I have lost track of how many times I have seen Gone With the Wind.
edgar, I don't believe that there is one person on our forum that doesn't know about Gone With the Wind.
I didn't ,however, know that Vivienne Leigh was born in Calcutta and died in London of TB.
Anything by Cole Porter is alright with me.
Now, for my last song of the night, Janis Ian does Jesse. Mm mm mm.
I made this video but all the words on the first slide don't show. I'll need to do it over.
How Much Is That Doggie In The Window
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
The one with the waggly tail
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
I do hope that doggie's for sale
I must take a trip to California
And leave my poor sweet heart alone
If he has a dog he won't be lonesome
And the doggie will have a good home
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
The one with the waggly tail
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
I do hope that doggie's for sale
I read in the paper there are robbers [Waf, waf]
With flash lights that shine in the dark
My love needs a doggie to protect him
And scare them away with one bark
I don't want a bunny or a kitty
I don't want a parrot that talks
I don't want a bowl of little fishies
You can't take a goldfish for a walk
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
The one with the waggly tail
How much is that doggie in the window? [Arf, arf]
I do hope that doggie's for sale
Good morning, WA2K radio audience.
Victor, I know the melody to your "doggie" song so it doesn't matter that it didn't play for me on your link. Thanks, buddy, and we'll dedicate that to Phoenix.
edgar, glad you remembered to provide us with "Jesse" because that is a lovely song by Janis Ian, even though it's a bit sad. Thanks, Texas.
Strangely, folks, I love the theme to the TV show Cold Case, and here is a combination of a travel logue and the music.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZuZ1eGEsqM&feature=related
Risë Stevens
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Risë Stevens (born June 11, 1913, (95) New York City) (first name properly spelled Risë and pronounced "REE-sah") is a retired American mezzo-soprano who captured a wide popular audience at the height of her career (1940 - 1960).
She studied at New York's Juilliard School of Music for three years. She went to Vienna, where she was trained by Marie Gutheil-Schoder and Herbert Graf. She made her début as Mignon in Prague in 1936 and stayed there until 1938, also appearing in guest appearances at the Vienna State Opera. Her Octavian in Der Rosenkavalier was one of her finest and most accomplished roles. She was engaged at the Teatro Colón in 1938 (again as Octavian) and was invited to the Glyndebourne Festival in 1939 where she was heard as Dorabella and Cherubino. In 1938 she made her début at the Metropolitan Opera as Mignon. Three days later, she sang Octavian opposite Lotte Lehmann. The singer's beautiful voice and attractive appearance led the film industry in Hollywood to produce several films with her, including The Chocolate Soldier (1941) with Nelson Eddy and Going My Way (1944) with Bing Crosby, the latter film crediting Stevens as a contralto.
For over two decades (until 1961) Stevens was the Met's leading mezzo-soprano and the only mezzo to command the top billing (and commensurate fees) normally awarded only to star sopranos and tenors. Her most successful roles there included Cherubino, Octavian, Dalila, Laura, Hänsel and Marina. She was especially celebrated for her Carmen, which she both performed and recorded several times. Stevens virtually owned the role during her tenure. Her combination of scrupulous artistry, rich vocal color and movie-star glamour earned her the adulation of a wide public beyond the Met's stage, and she frequently appeared on the nascent medium of television. She also appeared in Paris, London, at La Scala and at the Glyndebourne. She sang her last performance, as Carmen, at the Met in 1961. In 1962, she recorded the voice of Glinda for Journey Back to Oz, but the film was not released until the early 1970s. After her retirement from the opera stage, Stevens served as General Manager of the Metropolitan Opera Touring Company until 1966 and later coached the new generation of singers at the Met.
Gerald Mohr
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Born June 11, 1914(1914-06-11)
New York City
Died November 9, 1968 (aged 54)
Stockholm, Sweden
Spouse(s) Rita Deneau (1938-1957) (divorced)
Mai Dietrich (1958-1968)
Gerald Mohr (11 June 1914 - 9 November 1968) was a radio, film and television character actor who appeared in over 500 radio plays, 73 films and over 100 television shows.
The New York City-born actor was educated in Dwight Preparatory School in New York, where he learned to speak fluent French and German, and also learned to ride horses and play the piano. At Columbia University, where he was on a course to become a doctor, Mohr took ill with appendicitis and was recovering in a hospital when another patient, a radio broadcaster, recognised that Mohr's pleasant baritone voice would be ideal for radio work. Mohr joined the radio station and became a junior reporter. In the mid-1930s Orson Welles invited him to join his formative Mercury Theatre. During his time with the company, Mohr gained theatrical experience on the Broadway stage in The Petrified Forest and starred in Jean Christophe. He subsequently became a radio actor on such shows as Ann of the Airlanes.
Mohr appeared in over 500 radio plays throughout the 1930s, 1940s and early 1950s. Most notably, he starred as Raymond Chandler's hardboiled detective, Philip Marlowe, 1948-1951, in 119 half-hour radio plays. He also was the star of The Adventures of Bill Lance[1] and frequently starred in The Whistler.
He began appearing in films in the late 1930s, playing his first principal villain role in the 15-part cliffhanger serial Jungle Girl (1941). Then, after three years' war service in the American Air Force (1942-45), he returned to film work, starring as Michael Lanyard in three movies of "The Lone Wolf" series in 1946-47. He also made a cameo appearance in Gilda (1946), and Detective Story (1951), and co-starred in "The Magnificent Rogue" (1946) and The Sniper (1952). During 1949 he was co-announcer, along with Fred Foy, and episode narrator of 12 of the shows of the first series of The Lone Ranger TV series, starring Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels.
From the 1950s onwards, he appeared as guest star in over 100 television shows, including TV Westerns Maverick, Cheyenne, Bronco, Sugarfoot and Bonanza, as well as episodes of Perry Mason, 77 Sunset Strip, Hawaiian Eye, Lost in Space and many other series of the era, especially those being produced by Warner Brothers Studios and Dick Powell's Four Star Productions. [2]
Mohr also made guest appearances in a number of light comedy shows, including The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1951), I Love Lucy (1953), The Jack Benny Program (1961 & 1962),The Smothers Brothers Show (1965) and The Lucy Show (1968). He also had the recurring role of newsman Brad Jackson in My Friend Irma (1952).
During 1954-55, he starred as Christopher Storm in 39 episodes of the third series of "Foreign Intrigue - Cross Current", produced in Stockholm for American distribution. During several episodes of "Foreign Intrigue", but most noticeably in "The Confidence Game" and "The Playful Prince", he can be heard playing on the piano his own musical composition, "The Frontier Theme." "Foreign Intrigue" was nominated for an Emmy Award in 1954 under the category "Best Mystery, Action or Adventure Program" and again in 1955 under the category "Best Mystery or Intrigue Series".
Mohr guest starred seven times in the 1957-1962 television series Maverick, twice playing Western outlaw Doc Holliday, a role he reprised once more in "Doc Holliday in Durango", an episode of the TV Western series Tombstone Territory (1958). In one of the "Maverick" episodes he portrayed Steve Corbett, a character based on Bogart's in Casablanca. That episode, "Escape to Tampico," used the set from the original film, this time as a Mexican saloon where Bret Maverick (James Garner) arrives to hunt down Mohr's character for an earlier murder.
Mohr excelled in playing the handsome, charming villain as, for example, in "Escape to Tampico" and also in the lead role of Joe Sapelli in The Blonde Bandit (1950).
Mohr appeared in mostly B-movies throughout his career and starred in My World Dies Screaming aka Terror in the Haunted House (1958) and A Date with Death (1959), both of which were filmed in the experimental Psychorama format, Guns, Girls and Gangsters (1959), and The Angry Red Planet (1960).
During 1964 Mohr, together with his wife Mai, planned the formation of an international film company, headquartered in Stockholm, with Swedish and American writers. The company was to have featured comedy, adventure, crime and drama shows for worldwide distribution. By then fluent in Swedish, he also planned to star in a film for TV in which his character, a newspaperman, would speak only Swedish.
In 1964 he made a comedy Western, filmed in Stockholm and on location in Yugoslavia, called Wild West Story (see Swedish Wikipedia link) in which, unusually, the good guys spoke Swedish and the bad guys (Mohr, inter alia) spoke in English.
He also continued to market his powerful voice, playing Reed Richards (Mister Fantastic) in the Fantastic Four cartoon series during 1967 and Green Lantern in the 1968 animated series Aquaman. Also in 1968 he played the cameo role of Tom Branca in Funny Girl before guest starring in the TV Western series The Big Valley. He then flew to Stockholm, Sweden, in September 1968, to star in the pilot of a proposed new TV series called Private Entrance. Shortly after the completion of filming, he died of a heart attack in the evening of 9 November 1968, in Södermalm, Stockholm, at the age of 54.
Richard Todd
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Born Richard Andrew Palethorpe-Todd
June 11, 1919 (1919-06-11) (age 89)
Dublin, Ireland
Years active 1937 - present
Spouse(s) Catherine Grant-Bogle (1949-1970)
Virginia Mailer (1970-1992)
Awards won
Golden Globe Awards
Most Promising Newcomer - Male
1950 The Hasty Heart
Richard Todd (born June 11, 1919) is a British actor, soldier and film star.
Biography
He was born Richard Andrew Palethorpe-Todd in Dublin, Ireland. Todd's father Andrew William Palethorpe Todd, was a British army officer who gained three caps for Ireland at rugby before the First World War.
Todd moved to Devon, England when very young and attended Shrewsbury School. In his early career, he acted in regional theatres; he then co-founded the Dundee Repertory Theatre in 1939.
During the Second World War, Todd served as an officer in the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and as a Paratrooper in the British 6th Airborne Division. As a member of the 7th (LI) Parachute Battalion, he was one of the first British officers to land in Normandy on D-Day and met up with Major John Howard on Pegasus Bridge. Ironically, Todd would later play Howard in the film The Longest Day (1962), with another actor portraying Richard Todd.
After the war, Todd returned to repertory theatre in England. A film contract with Associated British followed and in 1948, he starred in the London stage version of The Hasty Heart (as Lachlan MacLachlan)[1] and was subsequently chosen to star in the Warner Brothers film adaptation of the play, which was filmed in England. Todd was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for the role in 1949. He later appeared in the The Dam Busters as Wing Commander Guy Gibson, probably the role he is best known for. Americans remember Todd for his role as the United States Senate Chaplain Peter Marshall in the film version of Catherine Marshall's best selling biography, A Man Called Peter. Todd was the first choice of author Ian Fleming to play James Bond in "Dr. No", but a scheduling conflict gave the role to Sean Connery. In the 1960's Todd unsuccessfully attempted to produce a film of Ian Fleming's The Diamond Smugglers[2] and a television series based on true accounts of the Queen's Messengers.[3]
In 1953, he appeared in a BBC Television adaptation of the novel Wuthering Heights, as Heathcliff. Nigel Kneale, who scripted the adaptation, said the production came about purely because Todd had turned up at the BBC and told them that he would like to play Heathcliff for them. Kneale had to write the script in only a week as the broadcast was rushed into production.[4] Todd continued to act on television, including roles in Virtual Murder, Silent Witness, and in the Doctor Who story Kinda in 1982. His active acting career extended into his eighties.
Todd has been married twice: to actress Catherine Grant-Bogle, whom he met in Dundee Repertory (1949-1970, two children) and model Virginia Mailer (1970-1992, two children). Now retired, Todd lives in the village of Little Humby, 8 miles from Grantham.
Tragedy
On 25 April 2006 the Daily Mail published a feature on the tragic death of two of Todd's four children by suicide. Peter, Todd's eldest son from his first marriage, shot himself in the head on 21 September 2005 - the same method his half-brother Seumas had used 8 years earlier. Peter's reason was his marriage was ending. Seumas's motivation was thought to be a depressive reaction to severe acne and the anti-acne drug he was taking. Todd's mother had also committed suicide when her son was 19, though Todd said 'her death didn't affect me badly ... we had been close but just before she died, we disagreed. She didn't want me to go on the stage. There were various differences and I had lost affection for her'. His sons' suicide affected him very profoundly and he admits to visiting their adjoining graves regularly. Todd said, 'It is rather like something that happens to men in war. You don't consciously set out to do something gallant. You just do it because that is what you are there for.'
Gene Wilder
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Born Jerome Silberman
June 11, 1933 (1933-06-11) (age 75)
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
Occupation Comedic actor
Years active 1961-present
Spouse(s) Mary Mercier (1960-1965)
Mary Joan Schutz (1967-1974)
Gilda Radner (1984-1989)
Karen Boyer (1991-present)
Awards won
Emmy Awards
Outstanding Guest Actor - Comedy Series
2003 Will & Grace
Gene Wilder (born Jerome Silberman; June 11, 1933) is an American Emmy Award-winning and twice Academy Award-nominated stage and screen actor, director and screenwriter.
Wilder began his career on stage, making his screen debut in the film Bonnie and Clyde in 1967. His first major role was as Leo Bloom in the 1968 film, The Producers. This was the first in a series of prolific collaborations with writer/director Mel Brooks, including 1974's Young Frankenstein, the script of which garnered the pair an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. Wilder is known for his portrayal of Willy Wonka in Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971) and for his four films with Richard Pryor: Silver Streak (1976), Stir Crazy (1980), See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989), and Another You (1991). Wilder has directed and written several of his films, including The Woman in Red (1984).
His marriage to actress Gilda Radner, who died from ovarian cancer, led to his active involvement in promoting cancer awareness and treatment, helping found the Gilda Radner Ovarian Cancer Detection Center in Los Angeles and co-founding Gilda's Club.
In more recent years, Wilder turned his attention to writing, producing a memoir in 2005, Kiss Me Like A Stranger: My Search for Love and Art, and the novels My French Whore (2007) and The Woman Who Wouldn't (2008).
Biography
Early life and education
Wilder, born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and his sister Corinne (b. 1927) were the children of Chicago-born Jeanne (née Baer) and William J. Silberman, a Russian Jewish immigrant.[1][2] Wilder first became interested in acting when at age 8, his mother was diagnosed with rheumatic fever and the doctor told him to "try and make her laugh."[3] When Jeanne Silberman felt that her son's potential wasn't being fully realized in Wisconsin, she sent him to Black-Foxe, a military institute in Hollywood, where he would be bullied and sexually assaulted, primarily because he was the only Jewish boy in the school.[4] After an unsuccessful short stay at Black-Foxe, Wilder returned home and became increasingly involved with the local theatre community. At age fifteen, he performed for the first time in front of a paying audience, as Balthasar (Romeo's manservant), in a production of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.[5]
Acting career
Early starts: Old Vic and Army
Wilder studied Communication and Theatre Arts at the University of Iowa, where he was a member of the Alpha Epsilon Pi Fraternity.[6] Following his 1955 graduation from Iowa, he was accepted at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in Bristol, England. After six months of studying fencing, Wilder became the first freshman to win the All School Fencing Championship.[7] Desiring to study Stanislavski's 'system', he returned to the U.S., living with his sister and her family in Queens. Wilder enrolled at the Herbert Berghof (HB) Studio.[8]
Wilder was drafted into the army on September 10, 1956. At the end of recruit training, he was assigned to the medical corps and sent to Fort Sam Houston for training. He was then given the opportunity to choose any post that was open and wanting to stay near New York City to attend acting classes at the HB Studio, he chose to serve as a Medic in the Department of Psychiatry and Neurology at Valley Forge Army Hospital, in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania.[9] In November 1957, his mother died from ovarian cancer. He was discharged from the army a year later, and returned to New York. A scholarship to the HB Studio allowed him to become a full-time student. At first living on unemployment insurance and some savings, he later supported himself with odd jobs such as driving a limousine and teaching fencing. Wilder's first professional acting job was in Cambridge, England, where he played the Second Officer in Herbert Berghof's production of Twelfth Night. He also served as a fencing choreographer.[10]
After three years of study with Berghof and Uta Hagen at the HB Studio, Charles Grodin told Wilder about Lee Strasberg's method acting. Grodin persuaded him to leave the Studio and begin studying with Strasberg in his private class. Several months later, Wilder was accepted into the Actors Studio. Feeling that "Jerry Silberman in Macbeth" did not have the right ring to it, he adopted a stage name.[11] He chose "Wilder" because it reminded him of Our Town author Thornton Wilder, while "Gene" came from Thomas Wolfe's first novel, Look Homeward, Angel. He also liked "Gene" because as a boy, he was impressed by a distant relative, a World War II bomber navigator who was "handsome and looked great in his leather flight jacket."[12][11] After joining the Actors Studio, he slowly began to be noticed in the off-Broadway scene thanks to performances in Sir Arnold Wesker's Roots and in Graham Greene's The Complaisant Lover, for which Wilder received the Clarence Derwent Award for "Best Performance by an Actor in a Nonfeatured Role."
Mel Brooks
In 1963, Wilder was cast in a leading role in Mother Courage and Her Children, a production starring Anne Bancroft, who introduced Wilder to her then boyfriend Mel Brooks.[13] A few months later, Brooks mentioned that he was working on a screenplay called Springtime for Hitler, for which he thought Wilder would be perfect in the role of Leo Bloom. Brooks elicited a promise from Wilder that he would check with him before making any long term commitments with any on Broadway or Off Broadway productions.[13] Months went by and Wilder toured the country with different theatre productions, participated in a televised CBS presentation of Death of a Salesman, and was cast for his first role in a film, a minor role in Arthur Penn's 1967 Bonnie and Clyde. After three years of not hearing from Brooks, Wilder was called for a reading with Zero Mostel, who was to be the star of Springtime for Hitler and had approval of his co-star. Mostel approved and Wilder was cast for his first leading role in a featured film, 1968's The Producers.[14]
The Producers would eventually become a cult comedy classic,[15][16] with Mel Brooks winning an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and Wilder being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Nevertheless, Mel Brooks' first directorial effort didn't do well at the box office and wasn't well received by all critics; New York Times critic Renata Adler reviewed the film and described it as "black college humor".[17][18]
In 1969, Wilder relocated to Paris, accepting a leading role in Bud Yorkin's Start the Revolution Without Me - a comedy that took place during the French Revolution. After shooting ended, Wilder returned to New York where he read the script for Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin in the Bronx and immediately called Sidney Glazier, who had produced The Producers. Both men began searching for the perfect director for the film. Jean Renoir was the first candidate but he wouldn't be able to do the film for at least a year, so British-Indian director Waris Hussein was hired.[19]
Willy Wonka, Young Frankenstein and Richard Pryor
In 1971, Mel Stuart offered Wilder the lead role in his film adaptation of Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Wilder was initially hesitant, but finally accepted the role under one condition:
" When I make my first entrance, I'd like to come out of the door carrying a cane and then walk toward the crowd with a limp. After the crowd sees Willy Wonka is a cripple, they all whisper to themselves and then become deathly quiet. As I walk toward them, my cane sinks into one of the cobblestones I'm walking on and stands straight up, by itself...but I keep on walking, until I realize that I no longer have my cane. I start to fall forward, and just before I hit the ground, I do a beautiful forward somersault and bounce back up, to great applause.[20] "
When Stuart asked why, Wilder replied, "because from that time on, no one will know if I'm lying or telling the truth."[21] All three films Wilder did after The Producers were box office failures, Start the Revolution and Quackser seemed to audiences poor copies of Mel Brooks films; while Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory seemed, to many parents, a moral story "too cruel" for children to understand, thus failing to attract family audiences.[22] After hearing that Wonka had been a commercial failure, Woody Allen offered Wilder a role in one segment of Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask). Wilder accepted, hoping that this would be the hit that would put an end to his series of flops. Everything was a hit, grossing over $18 million dollars in the United States alone against a $2 million dollar budget.[23]
After Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask), Wilder began working on a script he called Young Frankenstein. When he had written a two page scenario, he called Mel Brooks, who told him that it seemed like a "cute" idea but showed little interest.[24] A couple of months later, Wilder received a call from his then agent, Mike Medavoy, who asked if he had anything where he could include Peter Boyle and Marty Feldman, his two new clients. Having just seen Feldman on television, Wilder was inspired to write a scene that takes place at Transylvania Station, where Igor and Frederick meet for the first time. The scene would later be included in the film almost verbatim. Medavoy liked the idea and called Brooks, asking him to direct. Brooks was not convinced, but having spent four years working on two box office failures, he decided to accept.[13] While working on the Young Frankenstein script, Wilder was offered the part of the Fox in the musical film adaptation of Saint Exupéry's classic book, The Little Prince. When filming was about to begin in London, Wilder received an urgent call from Mel Brooks, who was filming Blazing Saddles, offering Wilder the role of the "Waco Kid" after Dan Dailey dropped out at the last minute, while Gig Young became too ill to continue. Wilder shot his scenes for Blazing Saddles and immediately afterwards filmed The Little Prince.[13]
After Young Frankenstein was written, the rights were to be sold to Columbia Pictures, but after having trouble agreeing on the budget, Wilder, Brooks and producer Michael Gruskoff went with 20th Century Fox, where both Brooks and Wilder had to sign five-year contracts. Young Frankenstein was a commercial success, with Wilder and Brooks receiving Best Adapted Screenplay nominations at the 1975 Oscars,[25] losing to Francis Coppola and Mario Puzo for their adaptation of The Godfather Part II.[26] While filming Frankenstein, Wilder had an idea for a romantic musical comedy about a brother of Sherlock Holmes. Marty Feldman and Madeline Kahn agreed to participate in the project and Wilder began writing what would become his directorial début, 1975's The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes' Smarter Brother.[27]
In 1975, Wilder's agent sent him a script for a film called Super Chief. Wilder accepted but told the film's producers that he thought the only person who could keep the film from being offensive was Richard Pryor. Pryor accepted the role in the film, which had been renamed Silver Streak, the first film to team Wilder and Pryor. While filming Silver Streak, Wilder began working on a the script for The World's Greatest Lover, inspired by Fellini's The White Sheik. Wilder wrote, produced and directed The World's Greatest Lover, which premièred in 1977, but was a commercial and critical failure.[28] 1979s The Frisco Kid would be Wilder's next project. The film was to star John Wayne, but he dropped out when the Warner Brothers executives tried to dissuade him from charging the studio his usual $1 million fee. Harrison Ford, a then up-and-coming actor, was hired for the role.[29]
Sidney Poitier and Gilda Radner
In 1980, Sidney Poitier and producer Hannah Weinstein persuaded Wilder and Richard Pryor to do another film together. Bruce Jay Friedman wrote the script for Stir Crazy with Poitier directing, for Columbia Pictures. Pryor had already begun struggling with drug addiction and filming became difficult, but once the film premièred it became an international success. New York magazine listed "Skip Donahue" (Wilder) and "Harry Monroe" (Pryor) number 9 on their 2007 list of "The Fifteen Most Dynamic Duos in Pop Culture History" and the film has often appeared in "best comedy" lists and rankings.[30][31]
Poitier and Wilder became friends, with the pair working together on a script called Traces. Traces would become 1982's Hanky Panky, the film where Wilder met comedienne Gilda Radner. Through the remainder of the decade, Wilder and Radner would work in several projects together. After Hanky Panky, Wilder directed his third film, 1984's The Woman in Red which starred Wilder, Radner and Kelly LeBrock. The Woman in Red was not well received by the critics, nor was their next project, 1986's Haunted Honeymoon which failed to attract audiences.
TriStar Pictures was looking to produce another film starring Wilder and Pryor, and Wilder agreed to do See No Evil, Hear No Evil only if he was allowed to re-write the script. The studio agreed and See No Evil, Hear No Evil premiered on May 1989 to mostly negative reviews. Some critics praised Wilder and Pryor, and even Kevin Spacey's performances but they mostly all agreed that the script was terrible. Roger Ebert called it "a real dud",[32] the Deseret Morning News described the film as "stupid", with an "idiotic script" that had a "contrived story" and too many "juvenile gags",[33] while Vincent Canby called it "by far the most successful co-starring vehicle for Mr. Pryor and Mr. Wilder", also acknowledging that "this is not elegant movie making, and not all of the gags are equally clever."[34]
1990s-2000s
Wilder would do one more film with Richard Pryor, the 1991 box office flop Another You, where Pryor's physical deterioration from multiple sclerosis was clearly noted.[35]
In 1994, Wilder starred in the NBC sitcom Something Wilder.[36] The show received poor reviews and lasted only one season. He went back to the small screen on 1999 appearing in three NBC television movies, most notably Alice in Wonderland. Three years later, Wilder guest-starred on two episodes of NBC's Will & Grace, winning a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor on a Comedy Series for his role as Mr. Stein, "Will Truman"s boss.[37]
Personal life
Relationships
Wilder met his first wife, Mary Mercier, while studying at the HB Studio in New York. Although the couple had not been together long, they married on July 22, 1960. They spent long periods of times apart, eventually divorcing in 1965. A few months later, Wilder began dating Mary Joan Schutz, a friend of his sister. Schutz had a daughter, Katharine, from a previous marriage. When Katharine started calling Wilder "dad" he decided to do what he felt was "the right thing to do",[38] marrying Shutz on October 27, 1967 and adopting Katherine that same year. Shutz and Wilder separated after seven years of marriage, with Shutz thinking that Wilder was having an affair with his Young Frankenstein co-star Madeline Kahn. After the divorce he would briefly date his other Frankenstein co-star Teri Garr. Wilder would eventually become estranged from Katherine.[39][13]
Wilder met Saturday Night Live actress Gilda Radner on August 13, 1981, while filming Sidney Poitier's Hanky Panky. Radner was married to G. E. Smith at the time, but she and Wilder became inseparable friends. When filming of Hanky ended, Wilder found himself missing Radner, so he called her. The relationship grew and Radner eventually divorced Smith in 1982. She moved in with Wilder, and the couple married on September 14, 1984, in the south of France. The couple wanted to have children, but Radner suffered miscarriages and doctors could not determine the problem. After experiencing severe fatigue and suffering from pain in her upper legs on the set of Haunted Honeymoon, Radner sought medical treatment. Following a number of false diagnoses it was determined that she had ovarian cancer in October 1986.[40] Over the next year and a half, Radner battled the disease, receiving chemotherapy and radiotherapy treatments. The disease finally went into remission, giving the pair a respite, during which time, Wilder filmed See No Evil, Hear No Evil.[40] By May 1989, the cancer returned and had metastasized. Radner died on May 20, 1989.[41] Wilder later stated "I always thought she'd pull through."[42]
Following Radner's death, Wilder became active in promoting cancer awareness and treatment, helping found the "Gilda Radner Ovarian Cancer Detection Center" in Los Angeles and co-founding Gilda's Club, a support group to raise awareness of cancer that began in New York City and now has branched throughout the country.[6]
Cancer and semi-retirement
While preparing for his role as a deaf man in See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Wilder had met Karen Webb (née Boyer), who was a clinical supervisor for the New York League for the Hard of Hearing. Webb had coached him in lip reading. Following Gilda Radner's death, Wilder and Webb reconnected and on September 8, 1991, they married.[42] The two live in Stamford, Connecticut, in the 1734 Colonial home that he had shared with Radner. The Wilders spend most of their time painting watercolors, writing and participating in charitable efforts.[13] In October 2001, he read from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as part of a special benefit performance held at the Westport Country Playhouse to aid families affected by the September 11, 2001 attacks.[43][13] Also in 2001, Wilder donated a collection of scripts, correspondences, documents, photographs, and clipped images to the University of Iowa Libraries.[1]
In 1998, Wilder collaborated on the book Gilda's Disease with oncologist Steven Piver, for which he shared personal experiences of Radner's struggle with ovarian cancer. Wilder himself was hospitalized with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 1999, but confirmed in March 2005 that the cancer was in complete remission following chemotherapy and a stem cell transplant.[13]
On March 1, 2005, Wilder released his highly-personal memoir Kiss Me Like A Stranger: My Search for Love and Art, an account of his life covering everything from his childhood, up to Radner's death. Two years later, in March 2007, Wilder released his first novel My French Whore which is set during World War I.[44] His second novel, The Woman Who Wouldn't, was released in March 2008.[45]
Adrienne Barbeau
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Born Adrienne Jo Barbeau
June 11, 1945 (1945-06-11) (age 63)
Sacramento, California
Spouse(s) John Carpenter (1979-1984)
Billy Van Zandt (1992-)
Adrienne Jo Barbeau (born June 11, 1945) is an American television, film, character and musical theater actress. Barbeau came to prominence through her role as Bea Arthur's divorced daughter, Carol Trainer, in the 1970s sitcom, Maude, and in several early 1980s horror and science fiction films. A sex symbol during that time, her more notable film work includes The Fog, Creepshow and Swamp Thing. During the 1990s, Barbeau became known for providing the voice of Catwoman on Batman: The Animated Series.
Biography
Early life
Barbeau was born in Sacramento, California, the daughter of Arman and Joseph Barbeau, who was a public relations executive for Mobil Oil.[1] Barbeau's father was French-Canadian and her mother Armenian-American.[2] She attended Del Mar High School in San Jose, California. In her autobiography, Barbeau says that she first caught the showbiz bug while entertaining troops at army bases throughout Southeast Asia touring with the San Jose Civic Light Opera.[3]
Career
In the late 1960s, Barbeau moved to New York City and worked "for the mob"[3] as a go-go dancer, as well as appearing Off-Broadway in a "nudie musical" called Stag Movie, before making her Broadway debut in Fiddler on the Roof, playing Tevye's daughter, Hodel. She has since starred in over 25 musicals and plays, among them Women Behind Bars, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, and Grease, as tough-girl Rizzo, for which she received a Theater Guild award and a 1972 Tony Award nomination.
During the 1970s, Barbeau starred as the daughter of Bea Arthur's title character on the comedy series Maude, which ran from 1972 to 1978. In her autobiography, There Are Worse Things I Could Do, she remarked: "What I didn't know is that when I said [my lines], I was usually walking down a flight of stairs and no one was even listening to me. They were just watching my breasts precede me."
Barbeau was cast in numerous television films and on shows such as The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, Valentine Magic on Love Island and Battle of the Network Stars. In her autobiography she claimed: "I actually thought CBS asked me to be on Battle of the Network Stars because they thought I was athletic. My husband clued me in: who cared if I won the race, as long as I bounced when I ran?"[3]
The popularity of Barbeau's 1978 cheesecake poster confirmed her status as a sex symbol. While reviewers have sometimes criticized her acting ability,[4] Barbeau's popularity stemmed partly from what critic Joe Bob Briggs referred to as the "two enormous talents on that woman",[5] and her typecasting as a "tough broad". Barbeau refused offers to appear topless in Playboy, although shots from an early nude shoot (in which she appeared topless) appeared in High Society in July 1980. In some Off-Broadway plays (early in her career), and in several movies, she has appeared topless as well. Despite her initial success, she said at the time that she thought of Hollywood as a "flesh market", and that she would rather appear in films that "explore the human condition" and "deal with issues".[6]
Barbeau was cast by her then-husband, director John Carpenter, in his 1980 horror film, The Fog, which was her first theatrical film appearance. The film was released in on February 1, 1980 and was a theatrical success, grossing over $21 million in the United States alone,[7] and establishing Barbeau as a genre film star. She subsequently appeared in a number of early-1980s horror and science fiction films, a number of which have now become cult film classics, including Escape from New York (also from Carpenter), Creepshow and Swamp Thing.
She also appeared in the high-grossing Burt Reynolds comedy The Cannonball Run in 1981 and as the shrewish wife of Rodney Dangerfield in Back to School (1986). For the remainder of the 1980s, Barbeau mostly starred in low-budget fare, like the spoof Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death, co-starring Bill Maher. She appeared in 1986's Tomes & Talismans, a library skills series presented as a serialized science fiction story.
Recent career
Barbeau continues to explore new fields ranging from a one-woman Off-Broadway show, hosting a talk show, to releasing an album of folk songs. In the 1990s, Barbeau mostly appeared in made-for-television films such as Scott Turow's The Burden of Proof in 1992, as well as playing Oswald's mother on The Drew Carey Show and gaining newfound fame among animation fans as Catwoman on Batman: The Animated Series and Gotham Girls. She also worked as a television talk show host and a weekly book reviewer for KABC talk radio in Los Angeles. In 1999, she guest starred in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges" as Romulan Senator Kimara Cretak.
In 1998, Barbeau released her debut album as a folk singer, the self-titled Adrienne Barbeau. She starred in the cartoon series Totally Spies! doing the voice of villieness Helga Von Guggen in seasons 1, 2 and 4. From 2003 to 2005, she starred on the HBO series Carnivàle. November 2001 she starred as herself in Sabrina the Teenage Witch in the Episode The Gift of Gab. From March to May of 2006, she starred as Judy Garland in the off-Broadway play The Property Known as Garland.[8]
Barbeau played Barbara Florentine in Rob Zombie's Halloween, a "reimagining" of the 1978 classic film of the same name, written and directed by her first husband, John Carpenter. Her scene was cut from the theatrical version of the film, but will be available when the movie is released on DVD.
Adrienne's autobiography "There Are Worse Things I Could Do" was published in 2006 by Carroll & Graf, rising to #11 on the Los Angeles Times Best-seller List. In August 2008 her first novel, "Vampyres of Hollywood", will be published with St. Martin's Press.
Personal life
Barbeau was married to director John Carpenter from January 1, 1979 to 1984. The two met on the set of his 1978 TV movie, Someone's Watching Me!. The couple had a son, John Cody (born May 7, 1984) shortly before they separated. During their marriage, the couple remained "totally outside Hollywood's social circles."[6]
Barbeau married actor/playwright Billy Van Zandt on December 31, 1992. He is the brother of musician/actor Steven Van Zandt. She gave birth to twin boys, Walker Steven and William Dalton Van Zandt, on March 17, 1997, at the age of 51.[9]
Subject: Fw: God Created Children
GOD CREATED CHILDREN (AND IN THE PROCESS GRANDCHILDREN)
T o those of us who have children in our lives,
whether they are our own,
grandchildren,
nieces,
nephews,
or students...
here is something to make you chuckle.
Whenever your children are out of control,
you can take comfort from the thought that
even God's omnipotence did not extend
to His own children.
After creating heaven and earth,
God created Adam and Eve.
And the first thing he said was
' DON'T !'
'Don 't what ? '
Adam replied.
'Don't eat the forbidden fruit.'
God said.
'Forbidden fruit ?
We have forbidden fruit ?
Hey Eve..we have forbidden fruit ! '
' No Way ! '
'Yes way ! '
'Do NOT eat the fruit ! '
said God.
'Why ? '
'Because I am your Father and I said so ! '
God replied,
wondering why He hadn't stopped
creation after making the elephants
A few minutes later,
God saw His children having an apple break
and He was ticked !
'Didn't I tell you not to eat the fruit? '
God asked.
'Uh huh,'
Adam replied.
'Then why did you ? '
said the Father.
'I don't know,'
said Eve.
'She started it! '
Adam said.
'Did not ! '
'Did too ! '
'DID NOT ! '
Having had it with the two of them,
God's punishment was that Adam and Eve
should have children of their own.
Thus the pattern was set and it has never changed.
If you have persistently and lovingly tried to give children wisdom and they haven't taken it,
don't be hard on yourself.
If God had trouble raising children,
what makes you think it would be
a piece of cake for you ?
THINGS TO THINK ABOUT !
1. You spend the first two years of their life
teaching them to walk and talk. Then you spend
the next sixteen telling them to sit down and shut up.
2. Grandchildren are God's reward
for not killing your own children.
3. Mothers of teens now know why
some animals eat their young.
4. Children seldom misquote you.
In fact,
they usually repeat word for word
what you shouldn't have said
5. The main purpose of holding children's parties
is to remind yourself that there are children
more awful than your own
6. We childproofed our homes,
but they are still getting in.
ADVICE FOR THE DAY:
Be nice to your kids.
They will choose your
nursing home one day
AND FINALLY:
IF YOU HAVE A LOT OF TENSION
AND YOU GET A HEADACHE,
DO WHAT IT SAYS
ON THE ASPIRIN BOTTLE:
'TAKE TWO ASPIRIN'
AND 'KEEP AWAY FROM CHILDREN'!!!!!
Thanks, Raggedy, for the great montage and the lovely, but sad, Daisy song.
Hey, BioBob, great info today on the famous folks, and thanks for the reminder of how we love and yet must sometimes endure our children.
Particularly funny to me is that parents teach their children to walk and talk and then say "Shut up and sit down".
If I'm not mistaken, I think today is also Hugh Laurie's birthday, but more about that later.
Can't resist this one by Strauss, y'all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLuW-GBaJ8k&NR=1
