WA2K Radio is now on the air

Good morning, WA2K folks.

edgar, anything that Johnny Mercer wrote has to be good, right?

A morning song:

What a lovely motion of the tranquil waves of the sea!
How beautiful they look as they slide onto the gentle beach!
Their pleasant murmur forms a song of magical sound
And their color is the emblem of the hope of love.
But with the horrible sound
Of the terrible, fierce storm,
Blows the violent North wind.
Majesty appears in its waves.
They rise in wild arrogance
In a mountain of foam and crystal,
And with a great noise afterwards
They return to the beach to die.

In the immensity of the floating waves, I saw you,
And when I went to save you, for your life, I lost mine.
The sweet vision in my soul carved indelibly
The tender passion that robbed me of fortune and peace.
If the echo of my sorrow
Should come to disturb your refuge,
Love will follow you.
Do not refuse to listen to its pain,
For the wind will bring you
The plaints of my heart
And will always repeat
The strains of my song.

by Thomas Keyes

some more lyrics by Mr. Mercer: (between your song & this one, we have the whole day covered )

Your lips were like a red and ruby chalice
Warmer than the summer night
The clouds were like an alabaster palace
Rising to a snowy height
Each star its own Aurora Borealis
Suddenly you held me tight
I could see the midnight sun

I can't explain
The silver rain that found me
Or was that a moonlit veil
The music of the Universe
Around me
Or was that a nightingale
And then your arms miraculously found me
Suddenly the sky turned pale
and I saw the midnight sun

Was there ever such a night
It's a thrill
I still don't quite believe
But after you were gone
There was still some
Stardust on my sleeve

The flame of it may dwindle
To an ember
And the stars forget to shine
And we may see the meadow in December
Icy white and crystaline
But oh my darling always I'll remember
When your lips were close to mine
And we saw the Midnight Sun
The Midnight Sun

A. A. Milne
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Born: January 18, 1882
Scotland
Died: January 31, 1956
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

Occupation(s): Novelist, Playwright, Poet

Alan Alexander Milne (January 18, 1882 - January 31, 1956), also known as A. A. Milne, was a British author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various children's poems. Milne was a noted writer, primarily as a playwright, before the huge success of Pooh overshadowed all his previous work.




Biography

Milne (pronounced mĭln) was born in Scotland but raised in London at Henley House School, a small independent school run by his father, John V. Milne. One of his teachers was H. G. Wells. He attended Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge where he studied on a mathematics scholarship. While there, he edited and wrote for Granta, a student magazine. He collaborated with his brother Kenneth and their articles appeared over the initials AKM. Milne's work came to the attention of the leading British humour magazine Punch, where Milne was to become a contributor and later an assistant editor.

Milne joined the British Army in World War I and served as an officer in the Signal Corps. After the war, he wrote a denunciation of war titled Peace with Honour (1934), which he retracted somewhat with 1940's War with Honour. During World War II, Milne was one of the most prominent critics of English comic writer P.G. Wodehouse, who was captured at his country home in France by the Nazis and imprisoned for a year. Wodehouse made radio broadcasts about his internment, which were broadcast from Berlin. Although the lighthearted broadcasts made fun of the Germans, Milne accused Wodehouse of committing an act of near treason by cooperating with his country's enemy. Wodehouse got some revenge by creating fatuous parodies of the Christopher Robin poems in some of his later stories.

During World War II, he was Captain of the Homeguard in Hartfield & Forrest Row, insisting on being plain 'Mr Milne' to the members of his platoon.

Also during World War II, his home was destroyed in an air raid.

Milne married Dorothy De Selincourt in 1913, and their only son, Christopher Robin Milne, was born in 1920. In 1925, A. A. Milne bought a country home, Cotchford Farm, in Hartfield, East Sussex. He retired to the farm after a stroke and brain surgery in 1952 left him an invalid.


Literary career

Milne is most famous for his Pooh books about a boy named Christopher Robin, after his son, and various characters inspired by his son's stuffed animals, most notably the bear named Winnie-the-Pooh. The source of the name is reputedly a Canadian black bear named Winnie (after Winnipeg), that was used as a military mascot by the Royal Winnipeg Rifles, a Canadian Infantry Regiment in World War I, and left to London Zoo after the war. After its heroics in September 1915, the bear was named 'Winnie the Pooh', years before Milne adopted it. E. H. Shepard illustrated the original Pooh books, using his own son's teddy, Growler ("a magnificent bear"), as the model. Christopher Robin Milne's own toys are now under glass in New York.

Milne also wrote a number of poems, including Vespers, They're Changing Guard at Buckingham Palace, and King John's Christmas, which were published in the books When We Were Very Young and Now We Are Six. Several of Milnes's childrens' poems were set to music by the composer Harold Fraser-Simson. His poems have been parodied many times, including with the books When We Were Rather Older and Now We Are Sixty.

The overwhelming success of his children's books was to become a source of considerable annoyance to Milne, whose self-avowed aim was to write whatever he pleased, and who had, until then, found a ready audience for each change of direction: he had freed pre-war Punch from its ponderous facetiousness; he had made a considerable reputation as a playwright (like his idol J. M. Barrie) on both sides of the Atlantic; he had produced a witty piece of detective writing in The Red House Mystery (although this was severely criticised by Raymond Chandler for the the implausibility of its plot). Indeed, Milne's publisher was displeased when he announced his intention to write poems for children, and he had never lacked an audience.

But once Milne had, in his own words, "said Goodbye to all that in 70,000 words" (the approximate length of the four children's books), he had no intention of producing a copy of a copy, given that one of the sources of inspiration, his son, was growing older.

His reception remained warmer in America than Britain, and he continued to publish novels and short stories, but by the late 1930s the audience for Milne's grown-up writing had largely vanished: he observed bitterly in his autobiography that a critic had said that the hero of his latest play ("God help it") was simply "Christopher Robin grown up ... what an obsession with me children are become!"

Even his old literary home, Punch, where the When We Were Very Young verses had first appeared, was ultimately to reject him, as Christopher Milne details in his autobiography The Enchanted Places, although Methuen continued to publish whatever Milne wrote, including the long poem 'The Norman Church' and an assembly of articles entitled Year In, Year Out (which Milne likened to a benefit night for the author).

He also adapted Kenneth Grahame's novel The Wind in the Willows for the stage as Toad of Toad Hall. The title was an implicit admission that such chapters as The Piper at the Gates of Dawn could not survive translation to the theater. A special introduction written by Milne is included in some editions of Grahame's novel.

After Milne's death, the rights to the Pooh characters were sold by his widow, Daphne, to the Walt Disney Company, which has made a number of Pooh cartoon movies, as well as a large amount of Pooh-related merchandise. She also destroyed his papers.

Royalties from the Pooh characters paid by Disney to the Royal Literary Fund, part-owner of the Pooh copyright, provide the income used to run the Fund's Fellowship Scheme, placing professional writers in UK universities.

Oliver Hardy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Born January 18, 1892
Harlem, Georgia
Died August 7, 1957
North Hollywood, California

Oliver Hardy (born Norvell Hardy January 18, 1892-August 7, 1957) was an American actor, most remembered for his role in one of the world's most famous double acts, Laurel and Hardy, with his friend Stan Laurel. He did not adopt the name "Oliver" until 1914. He did so as a tribute to his father, who died when Hardy was an infant.




Childhood

Hardy's parents were of English and Scottish descent. His father, Oliver, was a Confederate veteran wounded at the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862. After the war he worked as a foreman for the Georgia Southern Railroad, supervising the building of a rail line between Augusta and Madison. Their marriage took place on March 12, 1890; it was the second marriage for the widow, Emily, and the third for Oliver, who died less than a year after Norvell's birth. By the time Hardy was born, the family had moved to Harlem, Georgia. Hardy was sometimes a difficult child. He was not interested in education, although he acquired an early interest in music and theater, possibly from his mother's tenants. He ran away from home to join a theatrical group, and later ran away from a boarding school near Atlanta. His mother recognized his talent for singing, and sent him to Atlanta to study music and voice with a prominent musician, but Hardy skipped his lessons to sing in a vaudeville house. He was sent to a military college, but ran away from there, also. After toying with college and the idea of studying law, he decided to follow his dream of a singing career.


Early career

In 1910, a movie theater opened in the future Hardy's home town of Milledgeville, and he became the projectionist, ticket taker, janitor and manager. He soon became obsessed with the new motion picture industry, and became convinced that he could do a better job than the actors he saw on the screen. A friend suggested that he move to Jacksonville where some films were being made. In 1913 he did just that, where he worked as a cabaret and vaudeville singer at night, and at the Lubin Studios during the day. It was at this time that he met and married his first wife, pianist Madelyn Saloshin.

The next year he made his first movie, Outwitting Dad, for the Lubin studio. He was billed as O. N. Hardy, taking his father's name as a memorial. In his personal life, he was known as "Babe" Hardy, a nickname that he was given by an Italian barber, who would apply talcum powder to Oliver's cheeks and say, "nice-a-bab-y". In many of his later films at Lubin he was billed as "Babe Hardy." Hardy was a big man at six feet one inch tall and weighed up to 300 pounds. His size placed limitations on the roles he could play. He was most often cast as "the heavy" or the villain. He also frequently had roles in comedy shorts, his size complementing the character.

By 1915, he had made fifty short one-reeler films at the Lubin studio. He later moved to New York and made films for the Pathé, Casino and Edison Studios. He then returned to Jacksonville and made films for the Vim and King Bee studios. He worked with Charlie Chaplin imitator Billy West and comedic actress Ethel Burton Palmer during this time. (Hardy continued playing the "heavy" for West well into the early 1920s, often imitating Eric Campbell to West's Chaplin.) In 1917, Oliver Hardy moved to Los Angeles, working freelance for several Hollywood studios. The next year, he appeared in the movie The Lucky Dog, produced by G.M. ("Broncho Billy") Anderson and starring a young British comedian named Stan Laurel.[1] Oliver Hardy played the part of a robber, trying to stick up Stan's character. They did not work together again for several years, yet eventually formed the famous team of Laurel and Hardy.

Between 1918 and 1923 Oliver Hardy made more than forty films for Vitagraph, playing the "heavy" for Larry Semon. In 1919, he separated from his wife, ending with a divorce in 1920, due to Babe's infidelity. The very next year, on November 24th, 1921, Babe married again, to actress Myrtle Reeves. This marriage was also unhappy, with Myrtle eventually becoming an alcoholic.

In 1924, Hardy began working at Hal Roach Studios working with the Our Gang films and Charley Chase. In 1925, he was in a film "Yes, Yes, Nanette!" starring James Finlayson, who in later years was a recurring character in the Laurel and Hardy film series. The film was directed by Stan Laurel. He also continued playing supporting roles in films featuring Clyde Cooke and Bobby Ray.

In 1926, a hot leg of lamb changed the future of both Laurel and Hardy. Hardy was scheduled to appear in Get 'Em Young but was unexpectedly hospitalized after being burned by a hot leg of lamb. Laurel, who had been working as a gag man and director at Roach Studios, was recruited to fill in. Laurel kept appearing in front of the camera rather than behind it, and later that year appeared in the same movie as Hardy, 45 Minutes from Hollywood, although they didn't share any scenes together.


Career with Stan Laurel

In 1927, Laurel and Hardy began sharing screen time together in Slipping Wives, Duck Soup (no relation to the Marx Brothers film of the same name) and With Love and Hisses. Roach Studios' supervising director Leo McCarey had realized the audience reaction to the two, and had begun intentionally teaming them together, leading to the start of the Laurel and Hardy series late that year. With Laurel and Hardy, he had created one of the most famous comedy teams of all time. They began producing a huge body of short movies, including The Battle of the Century (1927) (with one of the largest pie fights ever filmed), Should Married Men Go Home? (1928), Two Tars (1928), Unaccustomed As We Are (1929, marking their transition to talking pictures) Berth Marks (1929), Blotto (1930), Brats (1930) (with Stan and Ollie portraying themselves, as well as their own sons, using oversized furniture to sets for the 'young' Laurel and Hardy), Another Fine Mess (1930), Be Big! (1931), and many others. In 1929, they appeared in their first feature, in one of the revue sequences of Hollywood Revue of 1929 and the following year they appeared as the comic relief in a lavish all-color (in Technicolor) musical feature entitled: The Rogue Song. This film marked their first appearance in color. In 1931 they made their first full length movie (in which they were the actual stars), Pardon Us although they continued to make features and shorts until 1935. Perhaps their greatest achievement, however, was The Music Box (1932), which won them an Academy Award for best short film - their only such award.

In 1936, Hardy's personal life suffered a blow as he and Myrtle divorced. Whilst waiting for a contractual issue between Laurel and Hal Roach to be resolved, Hardy made Zenobia with Harry Langdon. Eventually, however, new contracts were agreed and the team was loaned out to General Services Studio to make The Flying Deuces. While on the lot, Hardy fell in love with Virginia Lucille Jones, a script girl, whom he married the next year. They enjoyed a happy marriage until his death.

Laurel and Hardy also began performing for the USO, supporting the Allied troops during World War II. They also made A Chump at Oxford (1940) (which features a moment of role reversal, with Oliver becoming a temporarily concussed Stan's subordinate) and Saps at Sea (1940).

Beginning in 1941, Laurel and Hardy's films began to decline in quality. They left Roach Studios and began making films for 20th Century Fox, and later MGM. Although they were financially better off, they had very little artistic control at the large studios, and hence the films lack the very qualities that had made Laurel and Hardy worldwide names.

In 1947, Laurel and Hardy went on a six week tour of Great Britain. Initially unsure of how they would be received, they were mobbed wherever they went. The tour was then lengthened to include engagements in Scandinavia, Belgium, France, as well as a Royal Command Performance for King George VI and Queen Elizabeth.

In 1949, Hardy's friend, John Wayne, asked him to play a supporting role in The Fighting Kentuckian. Hardy had previously worked with Wayne and John Ford in a charity production of the play What Price Glory? while Laurel began treatment for his diabetes a few years previously. Initially hesitant, Hardy accepted the role at the insistence of his comedy partner. Frank Capra later invited Hardy to play a cameo role in "Riding High" with Bing Crosby in 1950.

In 1951, Laurel and Hardy made their final film. "Atoll K" (also known as "Utopia") was a simple concept; Laurel inherits a boat, and the boys set out to sea, where they discover and claim a brand new island, rich in uranium, making them powerful and wealthy. However, it was produced by a consortium of European interests, with an international cast and crew that could not speak to each other. In addition, the script needed to be rewritten by Stan to make it fit the comedy team's style, and both suffered serious physical problems during the filming.

In 1955, the pair had contracted with Hal Roach Jr. to produce a series of TV shows based on the Mother Goose fables. However, this was never to be. Laurel suffered a stroke, which required a lengthy convalescence. Hardy had a heart attack and stroke later that year, from which he never physically recovered.


Death

During 1956, Hardy began looking after his health for the first time in his life. During his health watch, he lost more than 150 pounds in a few months. This weight loss completely changed his appearance. However, he suffered a major stroke on September 14, which left him confined to bed and unable to speak for several months. He remained at home, being cared for by his beloved Lucille. He suffered two more strokes in early August, 1957 and slipped into a coma from which he never recovered. Oliver Hardy died on August 7, 1957, aged 65 years old. His remains are located in the Masonic Garden of Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery in North Hollywood.[1]

In 2006, BBC Four showed a drama based on Laurel meeting Hardy on his deathbed and reminiscing about their career called Stan

Cary Grant
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Birth name Archibald Alexander Leach
Born January 18, 1904
Bristol, England, UK
Died November 29, 1986, age 82
Davenport, Iowa, USA

Years active 1932-1966
Academy Awards

1970 Lifetime Achievement Award

Archibald Alexander Leach (January 18, 1904 - November 29, 1986), better known by his screen name, Cary Grant, was an English film actor. With his distinctive Mid-Atlantic accent, he was noted as perhaps the foremost exemplar of the debonair leading man, not only handsome, but also witty and charming. He was named the second Greatest Male Star of All Time of American cinema by the American Film Institute.




Biography

Early life and career

Archibald Leach was born in Horfield, Bristol, England. An only child (before he was born his parents had had another son who died in infancy), Leach had a confused and unhappy childhood. His mother, Elsie, was placed in a mental institution when he was nine. His father (who later had a relationship with another woman, with whom he had a son) told him that she was dead, and he only learned in 1935 that she was still alive, in an institution.

This left Leach with an insecurity in his relations with women and a secretiveness about his inner life. These insecurities, by his own admission, led him to crave applause and attention and to create a new persona that would attract it. After being expelled from Fairfield Grammar School in Bristol in 1918 (for investigating the girls' bathroom), he joined the Bob Pender stage troupe.

Grant traveled with the troupe to the United States in 1920 for a two-year tour. When the troupe returned to England, Grant decided to stay in the U.S. and continue his stage career. Still as Archie Leach, he performed on the stage at The Muny in St. Louis, Missouri, in such shows as Irene (1931); Music in May (1931); Nina Rosa (1931); Rio Rita (1931); Street Singer (1931); The Three Musketeers (1931); and Wonderful Night (1931).

Over time, he created a unique accent and persona that mixed working and upper class accents, while supporting himself as, among other things, a hawker and a male escort for socialites.


Hollywood stardom

After some success in light Broadway comedies, he came to Hollywood in 1931, where he acquired the name Cary Grant.

Grant starred in some of the classic screwball comedies, including The Awful Truth with Irene Dunne (the pivotal film in the establishment of Grant's screen persona), Bringing Up Baby with Katharine Hepburn, His Girl Friday with Rosalind Russell and Arsenic and Old Lace with Priscilla Lane. These performances solidified his appeal, and The Philadelphia Story, with Hepburn and James Stewart, presented his best-known screen role: the charming if sometimes unreliable man, formerly married to an intelligent and strong-willed woman who first divorced him, then realized that he was ?- with all his faults ?- irresistible.

Grant was one of Hollywood's top box-office attractions for several decades. He was a versatile actor, who did demanding physical comedy in movies like Gunga Din with the skills he had learned on the stage. Howard Hawks said that Grant was "so far the best that there isn't anybody to be compared to him".[1]

Grant was a favorite actor of Alfred Hitchcock, notorious for disliking actors, who said that Grant was "the only actor I ever loved in my whole life".[2] Grant appeared in such Hitchcock classics as Suspicion, Notorious, To Catch a Thief and North by Northwest.

In the mid-1950s, Grant formed his own production company, Grantley Productions, and produced a number of movies distributed by Universal, such as Operation Petticoat, Indiscreet, That Touch of Mink (co-starring Doris Day), and Father Goose.

While Grant was nominated for two Academy Awards in the 1940s, he was denied the Oscar throughout his active career as he was considered a maverick by virtue of the fact that he was the first actor to "go independent," effectively bucking the old studio system, which pretty much completely controlled what an actor could or could not do. In this way, Grant was able to control every aspect of his career. The cost was no golden statuette during his active career. Grant finally received a special Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1970. In 1981, he received the Kennedy Center Honors.

In the last few years of his life, Grant undertook tours of the United States with "A Conversation with Cary Grant", in which he would show clips from his films and answer audience questions. It was just before one of these performances, in Davenport, Iowa, on November 29, 1986, that Grant suffered a stroke, and died in the hospital a few hours later.


Personal life in Hollywood

Grant's personal life was complicated, involving five marriages and speculation about his sexuality.

In 1932 he met fellow actor Randolph Scott on the set of Hot Saturday, and the two shared a rented beach house (known as "Bachelor Hall") on and off for twelve years. Rumors ran rampant at the time that Grant and Scott were lovers.

Authors Marc Elliot, Charles Higham and Roy Moseley consider Grant to have been bisexual, with Higham and Moseley claiming that Grant and Scott were seen kissing in a public carpark outside a social function both attended in the 1960s. In his book, Hollywood Gays, Boze Hadleigh cites an interview with homosexual director George Cukor, who said about the alleged homosexual relationship between Scott and Grant: "Oh, Cary won't talk about it. At most, he'll say they did some wonderful pictures together. But Randolph will admit it - to a friend."

According to screenwriter Arthur Laurents, Grant was "at best bisexual". William J. Mann's book Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood, 1910-1969 recounts how photographer Jerome Zerbe spent "three gay months" (his words) in the movie colony taking many photographs of Grant and Scott, "attesting to their involvement in the gay scene." Zerbe says that he often stayed with the two actors, "finding them both warm, charming, and happy." In addition, Darwin Porter's book, Brando Unzipped (2006) claims that Grant had a homosexual affair with Marlon Brando.

Many writers seem to have no doubt about the actor's bisexuality; Grant, however, did not identify himself as such. He had many gay friends, including Cukor, William Haines, and Australian artist and costume designer Orry-Kelly, but he is not alleged to have had relationships with them. When Chevy Chase joked about Grant being gay in a television interview with Tom Snyder in 1980 ("Oh, what a gal!") Grant sued him and they settled out of court. Grant also complained to writer/director Peter Bogdanovich about the Chevy Chase incident, emphatically insisting that he was not gay, and that while he had nothing against homosexuals, he was simply not one himself (this exchange is cited at length in the chapter on Grant in Bogdanovich's 2005 book Who the Hell's in It?). Grant thought of the cottage industry of writers imagining him to be gay as merely a media echo chamber of falsehood. Also, it should be noted Grant had numerous heterosexual relationships throughout his life, marrying several times. During the filming of The Pride and the Passion, he fell in love with Sophia Loren and begged her to marry him. She declined and was soon after engaged to Carlo Ponti.

Grant's first wife was actress Virginia Cherrill. They married on February 10, 1934, and divorced just over a year later on March 26, 1935.

After becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1942, he married ultra-wealthy socialite Barbara Hutton, becoming a surrogate father and lifelong influence on her son, Lance Reventlow. The couple was derisively nicknamed "Cash and Cary", though an extensive prenuptial agreement was signed before the marriage. However, when he and Hutton divorced in 1945, Grant refused to accept a money settlement from her and they remained friends.

Grant's third wife was actress and writer Betsy Drake. This was his longest marriage (December 25, 1949 - August 14, 1962). In the early '60s Grant related how treatment with LSD at a prestigious California clinic ?- legal at the time ?- had finally brought him inner peace after yoga, hypnotism, and mysticism had proved ineffective. In a 2004 interview for the Turner Classic Movies production, Cary Grant: A Class Apart, Drake mocked rumors of Grant's homosexuality. "I didn't have time to think about his homosexuality," she says, "we were too busy *******."

His fourth marriage, to actress Dyan Cannon, on July 22, 1965, in Las Vegas, resulted in the birth of his only child, Jennifer, when he was 62. The marriage was troubled from the beginning (Grant was 61 and Cannon was 28), and they separated within 18 months, with Cannon claiming that Grant spanked her for disobeying him. The divorce, finalized on May 28, 1967, was bitter and messy, and the custody disputes over their daughter went on for years.

Grant married British hotel PR agent Barbara Harris (47 years his junior), on April 11, 1981, a marriage which lasted until his death.


Legacy

In November 2004 Grant was named "The Greatest Movie Star of All Time" by Premiere Magazine. [1]

Ian Fleming stated that he partially had Cary Grant in mind when he created his suave super-spy, James Bond. Sean Connery was selected for the first James Bond movie because of his likeness to Grant. Likewise, the later Bond, Roger Moore, was also selected for sharing Grant's wry sense of humor.


Quotations

"Everyone wants to be Cary Grant; even I want to be Cary Grant."
[Following his failed marriage to Barbara Hutton]: "She thought that she was marrying Cary Grant."
"I probably chose my profession because I was seeking approval, adulation, admiration and affection."
"I have spent the greater part of my life fluctuating between Archie Leach and Cary Grant, unsure of each, suspecting each."
Visiting his agent Grant intercepted a telegram from a journalist writing a profile asking "How Old Cary Grant?" Grant sent a reply saying "Old Cary Grant fine, how you?". (Actually not true. But when asked about the telegram by an interviewer, Cary did say that he wished he had done that.)
The dichotomy between Leach and Grant was referenced in his films from time to time:
In Arsenic and Old Lace Grant is in a graveyard, and one of the stones reads "Archie Leach".
In His Girl Friday, he responds to a pointed comment by saying, "The last man who said that to me was Archie Leach, just a week before he cut his throat."
His character in Gunga Din was named "Archie".
In one of his early films, She Done Him Wrong, Grant engages in this memorable dialogue with the film's sexy star, Mae West:
Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
Cary GrantMae: I always did like a man in a uniform. That one fits you grand. Why don't you come up sometime 'n see me? I'm home every evening.
Cary: Yeah, but I'm busy every evening.
Mae: Busy? So, what are you tryin' to do, insult me?
Cary: Why no, no, not at all. I'm just busy, that's all...
Mae: You ain't kiddin' me any. You know, I met your kind before. Why don't you come up sometime, huh?
Cary: Well, I...
Mae: Don't be afraid. I won't tell...Come up. I'll tell your fortune ... Aw, you can be had.

Trivia


In the film A Fish Called Wanda, the character played by John Cleese is named Archibald Leach, Cary Grant's real name [2]. Cleese was born in Weston-super-Mare, just a few kilometres from Grant's birthplace, Bristol.
Although many Cary Grant impressions include the quotation, "Judy, Judy, Judy", Grant never actually said that phrase in any of his movies. In Only Angels Have Wings, his character says "Oh, Judy," and "Come on, Judy," but that's as close as it gets.
Grant replaced James Stewart as the hapless ad man Roger Thornhill in North by Northwest. Years earlier, Stewart replaced Grant as Rupert Cadell in Rope, in which another character makes reference to Grant's film with Ingrid Bergman, Notorious
Politically, Grant was a Republican, and he introduced First Lady Betty Ford to the audience at the Republican National Convention in 1976
Christopher Reeve said he based his portrayal of Clark Kent on Grant's 1938 performance as the awkward bespectacled scientist in Bringing Up Baby. Grant's performance in that film had in turn been inspired by Harold Lloyd.
Some of his younger fans told him that he looked just like the comic book superhero Captain Marvel. (However, cartoonist C. C. Beck in fact based the superhero's appearance on fellow actor Fred MacMurray.)
The voice and appearance of Captain Scarlet (the title character of Gerry Anderson's Supermarionation science fiction TV series) is based on Cary Grant's, though he is actually voiced by Francis Matthews.
Wu Ming's novel 54 features Cary Grant and Archie Leach as two of the main characters. Many aspects of their two-headed persona are explored as the plot unfolds.
Tony Curtis used Grant's voice style in Some Like it Hot. At one point in the film, Jack Lemmon says that nobody talks like that. The film was set in the 1920s United States, so he was probably right. Reportedly, after seeing the film, Cary Grant said of Curtis's impression, "I don't talk like that."
In the 2004 film Touch of Pink, Cary Grant (played by Kyle MacLachlan) acts as the "Spirit Guide" and invisible friend of main character Alim.
In the 2006 film The Holiday, several characters recall Cary Grant being from Surrey, though he is not.

Danny Kaye
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

David Daniel Kaminsky, known as Danny Kaye (January 18, 1913 - March 3, 1987) was an American actor, singer and comedian.




Biography

Early life

Born to Ukrainian tailor immigrants in Brooklyn, red-haired Kaye became one of the world's best-known comedians. Kaye spent his early youth attending PS 149 in East New York. He continued on to Thomas Jefferson High School, although he never graduated. He learned his trade in his teen years as a tummler in the Catskills. In 1941 he appeared in the Broadway show, Lady in the Dark and performed the famous number "Tchaikovsky," by Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin, in which he sang the names of a whole string of Russian composers at breakneck speed, seemingly without taking a breath.


Career

According to The New York Times, when he appeared at the London Palladium music hall In 1948, he "roused the Royal family to shrieks of laughter and was the first of many performers who have turned English variety into an American preserve." Life magazine described his reception as "worshipful hysteria" and noted that the royal family, for the first time in history, left the royal box to see the show from the front row of the orchestra.

Kaye made his film debut in a 1935 comedy short subject, entitled Moon Over Manhattan. His feature film debut was Up in Arms (1944). He starred in several movies with actress Virginia Mayo in the 1940s, and is well known for his roles in films such as The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947), The Inspector General (1949), White Christmas (1954), Knock on Wood (1954), The Court Jester (1956), and Merry Andrew (1958). Kaye starred in two pictures based on biographies, Hans Christian Andersen (1952) about the Danish story-teller, and The Five Pennies (1959) about jazz pioneer Red Nichols. His wife, Sylvia Fine, wrote many of the songs Danny Kaye became famous for. Some of Kaye's films included the theme of doubles, two people who look identical (both played by Danny Kaye) being mistaken for each other, to comic effect.

Kaye starred in a radio program of his own, The Danny Kaye Show, on CBS in 1945-1946. Despite its clever writing (radio legend Goodman Ace, Sylvia Fine, and respected playwright-director Abe Burrows were the writers for the show) and performing cast (including Eve Arden, Lionel Stander, and big bandleader Harry James), the show lasted only a year.

He hosted his own variety hour on CBS television, The Danny Kaye Show, from 1963 to 1967. During this period, beginning in 1964, he also acted as television host to the annual CBS telecasts of MGM's The Wizard of Oz (1939 film). Kaye also did a stint as one of the What's My Line? Mystery Guests on the popular Sunday Night CBS-TV program. Later, Kaye also served as a guest panelist on that quiz show. Years later, Kaye also guest-starred in episodes of The Cosby Show and of the 1980s remake of The Twilight Zone (see The New Twilight Zone).

Kaye's influence was felt beyond the entertainment world in the world of professional sports as well. Kaye was the original owner of the Seattle Mariners along with his partner Lester Smith, from 1977-81.

During the 1950s, Kaye also acted in a pantomime production of Cinderella, in Sydney, Australia, where he played the role of "Buttons", Cinderella's stepfather's servant, and also Cinderella's friend.

In many of his movies, as well as on stage, Kaye proved to be an able actor, singer, dancer and comedian, often having his comedic talents showcased by special material written by his wife, Sylvia Fine. He showed quite a different and serious side as Ambassador for UNICEF, and in one of his few dramatic roles in the memorable TV-movie Skokie, in which he played a Holocaust survivor. Before he died in 1987, Kaye also demonstrated his ability to conduct an orchestra during a comical, but technically sound, series of concerts organised for UNICEF fundraising. Kaye received two Academy Awards, an honorary award in 1955 and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award in 1982. In his later years he took to entertaining at home as chef?-he had a special stove installed in his patio?-and host. He specialized in Chinese cooking.


Kaye died in 1987 from a heart attack, following a bout of hepatitis. He left a widow Sylvia Fine and a daughter Dena. He is interred in the Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York. His grave is adorned with a bench that contains friezes of a baseball and bat, an aircraft, a piano, a flower pot, musical notes, and a glove.

Philanthropy

Danny Kaye was also a very philanthropic person. Throughout his life he donated generously to various charities. There is a rehabilitation centre for injured soldiers in the northern city of Nahariya in Israel called Bet Kaye (Kaye House) constructed with the help of a substantial donation from Kaye.


Rumored affairs

According to some sources Kaye had a long-term affair with Eve Arden in the 1940s.

According to the biographer Donald Spoto, Kaye and Laurence Olivier had a 10-year affair in the 1950s, when Olivier was still married to Vivien Leigh. Though this has been refuted by Olivier's official biographer, Terry Coleman, Olivier's widow, Joan Plowright has contended otherwise, reportedly stating, "I have always resented the comments that it was I who was the homewrecker of Larry's marriage to Vivien Leigh. Danny Kaye was attached to Larry far earlier than I."[1]

Laws For Women To Live By


(Ooo, men, watch out for this list. The women have had it....)

1. Don't imagine you can change a man - unless he's in diapers.

2. What do you do if your boyfriend walks-out? You shut the door.

3. If they put a man on the moon - they should be able to put them all up there.

4. Never let your man's mind wander - it's too little to be out alone.

5. Go for younger men. You might as well - they never mature anyway.

6. Men are all the same - they just have different faces, so that you can tell them apart.


7. Definition of a bachelor; a man who has missed the opportunity to make some woman miserable.

8. Women don't make fools of men - most of them are the do-it-yourself types.

9. Best way to get a man to do something, is to suggest he is too old for it.

10. Love is blind, but marriage is a real eye-opener.

11. If you want a committed man, look in a mental hospital.

12. The children of Israel wandered around the desert for 40 years. Even in biblical times, men wouldn't ask for directions.

13. If he asks what sort of books you're interested in, tell him checkbooks.

14. Remember a sense of humor does not mean that you tell him jokes, it means that you laugh at his.

15. Sadly, all men are created equal.

Well, folks, we know that our Bob has completed his bio's when we once again hear about the battle between the sexes. Fabulous, hawkman, and most of what you say is true, Boston, and NOT a joke.

Our Raggedy will be along in a little, I suspect, and once again will put the name to the face. Of course we know now that men all have different faces so that we may tell them apart.

Mr. Turtle, welcome back, and that "Midnight Sun" is a telling song, M.D. No wonder I love it, but I didn't know that Mercer wrote it.

Here's an interesting item, listeners:

Merit can be bought. Passion can't.

The only people who can change the world are people who want to. And not everybody does.
Human beings have this thing I call the "Pissed Off Gene". It's that bit of our psyche that makes us utterly dissatisfied with our lot, no matter how kindly fortune smiles upon us.

It's there for a reason. Back in our early caveman days being pissed off made us more likely to get off our butt, get out of the cave and into the tundra hunting wooly mammoth, so we'd have something to eat for supper. It's a survival mechanism. Damn useful then, damn useful now.

It's this same Pissed Off Gene that makes us want to create anything in the first place- drawings, violin sonatas, meat packing companies, websites. This same gene drove us to discover how to make a fire, the wheel, the bow and arrow, indoor plumbing, the personal computer, the list is endless.

and as we await that speckled pup from PA, here is that Danny Kaye song:

"Tchaikowsky and Other Russians"

VERSE (not sung in the original production)

Without the least excuse
Or the slightest provocation,
May I fondly introduce,
For your mental delectation,
The names that always give me a concussion,
The names of those composers known as Russian.

REFRAIN

There's Malichevsky, Rubinstein, Arensky, and Tschaikowsky,
Sapelnikoff, Dimitrieff, Tscherepnin, Kryjanowsky,
Godowsky, Arteiboucheff, Moniuszko, Akimenko,
Solovieff, Prokofieff, Tiomkin, Korestchenko.

There's Glinka, Winkler, Bortniansky, Rebikoff, Ilyinsky,
There's Medtner, Balakireff, Zolotareff, and Kvoschinsky.
And Sokoloff and Kopyloff, Dukelsky, and Klenowsky,
And Shostakovitsch, Borodine, Glière, and Nowakofski.

There's Liadoff and Karganoff, Markievitch, Pantschenko
And Dargomyzski, Stcherbatcheff, Scriabine, Vassilenko,
Stravinsky, Rimsky-Korsakoff, Mussorgsky, and Gretchaninoff
And Glazounoff and Caeser Cui, Kalinikoff, Rachmaninoff,

Stravinsky and Gretchnaninoff,
Rumshinsky and Rachmaninoff,
I really have to stop, the subject has been dwelt
Upon enough!

ENSEMBLE: Stravinsky!
RINGMASTER: Gretchaninoff!

Love it!

Oooh. Cary Grant and Danny Kaye and

Ah, There's our Raggedy with those marvelous faces from Hollywood and the world of children's stories. Great, PA.

We are looking at Winnie and Milne and Cary and Danny.

Raggedy and I both love the songs of Danny Kaye, be they tender or hilarious, and it seems to me, folks, that many people think Cary Grant and Vivien Leigh are the world's most beautiful people. Can't support that, however. Cary was at Barbara Hutton's side when she died, so the "cash and cary" tales of their marriage seem to be simply rumours.

One of Danny's gentler songs:

Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam
Till I'm in the arms of my darling again
My heart will find no home
Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam
Her arms were warm as they welcomed me
Her eyes were a fire bright
And then I knew that my path must be
Through the ever haunted night
Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam
Till I'm in the arms of my darling again
My heart will find no home
Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam
Her voice was oh such a soft caress
Of love it gently told
And in her smile was the tenderness
I may never more behold
Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam
Till I'm in the arms of my darling again
My heart will find no home
Anywhere I wander, anywhere I roam

Good evening. NPR today reported the death of "Pookie" Hudson on Tuesday. Do yall remember him?
He wrote and sang tenor on a song by the Spanials that became the last record played at many, many high school dances: "Good Night, Sweetheart, Good Night."
Such innocent times.

Hey, John of Virginia, Welcome back. I am sorry to say that I don't know "Pookie" Hudson, but I certainly know Goodnight sweetheart. That was the signal that our band was packing up and going home.

Is this the song?

This version by Dean Martin


Goodnight sweetheart
Til we meet tomorrow
Goodnight sweetheart
Sleep will vanish sorrow
Tears and parting may make us forlorn
But with the dawn a new day is born
Goodnight sweetheart
Though I'm not beside you
Goodnight sweetheart
Still my love will guide you
Dreams will enfold you
In each one I'll hold you
Goodnight sweetheart
Dreams will enfold you
In each one I'll hold you
Goodnight sweetheart goodnight

Yes and no, Letty. The rhythm of the lyrics you posted above sounded right. But the lyrics did not.
So I did the Google thing, using... Good Night, Sweetheart, Good Night.
Spaniels.
Your version is by Guy Lombardo. The Spaniel's 1955 version uses a very similar melody but different words.
I don't know how to transfer stuff from Google to A2K. It might be amusing to show the two versions. One of the Google sites has audio that yall might be able to provide a link to.

Don't ask me why, Virginia John, but I know this version by the Spaniels as well.


Goodnight, sweetheart
Well. it's time to go
Goodnight, sweetheart
Well, it's time to go
I hate to leave you, but I really must say
Goodnight, sweetheart, goodnight

Well it's three o'clock in the mornin'
Baby, I just can't do right
Well, I hate to leave you, baby
I don't mean maybe
Because I love you so

(chorus)

Mother, and, oh, your father
Won't like it if we stay out too late
Well, I hate to leave you, baby
Don't mean maybe
You know I hate to go

Venus
Frankie Avalon

[Written by Ed Marshall]

Hey, Venus
Oh, Venus

Venus, if you will
Please send a little girl for me to thrill
A girl who wants my kisses and my arms
A girl with all the charms of you

Venus, make her fair
A lovely girl with sunlight in her hair
And take the brightest stars up in the skies
And place them in her eyes for me

Venus, goddess of love that you are
Surely the things I ask
Can't be too great a task

Venus, if you do
I promise that I always will be true
I'll give her all the love I have to give
As long as we both shall live

Venus, goddess of love that you are
Surely the things I ask
Can't be too great a task

Venus if you do
I promise that I always will be true
I'll give her all the love I have to give
As long as we both shall live

Hey, Venus
Oh, Venus
Make my wish come true

Good early morning, WA2K folks.

edgar, I recall another Venus song, but thought that I would begin the day with this one:

Toto - Africa Lyrics

I hear the drums echoing tonight
But she hears only whispers of some quiet conversation
She's coming in twelve-thirty flight
Her moonlit wings reflect the stars that guide me towards
salvation
I stopped an old man along the way
Hoping to find some old forgotten words or ancient melodies
He turned to me as if to say: "Hurry boy, it's waiting there for
you"

[Chorus:]
It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you
There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do
I bless the rains down in Africa
Gonna take some time to do the things we never had

The wild dogs cry out in the night
As they grow restless longing for some solitary company
I know that I must do what's right
Sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti
I seek to cure what's deep inside, frightened of this thing that
I've become

[Repeat chorus]

[Instrumental break]

Hurry boy, she's waiting there for you

[Repeat chorus]

Edgar Allan Poe
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Born: January 19, 1809
Boston, Massachusetts
Died: October 7, 1849
Baltimore, Maryland

Occupation(s): Poet, short story writer, literary critic
Genre(s): Horror fiction, Crime fiction, Detective fiction
Literary movement: Romanticism
Influences: George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, Charles Dickens, Ann Radcliffe, Nathaniel Hawthorne
Influenced: Charles Baudelaire, Oscar Wilde, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle, Clark Ashton Smith, Jules Verne, H. P. Lovecraft, Jorge Luis Borges, Ray Bradbury, Lemony Snicket

Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 - October 7, 1849) was an American poet, short story writer, editor, critic and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of the macabre, Poe was one of the early American practitioners of the short story and a progenitor of detective fiction and crime fiction. He is also credited with contributing to the emergent science fiction genre.[1] Poe died at the age of 40. The cause of his death is undetermined and has been attributed to alcohol, drugs, cholera, rabies, suicide (although likely to be mistaken with his suicide attempt in the previous year), tuberculosis, and other agents.



Life

Poe was born Edgar Poe to a Scots-Irish family in Boston, Massachusetts, on January 19, 1809, the son of actress Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe and actor David Poe, Jr. The second of three children, his elder brother was William Henry Leonard Poe, and younger sister, Rosalie Poe.[2] His father abandoned their family in 1810.[3] His mother died a year later from "consumption" (tuberculosis). Poe was then taken into the home of John Allan, a successful tobacco merchant in Richmond, Virginia. Although his middle name is often misspelled as "Allen" (even in encyclopedias), it is actually "Allan," after this family.

The family traveled to England in 1815, and Edgar sailed with them. He attended the Grammar School in Irvine, Scotland for a short period in 1815, before rejoining the family in London in 1816. He studied at a boarding school in Chelsea until the summer of 1817. He was then entered at Reverend John Bransby's Manor House School at Stoke Newington, then a suburb four miles north of London.

Poe moved back with the Allans to Richmond in 1820. After serving an apprenticeship in Pawtucket, Poe registered at the University of Virginia in 1826, but only stayed there for one year. He became estranged from his foster father over gambling debts Poe had acquired while trying to get more spending money, and traveled to Boston under the assumed name of Henri Le Rennet, arriving there in April 1827. That same year, he released his first book (anonymously as "a Bostonian"), Tamerlane and Other Poems; a surviving copy of this rare book has sold for $200,000.

Reduced to destitution, Poe enlisted in the United States Army as a private, using the name Edgar A. Perry on May 26, 1827, and served at Fort Independence in Boston Harbor. The regiment was posted to Fort Moultrie, Charleston, South Carolina. After serving for two years and attaining the rank of sergeant major, Poe was discharged on April 15, 1829.

Poe moved to Baltimore, Maryland to stay with his widowed aunt, Maria Clemm, her daughter, Poe's first cousin, Virginia Eliza Clemm, and his brother Henry. In 1829, Poe's foster mother, Frances Allan, died. As was his foster mother's dying wish, John Allan reconciled with his foster son, and began coordinating an appointment for him to the United States Military Academy at West Point. Meanwhile, Poe published his second book, Al Aaraaf Tamerlane and Minor Poems in Baltimore in 1829.

Poe traveled to West Point, and took his oath on July 1, 1830. John Allan married a second time. The marriage, and bitter quarrels with Poe over the children born to Allan out of affairs, led to the foster father finally disowning Poe. Poe decided to leave West Point, and went on strike, refusing to attend formations, classes, or church. He was court-martialed for disobedience. He left for New York in February 1831, and released a third volume of poems, Poems, Second Edition.

He returned to Baltimore, to his aunt, brother and cousin, in March 1831. Henry passed away from tuberculosis in August 1831. Poe turned his attention to prose, and placed a few stories with a Philadelphia publication. He also began work on his only drama, Politian. The Saturday Visitor, a Baltimore paper, awarded a prize in October 1833 to his The Manuscript Found in a Bottle. The story brought him to the attention of John P. Kennedy, a Baltimorian of considerable means. He helped Poe place some of his stories, and also introduced him to Thomas W. White, editor of the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond. Poe became assistant editor of the periodical in July 1835. Within a few weeks, he was discharged after being found drunk repeatedly. Returning to Baltimore, he secretly married Virginia, his cousin, on September 22, 1835. She was 13 at the time.

Reinstated by White after promising good behaviour, Poe went back to Richmond with Virginia and her mother, and remained at the paper until January 1837. During this period, its circulation increased from 700 to 3500.[2] He published several poems, book reviews, criticism, and stories in the paper. On May 16, 1836, he entered into a bond of marriage in Richmond with Virginia Clemm, this time in public.


Career

Edgar Allan Poe.The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym was published and widely reviewed in 1838. In the summer of 1839, Poe became assistant editor of Burton's Gentleman's Magazine. He published a large number of articles, stories, and reviews, enhancing the reputation as a trenchant critic that he had established at the Southern Literary Messenger. Also in 1839, the collection Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque was published in two volumes. Though not a financial success, it was a milestone in the history of American literature, collecting such classic Poe tales as "The Fall of the House of Usher", "MS. Found in a Bottle", "Berenice", "Ligeia" and "William Wilson". Poe left Burton's after about a year and found a position as assistant at Graham's Magazine.

The evening of January 20, 1842, Virginia broke a blood vessel while singing and playing the piano. Blood began to rush forth from her mouth. It was the first sign of consumption, now more commonly known as tuberculosis. She only partially recovered. Poe began to drink more heavily under the stress of Virginia's illness. He left Graham's and attempted to find a new position, for a time angling for a government post. He returned to New York, where he worked briefly at the Evening Mirror before becoming editor of the Broadway Journal. There he became involved in a noisy public feud with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. On January 29, 1845, his poem "The Raven" appeared in the Evening Mirror and became a popular sensation.

The Broadway Journal failed in 1846. Poe moved to a cottage in the Fordham section of The Bronx, New York. He loved the Jesuits at Fordham University and frequently strolled about its campus conversing with both students and faculty. Fordham University's bell tower even inspired him to write "The Bells." The Poe Cottage is on the southeast corner of the Grand Concourse and Kingsbridge Road, and is open to the public. Virginia died there on January 30, 1847. Increasingly unstable after his wife's death, Poe attempted to court the poet Sarah Helen Whitman, who lived in Providence, Rhode Island. Their engagement failed, purportedly because of Poe's drinking and erratic behavior; however there is also strong evidence that Miss Whitman's mother intervened and did much to derail their relationship. He then returned to Richmond and resumed a relationship with a childhood sweetheart, Sarah Elmira Royster.


Death

Edgar Allan Poe's reburial celebration on November 17, 1875 at Westminster graveyard.On October 3, 1849, Poe was found on the streets of Baltimore delirious and "in great distress, and... in need of immediate assistance," according to the friend who found him, Dr. E. Snodgrass. He was taken to the Washington College Hospital,[4] where he died early on the morning of October 7. Poe was never coherent long enough to explain how he came to be in his dire condition, and, oddly, was wearing clothes that were not his own. Poe is said to have repeatedly called out the name "Reynolds" on the night before his death, though no one has ever been able to identify the person to whom he referred. One Poe scholar, W. T. Bandy, has suggested that he may instead have called for "Herring," (Poe's uncle was called Henry Herring). Some sources say Poe's final words were "Lord help my poor soul." Poe suffered from bouts of depression and madness, and he attempted suicide in 1848.

The precise cause of Poe's death is disputed. Dr. Snodgrass was convinced that Poe died as a result of alcoholism and did a great deal to popularize this interpretation of the events. He was, however, a supporter of the temperance movement who found Poe a useful example in his work. Later scholars have shown that his account of Poe's death distorts facts to support his theory.

Dr. John Moran, the physician who attended Poe, stated in his own 1885 account that "Edgar Allan Poe did not die under the effect of any intoxicant, nor was the smell of liquor upon his breath or person." This was, however, only one of several, sometimes contradictory, accounts of Poe's last days which he published over the years, so his testimony cannot be considered entirely reliable.

Cholera cannot be ruled out. While in Richmond during the summer of 1849, Poe wrote letters to his aunt, Maria Clemm (July 7th), and to a newspaperman, E.H.N. Patterson (July 19th and August 7th), in which he confided that he may have contracted cholera in Philadelphia. Cholera is also a theme in three of his short stories ("The Masque of the Red Death"; "The Sphinx"; "Bon-Bon").

Numerous other theories have been proposed over the years, including several forms of rare brain disease, diabetes, various types of enzyme deficiency, syphilis, the idea that Poe was shanghaied, drugged, and used as a pawn in a ballot-box-stuffing scam during the election that was held on the day he was found,[2] and, more recently, rabies. The rabies death theory was proposed by Dr. R. Michael Benitez, and is based upon the fact that Poe's symptoms before death are similar to those displayed in a classic case of rabies.[5] Cats play a prominent part in many of his stories, and it is conjectured that he was accidentally bitten by a rabid pet.

In the absence of contemporary documentation (all surviving accounts are either incomplete or published years after the event; even Poe's death certificate, if one was ever made out, has been lost), it is likely that the cause of Poe's death will never be known.

Poe is buried on the grounds of Westminster Hall and Burying Ground,[6] now part of the University of Maryland School of Law[7] in Baltimore.

Even after his death, Poe has created controversy and mystery. Because of his fame, school children collected money for a new burial spot closer to the front gate. He was reburied on October 1, 1875. A celebration was held at the dedication of the new tomb on November 17. Likely unknown to the reburial crew, however, the headstones on all the graves, previously facing to the east, were turned to face the West Gate in 1864.[1] Therefore, as it was described in a seemingly fitting turn of events:

In digging on what they erroneously thought to be the right of the General Poe the committee naturally first struck old Mrs. Poe who had been buried thirty-six years before Edgar's mother-in-law; they tried again and presumably struck Mrs. Clemm who had been buried in 1876 only four years earlier. Henry's Poe's brother foot stone, it there, was respected for they obviously skipped over him and settled for the next body, which was on the Mosher lot. Because of the excellent condition of the teeth, he would certainly seem to have been the remains of Philip Mosher Jr, of the Maryland Militia, age 19.
Poe's grave site has become a popular tourist attraction. Beginning in 1949, the grave has been visited every year in the early hours of Poe's birthday, January 19th, by a mystery man known endearingly as the Poe Toaster. It has been reported that a man draped in black with a silver-tipped cane, kneels at the grave for a toast of Martel Cognac and leaves the half-full bottle and three red roses. One theory (of many) is that the three red roses are in memory of Poe himself, his mother-in-law, and his wife Virginia.

The grave bears no epitaph, though many (including Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.) made suggestions for appropriate epitaphs. An earlier stone of white Italian marble had been carved with an epitaph, but it was destroyed before it reached the grave when a train derailed and plowed through the monument yard where it was being kept.


Griswold's "Memoir"

The day Edgar Allan Poe was buried, a long obituary appeared in the New York Tribune signed "Ludwig". The piece began, "Edgar Allan Poe is dead. He died in Baltimore the day before yesterday. This announcement will startle many, but few will be grieved by it."[8] It was reprinted in numerous papers across the country.

"Ludwig" was soon identified as Rufus Griswold, a minor editor and anthologist who had borne a grudge against Poe since 1842, when Poe wrote a review of one of Griswold's anthologies, a review that Griswold deemed to be full of false praise. Though they were coolly polite in person, an enmity developed between the two men as they clashed over various matters. Critics have seen this obituary as a way for Griswold to finally settle his score with Poe.

Rufus Griswold wrote a biographical "Memoir" of Poe, which he included in an additional volume of the collected works. Griswold depicted Poe as a depraved, drunk, drug-addled madman. This biography presented a starkly different version of Poe's biography than any other at the time, and included items now believed to have been forged by Griswold to bolster his case. Griswold's book was denounced by those who knew Poe well; Griswold's account became a popularly accepted one, however, in part because it was the only full biography available and was widely reprinted, and in part because it seemed to accord with the narrative voice Poe used in much of his fiction. No accurate biography of Poe appeared until John Ingram's of 1875. By then, however, Griswold's depiction of Poe was entrenched in the mind of the public, not only in America but around the world. Griswold's madman image of Poe is still existent in the modern perceptions of the man himself.


Literary and artistic theory

In his essay "The Poetic Principle", Poe would argue that there is no such thing as a long poem, since the ultimate purpose of art is aesthetic, that is, its purpose is the effect it has on its audience, and this effect can only be maintained for a brief period of time (the time it takes to read a lyric poem, or watch a drama performed, or view a painting, etc.). He argued that an epic, if it has any value at all, must be actually a series of smaller pieces, each geared towards a single effect or sentiment, which "elevates the soul".

Poe associated the aesthetic aspect of art with pure ideality claiming that the mood or sentiment created by a work of art elevates the soul, and is thus a spiritual experience. In many of his short stories, artistically inclined characters (especially Roderick Usher from "The Fall of the House of Usher") are able to achieve this ideal aesthetic through fixation, and often exhibit obsessive personalities and reclusive tendencies. "The Oval Portrait" also examines fixation, but in this case the object of fixation is itself a work of art.

He championed art for art's sake (before the term itself was coined). He was consequentially an opponent of didacticism, arguing in his literary criticisms that the role of moral or ethical instruction lies outside the realm of poetry and art, which should only focus on the production of a beautiful work of art. He criticized James Russell Lowell in a review for being excessively didactic and moralistic in his writings, and argued often that a poem should be written "for a poem's sake". Since a poem's purpose is to convey a single aesthetic experience, Poe argues in his literary theory essay "The Philosophy of Composition", the ending should be written first. Poe's inspiration for this theory was Charles Dickens, who wrote to Poe in a letter dated March 6, 1842,

Apropos of the "construction" of "Caleb Williams," do you know that Godwin wrote it backwards, ?- the last volume first, ?- and that when he had produced the hunting down of Caleb, and the catastrophe, he waited for months, casting about for a means of accounting for what he had done?[2]
Poe refers to the letter in his essay. Dickens's literary influence on Poe can also be seen in Poe's short story "The Man of the Crowd". Its depictions of urban blight owe much to Dickens and in many places purposefully echo Dickens's language.

He was a proponent and supporter of magazine literature, and felt that short stories, or "tales" as they were called in the early nineteenth century, which were usually considered "vulgar" or "low art" along with the magazines that published them, were legitimate art forms on par with the novel or epic poem. His insistence on the artistic value of the short story was influential in the short story's rise to prominence in later generations.

Poe often included elements of popular pseudosciences such as phrenology[9] and physiognomy[10] in his fiction.

Poe also focused the theme of each of his short stories on one human characteristic. In "The Tell-Tale Heart", he focused on guilt, in "The Fall of the House of Usher", his focus was fear, etc.

Much of Poe's work was allegorical, but his position on allegory was a nuanced one: "In defence of allegory, (however, or for whatever object, employed,) there is scarcely one respectable word to be said. Its best appeals are made to the fancy ?- that is to say, to our sense of adaptation, not of matters proper, but of matters improper for the purpose, of the real with the unreal; having never more of intelligible connection than has something with nothing, never half so much of effective affinity as has the substance for the shadow."[3]


Legacy and lore

Edgar Allan Poe's grave, Baltimore, MD.Poe's works have had a broad influence on American and world literature (sometimes even despite those who tried to resist it), and even on the art world beyond literature. The scope of Poe's influence on art is evident when one sees the many and diverse artists who were directly and profoundly influenced by him.


American literature

Poe's literary reputation was greater abroad than in the United States, perhaps as a result of America's general revulsion towards the macabre. Rufus Griswold's defamatory reminiscences did little to commend Poe to U.S. literary society. However, American authors as diverse as Walt Whitman, H. P. Lovecraft, William Faulkner, and Herman Melville were influenced by Poe's works. Nathanael West used the concept and remarkable black humor of Poe's "The Man That Was Used Up" in his third novel, A Cool Million.

Flannery O'Connor, however, who grew up reading Poe's satirical works, claimed the influence of Poe on her works was "something I'd rather not think about" (Poe Encyclopaedia, p. 259). T. S. Eliot, who was often quite hostile to Poe, describing him as having "the intellect of a highly gifted person before puberty," [4] professed that he was impressed, however, by Poe's abilities as a literary critic, calling him "the directest, the least pedantic, the least pedagogical of the critics writing in his time in either America or England." [5]

Mark Twain was also a sharp critic of Poe. "To me his prose is unreadable?-like Jane Austen's," he wrote in a January 18, 1909 letter to William Dean Howells. [6]


Influence on French literature

In France, where he is commonly known as "Edgar Poe," Poe's works first arrived when two French papers published separate (and uncredited) translations of Poe's detective story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue". A third newspaper, La Presse, accused the editor of the second paper, E. D. Forgues, of plagiarizing the first paper. Forgues explained that the story was original to neither paper, but was a translation of "les Contes d'E. Poe, littérateur américain." ("the stories of E. Poe, American author.") When La Presse did not acknowledge Forgues' explanation of the events, Forgues responded with a libel lawsuit, during which he repeatedly proclaimed, "Avez-vous lu Edgar Poe? Lisez Edgar Poe." ("Have you read Edgar Poe? Read Edgar Poe!") The notoriety of this trial spread Poe's name throughout Paris, gaining the interest of many poets and writers. (Silverman 321)

Among these was Charles Baudelaire, who translated almost all of Poe's stories and several of the poems into French. His excellent translations meant that Poe enjoyed a vogue among avant-garde writers in France while being ignored in his native land. Poe also exerted a powerful influence over Baudelaire's own poetry, as can be seen from Baudelaire's obsession with macabre imagery, morbid themes, musical verse and aesthetic pleasure. In a draft preface to his most famous work, Les Fleurs du mal, Baudelaire lists Poe as one of the authors whom he plagiarized. Baudelaire also found in Poe an example of what he saw as the destructive elements of bourgeois society. Poe himself was critical of democracy and capitalism (in his story "Mellonta Tauta," Poe proclaims that "democracy is a very admirable form of government?-for dogs" [7]), and the tragic poverty and misery of Poe's biography seemed, to Baudelaire, to be the ultimate example of how the bourgeoisie destroys genius and originality. Raymond Foye, editor of the book The Unknown Poe, put Baudelaire's and Poe's shared political sympathies this way:

Poe's anti-democratic views persuaded Baudelaire to abandon his socialism, and if these two men shared a single political preference it was monarchy. But each was a country unto himself, a majority of one, an aristocrat of the mind. There is arrogance here: the arrogance of loneliness. (Foye 76)
Poe was much admired, also, by the school of Symbolism. Stéphane Mallarmé dedicated several poems to him and translated some of Poe's works into French, accompanied by illustrations by Manet (see below). The later authors Paul Valéry and Marcel Proust were great admirers of Poe, the latter saying "Poe sought to arrive at the beautiful through evocation and an elimination of moral motives in his art."


Other world literature

Britain

From France, Poe's works made their way to Britain, where writers like Algernon Swinburne caught the Poe-bug, and Swinburne's musical verse owes much to Poe's technique. Oscar Wilde called Poe "this marvellous lord of rhythmic expression" and drew on Poe's works for his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray and his short stories (Poe Encyclopedia 375).

The poet and critic W. H. Auden revitalized interest in Poe's works, especially his criticism. Auden said of Poe, "His portraits of abnormal or self-destructive states contributed much to Dostoyevsky, his ratiocinating hero is the ancestor of Sherlock Holmes and his many successors, his tales of the future lead to H. G. Wells, his adventure stories to Jules Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson." (Poe Encyclopedia 27).

Other English writers, such as Aldous Huxley, however, were less fond of him. Huxley considered Poe to be the embodiment of vulgarity in literature. [8]


Russia

Poe's poetry was translated into Russian by the Symbolist poet Konstantin Balmont and enjoyed great popularity there in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, influencing artists such as Nabokov, who makes several references to Poe's work in his most famous novel, Lolita.

Fyodor Dostoevsky called Poe "an enormously talented writer", favorably reviewing Poe's detective stories and briefly referencing "The Raven" in his novel The Brothers Karamazov. It has been suggested that Crime and Punishment's Raskolnikov was inspired in part by Montresor from "The Cask of Amontillado", and that the same novel's Porfiry Petrovich owes a debt to C. Auguste Dupin (Poe Encyclopaedia 102).


Argentina

Argentinian author Jorge Luis Borges was a great admirer of Poe's works and translated his stories into Spanish. Many of the characters from Borges' stories are borrowed directly from Poe's stories, and in many of his stories Poe is mentioned by name. Another Argentinian author, Julio Cortázar, translated Poe's complete fiction and essays into Spanish.


Other countries

Poe was also an influence for the Swedish poet and author Viktor Rydberg, who translated a considerable amount of Poe's work into Swedish; a Japanese author who even took a pseudonym, Edogawa Rampo, from a rendering of Poe's name in that language; and German author Thomas Mann, in whose novel Buddenbrooks, a character reads Poe's short novels and professes to be influenced by his works. Friedrich Nietzsche refers to Poe in his masterpiece Beyond Good and Evil, and some have found evidence of Poe's influence on the philosopher.[9]

Poe is one of the main topics in Zettel's Traum, the 1,334-pages novel of Folio format by Arno Schmidt, type-written between 1962 and 1970. Trying to infer missing facts of Poe's life by a subliminal reading of the work, Schmidt at length expounds an extremely extravagant - and humoristic - overall theory about Poe's life and works. [10]


Detective fiction

He is often credited as being an originator in the genre of detective fiction with his three stories about C. Auguste Dupin, the most famous of which is "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." (Poe also wrote a satirical detective story called "Thou Art the Man") There is no doubt that he inspired mystery writers who came after him, particularly Arthur Conan Doyle in his series of stories featuring Sherlock Holmes. Doyle was once quoted as saying, "Each [of Poe's detective stories] is a root from which a whole literature has developed.... Where was the detective story until Poe breathed the breath of life into it?" (Poe Encyclopedia 103). Though Poe's Dupin was not the first detective in fiction, he became an archetype for all subsequent detectives, and Doyle acknowledged the primacy of C. Auguste Dupin in his Sherlock Holmes story, A Study in Scarlet, in which Watson compares Holmes to Dupin, much to Holmes's chagrin.

The Mystery Writers of America have named their awards for excellence in the genre the "Edgars."


Science fiction, gothic fiction and horror fiction

Poe also profoundly influenced the development of early science fiction author Jules Verne, who discussed Poe in his essay Poe et ses œuvres and also wrote a sequel to Poe's novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket called The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, Le sphinx des glaces (Poe Encyclopedia 364). H. G. Wells, in discussing the construction of his classics of science fiction, The War of the Worlds and The First Men in the Moon, noted that "Pym tells what a very intelligent mind could imagine about the south polar region a century ago" (Poe Encyclopaedia 372).

Renowned science fiction author Ray Bradbury has also professed a love for Poe. He often draws upon Poe in his stories and mentions Poe by name in several stories. His anti-censorship story "Usher II", set in a dystopian future in which the works of Poe (and some other authors) have been censored, features an eccentric who constructs a house based on Poe's tale "The Fall of the House of Usher".

Along with Mary Shelley, Poe is regarded as the foremost proponent of the Gothic strain in literary Romanticism. Death, decay and madness were an obsession for Poe. His curious and often nightmarish work greatly influenced the horror and fantasy genres, and the horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft claimed to have been profoundly influenced by Poe's works.


Playwrights and filmmakers

On the stage, the great dramatist George Bernard Shaw was greatly influenced by Poe's literary criticism, calling Poe "the greatest journalistic critic of his time" (Poe Encyclopaedia 315). Alfred Hitchcock declared Poe as a major inspiration, saying, "It's because I liked Edgar Allan Poe's stories so much that I began to make suspense films."

Actor John Astin, who performed as Gomez in the Addams Family television series, is an ardent admirer of Poe, whom he resembles, and in recent years has starred in a one-man play based on Poe's life and works, Edgar Allan Poe: Once Upon a Midnight. [11] The musical play Nevermore [12], by Matt Conner and Grace Barnes, was inspired by Poe's poems and essays. Actor Vincent Price played in many films based on Poe's stories like The Black Cat. Morella, The Facts In The Case Of M. Valdimar, and the Pit And The Pendulum, among many more. There has also been talk about Marilyn Manson making movies out of three of Poe's stories.

Poe's poem "A Dream Within A Dream" is frequently alluded to in the film Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975), directed by Peter Weir.


Physics and cosmology

Eureka, an essay written in 1848, included a cosmological theory that anticipated black holes[11][12] and the big bang theory by 80 years, as well as the first plausible solution to Olbers' paradox[13]. Though described as a "prose poem" by Poe, who wished it to be considered as art, this work is a remarkable scientific and mystical essay unlike any of his other works. He wrote that he considered Eureka to be his career masterpiece.

Poe eschewed the scientific method in his Eureka. He argued that he wrote from pure intuition, not the Aristotelian a priori method of axioms and syllogisms, nor the empirical method of modern science set forth by Francis Bacon. For this reason, he considered it a work of art, not science, but insisted that it was still true. Though some of his assertions have later proven to be false (such as his assertion that gravity must be the strongest force?-it is actually the weakest), others have been shown to be surprisingly accurate and decades ahead of their time.


Cryptography

Poe had a keen interest in the field of cryptography, as exemplified in his short story The Gold Bug. In particular he placed a notice of his abilities in the Philadelphia paper Alexander's Weekly (Express) Messenger, inviting submissions of ciphers, which he proceeded to solve.[13] His success created a public stir for some months. He later wrote essays on methods of cryptography which proved useful in deciphering the German codes employed during World War I.

Poe's success in cryptography relied not so much on his knowledge of that field (his method was limited to the simple substitution cryptogram), as on his knowledge of the magazine and newspaper culture. His keen analytical abilities, which were so evident in his detective stories, allowed him to see that the general public was largely ignorant of the methods by which a simple substitution cryptogram can be solved, and he used this to his advantage. [14] The sensation Poe created with his cryptography stunt played a major role in popularizing cryptograms in newspapers and magazines.


Music

Poe and his works have provided considerable inspiration to both classical music and popular music. See Edgar Allan Poe and music.


Visual arts

In the world of visual arts, Gustave Doré and Édouard Manet composed several illustrations for Poe's works.


Pop culture

His legacy is abundant in modern pop culture. It is much alive in the city of Baltimore. Even though Poe spent less than two years there, he is now treated as a native son. In 1996, when NFL football arrived, the team took the name Baltimore Ravens, in honor of his best known poem. The team's three "winged" mascots were named Edgar, Allan, and Poe.

The television show Homicide: Life on the Street, set in Baltimore, made reference to Poe and his works in several episodes. Poe figured most prominently in an episode in which a Poe-obsessed killer walls up his victim in the basement of a house to imitate the grisly murder of Fortunato by Montresor in "The Cask of Amontillado". In a disturbing scene near the end of the episode, the killer reads from the works of Poe as a dramatic effect to increase the tension.

The bar in which Poe was last seen drinking before his death still stands in Fells Point. Though the name has changed and it is now known as The Horse You Came In On, local lore insists that a ghost they call "Edgar" haunts the rooms above.[14]

But Poe's vast influence over pop culture does not end with Baltimore. Poe's image, with his weary expression, piercing eyes and tangled hair (see the daguerreotype above), has become a cultural icon for the troubled genius. His face adorns the bottlecaps of Raven Beer,[15] the covers of numerous books on American literature as a whole, and is often stereotyped in cartoons as "the creepy guy".[16] Numerous popular movie makers have incorporated Poe or Poe's works into their works (see "Adaptations" below).

Edgar Allan Poe is credited with the inspiration for pro wrestler Scott Levy's stage name, Raven.


Preserved home

Edgar Allan Poe, his wife Virginia, and his mother-in-law Maria rented several homes in Philadelphia, but only the last house has survived. The Spring Garden home, where the author lived in 1843-44, is today preserved by the National Park Service as the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site. It is located on 7th and Spring Garden Streets, and is open Wednesday through Sunday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Another of his former residences is preserved in Baltimore. It is open to the public and is also the home of the Edgar Allan Poe Society.


Imitators

Like any famous artist, Poe's works have spawned legions of imitators and plagiarists. [15] One interesting trend among imitators of Poe, however, has been claims by clairvoyants or psychics to be "channelling" poems from Poe's spirit beyond the grave. One of the most notable of these was Lizzie Doten, who in 1863 published Poems from the Inner Life, in which she claimed to have "received" new compositions by Poe's spirit. The compositions were re-workings of famous Poe poems such as "The Bells", but which reflected a new, positive outlook. Mabbott notes that, at least compared to many other Poe imitators, Doten was not entirely without poetic talent, whether that talent was her own or "channelled" from Poe.

For my soul from out that shadow
Hath been lifted evermore?-
From that deep and dismal shadow,
In the streets of Baltimore!

?-Lizzie Doten, "Streets of Baltimore", from Poems from the Inner Life, imitating "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe.[16]

John Raitt
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Emmett Raitt (born on 19 January 1917 in Santa Ana, California, died 20 February 2005, Pacific Palisades, California) was a star of the musical theater stage.

He is best known for his stage roles in the musicals Carousel, Oklahoma!, The Pajama Game, and A Joyful Noise, in which he set the standard for virile, handsome, strong-voiced leading men during the golden age of the Broadway musical. His only leading film role was in the 1957 movie version of The Pajama Game opposite Doris Day.

On television, he was seen many times on the Bell Telephone Hour. A clip of a television performance of Raitt singing the final section of the song "Soliloquy" from Carousel is included in the documentary film Broadway: The Golden Age, by the Legends Who Were There. In 1957, also for television, he and Mary Martin re-created their starring roles in the national touring version of Annie Get Your Gun.

In 1945, John Raitt was one of the recipients of the first Theatre World Award for his debut performance in Carousel. In 1965, he starred in the twentieth-anniversary production of the show at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

He died on February 20, 2005, at his home in Pacific Palisades, California, from complications due to pneumonia, aged 88. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Live Theatre.

He was the father of singer Bonnie Raitt, and former father-in-law of Michael O'Keefe. He was the grandfather of Bay Raitt, the creator of Gollum's face for the The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.

Guy Madison
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Guy Madison (January 19, 1922 - February 6, 1996) was an American film and television actor.




Early Life

He was born Robert Ozell Mosely in Bakersfield, California. He attended Bakersfield Junior College for two years and then worked briefly as a telephone lineman before joining the United States Coast Guard in 1942.


Acting career

In 1944, while visiting Hollywood on leave from the Coast Guard, his boyish good looks were spotted by a talent scout from David O. Selznick's office and he was immediately cast in a bit part in Selznick's Since You Went Away. Following the film's release in 1944, the studio received thousands of letters from fans wanting to know more about him.

He was signed by RKO Pictures in 1946 and began appearing in romantic comedies and dramas but his wooden acting style hurt his chances of advancing in films. In 1951, television came to the rescue of his fleeting career when he was cast in The Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok, which ran for six years.

Following his television series, he appeared in several more films, mostly westerns, before leaving for Europe, where he found greater success in spaghetti westerns.


Personal life

He was married to actresses Gail Russell (1949-1954) and Sheilia Connolly (1961-1963). Both marriages ended in divorce. He has four children - three daughters and one son.

There are some rumors that Madison may have had homosexual leanings. According to Hollywood biographer Lawrence J. Quirk, Mike Connolly, gay gossip columnist for the Hollywood Reporter from 1951 to 1966, "would put the make on the most prominent young actors, including Robert Francis, Guy Madison, Anthony Perkins, Nick Adams, and James Dean. Quirk said there was rampant gossip at gay parties regarding not only Connolly's escapades with these actors but also a noteworthy pornography collection he would display to those he favored."[1]

"Talent agent Henry Willson, ... serving for a while under David O. Selznick, had a singular knack for discovering and renaming young actors whose visual appeal transcended any lack of ability. Under his tutelage, Robert Mosely became Guy Madison, Arthur Gelien was changed to Tab Hunter, and Roy Fitzgerald turned into Rock Hudson. So successful was the beefcake aspect of this enterprise, and so widely recognized was Willson's sexuality, that it was often, and often inaccurately, assumed that all of his clients were gay."[2]

Guy Madison died from emphysema in 1996 and was buried at Forest Lawn Cemetery (Cathedral City) near Palm Springs, California.