sunset Strip (1958) and I Sailed to Tahiti with an All Girl Crew (1969). He was married to Gloria Jean Bailey, Jeanne Evans, Julie Van Zandt, Phyllis Coates, Virginia Carpenter and Barbara Joyce. He died on 28 March 2015 in Newport Beach, California, USA.

Elmo Williams was born James Elmo Williams in Lone Wolf, Oklahoma. Orphaned at 16, he attended schools in Oklahoma and New Mexico before moving to Los Angeles. In 1933 he struck up a relationship with film editor Merrill G. White, who hired Williams as his assistant on a business trip to England. He learned the basics of film editing from White and soon gained a reputation as a first-rate editor, doing much work at RKO. In 1947 Williams edited the documentary Design for Death (1947), which earned an Oscar as Best Documentary, and in 1952 he received an Oscar for his editing of the western classic High Noon (1952). He soon branched out into directing, turning out several low-budget efforts for Lippert Pictures and Republic Pictures. Williams journeyed to Europe in 1958 to work as editor and second-unit director on The Vikings (1958) and wound up staying there for several years when he was hired to produce and direct the TV series Tales of the Vikings (1959).

Upon his return to the US, Williams was hired by 20th Century-Fox as a second-unit director. In that capacity, and as associate producer, he was sent back to Europe to work on the WW II epic The Longest Day (1962), helping to stage the film's spectacular battle scenes. He had another extended stay in Europe when he was given the job of Managing Director of European Production for Fox, a position he held until 1966, when he returned to the US to work on another World War II epic, Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970). In 1970 Williams was appointed Vice President in charge of Worldwide Production at Fox, a job he left in 1973 to go into independent production.

Julie Gibson was born on 6 September 1913 in Grant County, Washington, USA. She was an actress, known for Bowery Buckaroos (1947), The Contender (1944) and Chick Carter, Detective (1946). She was married to Charles Barton, Dean Dillman Jr. and Jimmie Grier. She died on 2 October 2019 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

Don Lusk was born on 28 October 1913 in Los Angeles County, California, USA. He was a director and assistant director, known for Lady and the Tramp (1955), Sleeping Beauty (1959) and Alice in Wonderland (1951). He was married to Marjorie Gummerson. He died on 30 December 2018 in San Clemente, California, USA.

Licia Albanese was born on 23 July 1909 in Bari, Apulia, Italy. She was an actress, known for Otello (1948), Serenade (1956) and Great Performances (1971). She was married to Joseph A. Gimma. She died on 15 August 2014 in Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA.

Lotte Koch was born on 9 March 1913 in Brussels, Belgium. She was an actress, known for The Heart of a Queen (1940), Export in Blond (1950) and Die schwarze Robe (1944). She was married to Ernst von Klipstein and Dieter von Klipstein. She died on 26 May 2013 in Munich, Unterhaching, Bavaria, Germany.

André Lavagne was born on 12 July 1913 in Paris, France. He was a composer, known for Un chien et madame (1949), A Love Under an Umbrella (1951) and L'amour maternel chez les animaux (1944). He died on 21 March 2014 in Paris, France.

Mario Sequi was born on 30 June 1913 in Monserrato, Sardinia, Italy. He is a director and writer, known for Cronaca di un delitto (1953), Altura (1949) and Monastero di Santa Chiara (1949).