Deaths: November 12
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- Producer
- Writer
- Actor
Stan Lee was an American comic-book writer, editor, and publisher, who was executive vice president and publisher of Marvel Comics.
Stan was born in New York City, to Celia (Solomon) and Jack Lieber, a dress cutter. His parents were Romanian Jewish immigrants. Lee co-created Spider-Man, the Hulk, Doctor Strange, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Daredevil, Thor, the X-Men, and many other fictional characters, introducing a thoroughly shared universe into superhero comic books. In addition, he challenged the comics' industry's censorship organization, the Comics Code Authority, indirectly leading to it updating its policies. Lee subsequently led the expansion of Marvel Comics from a small division of a publishing house to a large multimedia corporation.
He had cameo appearances in many Marvel film and television projects, with many yet to come, posthumously. A few of these appearances are self-aware and sometimes reference Lee's involvement in the creation of certain characters.
On 16 July 2017, Lee was named a Disney Legend, a hall of fame program that recognizes individuals who have made an extraordinary and integral contribution to The Walt Disney Company.
Stan was married to Joan Lee for almost 70 years, until her death. The couple had two children. Joan died on July 6, 2017. Stan died on November 12, 2018, in LA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Al Ruscio was born on 2 June 1924 in Salem, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor, known for Showgirls (1995), The Phantom (1996) and The Godfather Part III (1990). He was married to Kate Williamson. He died on 12 November 2013 in Encino, Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Composer
- Music Department
He was born into a Jewish family in Berlin but he was raised as a Lutheran to protect him from Nazi persecution. He fled Germany to Italy in 1937 as he was about to be inducted into the Hitler youth movement. After attending a music conservatory in Rome, he obtained a scholarship to the University of Cincinnati and immigrated to the United States in 1939 penniless to avoid being conscripted by German military authorities. Arriving at age of 18 and unable to speak a word of English, he took the last name of his adopted father, Elliott B. Hague, an eye surgeon with close ties to the university. He graduated in 1942 and served in the U.S. military for more than two years before embarking on a career as a composer. (1955) He celebrated his first Broadway success with the opening of the hit 1955 musical 'Plain and Fancy,' an Amish-themed show that featured Barbara Cook and the popular song `Young and Foolish.'- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Charles 'Honi' Coles was born on 2 April 1911 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. He was an actor, known for Dirty Dancing (1987), Rocky II (1979) and The Cotton Club (1984). He was married to Marion Coles. He died on 12 November 1992 in New York City, New York, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
For over five decades veteran character actor Dave Willock could be spotted as your friendly neighbor, buddy or unassuming blue-collar in hundreds of assorted films--both comedy and drama. Tall and lanky marked with a slightly long, gaunt puss, flat vocal pattern and jug-like ears, he was for the most part an amiable guy who blended in unobtrusively as a benign servile -- cabbie, clerk, usher, soda jerk, photographer, messenger boy, bellhop, etc. Decades later he was handed minor but steady work via Jerry Lewis, Robert Aldrich and Walt Disney.
Born in Chicago, Illinois on August 13, 1909 to non-professionals, Dave began his career in theater and drama while a student at the University of Wisconsin. Following college studies, he entered vaudeville as part of the comedy team of "Willock & Carson," an act he put together with future actor Jack Carson. From vaudeville he and Carson transitioned into radio, appearing first on Bing Crosby's "Kraft Music Hall" in 1938. Carson became the bigger star of the two and when he received his own show ("The Jack Carson Show") he utilized his old friend and partner's talents in a second-banana position playing Carson's smart-mouthed nephew Tugwell.
On his own, Dave made his film debut in a student bit in Good Girls Go to Paris (1939) and remained in the overlooked, often unbilled category throughout the war years. His small but amiable bits included various army buddies, benign suitors and dependable sidekicks. Some of his more visible featured roles came in war-era musicals and comedies such as Priorities on Parade (1942), Lucky Jordan (1942), Let's Face It (1943), The Gang's All Here (1943)- Pin Up Girl (1944), She's a Sweetheart (1944) and Joe Palooka, Champ (1946), but nothing he was seen in was big enough to maneuver him into the top character ranks. He was seen to better advantage with the coming of TV, where he dotted a number of comedies, dramas and sitcom series.
A perennial support player, he appeared in a number of cult sci-fi classics of the 1950s including It Came from Outer Space (1953), Revenge of the Creature (1955) and Queen of Outer Space (1958). In later years he served as a minor foil for Jerry Lewis when the comedian went solo in such film vehicles as The Delicate Delinquent (1957), The Geisha Boy (1958), The Ladies Man (1961), The Nutty Professor (1963), The Patsy (1964) and The Disorderly Orderly (1964). Dave was a utility player as well for director Robert Aldrich in such films as Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964), The Legend of Lylah Clare (1968), The Grissom Gang (1971), and Emperor of the North (1973), with his most famous Aldrich role being that of Bette Davis and Joan Crawford's vaudeville father in the classic grand guignol shocker What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962). Disney kept him fairly busy in their TV and film features from the late 1950s into the 1970s, and he was a favorite casting choice of Jack Webb for Dragnet and Adam-12 (where he'd appear as a good-natured barfly or a pharmacist). Willock was also heard but not seen in animated cartoons, notably as the narrator of the Wacky Races (1968) kiddie cartoon.
Retired by the late 1970s, Dave passed away on November 12, 1990 of complications from a stroke in Woodland Hills, California at the age of 81.- David Oliver was born on 31 January 1962 in Concord, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Night of the Creeps (1986), A Year in the Life (1987) and A Year in the Life (1986). He died on 12 November 1992 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- David Pearson was born on 22 December 1934 in Spartanburg, South Carolina, USA. He was married to Helen Ray. He died on 12 November 2018 in Spartanburg, South Carolina, USA.
- Actress
- Soundtrack
Diane Brewster was born on March 11, 1931, in Kansas City, Missouri. She was largely a character actress in both motion pictures and television. She was 24 years old when she began acting on TV. Her first role was in a few episodes of the westerns Cheyenne (1955) and Zane Grey Theatre (1956). Her first motion picture roles was as Sylvia Quentin in Pharaoh's Curse (1957) in 1956. However, most older viewers remember her as the attractive grade school teacher Miss Canfield on the popular TV comedy series Leave It to Beaver (1957). While her last big screen appearance was as Kate Lawrence in The Young Philadelphians (1959) in 1959, Diane made one more TV appearance on Family Affair (1966) in 1966. Afterwards, Diane retired from the camera. Diane died of heart failure on November 12, 1991. She was 60 years old.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Eve Arden was born Eunice Mary Quedens in Mill Valley, California (near San Francisco), and was interested in show business from an early age. At 16, she made her stage debut after quitting school to join a stock company. After appearing in minor roles in two films under her real name, Eunice Quedens, she found that the stage offered her the same minor roles. By the mid 30s, one of these minor roles would attract notice as a comedy sketch in the stage play "Ziegfeld Follies".
By that time, she had changed her name to Eve Arden, which she adopted while looking over some cosmetics and spotting the names "Evening in Paris" and "Elizabeth Arden". In 1937, she garnered some attention with a small role in Oh, Doctor (1937), which led to her being cast in a minor role in the film Stage Door (1937). By the time the film was finished, her part had expanded into the wise-cracking, fast-talking friend to the lead. She would play virtually the character for most of her career.
While her sophisticated wise-cracking would never make her the lead, she would be a busy actress in dozens of movies over the next dozen years. In At the Circus (1939), she was the acrobatic Peerless Pauline opposite Groucho Marx and the Russian sharp shooter in the comedy The Doughgirls (1944). For her role as Ida in Mildred Pierce (1945), she received an Academy Award nomination. Famous for her quick ripostes, this led to work in Radio during the 1940s. In 1948, CBS Radio premiered "Our Miss Brooks", which would be the perfect show for her character. As her film career began to slow, CBS would take the popular radio show to television in 1952. The television series Our Miss Brooks (1952) would run through 1956 and led to the movie Our Miss Brooks (1956).
When the show ended, Arden tried another television series, The Eve Arden Show (1957), but it was soon canceled. In the 1960s, Arden raised a family and did a few guest roles, until her come-back television series The Mothers-In-Law (1967). This show, co-starring Kaye Ballard ran for two seasons. After that, she would make more unsold pilots, a couple of television movies and a few guest shots. She returned in occasional cameo appearances including as Principal McGee in Grease (1978), and Warden June in Pandemonium (1982).- Additional Crew
- Writer
Frederick Patten was born on 11 December 1940 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was a writer, known for Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (1979), Lupin the 3rd: The Mystery of Mamo (1978) and Vampire Hunter D (1985). He died on 12 November 2018 in the USA.Fred Patten- Actor
- Camera and Electrical Department
Gabriele Tinti was born on 22 August 1932 in Molinella, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. He was an actor, known for Endgame - Bronx lotta finale (1983), The Flight of the Phoenix (1965) and Le sette spade del vendicatore (1962). He was married to Laura Gemser and Norma Bengell. He died on 12 November 1991 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.- Gustavo Escanlar was a writer and actor, known for Las Novias de Travolta (2009) and El hombre de Walter (1995). He died on 12 November 2010 in Montevideo, Uruguay.
- Helen Borgers was born on 9 August 1957 in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. She died on 13 November 2017 in the USA.
- Actor
- Writer
Ian Cullen first trod the boards in a village pantomime at the age of four and has been an actor ever since. He became a household name when he played PC Joe Skinner in Z Cars (1962), first appearing in 1969, the character was later promoted to Detective and stayed with the show for 6 years, until he was gunned down in the line of duty in one of TV's biggest shocks in the mid 70s.
Other recurring roles include the classic 60s hospital drama Emergency-Ward 10 (1957), where he played Warren Kent (1966-67), When the Boat Comes In (1976), as Geordie Watson (1977-81) and as Angus Hart, the original lead of the Channel 5 soap opera Family Affairs (1997). Ian's character, Angus Hart, was also killed in a shock storyline when the entire Hart family were killed in a boat explosion. He has also guest starred in many British television series, including Doctor Who (1963), The Bill (1984), Blake's 7 (1978) and Sorry! (1981).
Ian's stage work is extensive and has seen him perform all over the Country, with 8 West End productions to his name and 2 years with the Royal Shakespeare Company. He won rave reviews for his performance as Jay in 'Road to the Sea' at the Orange Tree Theatre, in 2003.
In 2008 he won a Gold Award for his narration of the feature length documentary The Destiny of Britain (2007). Constantly busy, Ian also runs the Surrey Heath Youth Actors Company with his wife, actress Yvonne Quenet. They have been married for over 30 years and have three daughters.- Igor Luchenok was born on 6 August 1938 in Minskaya oblast, USSR. He was a composer, known for Rudobelskaya respublika (1971), Tretyego ne dano (1980) and Din Rid v zhizni i v pesne (1986). He was married to Alexandra Chekanova. He died on 12 November 2018 in Minsk, Belarus.
- Writer
- Music Department
- Actor
Author, playwright and composer Ira Levin decided on a career of a writer at the age of 15. Educated at the elite Horace Mann school, he went on to two years at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, before transferring to New York University, where he majored in philosophy and English. He earned his degree in 1950. In 1953 he was drafted into the army. Based in Queens, New York, he wrote and produced training films for Uncle Sam before moving into television, penning scripts for such anthology series as Lights Out (1946) and The United States Steel Hour (1953). He made a bright theatre debut at the age of 25 with an adaptation of Mac Hyman's "No Time for Sergeants" (1955). He went on to write several plays, including the longest-running Broadway mystery to date, "Deathtrap" (1978), and several popular novels, including "A Kiss Before Dying", and other plays including "Critics Choice" and "Interlock" and the Broadway stage score and libretto for "Drat the Cat!". Joining ASCAP in 1965, he wrote the popular gospel song "He Touched Me" with his chief musical collaborator Milton Schafer.- Jarma Lewis was born on 5 June 1931 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA. She was an actress, known for The Tender Trap (1955), The Magnetic Monster (1953) and The Prodigal (1955). She was married to Benjamin Edward Bensinger III. She died on 12 November 1985 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Director
Born in Danbury, Connecticut, USA, to Greg and Mary, Jonathan Brandis began his career at age 5, acting in several television commercials. He also appeared in small parts in several films and TV shows before his first starring role in the 1990 film The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter (1990). He starred in popular films such as Ladybugs (1992) and starred as Lucas Wolenczak in Steven Spielberg's television series SeaQuest 2032 (1993). He doubled up his high school courses so he could finish a year early for his role on SeaQuest. After his career stalled for a bit, he was hoping his role in serious drama film Hart's War (2002) would relaunch it. However, most of his scenes ended up being cut from the finished film. This caused him to fall into a deep depression in which he would drink heavily and tragically end his own life on November 12th, 2003.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Kay E. Kuter was born on 25 April 1925 in Los Angeles, California, USA. He was an actor, known for The Last Starfighter (1984), Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993) and Watermelon Man (1970). He died on 12 November 2003 in Burbank, California, USA.- Actor
- Composer
- Soundtrack
Kurt Kaiser was born on 17 December 1933 in the USA. He was an actor and composer, known for A Bronx Tale (1993), The Heart Is a Rebel (1958) and Way Out (1966). He was married to Patricia Anderson. He died on 12 November 2018 in Waco, Texas, USA.- Liz Smith was born on 2 February 1923 in Fort Worth, Texas, USA. She was an actress, known for Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992), The Smurfs (2011) and The Fan (1981). She was married to Fred Lister and George Edward Beeman. She died on 12 November 2017 in New York, USA.
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Luciano Marin was born on 9 December 1931 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was an actor and assistant director, known for The Giants of Thessaly (1960), Maciste contro i mostri (1962) and Hercules and the Captive Women (1961). He was married to Nennella Carotenuto. He died on 12 November 2019 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.- Actress
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Born in Oaxaca, Mexico, Lupita Tovar appeared first in silent Fox films before making the move to Universal and co-starring in the Spanish-language version of 1930's "The Cat Creeps" (La voluntad del muerto (1930)). For the same producer, Czech-born Paul Kohner, she appeared as Eva Seward (the Spanish-language counterpart of Helen Chandler's Mina) in Universal's Spanish Dracula (1931). In 1932, she married Kohner, who later became one of the top agents in Hollywood. (Their actress-daughter, Susan Kohner, was Oscar-nominated for her performance in Universal's 1959 Imitation of Life (1959); their son, Pancho Kohner, is a producer). Tovar gave up films in the 1940s and has been widowed since 1988.- Martin Sagner was born on 11 August 1932 in Novigrad Podravski, Croatia, Yugoslavia. He was an actor, known for Abeceda straha (1961), Punom parom (1978) and Breza (1967). He was married to Zorica Bajgot-Sagner. He died on 12 November 2019 in Zagreb, Croatia.
- Director
- Writer
- Soundtrack
Michel Chapuis was born on 15 January 1930 in Dole, Jura, France. He was a director and writer, known for Tout voir (1967), Saint-Jacques... La Mecque (2005) and Le mas Théotime (1969). He died on 12 November 2017 in Dole, Jura, France.- Actor
- Music Department
- Composer
Mitch Mitchell was born on 9 July 1947 in Ealing, Middlesex, England, UK. He was an actor and composer, known for The Groundstar Conspiracy (1972), Jennings at School (1958) and The Mend (2014). He was married to Lynn Collins. He died on 12 November 2008 in Portland, Oregon, USA.- Oscar Alegre was born on 10 January 1939 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was an actor, known for The Motorcycle Diaries (2004), Tocá para mí (2001) and Chile 672 (2006). He died on 12 November 2016 in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
- Actress
- Soundtrack
Her father was Irish Philadelphian newspaperman, Benny McNulty. He was related to Jim Farley, Roosevelt's campaign manager and later U.S. Postmaster General. As a child, she sang songs at a silent movie theater. After the sixth grade she joined a touring vaudeville act called "The Kiddie Kabaret." Billed as Penny McNulty, she sang and danced with Milton Berle and Gene Raymond. Her first speaking part was in a Jack Benny Broadway show, "Great Temptations".
Moving to Hollywood, she took a new name after marrying dentist Lawrence Singleton. Her first name derived from having saved large amounts of penny coins. She played a tough nightclub dancer in After the Thin Man (1936) and acted/sang/danced in Swing Your Lady (1938), one of the movies Humphrey Bogart regarded as his worst. Though naturally a brunette, she bleached her hair blonde ever since she got the role of Blondie in that long-lived series.- A popular character actor who played straight man to, among other comic greats, Bob Hope, Milton Berle, Jerry Lewis & Dean Martin, Jack Benny, and Red Skelton, Leeds accompanied Hope on 14 international USO tours. Appeared on Broadway with Mickey Rooney and Ann Miller in "Sugar Babies." Leeds' long television career peaked during the 1950s and 1960s but continued through the 1980s.
- Raju Mathew was born in 1937 in India. He was a producer, known for Athirathram (1984), Vrutham (1987) and Aanaval Mothiram (1990). He died on 12 November 2019 in Kottayam, Kerala, India.
- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Sir Robert's career fell into two distinct parts. In the '60s, he was widely regarded as the heir of Laurence Olivier. But, after his departure from Britain's National Theatre in 1970 and the breakup of his marriage with Maggie Smith three years later, he suffered a slump made worse by heavy drinking. In the '90s, the Royal Shakespeare Company invited him to play first Falstaff in "Henry IV" and then Lear in "King Lear", and this re-established Stephens's career. He was knighted early in 1995.- Additional Crew
- Actor
- Writer
Russell Clark was born on 8 August 1949 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for Fallen (1998), The New Guy (2002) and Major Payne (1995). He died on 12 November 2002 in Hollywood, California, USA.- Actor
- Art Department
- Costume and Wardrobe Department
Tom Neyman was born on 23 November 1935 in Brownsville, Texas, USA. He was an actor, known for Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966), Manos Returns (2018) and Hands: The Fate of 'Manos' (2015). He was married to Kay Elizabeth Wade, Phyllis A. Steele, Jacqueline Neyman and Jackey Reace Lumpkin. He died on 13 November 2016 in Falls City, Oregon, USA.- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Lancashire-born Warren Clarke was an actor of immense presence and considerable versatility who turned his wide-shouldered, robust appearance and lived-in, hangdog facial features into an asset. For more than two and a half decades he had toiled in a wide variety of supporting roles before finding international success as the often crude, irascible, heavy-drinking Superintendant Andy Dalziel in TV's Dalziel and Pascoe (1996). When the series began, Clarke had summed up Dalziel as 'a beer-swilling chauvinist pig', but the character evolved and became more complex and endearing (in a curmudgeonly sort of way) over the show's eleven-year duration. There were also commonalities between the actor and his creation: impatience, a reputation for not tolerating fools gladly; a humorous, irreverent nature and a shared dislike for political correctness. In private life, Clarke was passionate about football (a lifelong Manchester City supporter) and golf.
The son of a hard-working stained glass maker, Clarke developed his love for the performing arts while in his teens. A frequent visitor to the cinema for Saturday morning and matinée screenings ("Flash Gordon" seemed to have been a particular favourite), he was actively encouraged by his parents to follow his chosen vocation. He performed in amateur theatrics, meanwhile earning his money as a copy boy, running errands for the Manchester Evening News, then working in a fruit and vegetable market before securing his first acting gig with Huddersfield Rep at the age of eighteen. Clarke once recalled his first performance, as an elderly German academic, which was marred by a make-up malfunction when the self-raising flour he had put in his hair to make it appear white mixed with perspiration, turned to dough and ran down his face. He would eventually master the stage (enacting, among other parts, Caligula in John Mortimer's 1972 adaptation of "I, Claudius" and Winston Churchill in "Three Days in May" at the West End, a performance the reviewer of The Guardian described as "utterly persuasive").
From the late 1960's, Clarke found more or less regular television work, at first with Granada in series like The Avengers (1961) and Callan (1967). For years he remained a struggling actor, earning barely enough to make ends meet. He performed on stage at the Royal Court in London, and, to improve his situation, earned a second income as a van driver. He finally attracted attention on the big screen as a violent, bowler-hatted thug in Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange (1971). The turning point in Clarke's career was his role as a pig-headed manager of an engineering firm involved in a chalk-and-cheese relationship with a liberal-minded academic in Nice Work (1989). In the years between, his expressive features graced a succession of diverse leading and supporting parts in both comedy and drama: Churchill in ITV's Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill (1974); Quasimodo in the 1976 television version of "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"; a mutinous Roman soldier in the epic miniseries Masada (1981); a surly East German STASI officer in the uproarious parody Top Secret! (1984); a pig-fixated Regency period industrialist in Blackadder the Third (1987); stalwart, bewhiskered Lawrence Boythorne in BBC's outstanding production of Bleak House (2005); "pathetically nice" market gardener Brian Addis in the first two seasons of Down to Earth (2000). Clarke's guest appearances were prolific: from Elsie Tanner's nephew in Coronation Street (1960) to a querulous diabetic patient in Call the Midwife (2012).
Always a welcome presence in period drama, he had been cast in Poldark (2015), a remake of the popular 1975 miniseries, based on the novels by Winston Graham. Filming had already begun in Bristol and Cornwall when Clarke died in his sleep at the age of 67.- Wendy Pepper was born on 23 August 1964 in Dayton, Ohio, USA. She died on 12 November 2017 in Washington, District of Columbia, USA.
- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Billy Wilder proclaimed William Holden to be "the ideal motion picture actor". For almost four decades, the handsome, affable 'Golden Holden' was among Hollywood's most durable and engaging stars. He was born William Franklin Beedle Jr., one of three sons to a high school English teacher, Mary Blanche (Ball), and a chemical and fertilizer analyst, William Franklin Beedle, head of the George W. Gooch Laboratories in Pasadena. His father, a keen physical fitness enthusiast, taught young Bill the art of tumbling and boxing. During his days as a student at South Pasadena High, he also became adept at team sports (football and baseball), learned to ride and shoot and to be proficient on piano, clarinet and drums.
To his father's chagrin, Bill had no inclination of following in dad's footsteps, though he did major in chemistry at Pasadena Junior College. A trip to New York and Broadway had set Bill's path firmly on an acting career. He had already performed in school plays and lent his voice to several radio plays in Los Angeles by the time he was spotted by a Paramount talent scout (playing the part of octogenarian Eugene Curie) at the Pasadena Workshop Theatre. In early 1938, he was offered a six-month studio contract for a weekly salary of $50. Naturally, the name Beedle had to go. Several alternatives were bandied around -- including Randolph Carey and Taylor Randolph - until the head of Paramount's publicity department settled on the name Holden (based on a personal friend who was an associate editor at the L.A. Times, also named Bill).
Having joined Paramount's Golden Circle Club of promising young actors, Bill was now groomed for stardom. However, it was a loan-out to Columbia that secured him his breakthrough role. He was the sixty-sixth actor to audition for the part of an Italian violinist forced to become a boxer in Golden Boy (1939). His earlier training as a junior pugilist proved somewhat beneficial but it was self-effacing co-star Barbara Stanwyck who turned out to be most instrumental in helping him rehearse and overcoming his nerves to act alongside her and thespians Lee J. Cobb and Adolphe Menjou. The picture was a minor hit and Columbia consequently acquired half his contract. For the next few years, Bill continued playing wholesome, guy-next-door types and rookie servicemen in pictures like Our Town (1940), I Wanted Wings (1941) (which was the making of 'peek-a-boo' star Veronica Lake) and The Fleet's In (1942). His salary had been enhanced and he now earned $150 a week. In July 1941, he married 25-year old actress Brenda Marshall, who commanded five times his income.
In 1942, he enlisted in the Officers Candidate School in Florida, graduating as an Air Force second lieutenant. He spent the next three years on P.R. duties and making training films for the Office of Public Information. One of his brothers, a naval pilot, was shot down and killed over the Pacific in 1943. After war's end, he was demobbed and returned to Hollywood to resume playing similar characters in similar movies. He later commented that he found "no interest or enjoyment" in portraying the same type of "nice-guy meaningless roles in meaningless movies". That was to change - along with his image - when he was invited to play the part of caddish, down-on-his-luck scriptwriter Joe Gillis in Sunset Blvd. (1950). The brilliantly acidulous screenplay was by Charles Brackett and director Billy Wilder (from their story A Can of Beans) and the story was narrated in flashback by Bill's character, opening with Gillis floating face-down in the swimming pool of a decrepit mansion "of the kind crazy people bought in the 20s".
With Sunset Blvd. (1950), Holden had effectively graduated from leading man to leading actor. No longer typecast, he was now allowed more hard-edged or even morally ambiguous roles: a self-serving, cynical prisoner-of-war in Stalag 17 (1953) (for which he won an Academy Award); an unemployed drifter who disrupts and changes the lives (particularly of womenfolk) in a small Kansas town, in Picnic (1955); a happy-go-lucky gigolo (who, as Billy Wilder explained the part to Bill, gets the sports car while Bogey -- Humphrey Bogart -- gets the girl), in the delightful Sabrina (1954); and an ill-fated U.S. Navy pilot in The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954), set during the Korean War. Clever dialogue and the Holden likability factor also improved what potentially could have turned out dull or maudlin in pictures like Forever Female (1953) and Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955).
Already one of the highest paid stars of the 1950s, Holden received 10% of the gross for The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), making him an instant multi-millionaire. He invested much of his earnings in various enterprises, even a radio station in Hong Kong. At the end of the decade, he relocated his family to Geneva, Switzerland, but spent more and more of his own time globetrotting. In the 1960s, Holden founded the exclusive Mount Kenya Safari Club with oil billionaire Ray Ryan and Swiss financier Carl Hirschmann. His fervent advocacy of wildlife conservation now consumed more of his time than his acting. His films, consequently, dropped in quality.
Drinking ever more heavily, he also started to show his age. By the time he appeared as the leader of an outlaw gang on their last roundup in Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch (1969), his face was so heavily lined that someone likened it to 'a map of the United States.' He still had a couple more good performances in him, in The Towering Inferno (1974) and Network (1976), until his shock death from blood loss due to a fall at his apartment while intoxicated. In 1982, actress Stefanie Powers, with whom he had been in a relationship since 1972, helped set up the William Holden Wildlife Foundation and the William Holden Wildlife Education Center in Kenya. Bill also has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. His wanderlust has left traces of him all over the world.- Wilma Glodean Rudolph (June 23, 1940 - November 12, 1994) was an American track and field sprinter, who competed in the 100 and 200 meters dash. Rudolph was considered the fastest woman in the world in the 1960s and competed in two Olympic Games, in 1956 and in 1960.
In the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Rudolph became the first American woman to win three gold medals in track and field during a single Olympic Games. A track and field champion, she elevated women's track to a major presence in the United States. As a member of the black community, she is also regarded as a civil rights and women's rights pioneer. Along with other 1960 Olympic athletes such as Cassius Clay (who later became Muhammad Ali), Rudolph became an international star due to the first international television coverage of the Olympics that year.
The powerful sprinter emerged from the 1960 Rome Olympics as "The Tornado, the fastest woman on earth". The Italians nicknamed her La Gazzella Nera ("The Black Gazelle"); to the French she was La Perle Noire ("The Black Pearl"). - Composer
- Actor
- Editor
Zoran Hristic was born on 30 July 1938 in Belgrade, Serbia, Yugoslavia. He was a composer and actor, known for Love and Rage (1978), The Elusive Summer of '68 (1984) and Nemirni (1967). He was married to Eva Laban and Gordana Hristic. He died on 12 November 2019 in Belgrade, Serbia.