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James Whitmore
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Born October 1, 1921 (1921-10-01) (age 86)
White Plains, New York
James Allen Whitmore (born October 1, 1921) is an American film actor.




Biography

Early life

Whitmore was born in White Plains, New York to Florence Bell and James Allen Whitmore. He graduated from Amherst High School in Amherst, New York, and subsequently Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones, and served in the United States Marine Corps during World War II.


Career

Whitmore's first major movie was Battleground, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Other major films included The Asphalt Jungle, The Next Voice You Hear, Above and Beyond, Kiss Me, Kate, Them!, Oklahoma! (1955), Black Like Me, Guns of the Magnificent Seven, Tora! Tora! Tora!, and Give 'em Hell, Harry!, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of former President of the United States Harry S. Truman.

In 1963, Whitmore played Captain William Benteen in the The Twilight Zone episode "On Thursday We Leave for Home." In 1969 Whitmore played the leading character of Professor Woodruff in the TV series My Friend Tony, produced by NBC. He was also a lawyer, Abraham Lincoln Jones, in the TV Series The Law & Mr.Jones during the late 1950s.

Whitmore also appeared as General Oliver O. Howard in the 1975 TV movie I Will Fight No More Forever, based on the 1877 conflict between the United States and the Nez Percé tribe, led by Chief Joseph. Whitmore's last major role was that of librarian Brooks Hatlen in the critically-acclaimed and Academy award-nominated 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption; who commits suicide in the middle of the film. To a younger generation, he is probably best known, in addition to his role in Shawshank, as the commercial spokesman for Miracle-Gro plant food for many years.

In addition to his film career, Whitmore has done extensive theatre work. He won a Tony Award for "Best Performance by a Newcomer" in the Broadway production of Command Decision (1948). He later won the title "King of the One Man Show" after appearing in the solo vehicles Will Rogers' USA (1970), Give 'em Hell, Harry! (1975) (repeating the role in the film version, for which he was nominated for an Oscar) and as Theodore Roosevelt in Bully (1977) although the latter production did not repeat the success of the first two.

In 1999, he played Raymond Oz in two episodes of The Practice, earning an Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Drama Series.

In 2002, Whitmore got the role of the Grandfather in the Disney Channel original movie A Ring of Endless Light. Whitmore has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6611 Hollywood Blvd.

In April of 2007 he also appeared in C.S.I. in an episode titled "Ending Happy" as Milton, an elderly man who provides a clue of dubious utility.


Personal life

Whitmore is the father of actor James Whitmore Jr. and the grandfather of actor James Whitmore III. He was married to actress Audra Lindley. Whitmore spends most of his summers in Peterborough, New Hampshire, performing with the Peterborough Players and of course his wife since 2001, Noreen Nash.

Roger Williams
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Background information

Birth name Louis Weertz
Born October 1, 1924 (1924-10-01) (age 83)
Omaha, Nebraska, United States
Genre(s) Pop standards
Instrument(s) Piano
Years active 1955-present
Label(s) Kapp
Website Roger Williams homepage

Roger Williams (born October 1, 1924) is one of the most popular pianists in American popular music history.[citation needed] As of 2004, he has released 116 albums.[1]

He was born Louis Weertz, the son of a Lutheran minister (Rev. Frederick J. Weertz) and a music teacher (Dorothea Bang Weertz), in Omaha, Nebraska, but before his first birthday moved to Des Moines, Iowa. He first played the piano at age three, but in high school became interested in boxing, mainly at his father's insistence, and only returned to music after breaking his nose several times and sustaining several other injuries. He majored in piano at Drake University in Des Moines, but was expelled for playing "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" in the practice room.[2] Weertz entered the United States Navy, served in World War II, and while still in the Navy received a bachelor's degree from Idaho State College (now Idaho State University) in 1950. Afterwards he managed to re-enroll at Drake, where he earned his master's degree, and later moved to New York City to study at the Juilliard School of Music. At Juilliard he studied jazz piano under Lennie Tristano and Teddy Wilson.

One night he was scheduled to play as an accompanist for a Juilliard student who was scheduled to sing on "Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts." The singer failed to appear, and Louis Weertz went on as a piano soloist, winning the night's contest. He was heard by David Kapp, founder of Kapp Records, and Kapp was so impressed that he signed the pianist, changing his name to "Roger Williams" after the founder of Rhode Island. In addition to the Godfrey program, he also won a talent contest on Dennis James' program, "Chance of a Lifetime."[3]

In 1955 he recorded the only piano instrumental to reach #1 on Billboard magazine's popular music charts: "Autumn Leaves."[1] While many other records of this song have been made since it was composed in 1945 by the composer Joseph Kosma, Roger Williams' version is easily the best known and most played. In 1966 he had another Top Ten hit with the song Born Free from the motion picture soundtrack of the same name.

His first wife, Joy Dunsmoor, bore him three children. After divorcing her he married again, in 1985, to Louise DiCarlo.

He was the first pianist to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. On October 29, 2004 he was inducted into the Nebraska Music Hall of Fame.

Williams resides in Encino, California and has more recently bought the rights to his Kapp masters from the Universal Music Group.

Tom Bosley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



Born October 1, 1927 (1927-10-01) (age 80)
Chicago, Illinois
[show]Awards
Tony Awards
Featured Actor
1959 Fiorello!

Thomas Edward Bosley (born October 1, 1927) is an Emmy-nominated and Tony Award winning American actor, best known on-stage for his work in Fiorello!, and for his starring and supporting roles on television shows like Happy Days, Murder, She Wrote and the Father Dowling Mysteries.





Biography

Early life

Bosley was born in Chicago, Illinois; he is Jewish.[1] During World War II, Tom Bosley served in the U.S. Navy. While attending DePaul University in Chicago in 1947, he made his stage debut in Our Town with the Canterbury Players at the Fine Arts Theatre. Bosley performed at the Woodstock Opera House in Woodstock, Illinois in 1949 and 1950 alongside Paul Newman.


Career

Bosley's breakthrough stage role was New York's Mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia in the long-running Broadway musical Fiorello! (1959) for which he won a Tony Award. His first motion picture role was in 1963, as the would-be suitor of Natalie Wood in Love with the Proper Stranger.

Bosley is best known as Howard Cunningham, Richie Cunningham's father, in the long running sitcom Happy Days. Bosley is also known for portraying Sheriff Amos Tupper on Murder, She Wrote. He also portrayed the titular Father Frank Dowling on the TV mystery series, Father Dowling Mysteries.

Bosley has several notable roles in animation, due to his resonant, fatherly yet expressive tone. Bosley is the voice of Harry Boyle in the animated series, Wait Till Your Father Gets Home. He provided the voice of the title character in the 1980s cartoon The World of David the Gnome, and voiced the shop owner Mr. Winkle in the children's animated Christmas special The Tangerine Bear. He also narrated the movie documentary series That's Hollywood. Additionally, he played the narrator B.A.H. Humbug in the Rankin/Bass animated Christmas special The Stingiest Man In Town.

He has endorsed Glad Trash Bags, D-Con, the IQ Computer and Sonic Drive-Ins, and currently is the spokesman for SMC Specialty Merchandise Corporation.

In 2004, Bosley guest starred as a toy maker named Ben-Ami on the series finale of the Christian video series K10C: Kids' Ten Commandments.

Beginning in 2008, Bosley will join the cast of the television drama Underground

Bosley shared a heartfelt story about his experience with the Holocaust in the documentary film Paper Clips. Other films include The Triangle Factory Fire Scandal.

George Peppard
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Birth name George Peppard Jr.
Born October 1, 1928(1928-10-01)
Detroit, Michigan, United States
Died May 8, 1994 (aged 65)
Los Angeles, California, United States
Spouse(s) Helen Davies (1954-1964)
Elizabeth Ashley (1966-1972)
Sherry Boucher (1975-1979)
Alexis Adams (1984-1986)
Laura Taylor (1992-1994)

George Peppard, Jr. (October 1, 1928 - May 8, 1994) was a popular American film and television actor.

He secured a major role early in his career when he starred alongside Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), but he is probably best known for his role as Col. John "Hannibal" Smith in the 1980s television show The A-Team, where he is the cigar-chomping leader of a renegade commando squad.





Biography

Early life

George Peppard, Jr. was born in Detroit, Michigan. The son of building contractor George Peppard, Sr. and opera singer Vernelle Rohrer; he graduated from Dearborn High School in Dearborn, Michigan.

Peppard enlisted in the Marine Corps at 17 and rose to the rank of Acting Gunnery Sergeant in the Artillery, leaving the Marines at the end of his first tour. He studied Civil Engineering at Purdue University where he was a member of Beta Theta Pi. He also attended Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.


Acting career

Peppard made his stage debut in 1949 at the Pittsburgh Playhouse. He then enrolled in The Actors Studio in New York. His first work on Broadway led to his first television appearance, with a young Paul Newman, in The United States Steel Hour (1956). Peppard's Broadway appearance in "The Pleasure of His Company" (1958) led to a MGM contract. Prior to a strong film debut in The Strange One (1957), he was discovered playing Robert Mitchum's illegitimate son in the popular melodrama Home from the Hill (1960).

His good looks, elegant manner, and superior acting skills landed Peppard his most famous film role as Paul Varjak in Breakfast at Tiffany's with Audrey Hepburn. This role boosted him briefly to a major film star from its debut in 1961 through the late 60's. His most famous films included How the West Was Won in 1962, The Carpetbaggers in 1964 and The Blue Max in 1966.

Peppard developed a tendency to choose tough guy roles in big, ambitious pictures where he was somewhat overshadowed by ensemble casts; for example, his strong military role as German pilot Bruno Stachel, an obsessively competitive officer pilot from humble beginnings who challenges the Prussian aristocracy during World War I in The Blue Max (1966).

Due to the complications of alcoholism, his career led to a string of B films (see list below), except for a brief moment of notable success with the highly successful TV series Banacek (1972-74), (part of the NBC Mystery Movie series), and one of his most critically acclaimed, though rarely seen, performances in the TV movie 'Guilty or Innocent: The Sam Sheppard Murder Case.' (1975)

Among these disappointing films was the 1970 Western, Cannon for Cordoba, in which Peppard played the steely Captain Rod Douglas, who has been put in charge of gathering a group of soldiers to take part in a dangerous mission into Mexico. Although it also featured the talents of actors such as Pete Duel and Nico Minardos, it is not among Peppard's best efforts. Neither was his role as "Space Cowboy" in Roger Corman's science fiction B-movie, Battle Beyond the Stars. He appeared in the short lived (only 1/2 season) Doctors' Hospital (1975) and several other television films. He also appeared in the science fiction film "Damnation Alley" in 1977. Still interested in film, but with film roles becoming increasingly uninteresting, he acted in, directed, and produced the drama "Five Days from Home" (1979).


Dynasty (1981)

Peppard was offered the original role of Blake Carrington in the tv series Dynasty (1981) and filmed the pilot episode with Linda Evans and Bo Hopkins. Peppard later turned down the role due to disagreements with writers and the part was subsequently offered to John Forsythe and the scenes with Peppard were reshot.


The A-Team

Peppard as "Hannibal" in The A-TeamIn the early 1980s, George Peppard re-emerged as a television star for his role as Colonel John "Hannibal" Smith in the action adventure series The A-Team, acting alongside Mr. T, Dirk Benedict, and Dwight Schultz. In the series, the A-Team was a crack team of renegade commandos on the run from the military for a crime they did not commit while serving in the Vietnam war. The A-Team made their living as soldiers of fortune, albeit only helping people with a just grievance.

"Hannibal" Smith was the leader of the A-Team, distinguished by his cigar-smoking, black leather gloves, disguises, and catch phrase, "I love it when a plan comes together." The show ran on NBC from 1983-1987 and lasted 5 seasons. It made George Peppard known to a younger generation, and is arguably his most well-known role. Surprisingly, the role wasn't originally written with Peppard in mind; at one point, James Coburn was considered for the part.


Personal life

Peppard married five times, and was the father of three children:

Helen Davies ?- 1954-1964: two children, Bradford and Julie
Elizabeth Ashley ?- 1966-1972: his co-star in The Carpetbaggers. One son, Christian
Sherry Boucher-Lytle ?- 1975-1979
Alexis Adams ?- 1984-1986
Laura Taylor - 1992-1994
Peppard finally gave up drinking in 1978 and spent his later years trying to help other alcoholics enter into recovery.

A life-long smoker, Peppard was diagnosed with lung cancer in 1992 and consequently quit. His fifth wife and "number one fan," former West Palm Beach banker Laura Taylor, met and married him shortly after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, and nursed him through his last 18 months. Cancer never forced his retirement from acting, and Peppard completed a pilot for a new series in 1994 (a Matlock spin-off) just shortly before his passing.

Peppard died of cancer (or more specifically, complications arising from the treatment of cancer: chemotherapy-induced leukemia) on May 8, 1994, in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 65. He is buried in Northview Cemetery in Dearborn, Michigan.

Richard Harris
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Birth name Richard St John Harris
Born 1 October 1930(1930-10-01)
Limerick, Ireland
Died 25 October 2002 (aged 72)

Spouse(s) Elizabeth Rees-Williams (1957-1969)
Ann Turkel (1974-1982)
[show]Awards
Academy Awards
Nominated: Best Actor
1963 This Sporting Life
1990 The Field
Golden Globe Awards
Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical/Comedy
1968 Camelot
Grammy Awards
Best Spoken Word Album
1974 Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Richard St. John Harris (1 October 1930 - 25 October 2002) was an Academy Award-nominated and Grammy Award--winning Irish actor, singer and songwriter. He appeared on stage and in many films, and is perhaps best known for his roles as King Arthur in Camelot (1967), as Oliver Cromwell in Cromwell and for his portrayal of Albus Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001) and Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002), his last film. He also played a British aristocrat and prisoner in A Man Called Horse (1970).

Harris was a notorious playboy and drinker, part of a rowdy generation of British and Irish actors including Albert Finney, Laurence Harvey, Peter Finch, Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole. [citation needed]




Biography

Early life and career

Harris was born in Limerick, Ireland, one of nine children of farmer Ivan Harris and Mildred (née Harty). He was schooled by the Jesuits at Crescent College. A talented rugby player, he was on several Munster Junior and Senior Cup teams for Crescent, and played for the well-respected Garryowen club. He might have become a provincial or international-standard rugby player, but his athletic career was cut short when he contracted tuberculosis in his teens. He remained an ardent fan of Munster provincial rugby team until his death, attending many matches, and there are numerous stories of japes at rugby matches with fellow actors and rugby fans Peter O'Toole and Richard Burton.

After recovering from the disease he moved to London, wanting to become a director. He could not find any suitable courses and enrolled in the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) to learn acting. While still a student, Harris rented the tiny "off-West End" Irving Theatre, and directed his own production of the Clifford Odets play Winter Journey (The Country Girl). The show was a critical success, but a financial failure, and Harris lost all his savings on the venture.

As a result, he ended up temporarily homeless, sleeping in a coal cellar for six weeks. After completing his studies at the Academy, Harris joined Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop. He began getting roles in West End theatre productions, starting with The Quare Fellow in 1956, a transfer from the Theatre Workshop.


Career

Harris made his film debut in 1958 in the film Alive and Kicking. He had a memorable bit part in The Guns of Navarone as an Australian air force pilot who reports that blowing up the "bloody guns" of the title is impossible by air. For his role in Mutiny on the Bounty, despite being virtually unknown, he insisted on third billing, behind Trevor Howard and Marlon Brando.

His first star turn was in the 1963 film This Sporting Life, as a bitter young coal miner, Frank Machin, who becomes an acclaimed rugby league footballer. For his role as Frank Machin, Harris won the 1963 award for best actor at the Cannes film festival. He also won acclaim and notice for his leading role (with Charlton Heston) in Sam Peckinpah's famous "lost masterpiece" Major Dundee (1965), as an Irish immigrant-turned-Confederate cavalryman during the American Civil War.

He appeared as King Arthur in the film adaptation of Camelot (in which he was cast despite his limited singing range, just like Richard Burton), and proceeded to appear on stage in that role for years. He recorded several albums, one ("A Tramp Shining") included the seven-minute hit song written by Jimmy Webb, "MacArthur Park" (which Harris mispronounced as "MacArthur's Park"); that song reached #2 on the United States Billboard magazine pop chart, while topping several charts in Europe, in the summer of 1968. A second all-Webb composed album, "The Yard Went on Forever", was released in 1969. He also wrote one of the songs, There are Too Many Saviours on My Cross, considered to be a criticism of the sectarian violence in Northern Ireland.

Some memorable performances followed, among them a role as a reluctant police informer in The Molly Maguires (1970) alongside Sean Connery. In 1971 he starred in the film Man in the Wilderness and in the low-budget Orca in 1977. Harris achieved a form of cult status for his role as mercenary tactician Rafer Janders in the 1978 film The Wild Geese. Also, in 1973, Harris wrote a highly acclaimed book of poetry, titled I, In The Membership Of My Days which was later released in record format with him reciting his poems.

By the end of the 1980s, Harris had gone a long time without a significant film role. He was familiar with the stage plays of fellow Irishman John B. Keane, and had heard that one of them, The Field, was being adapted for film by director Jim Sheridan. Sheridan was working with actor Ray McAnally on the adaptation, intending to feature McAnally in the lead role (Bull McCabe). When McAnally died suddenly during initial preparations for the film, Harris began a concerted campaign to be cast as McCabe. This campaign eventually succeeded, and the film version of The Field (which also starred Tom Berenger) was released in 1990. Harris earned an Academy Award nomination for his portrayal.


Later career and Harry Potter

Later in his career, Harris appeared in two Oscar-winning films, first as gunman "English Bob" in the 1992 western, Unforgiven, as well as portraying Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius in Ridley Scott's Gladiator (2000).

Harris initially declined the offer to play Albus Dumbledore in the Harry Potter films, not wanting to commit to subsequent sequels. Upon learning that he had turned down the role, his granddaughter convinced him that he was "going to do it."[1] He played the role of Headmaster Dumbledore in the first two Harry Potter film adaptations, but died before filming commenced on the third movie.

In the 2002 re-make of The Count of Monte Cristo, Harris performed as the book's fictionalized character of Abbé Faria, the jailed priest and former Napoleonic soldier who instructs Dantès in language, science, and combat, and provides him a treasure map.

In 2003, his voice could be heard as the character Opaz in the animated film Kaena: The Prophecy. The movie was dedicated to him as he had died the previous year.


Personal life and death

In 1957, he married Elizabeth Rees-Williams, daughter of David Rees-Williams. Their three children are actor Jared Harris, actor Jamie Harris (born Tudor St. John Harris, but known as Jamie since childhood), and director Damian Harris (who has a son named Marlowe, born 2002, with Australian actress Peta Wilson). Harris and Rees-Willams were divorced in 1969, and Elizabeth married another actor, Rex Harrison.

Harris' second marriage was to American actress Ann Turkel, who was 16 years his junior; that marriage also ended in divorce. He was a member of the Knights of Malta, despite his divorces, and was also knighted by Denmark in 1985. He was reportedly good friends with Peter O'Toole.[2] His family reportedly hoped O'Toole would replace Harris as Dumbledore in Harry Potter And The Prisoner of Azkaban.[2]

Harris died of Hodgkin's disease in 2002 at the age of 72, two and a half weeks before the U.S. premiere of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. He would be replaced as Dumbledore by fellow Irish-born actor Michael Gambon.

Whenever he was in London, Harris lived at the Savoy Hotel. According to hotel archivist Susan Scott, when he was being taken from the hotel on a stretcher, shortly before his death, he warned diners, 'It was the food!'[3]


Epilogue

Harris's Bar opened in the new landmark Riverpoint building in Limerick. It was named in honour of the Limerick legend. A statue of Harris was unveiled in Bedford Row in Limerick on September 7th 2007 by the Mayor of Limerick, Cllr. Ger Fahy, with the Harris Family in attendance. Sculptor Jim Connolly

On 30 September 2006, Manuel Di Lucia, of Kilkee, County Clare and long time friend, organized a bronze lifesize statue of Richard Harris at age eighteen playing the game of raquets to be unveiled in Kilkee [citation needed]. Sculptor Seamus Connolly

Julie Andrews
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Birth name Julia Elizabeth Wells
Born 1 October 1935 (1935-10-01) (age 72)
Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England
Spouse(s) Tony Walton (1959-1967)
Blake Edwards (1969-present)

Children Emma Walton (b.1962)
Amy Edwards (b.1974)
Joanna Edwards (b.1975)
[show]Awards
Academy Awards
Best Actress
1964 Mary Poppins
BAFTA Awards
Best Newcomer
1964 Mary Poppins
Emmy Awards
Outstanding Variety, Music/Comedy Series
1973 The Julie Andrews Hour
Outstanding Nonfiction Series
2004 Broadway: The American Musical
Golden Globe Awards
Best Actress - Musical or Comedy
1965 Mary Poppins
1966 The Sound of Music
1983 Victor/Victoria
Grammy Awards
Best Album for Children
1965 Mary Poppins
Screen Actors Guild Awards
Life Achievement Award
2006 Lifetime Achievement

Dame Julie Elizabeth Andrews, DBE (born Julia Elizabeth Wells[1] on 1 October 1935[2]) is an award-winning English actress, singer, author and cultural icon. She is the recipient of Golden Globe, Emmy, Grammy, BAFTA, People's Choice Award, Theatre World Award, Screen Actors Guild and Academy Award honors. Andrews rose to prominence after starring in Broadway musicals such as My Fair Lady and Camelot, as well as musical films like Mary Poppins (1964) and The Sound of Music (1965).

In 2001, she had a major revival of her acting career as a result of her role in The Princess Diaries, its sequel The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement as well as the Shrek animated films. In 2005 Andrews made her debut as a stage director with a revival of The Boyfriend, in which she also made her Broadway acting debut in 1954.




Early life

Andrews was born Julia Elizabeth Wells on 1 October 1935 in Walton-on-Thames, Surrey, England, the daughter of Edward C. "Ted" Wells, a teacher of metal and woodworking, and Barbara Wells (née Morris), who played piano at her sister Joan's dance school. It was at this Aunt Joan's dance school that the two-year-old Julia had her first non-speaking role as a fairy, then at age three the singing and speaking role of Nod in a production of Winken, Blinken, and Nod.[3][4]

In 1939, Barbara Wells met Ted Andrews (died 1966) while both worked for a variety show called The Dazzle Company at the seaside resort town of Bognor Regis. A Vaudeville-style entertainer who emigrated to England from Canada, Ted Andrews was billed as "The Canadian Troubador, Songs and a Guitar".[5][6]

With the outbreak of World War II, Barbara and Ted Wells went their separate ways. Ted assisted with the evacuation of children in Surrey during the Blitz, while Barbara joined Ted Andrews in entertaining the troops through the good offices of the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA). Barbara and Ted were soon divorced; they both remarried - her mother to Ted Andrews in 1939, and her father to a former hairstylist working a lathe at a war factory that employed them both in Hinchley Wood, Surrey.[7][8]

Julia Wells lived briefly with her father and her brother John Wells in Surrey. About 1940, her father sent her to live with her mother and stepfather, who (her father felt) would be better able to provide for his talented daughter's artistic training. While her mother wanted Julia to call Ted Andrews "Uncle Ted", she determined to refer to her stepfather as "Pop", while her father remained "Dad" or "Daddy" to her. Julia Wells's surname was legally changed to Andrews around this time.[9]

The Andrews family was "very poor and we lived in a bad slum area of London," Andrews said, adding, "That was a very black period in my life." But as the stage career of Ted and Barbara Andrews grew in popularity, they were able to afford to move to better surroundings, first to Beckenham, and then, as the war ended, back to Andrews' home town of Walton-on-Thames. The Andrewses took up residence at The Old Meuse, a house where Andrews' maternal grandmother happened to have served as a maid.[10]

Andrews' father sponsored lessons for his daughter, first at the Cone-Ripman School, then with the famous concert soprano and voice instructor Madame Lilian Stiles-Allen. "She had an enormous influence on me," Andrews said of Mme Stiles-Allen, adding, "She was my third mother -- I've got more mothers and fathers than anyone in the world." Andrews developed a strong voice and perfect pitch.[11][12]

Andrews performed spontaneously and unbilled on stage with her parents for about two years beginning in 1945. "Then came the day when I was told I must go to bed in the afternoon because I was going to be allowed to sing with Mummy and Pop in the evening," Andrews explained. She would stand on a beer crate to reach the microphone and sing while her mother played piano, sometimes a solo or as a duet with her stepfather. "It must have been ghastly, but it seemed to go down all right."[13][14]

Andrews got her big break when her step-father introduced her to Val Parnell, whose Moss Empires controlled prominent venues in London. Andrews made her professional solo debut at the London Hippodrome singing the difficult "Je Suis Titania" aria from Mignon as part of a musical revue called "Starlight Roof" on 22 October 1947. She played the Hippodrome for one year.[15][16] See List of former child actors.

On 1 November 1948, Andrews became the youngest solo performer ever to be seen in a Royal Command Variety Performance, at the London Palladium, where she performed along with Danny Kaye, the Nicholas Brothers, and the comedy team George and Bert Bernard for members of King George VI's family.[17][18]

Andrews followed her parents into radio and television.[19] She reportedly made her television debut on the BBC program RadiOlympia Showtime on 8 October 1949[20]. She garnered considerable fame throughout England for her work on the BBC radio show "Educating Archie", which she played from 1950 to 1952.[21]

Andrews appeared on West End Theatre at the London Casino, where she played one year each as Princess Balroulbadour in Aladdin and the egg in Humpty Dumpty. She also appeared on provincial stages across England in Jack and the Beanstalk and Little Red Riding Hood, as well as starring as the lead role in Cinderella.[22]


Mid-1950s

On 30 September 1954, on the eve of her 19th birthday, Andrews made her Broadway debut portraying "Polly Browne" in the already highly successful London musical The Boy Friend.[2] To the critics, Andrews was the stand-out performer in the show.[23]

In November 1955, Andrews was signed to appear opposite Bing Crosby in what is regarded as the first made-for-television movie, High Tor.[24]

In 1956, she appeared in the Frederick Loewe and Alan Jay Lerner musical My Fair Lady as Eliza Doolittle, opposite Rex Harrison's Henry Higgins. The show was a musical adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion and became the smash hit of the decade. Andrews was a sensation.

Before My Fair Lady, Andrews had auditioned for but not received a part in the Richard Rodgers play Pipe Dream. Rodgers wanted her for "Pipe Dream" but advised her to take the part in "My Fair Lady" if she was offered it, rather than the part in "Pipe Dream". Rodgers was so impressed with Andrews' talent that, concurrent with her run in My Fair Lady, Andrews was featured in the Rodgers and Hammerstein television musical, Cinderella.[25] Cinderella was broadcast live on CBS on March 31, 1957 and attracted an estimated 107 million viewers. [26]

Andrews married Tony Walton on 5 May 1959 in Weybridge, Surrey. They had first met in 1948 when Andrews was appearing at the London Casino in the show Humpty Dumpty. Andrews filed for divorce on 14 November 1967.[27]


1960s

In 1960, Lerner and Loewe again cast her in a period musical, as Queen Guinevere in Camelot, opposite Richard Burton and newcomer Robert Goulet. After a slow start, cast appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show ensured that the show would ultimately become a hit.


Rave Broadway reviews aside, movie studio head Jack Warner felt Andrews lacked broad name recognition, so he hired film actress Audrey Hepburn to play Eliza for the film version of My Fair Lady. As Warner later recalled, the decision was easy. "In my business I have to know who brings people and their money to a movie theatre box office. Audrey Hepburn had never made a financial flop."[28] Ironically, Hepburn's singing voice would be judged inadequate and would be overdubbed by Marni Nixon.

Andrews received the "consolation" of playing her first film in the title role of Walt Disney's Mary Poppins. Walt Disney had seen a performance of Camelot and thought Andrews would be perfect for the role of an English nanny who is "practically perfect in every way!" Andrews initially declined due to pregnancy, but Disney politely insisted, saying, "We'll wait for you." Andrews and her husband headed back to England in September 1962 to await the birth of daughter Emma Kate Walton, who was born in London two months later. Andrews and family returned to America in 1963 and began the film.

As a result of her performance in Mary Poppins, Andrews won the 1964 Academy Award for Best Actress and the 1965 Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy. She and her "Mary Poppins" co-stars also won the 1965 Grammy Award for Best Album for Children. As a measure of "sweet revenge", as Poppins songwriter Richard M. Sherman put it, Andrews closed her acceptance speech at the Golden Globes by saying, "And, finally, my thanks to a man who made a wonderful movie, and who made all this possible in the first place, Mr. Jack Warner."[29]


Andrews was nominated for the 1965 Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as Maria von Trapp in The Sound of Music. The movie also starred actors Christopher Plummer and Charmian Carr. The role had some superficial similarities to that of Mary Poppins.

By the end of 1967, Andrews had appeared in the most-watched television special, Cinderella; the biggest Broadway musical of its time, My Fair Lady; the largest-selling long-playing album, the original cast recording of My Fair Lady; the biggest hit in Disney's history, Mary Poppins; the biggest and second biggest hits in Universal's history, Thoroughly Modern Millie and Torn Curtain; and the biggest hit in 20th Century Fox's history and the most successful film of all time, The Sound of Music. This distinction is unmatched by any other performer in history.[citation needed]


1970s, 1980s and 1990s

Star!, a 1968 biopic of Gertrude Lawrence, and Darling Lili (1970), co-starring Rock Hudson and directed by her second husband, Blake Edwards (they married in 1969), are often cited by critics as major contributors to the decline of the movie musical. Both were damaging to Andrews' career and she made only three other films in the 1970s, The Tamarind Seed, Little Miss Marker and 10.

She starred in her own variety series (for one season, on the ABC network in 1972 - 1973, winning 7 Emmy Awards), but the greatest critical acclaim accorded her TV work was for her variety show specials with her close friend Carol Burnett.

In 1983, she was chosen as the Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year by the Harvard University theatrical society. The roles of Victoria Grant and Count Victor Grezhinski in the film Victor/Victoria earned Andrews the 1983 Golden Globe Award for Best Actress - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, as well as a nomination for the 1982 Academy Award for Best Actress, her third Oscar nomination overall.[30][2]

In 1993, she starred in a limited run at the Manhattan Theatre Club, of the American premiere of Stephen Sondheim's revue, Putting It Together. The show sold out immediately and proved that there was tremendous interest in seeing her return to the New York stage. In 1995, she starred in the commercially successful stage musical version of Victor/Victoria. It was her first appearance in a Broadway show in 35 years. Opening on Broadway on 25 October 1995 at the Marquis Theatre, it later went on the road on a very successful world tour. When she was the only Tony Award nominee for the production, she declined the nomination, saying that she could not accept because she felt the entire production was snubbed.[31]

Andrews was forced to quit the show towards the end of the Broadway run, when she developed vocal problems. She subsequently underwent surgery to remove non-cancerous nodules from her throat and was left unable to sing.[2] In 1999, Andrews filed a medical malpractice lawsuit against the doctors at New York's Mount Sinai Hospital, including Stuart Kessler, who had operated on her throat. Originally, the doctors claimed that she should regain her voice within six weeks, but Andrews' stepdaughter Jennifer Edwards has claimed that "it's been two years, and it [her singing voice] still hasn't returned."[32]


Revival

Director Garry Marshall cast her in The Princess Diaries and its sequel, playing the role of the queen of an imaginary country, Queen Clarisse Marie Renaldi; both films, in which she starred opposite Anne Hathaway, proved to be box-office success stories. In the film The Princess Diaries 2, Andrews made her singing comeback, performing the song "Your Crowning Glory." The melody was set in a limited range of an octave and a major third to accommodate Andrews' recovering voice. The film's music superviser Dawn Soler had a positive reaction to Andrews' performance: "She nailed the song on the first take. I looked around and I saw grips with tears in their eyes."[33] She has also starred in two made-for-television movies based on the character of Eloise (playing her Nanny), the child who lives at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. In 2004, she lent her voice to the role of Queen Lillian in Shrek 2, and Shrek the Third.


Recent activities

In 1999, Julie starred in a new movie, One Special Night, made for television, with James Garner. This would be their third time acting together; the first was The Americanization of Emily (1964) and the second Victor/Victoria (1982).[32] She has described "The Americanization of Emily" as her favorite film. [34]

In the 2000 New Year's Honours, despite her long exile in the United States and Switzerland, she was made a Dame Commander of the British Empire (DBE).

Andrews has been struggling to recover her four-octave singing voice following surgery to remove vocal fold cysts, but had a short tour of the U.S. at the end of 2002 with Christopher Plummer, Charlotte Church, Max Howard, and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. The year before her tour, she and Plummer reunited for the first time since The Sound of Music in a live television adaptation of On Golden Pond, which aired on CBS in the United States.

Andrews' career is said to have suffered from typecasting, as her two most famous roles (in Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music) cemented her image as a "sugary sweet" personality best known for working with children. Her roles in Blake Edwards' films could be seen as an attempt to break away from this image: In 10, her character is a no-nonsense career woman; in Victor/Victoria, she plays a woman pretending to be a man (who is working as a female impersonator); and, perhaps most notoriously, in S.O.B., she plays a character very similar to herself, who agrees (with some pharmaceutical persuasion) to "show my boobies" in a scene in the film-within-a-film. For this last performance, late night television host Johnny Carson thanked Andrews for "showing us that the hills were still alive", alluding to her most famous line from the title song of The Sound of Music.

Andrews recently directed a revival of The Boy Friend, the musical in which she made her Broadway debut in 1954. The production was created in 2003, at the Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor, New York. It was then remounted at the Tony Award winning Goodspeed Opera House in 2005, where she developed it further. From there, the show toured to cities in North America, including: Boston, Chicago and Toronto through 2006. The production included costume and scenic design by good friend and former husband, Tony Walton.

Andrews received Kennedy Center Honors in 2001. She also appears in the 2002 List of "100 Greatest Britons" sponsored by the BBC and chosen by the public. For her contribution to the motion picture industry, she has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, located at 6901 Hollywood Blvd.

On May 5th, 2005 Andrews became the Official Ambassador for Disneyland's 18 month-long, 50th anniversary celebration the "Happiest Homecoming on Earth". Her duties included making personal appearances at the park, traveling to promote the celebration and narrating the new 50th anniversary fireworks show, "Remember...Dreams Come True".

In a recent (2006) interview, she said: "To be honest with you, I've never been busier in my life," Andrews said. "I'm not quite sure what I was supposed to learn from all of that. It did bother me. I can't say that I wasn't devastated. Singing, with an orchestra, being able to sing, was what I'd known my entire life. Whatever happened, I think I found so much to keep me feeling that I'm contributing still."

In January of 2007, Andrews was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Screen Actors Guild's awards. The award was presented by two of Andrews' co-stars: Anne Hathaway, Andrews' co-star in The Princess Diaries, and Dick Van Dyke, her co-star from Mary Poppins.[35] When commenting on her feelings on receiving the award, Andrews said: "I'm terribly honored...I mean, there are an awful lot of people out there that could be honored. And the fact that they very sweetly chose me, means a lot."[30] When commenting on her career, Andrews said: "My career has just been blessed by good fortune, by amazing mentors who really cared and so many wonderful actors who have been a part of my life."[35]

Currently, Andrews' goals included continuing stage direction and possibly producing her own Broadway musical.[30]

In the fall of 2007, Julie Andrews will lend her voice to the narration of the Disney film, Enchanted.

In April 2008, Andrews will release "part one", of her autobiography, entitled Home: A Memoir, which will chronicle her early years in England's Music Hall circuit, up to her winning the role of Mary Poppins. The American Library Association has invited Andrews to serve as the 2008 Chair of National Library Week to promote the value of libraries and librarians. "Libraries have always been places of opportunity, places where everyone can come together, whether for research, entertainment, self help or to find that one special book," she said.





Status as a gay and lesbian icon

Julie Andrews has long had something of a dual image, being both a family-friendly icon and an icon for gays and lesbians. According to cultural studies scholar Brett Farmer, she "... is notable as one of the few divas to enjoy a parallel popularization across both gay and lesbian reading formations."[36] Andrews herself has acknowledged her strange status, commenting that " "I'm that odd mixture of, on the one hand, being a gay icon and, on the other, having grandmas and parents grateful I'm around to be a babysitter for their kids. . . "[37] She has frequently appeared as a formative presence and signifier in narratives of homosexual identity, notably in The Queen's Throat: Opera, Homosexuality, and the Mystery of Desire, Does Freddy Dance and Widescreen Dreams: Growing Up Gay at the Movies, and recently ranked 25th in a major poll ranking top gay icons.[38]

Perhaps more interesting is that there is notable investment in the very films that cemented her alleged "sugary sweet" image, as much as, if not more, than in Victor/Victoria. The Sound of Music has long been a gay favorite, and its recent Singalong incarnation was originally created for London's Gay and Lesbian Film Festival in 1999[39]. Recent queer theorists such as Stacy Wolf and Peter Kemp have argued for a different reading of the image projected by her two most famous films, Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music, as that of a transgressive, subversive and life-changing force, rather than a sugary nanny committed to keeping the traditional status quo. Stacy Wolf's book, A Problem Like Maria-- Gender and Sexuality in the American Musical, analyzes Andrews' unique performance style (alongside stars such as Mary Martin and Ethel Merman) and devotes an entire chapter to The Sound of Music, studying it within a queer feminist context, and shedding light on its importance among lesbian spectators.

Stella Stevens
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Birthplace
Yazoo City, Mississippi
Birthdate October 1, 1938 (1938-10-01) (age 69)
Measurements 37" - 22" - 36"
Height 5 ft 5 in (1.65 m)
Weight 118 lb (54 kg)
Preceded by Ellen Stratton
Succeeded by Susie Scott

Stella Stevens (born Estelle Caro Eggleston on October 1, 1938 in Yazoo City, Mississippi) is an American actress, film producer film director and nude model who began her acting career in 1959.





Biography

Stevens was born in Yazoo City although some sources mistakenly indicate the hamlet of Hot Coffee, Mississippi as the place of her birth. This was a publicity device.

She married electrician Noble Herman Stephens on December 1, 1954, probably in Memphis, by whom she had her only child, actor/producer Andrew Stevens. She and Herman Stephens divorced three years later, although she retained a variation of his surname as her own professional name. She was formerly Kate Jackson's mother-in-law. She has three grandchildren.

She was first under contract to 20th Century Fox, then dropped after six months. After winning the role of "Appassionata Von Climax" in Li'l Abner (1959), she got a contract with Paramount Studios (1959-1963) and later Columbia Pictures (1964-1968). She shared the 1960 Golden Globe Award for "Most Promising Newcomer - Female" with Tuesday Weld, Angie Dickinson, and Janet Munro.

In 1960, she was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month for January (and had featured pictorials in 1965 and 1968). She was listed among the 100 sexiest stars of the 20th century (#27). During the 1960s, she was one of the ten most photographed women in the world, along with Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Brigitte Bardot, Ann-Margret and Raquel Welch.

In 1962, she starred opposite Elvis Presley in Girls! Girls! Girls!. Later that year, she portrayed Jerry Lewis's love interest in The Nutty Professor. 1970 saw her featured in The Ballad of Cable Hogue with Jason Robards. In 1972, she appeared in Irwin Allen's The Poseidon Adventure as "Linda Rogo" (the former-hooker wife of Ernest Borgnine's character).

Throughout her career, she appeared in dozens of TV shows and was a regular on the 1981-1982 prime-time soap opera Flamingo Road. She teamed with the late Sandy Dennis in a touring production of an all-female version of Neil Simon's The Odd Couple, playing the messy one.

She produced and directed two films, The Ranch (1989) and The American Heroine (1979).

Randy Quaid
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Birth name Randall Rudy Quaid
Born October 1, 1950 (1950-10-01) (age 57)
Houston, Texas, United States
Spouse(s) Ella Jolly (1980-1985)
Evi Quaid (1989-present)
[show]Awards
Golden Globe Awards
Best Actor - Miniseries
1988 LBJ: The Early Years

Randall Rudy "Randy" Quaid (born October 1, 1950) is an Academy Award-nominated American actor and comedian.




Biography

Personal life

Quaid was born in Houston, Texas to Juanita Bonniedale "Nita" (née Jordan), a real estate agent, and William Rudy Quaid, an electrician.[1] Quaid is married to former Helmut Newton model Evi Quaid, and is the older brother of fellow actor Dennis Quaid. He attended Pershing Middle School (Houston).


Feature films

In a career that spans over 30 years, he has appeared in over 90 movies. Peter Bogdanovich discovered him when Quaid was a student at the University of Houston in Houston, Texas. He received his first exposure in The Last Picture Show, when escorting Jacy Farrow (played by Cybill Shepherd) to late-night indoor skinny dipping at a swimming pool. It was the first of several roles he has had which were directed by Bogdanovich and/or based on the writings of Larry McMurtry.


Quaid appeared in several National Lampoon's Vacation movies where he proved an impressive scene-stealer as Cousin Eddie, the dim-witted, bucolic in-law of Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase). He was nominated for an Academy Award for his role in The Last Detail (1973) and won a Golden Globe for his portrayal of President Lyndon Johnson in LBJ: The Early Years (1987). He was featured (with Margaret Colin) in two science fiction movies, the unsuccessful Martians Go Home and very successful Independence Day. Other movies include Kingpin, where he played the lovable Amish bowler Ishmael, alongside Woody Harrelson and Weird Science (the television version) cast member Vanessa Angel; a loser father in Not Another Teen Movie; and an obnoxious neighbor to Richard Pryor's character in Moving. He played the lead role in the HBO movie Dead Solid Perfect as a golfer trying to make it on the PGA Tour. Quaid is often considered to be one of the most versatile actors of his generation, easily adapting to suit incredibly varied roles in both comedy and drama. In fact he's often nominated for awards when playing complex dramatic characters.

In 2004, Quaid appeared on stage undertaking the starring role of Frank in the world premiere of Sam Shepard's The God of Hell produced by the New School University at the Actors Studio Drama School in New York. In The God of Hell Quaid's portrayal of Frank, a Wisconsin dairy farmer whose home is infiltrated by a dangerous government operative who wants to take over his farm, was well-received and reviewed by New York City's top theatre critics. It also marked the second time that Quaid starred in a Shepard play, the first being the long running Broadway hit True West.

In 2005, Quaid starred as Bill Geurrard in the Universal Pictures film The Ice Harvest. His chilling portrayal of a Kansas City mob boss was voted as one of the Top 10 Film Gangsters of all-time in a UK poll, the number one slot went to Marlon Brando. He had a pivotal supporting role in the SAG Award nominated ensemble drama Brokeback Mountain (2005) in which he played a homophobic rancher whose two male employees are the movie's main characters. On March 23, 2006, Quaid filed a lawsuit for $10 million plus punitive damages against Focus Features, Del Mar Productions, James Schamus, David Linde, alleging that they both intentionally and negligently misrepresented Brokeback Mountain as being, "a low-budget, art house film with no prospect of making any money" in order to secure Quaid's professional acting services at a considerably lower rate to his usual fee. The film then grossed over $160 million. The lawsuit was closely monitored by many actors who forgo their usual fees to make low-budget movies they believe have artistic merit. On May 5, 2006, Quaid dropped his lawsuit after he was advised that a financial resolution would be made. In 2007, Quaid portrays King Carlos the IV in Goya's Ghosts, a role for which he learned to play the violin, and he stars in the comedy Gary the Tennis Coach alongside Sean William Scott.


Television

Quaid received both Golden Globe and Emmy nominations for his 2005 portrayal of talent manager Colonel Tom Parker in the critically acclaimed CBS television network mini-series Elvis. Quaid's other television appearances include a season as a Saturday Night Live cast member (1985-1986), the role of real-life gunslinger John Wesley Hardin in the miniseries Streets of Laredo, and starring roles in the short-lived series The Brotherhood of Poland, New Hampshire (2003) and Davis Rules (1991-1992). He was featured in the highly-rated TV movies Category 6: Day of Destruction and Category 7: The End of the World and starred in Last Rites, a made-for-cable Starz/Encore! premiere movie.

He also provided the voice of an animated Colonel Sanders character in a series of television commercials for fried chicken restaurant chain KFC.

The Accident
--Author Unknown

A drunk man in an Oldsmobile
They said had run the light
That caused the six-car pileup
On 109 that night.

When broken bodies lay about
"And blood was everywhere,"
"The sirens screamed out eulogies,"
For death was in the air.

"A mother, trapped inside her car,"
Was heard above the noise;
Her plaintive plea near split the air:
"Oh, God, please spare my boys!"

She fought to loose her pinned hands;
"She struggled to get free,"
But mangled metal held her fast
In grim captivity.

Her frightened eyes then focused
On where the back seat once had been,
But all she saw was broken glass and
Two children's seats crushed in.

Her twins were nowhere to be seen;
She did not hear them cry,
And then she prayed they'd been thrown free,
"Oh, God, don't let them die! "

Then firemen came and cut her loose,
But when they searched the back,
They found therein no little boys,
But the seat belts were intact.

They thought the woman had gone mad
And was traveling alone,
But when they turned to question her,
They discovered she was gone.

Policemen saw her running wild,
screaming above the noise
In beseeching supplication,
"Please help me find my boys!

"They're four years old and wear blue shirts;
Their jeans are blue to match.""
One cop spoke up, "They're in my car,
And they don't have a scratch."

"They said their daddy put them there
And gave them each a cone,
Then told them both to wait for Mom
To come and take them home."

"I've searched the area high and low,
But I can't find their dad.
He must have fled the scene,
I guess, and that is very bad."

The mother hugged the twins and said,
While wiping at a tear,
"He could not flee the scene, you see,
For he's been dead a year."

The cop just looked confused and asked,
"Now, how can that be true?
The boys said, 'Mommy, Daddy came
And left a kiss for you."

"He told us not to worry
And that you would be all right,
And then he put us in this car with
The pretty, flashing light."

"We wanted him to stay with us,
Because we miss him so,
But Mommy, he just hugged us tight,
And said he had to go."

"He said someday we'd understand
And told us not to fuss,
And he said to tell you, Mommy,
He's watching over us."

The mother knew without a doubt
That what they spoke was true,
For she recalled their dad's last words,
"I will watch over you."

The firemen's notes could not explain
The twisted, mangled car,
And how the three of them escaped
Without a single scar.

But on the cop's report was scribed,
In print so very fine,
An angel walked the beat tonight
on Highway 109.

That poem was worth a second read, Bob. It is the start of the spooky season, and that one gives us a chill or two.

I had forgotten about The A-Team and had to recall it by photo, listeners.



George is the only one smiling.

Let's do this song as I had no idea that George Peppard was in Breakfast at Tiffany's

Moon River

Moon river, wider than a mile,
I'm crossing you in style, some day.
Old dream maker, you heart breaker,
Wherever you're goin', I'm goin' your way.
Two drifters, off to see the world,
There's such a lot of world, to see.
We're after the same rainbow's end,
Waitin' 'round the bend,
My Huckleberry friend, moon river,
And me

By Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer

My radio experiences span over 60 years. As a child, the Golden Age radio programs meant as much to me as did the music broadcasts. So, I think I shall, from time to time, throw in a bit of related trivia, beginning with one of my top favorites, Hal Peary.


Biography
Known to radio, film and TV fans as "Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve," Hal Peary's booming voice and distinctive laugh certainly left their mark on all three mediums. Born Harrold Jese Pereira de Faria in San Leandro, California, Peary was the son of Portuguese immigrants. A natural performer with a great singing voice, Peary was performing on radio in the San Francisco area by age eleven. He went on to be a popular radio performer and the break that would change his career came in 1939 when he was cast on The Fibber McGee and Molly Show playing a host of characters. When his "Throckmorton Gildersleeve" character became a hit it was spun-off into its own program, The Great Gildersleeve. The show was one of radios most popular, running for seventeen years and enabled the Peary to develop a movie career playing the Gildersleeve character. The rotund Peary was right at home on the silver screen in movies such as The Great Gildersleeve, Gildersleeve's Ghost, Gildersleeve on Broadway, and Gildersleeve's Bad Day, and he proved himself to be as gifted a physical comedian as he was with his voice. Peary appeared on television in several series including Roman Holidays, Fibber McGee and Molly, and Blondie. He continued to work into the 1970s making guest appearances on shows such as The Brady Bunch and doing voice work. Interestingly, in 1950 Peary left The Great Gildersleeve radio program and was replaced by Willard Waterman. Waterman's voice was similar to Peary's and he did such a fine imitation of him that many people didn't realize that Peary had left the show.







Filmography
Film


Here We Go Again
The Great Gildersleeve
Gildersleeve's Bad Day
Gildersleeve on Broadway
Unusual Occupations
Gildersleeve's Ghost
Hare Conditioned (voice)
Port of Hell
Wetbacks
Outlaw Queen
A Tiger Walks
Clambake
Seven Days' Leave
Country Fair
Look Who's Laughing
Comin' Round the Mountain
TV

Roman Holidays
Rudolph's Shiny New Year (voice)
Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July (voice)
Fibber McGee and Molly
Blondie

TV Guest Appearances

Perry Mason
Petticoat Junction
The Addams Family
My Three Sons
Petticoat Junction
The Brady Bunch
The Dick Van Dyke Show
Circus Boy
The Spike Jones Show

Bring It On Home To Me
Sam Cooke (With backup by Lou Rawls)

If you ever change your mind
About leavin', leavin' me behind
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, oh yeah

You know I laughed (ha ha) when you left
But now I know I've only hurt myself
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah

(Yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

I'll give you jewellery, money too
And that's not all, all I'll do for you
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah

(Yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)
Yeah

------ Guitar and piano in unison ------

You know I'll always be your slave
Till I'm dead and buried in my grave
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah

(Yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

If you ever change your mind
About leavin', leavin' me behind
Oh, oh, bring it to me
Bring your sweet lovin'
Bring it on home to me, yeah

(Yeah) yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)
Yeah (yeah) yeah (yeah)

Thanks, edgar, for that great commentary on the Radio Days. I am afraid, y'all, that I don't have anyone to ask about the good old days. That's why these brief comments are welcomed. My mom spent a lot of time listening to the radio, and I recall bits and pieces of this and that. Went to the archives to find your man, Texas



I know Lou Rawls as well, but although this is not a familiar song, the lyrics are great.

Lou Rawls---Nobody But Me

I've got no chauffeur to chauffeur me
I've got no servant to serve my tea
But I'm as happy as a man can be
Because I've got a girl who loves nobody but me

I don't own stock in no stock exchange
I don't hold claim to no real estate
But I'm not living my life in vain
Because I've got a girl who loves nobody but me

And everytime my sweetie goes walking
Down some sunny street
She always sets the whole town to talking
'Cause she's a genuine Athenes from her head down to her feet

I don't rank high in society
I don't possess a PhD
But I'm all set confident-u-ally
Because I've got a girl who loves nobody but me, now

Would Letty please undedicate that Kate Bush song to Raggedyaggie.

Would you believe it if you didn't see it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfGc4wcil2g

Dream Weaver
Gary Wright lyrics

I've just closed my eyes again
Climbed aboard the dream weaver train
Driver take away my worries of today
And leave tomorrow behind

Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe you can get me through the night
Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe we can reach the morning light

Fly me high through the starry skies
Maybe to an astral plane
Cross the highways of fantasy
Help me to forget todays pain

Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe you can get me through the night
Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe we can reach the morning light

Though the dawn may be coming soon
There still may be some time
Fly me away to the bright side of the moon
And meet me on the other side

Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe you can get me through the night
Ooooh, dream weaver
I believe we can reach the morning light

Dream weaver
Dream weaver

Mahatma Gandhi
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

October 2, 1869(1869-10-02) - January 30, 1948 (aged 78)

India's "Father of the Nation"
Alternate name: Mahatma Gandhi
Date of birth: October 2, 1869(1869-10-02)
Place of birth: Porbandar, Gujarat, British India
Date of death: January 30, 1948 (aged 78)
Place of death: New Delhi, India
Movement: Indian independence movement
Major organizations: Indian National Congress

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (Gujarati: મોહનદાસ કરમચંદ ગાંધી, IAST: mohandās karamcand gāndhī, IPA: /moɦənd̪as kərəmtʃənd̪ gand̪ʱi/ (October 2, 1869 - January 30, 1948) was a major political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian independence movement. He was the pioneer of Satyagraha?-the resistance of tyranny through mass civil disobedience, firmly founded upon ahimsa or total non-violence?-which led India to independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. Gandhi is commonly known in India and across the world as Mahatma Gandhi (IPA: /mə'hɑt.mə 'gɑn.di/[1]) (Sanskrit: महात्मा mahātmā - "Great Soul") and as Bapu (Gujarati: બાપુ bāpu - "Father"). In India, he is officially accorded the honour of Father of the Nation and October 2nd, his birthday, is commemorated each year as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday. On 15 June 2007, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution declaring October 2 to be the "International Day of Non-Violence."[2][3]

As a British-educated lawyer, Gandhi first employed his ideas of peaceful civil disobedience in the Indian community's struggle for civil rights in South Africa. Upon his return to India, he organized poor farmers and labourers to protest against oppressive taxation and widespread discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for the alleviation of poverty, for the liberation of women, for brotherhood amongst differing religions and ethnicities, for an end to untouchability and caste discrimination, and for the economic self-sufficiency of the nation, but above all for Swaraj?-the independence of India from foreign domination. Gandhi famously led Indians in the disobedience of the salt tax on the 400 kilometre (248 miles) Dandi Salt March in 1930, and in an open call for the British to Quit India in 1942. He was imprisoned for many years on numerous occasions in both South Africa and India.

Throughout his life, Gandhi remained committed to non-violence and truth even in the most extreme situations. A student of Hindu philosophy, he lived simply, organizing an ashram that was self-sufficient in its needs. Making his own clothes?-the traditional Indian dhoti and shawl woven with a charkha?-he lived on a simple vegetarian diet. He used rigorous fasts, for long periods, for both self-purification and protest.





Early life

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born into the Hindu Modh family in Porbandar, in 1869. He was the son of Karamchand Gandhi, the diwan (Prime Minister) of Porbandar, and Putlibai, Karamchand's fourth wife, a Hindu of the Pranami Vaishnava order. Karamchand's first two wives, who each bore him a daughter, died from unknown reasons (rumored to be in childbirth). Living with a devout mother and surrounded by the Jain influences of Gujarat, Gandhi learned from an early age the tenets of non-injury to living beings, vegetarianism, fasting for self-purification, and mutual tolerance between members of various creeds and sects. He was born into the vaishya, or business, caste.


In May 1883, at the age of 13, Gandhi was married through his parents' arrangements to Kasturba Makhanji (also spelled "Kasturbai" or known as "Ba"). They had four sons: Harilal Gandhi, born in 1888; Manilal Gandhi, born in 1892; Ramdas Gandhi, born in 1897; and Devdas Gandhi, born in 1900. Gandhi was a mediocre student in his youth at Porbandar and later Rajkot. He barely passed the matriculation exam for Samaldas College at Bhavanagar, Gujarat. He was also unhappy at the college, because his family wanted him to become a barrister.

At the age of 18 on September 4, 1888, Gandhi went to University College London to train as a barrister. His time in London, the Imperial capital, was influenced by a vow he had made to his mother in the presence of the Jain monk Becharji, upon leaving India, to observe the Hindu precepts of abstinence from meat, alcohol, and promiscuity. Although Gandhi experimented with adopting "English" customs?-taking dancing lessons for example?-he could not stomach his landlady's mutton and cabbage. She pointed him towards one of London's few vegetarian restaurants. Rather than simply go along with his mother's wishes, he read about, and intellectually embraced vegetarianism. He joined the Vegetarian Society, was elected to its executive committee, and founded a local chapter. He later credited this with giving him valuable experience in organizing institutions. Some of the vegetarians he met were members of the Theosophical Society, which had been founded in 1875 to further universal brotherhood, and which was devoted to the study of Buddhist and Hindu Brahmanistic literature. They encouraged Gandhi to read the Bhagavad Gita. Not having shown a particular interest in religion before, he read works of and about Hinduism, Christianity, Buddhism, Islam and other religions. He returned to India after being called to the bar of England and Wales by Inner Temple, but had limited success establishing a law practice in Bombay. Later, after applying and being turned down for a part-time job as a high school teacher, he ended up returning to Rajkot to make a modest living drafting petitions for litigants, but was forced to close down that business as well when he ran afoul of a British officer. In his autobiography, he describes this incident as a kind of unsuccessful lobbying attempt on behalf of his older brother. It was in this climate that (in 1893) he accepted a year-long contract from an Indian firm to a post in Natal, South Africa.

When back in London in 1895, he happened to meet Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain, the Radical-turned-ultra-Tory, whose son Neville became Prime Minister in the 1930s and helped suppress Gandhi. Chamberlain Snr. agreed that the treatment of Indians was barbaric but appeared unwilling to push through any legislation about this however.


Civil rights movement in South Africa (1893-1914)


South Africa changed Gandhi dramatically, as he faced the discrimination commonly directed at blacks and Indians. One day in court at Durban, the magistrate asked him to remove his turban. Gandhi refused and stormed out of the courtroom. He was thrown off a train at Pietermaritzburg, after refusing to move from the first class to a third class coach while holding a valid first class ticket. Traveling further on by stagecoach, he was beaten by a driver for refusing to travel on the foot board to make room for a European passenger. He suffered other hardships on the journey as well, including being barred from many hotels. These incidents have been acknowledged by several biographers as a turning point in his life, explaining his later social activism. It was through witnessing firsthand the racism, prejudice and injustice against Indians in South Africa that Gandhi started to question his people's status, and his own place in society.

Gandhi extended his original period of stay in South Africa to assist Indians in opposing a bill to deny them the right to vote. Though unable to halt the bill's passage, his campaign was successful in drawing attention to the grievances of Indians in South Africa. He founded the Natal Indian Congress in 1894, and through this organization, he molded the Indian community of South Africa into a homogeneous political force. In January 1897, when Gandhi returned from a brief trip to India, a white mob attacked and tried to lynch him.[1] In an early indication of the personal values that would shape his later campaigns, he refused to press charges against any member of the mob, stating it was one of his principles not to seek redress for a personal wrong in a court of law.

At the onset of the South African War, Gandhi argued that Indians must support the war effort in order to legitimize their claims to full citizenship, organizing a volunteer ambulance corps of 300 free Indians and 800 indentured labourers called the Indian Ambulance Corps, one of the few medical units to serve wounded black South Africans. In 1906, the Transvaal government promulgated a new Act compelling registration of the colony's Indian population. At a mass protest meeting held in Johannesburg on September 11th that year, Gandhi adopted his still evolving methodology of satyagraha (devotion to the truth), or non-violent protest, for the first time, calling on his fellow Indians to defy the new law and suffer the punishments for doing so, rather than resist through violent means. This plan was adopted, leading to a seven-year struggle in which thousands of Indians were jailed (including Gandhi), flogged, or even shot, for striking, refusing to register, burning their registration cards, or engaging in other forms of non-violent resistance. While the government was successful in repressing the Indian protesters, the public outcry stemming from the harsh methods employed by the South African government in the face of peaceful Indian protesters finally forced South African General Jan Christiaan Smuts to negotiate a compromise with Gandhi. Gandhi's ideas took shape and the concept of Satyagraha matured during this struggle.


Struggle for Indian Independence (1916-1945)

He spoke at the conventions of the Indian National Congress, but was primarily introduced to Indian issues, politics and the Indian people by Gopal Krishna Gokhale, a respected leader of the Congress Party at the time.


Champaran and Kheda


Gandhi's first major achievements came in 1918 with the Champaran agitation and Kheda Satyagraha, although in the latter it was indigo and other cash crops instead of the food crops necessary for their survival. Suppressed by the militias of the landlords (mostly British), they were given measly compensation, leaving them mired in extreme poverty. The villages were kept extremely dirty and unhygienic; and alcoholism, untouchability and purdah were rampant. Now in the throes of a devastating famine, the British levied an oppressive tax which they insisted on increasing. The situation was desperate. In Kheda in Gujarat, the problem was the same. Gandhi established an ashram there, organizing scores of his veteran supporters and fresh volunteers from the region. He organized a detailed study and survey of the villages, accounting for the atrocities and terrible episodes of suffering, including the general state of degenerate living. Building on the confidence of villagers, he began leading the clean-up of villages, building of schools and hospitals and encouraging the village leadership to undo and condemn many social evils, as accounted above.

But his main impact came when he was arrested by police on the charge of creating unrest and was ordered to leave the province. Hundreds of thousands of people protested and rallied outside the jail, police stations and courts demanding his release, which the court reluctantly granted. Gandhi led organized protests and strikes against the landlords, who with the guidance of the British government, signed an agreement granting the poor farmers of the region more compensation and control over farming, and cancellation of revenue hikes and its collection until the famine ended. It was during this agitation, that Gandhi was addressed by the people as Bapu (Father) and Mahatma (Great Soul). In Kheda, Sardar Patel represented the farmers in negotiations with the British, who suspended revenue collection and released all the prisoners. As a result, Gandhi's fame spread all over the nation.


Non-cooperation

Non-cooperation and peaceful resistance were Gandhi's "weapons" in the fight against injustice. In Punjab, the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of civilians by British troops caused deep trauma to the nation, leading to increased public anger and acts of violence. Gandhi criticized both the actions of the British Raj and the retaliatory violence of Indians. He authored the resolution offering condolences to British civilian victims and condemning the riots, which after initial opposition in the party, was accepted following Gandhi's emotional speech advocating his principle that all violence was evil and could not be justified.[4] But it was after the massacre and subsequent violence that Gandhi's mind focused upon obtaining complete self-government and control of all Indian government institutions, maturing soon into Swaraj or complete individual, spiritual, political independence.


In December 1921, Gandhi was invested with executive authority on behalf of the Indian National Congress. Under his leadership, the Congress was reorganized with a new constitution, with the goal of Swaraj. Membership in the party was opened to anyone prepared to pay a token fee. A hierarchy of committees was set up to improve discipline, transforming the party from an elite organization to one of mass national appeal. Gandhi expanded his non-violence platform to include the swadeshi policy - the boycott of foreign-made goods, especially British goods. Linked to this was his advocacy that khadi (homespun cloth) be worn by all Indians instead of British-made textiles. Gandhi exhorted Indian men and women, rich or poor, to spend time each day spinning khadi in support of the independence movement.[5] This was a strategy to inculcate discipline and dedication to weed out the unwilling and ambitious, and to include women in the movement at a time when many thought that such activities were not respectable activities for women. In addition to boycotting British products, Gandhi urged the people to boycott British educational institutions and law courts, to resign from government employment, and to forsake British titles and honours.

"Non-cooperation" enjoyed wide-spread appeal and success, increasing excitement and participation from all strata of Indian society. Yet, just as the movement reached its apex, it ended abruptly as a result of a violent clash in the town of Chauri Chaura, Uttar Pradesh, in February 1922. Fearing that the movement was about to take a turn towards violence, and convinced that this would be the undoing of all his work, Gandhi called off the campaign of mass civil disobedience.[6] Gandhi was arrested on March 10, 1922, tried for sedition, and sentenced to six years imprisonment. Beginning on March 18, 1922, he only served about two years of the sentence, being released in February 1924 after an operation for appendicitis.

Without Gandhi's uniting personality, the Indian National Congress began to splinter during his years in prison, splitting into two factions, one led by Chitta Ranjan Das and Motilal Nehru favouring party participation in the legislatures, and the other led by Chakravarti Rajagopalachari and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, opposing this move. Furthermore, cooperation among Hindus and Muslims, which had been strong at the height of the non-violence campaign, was breaking down. Gandhi attempted to bridge these differences through many means, including a three-week fast in the autumn of 1924, but with limited success.[7]


Swaraj and the Salt Satyagraha


Gandhi stayed out of the limelight for most of the 1920s, preferring to resolve the wedge between the Swaraj Party and the Indian National Congress, and expanding initiatives against untouchability, alcoholism, ignorance and poverty. He returned to the fore in 1928. The year before, the British government had appointed a new constitutional reform commission under Sir John Simon, with not a single Indian in its ranks. The result was a boycott of the commission by Indian political parties. Gandhi pushed through a resolution at the Calcutta Congress in December 1928 calling on the British government to grant India dominion status or face a new campaign of non-violence with complete independence for the country as its goal. Gandhi had not only moderated the views of younger men like Subhas Chandra Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru, who sought a demand for immediate independence, but also modified his own call to a one year wait, instead of two.[8] The British did not respond. On December 31, 1929, the flag of India was unfurled in Lahore. January 26, 1930 was celebrated by the Indian National Congress, meeting in Lahore, as India's Independence Day. This day was commemorated by almost every other Indian organization. Making good on his word, he launched a new satyagraha against the tax on salt in March 1930, highlighted by the famous Salt March to Dandi from March 12 to April 6, marching 400 kilometres (248 miles) from Ahmedabad to Dandi, Gujarat to make salt himself. Thousands of Indians joined him on this march to the sea. This campaign was one of his most successful at upsetting British rule; Britain responded by imprisoning over 60,000 people.


The government, represented by Lord Edward Irwin, decided to negotiate with Gandhi. The Gandhi-Irwin Pact was signed in March 1931. The British Government agreed to set all political prisoners free in return for the suspension of the civil disobedience movement. Furthermore, Gandhi was invited to attend the Round Table Conference in London as the sole representative of the Indian National Congress. The conference was a disappointment to Gandhi and the nationalists, as it focused on the Indian princes and Indian minorities rather than the transfer of power. Furthermore, Lord Irwin's successor, Lord Willingdon, embarked on a new campaign of repression against the nationalists. Gandhi was again arrested, and the government attempted to destroy his influence by completely isolating him from his followers. This tactic was not successful. In 1932, through the campaigning of the Dalit leader B. R. Ambedkar, the government granted untouchables separate electorates under the new constitution. In protest, Gandhi embarked on a six-day fast in September 1932, successfully forcing the government to adopt a more equitable arrangement via negotiations mediated by the Dalit cricketer turned political leader Palwankar Baloo. This was the start of a new campaign by Gandhi to improve the lives of the untouchables, whom he named Harijans, the children of God. On May 8, 1933 Gandhi began a 21-day fast of self-purification to help the Harijan movement.[9]

In the summer of 1934, three unsuccessful attempts were made on his life.

When the Congress Party chose to contest elections and accept power under the Federation scheme, Gandhi decided to resign from party membership. He did not disagree with the party's move, but felt that if he resigned, his popularity with Indians would cease to stifle the party's membership, that actually varied from communists, socialists, trade unionists, students, religious conservatives, to those with pro-business convictions. Gandhi also did not want to prove a target for Raj propaganda by leading a party that had temporarily accepted political accommodation with the Raj.[10]

Gandhi returned to the head in 1936, with the Nehru presidency and the Lucknow session of the Congress. Although Gandhi desired a total focus on the task of winning independence and not speculation about India's future, he did not restrain the Congress from adopting socialism as its goal. Gandhi had a clash with Subhas Bose, who had been elected to the presidency in 1938. Gandhi's main points of contention with Bose were his lack of commitment to democracy, and lack of faith in non-violence. Bose won his second term despite Gandhi's criticism, but left the Congress when the All-India leaders resigned en masse in protest against his abandonment of the principles introduced by Gandhi.[11]


World War II and Quit India


World War II broke out in 1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland. Initially, Gandhi had favored offering "non-violent moral support" to the British effort, but other Congressional leaders were offended by the unilateral inclusion of India into the war, without consultation of the people's representatives. All Congressmen elected to resign from office en masse.[12] After lengthy deliberations, Gandhi declared that India could not be party to a war ostensibly being fought for democratic freedom, while that freedom was denied to India itself. As the war progressed, Gandhi intensified his demand for independence, drafting a resolution calling for the British to Quit India. This was Gandhi's and the Congress Party's most definitive revolt aimed at securing the British exit from Indian shores.[13]


Gandhi was criticized by some Congress party members and other Indian political groups, both pro-British and anti-British. Some felt that opposing Britain in its life or death struggle was immoral, and others felt that Gandhi wasn't doing enough. Quit India became the most forceful movement in the history of the struggle, with mass arrests and violence on an unprecedented scale.[14] Thousands of freedom fighters were killed or injured by police gunfire, and hundreds of thousands were arrested. Gandhi and his supporters made it clear they would not support the war effort unless India were granted immediate independence. He even clarified that this time the movement would not be stopped if individual acts of violence were committed, saying that the "ordered anarchy" around him was "worse than real anarchy." He called on all Congressmen and Indians to maintain discipline via ahimsa, and Karo Ya Maro ("Do or Die") in the cause of ultimate freedom.


Gandhi and the entire Congress Working Committee were arrested in Bombay by the British on August 9, 1942. Gandhi was held for two years in the Aga Khan Palace in Pune. It was here that Gandhi suffered two terrible blows in his personal life. His 42-year old secretary Mahadev Desai died of a heart attack 6 days later and his wife Kasturba died after 18 months imprisonment in February 1944; six weeks later Gandhi suffered a severe malaria attack. He was released before the end of the war on May 6, 1944 because of his failing health and necessary surgery; the Raj did not want him to die in prison and enrage the nation. Although the Quit India movement had moderate success in its objective, the ruthless suppression of the movement brought order to India by the end of 1943. At the end of the war, the British gave clear indications that power would be transferred to Indian hands. At this point Gandhi called off the struggle, and around 100,000 political prisoners were released, including the Congress's leadership.


Freedom and partition of India


Gandhi advised the Congress to reject the proposals the British Cabinet Mission offered in 1946, as he was deeply suspicious of the grouping proposed for Muslim-majority states?-Gandhi viewed this as a precursor to partition. However, this became one of the few times the Congress broke from Gandhi's advice (though not his leadership), as Nehru and Patel knew that if the Congress did not approve the plan, the control of government would pass to the Muslim League. Between 1946 and 1948 , over 5,000 people were killed in violence. Gandhi was vehemently opposed to any plan that partitioned India into two separate countries. An overwhelming majority of Muslims living in India, side by side with Hindus and Sikhs, were in favour of Partition. Additionally Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of the Muslim League, commanded widespread support in West Punjab, Sindh, NWFP and East Bengal. The partition plan was approved by the Congress leadership as the only way to prevent a wide-scale Hindu-Muslim civil war. Congress leaders knew that Gandhi would viscerally oppose partition, and it was impossible for the Congress to go ahead without his agreement, for Gandhi's support in the party and throughout India was strong. Gandhi's closest colleagues had accepted partition as the best way out, and Sardar Patel endeavoured to convince Gandhi that it was the only way to avoid civil war. A devastated Gandhi gave his assent.

On the day of the transfer of power, Gandhi did not celebrate independence with the rest of India, but was alone in Calcutta, mourning the partition and working to end the violence. After India's independence, Gandhi focused on Hindu-Muslim peace and unity. He conducted extensive dialogue with Muslim and Hindu community leaders, working to cool passions in northern India, as well as in Bengal. Despite the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947, he was troubled when the Government decided to deny Pakistan the Rs. 55 crores due as per agreements made by the Partition Council. Leaders like Sardar Patel feared that Pakistan would use the money to bankroll the war against India. Gandhi was also devastated when demands resurged for all Muslims to be deported to Pakistan, and when Muslim and Hindu leaders expressed frustration and an inability to come to terms with one another.[15] He launched his last fast-unto-death in Delhi, asking that all communal violence be ended once and for all, and that the payment of Rs. 55 crores be made to Pakistan. Gandhi feared that instability and insecurity in Pakistan would increase their anger against India, and violence would spread across the borders. He further feared that Hindus and Muslims would renew their enmity and precipitate into an open civil war. After emotional debates with his life-long colleagues, Gandhi refused to budge, and the Government rescinded its policy and made the payment to Pakistan. Hindu, Muslim and Sikh community leaders, including the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Mahasabha assured him that they would renounce violence and call for peace. Gandhi thus broke his fast by sipping orange juice.[16]


Assassination


On January 30, 1948, Gandhi was shot and killed while having his nightly public walk on the grounds of the Birla Bhavan (Birla House) in New Delhi. The assassin, Nathuram Godse, was a Hindu radical with links to the extremist Hindu Mahasabha, who held Gandhi responsible for weakening India by insisting upon a payment to Pakistan.[17] Godse and his co-conspirator Narayan Apte were later tried and convicted; they were executed on 15 November 1949. Gandhi's memorial (or Samādhi) at Rāj Ghāt, New Delhi, bears the epigraph "Hē Ram", (Devanagari: हे ! राम or, He Rām), which may be translated as "Oh God". These are widely believed to be Gandhi's last words after he was shot, though the veracity of this statement has been disputed.[18] Jawaharlal Nehru addressed the nation through radio:

" Friends and comrades, the light has gone out of our lives, and there is darkness everywhere, and I do not quite know what to tell you or how to say it. Our beloved leader, Bapu as we called him, the father of the nation, is no more. Perhaps I am wrong to say that; nevertheless, we will not see him again, as we have seen him for these many years, we will not run to him for advice or seek solace from him, and that is a terrible blow, not only for me, but for millions and millions in this country.[19] "

According to his wish, the majority of Gandhi's ashes were immersed in some of the world's major rivers, such as The Nile, Volga, Thames, etc. A small portion was sent to Paramahansa Yogananda from Dr. V.M. Nawle, (a publisher and journalist from Pune (formerly Poona), India) encased in a brass & silver coffer. The ashes were then enshrined at the Mahatma Gandhi World Peace Memorial in the Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine within a thousand-year-old stone sarcophagus from China.


Gandhi's principles


Truth

Gandhi dedicated his life to the wider purpose of discovering truth, or Satya. He tried to achieve this by learning from his own mistakes and conducting experiments on himself. He called his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth.

Gandhi stated that the most important battle to fight was overcoming his own demons, fears, and insecurities. Gandhi summarized his beliefs first when he said "God is Truth". He would later change this statement to "Truth is God". Thus, Satya (Truth) in Gandhi's philosophy is "God".


Nonviolence

The concept of nonviolence (ahimsa) and nonresistance has a long history in Indian religious thought and has had many revivals in Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, Jewish and Christian contexts. Gandhi explains his philosophy and way of life in his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth. He was quoted as saying:

"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall ?- think of it, always."

"What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy?"

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."

"There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for."

In applying these principles, Gandhi did not balk from taking them to their most logical extremes. In 1940, when invasion of the British Isles by Nazi Germany looked imminent, Gandhi offered the following advice to the British people (Non-Violence in Peace and War):[20]

"I would like you to lay down the arms you have as being useless for saving you or humanity. You will invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions.... If these gentlemen choose to occupy your homes, you will vacate them. If they do not give you free passage out, you will allow yourselves, man, woman, and child, to be slaughtered, but you will refuse to owe allegiance to them."

However, Gandhi was aware that this level of nonviolence required incredible faith and courage, which he realized not everyone possessed. He therefore advised that everyone need not keep to nonviolence, especially if it were used as a cover for cowardice:

"Gandhi guarded against attracting to his satyagraha movement those who feared to take up arms or felt themselves incapable of resistance. 'I do believe,' he wrote, 'that where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence, I would advise violence.'"[21]

"At every meeting I repeated the warning that unless they felt that in non-violence they had come into possession of a force infinitely superior to the one they had and in the use of which they were adept, they should have nothing to do with non-violence and resume the arms they possessed before. It must never be said of the Khudai Khidmatgars that once so brave, they had become or been made cowards under Badshah Khan's influence. Their bravery consisted not in being good marksmen but in defying death and being ever ready to bare their breasts to the bullets."[22]


Vegetarianism

As a young child, Gandhi experimented with meat-eating. This was due partially to his inherent curiosity as well as his rather persuasive peer and friend Sheikh Mehtab. The idea of vegetarianism is deeply engrained in Hindu and Jain traditions in India, and, in his native land of Gujarat, most Hindus were vegetariam. The Gandhi family was no exception. Before leaving for his studies in London, Gandhi made a promise to his mother, Putlibai and his uncle, Becharji Swami that he would abstain from eating meat, taking alcohol, and engaging in promiscuity. He held fast to his promise and gained more than a diet: he gained a basis for his life-long philosophies. As Gandhi grew into adulthood, he became a strict vegetarian. He wrote the book The Moral Basis of Vegetarianism and several articles on the subject, some of which were published in the London Vegetarian Society's publication, The Vegetarian [2]. Gandhi, himself, became inspired by many great minds during this period and befriended the chairman of the London Vegetarian Society, Dr. Josiah Oldfield.

Having also read and admired the work of Henry Stephens Salt, the young Mohandas met and often corresponded with the vegetarian campaigner. Gandhi spent much time advocating vegetarianism during and after his time in London. To Gandhi, a vegetarian diet would not only satisfy the requirements of the body, it would also serve an economic purpose as meat was, and still is, generally more expensive than grains, vegetables, and fruits. Also, many Indians of the time struggled with low income, thus vegetarianism was seen not only as a spiritual practice but also a practical one. He abstained from eating for long periods, using fasting as a form of political protest. He refused to eat until his death or his demands were met. It was noted in his autobiography that vegetarianism was the beginning of his deep commitment to Brahmacharya; without total control of the palate, his success in Bramacharya would likely falter.


Brahmacharya

When Gandhi was 16 his father became very ill. Being very devoted to his parents, he attended to his father at all times during his illness. However, one night, Gandhi's uncle came to relieve Gandhi for a while. He retired to his bedroom where carnal desires overcame him and he made love to his wife. Shortly afterward a servant came to report that Gandhi's father had just died. Gandhi felt tremendous guilt and never could forgive himself. He came to refer to this event as "double shame." The incident had significant influence in Gandhi becoming celibate at the age of 36, while still married.[23]

This decision was deeply influenced by the philosophy of Brahmacharya?-spiritual and practical purity?-largely associated with celibacy and asceticism. Gandhi saw brahmacharya as a means of becoming close with God and as a primary foundation for self realization. In his autobiography he tells of his battle against lustful urges and fits of jealousy with his childhood bride, Kasturba. He felt it his personal obligation to remain celibate so that he could learn to love, rather than lust. For Gandhi, brahmacharya meant "control of the senses in thought, word and deed."[24]


Simplicity

Gandhi earnestly believed that a person involved in social service should lead a simple life which he thought could lead to Brahmacharya. His simplicity began by renouncing the western lifestyle he was leading in South Africa. He called it "reducing himself to zero," which entailed giving up unnecessary expenditure, embracing a simple lifestyle and washing his own clothes.[25] On one occasion he returned the gifts bestowed to him from the natals for his diligent service to the community.[26]

Gandhi spent one day of each week in silence. He believed that abstaining from speaking brought him inner peace. This influence was drawn from the Hindu principles of mauna (Sanskrit:मौनं - silence) and shanti (Sanskrit:शांति - peace). On such days he communicated with others by writing on paper. For three and a half years, from the age of 37, Gandhi refused to read newspapers, claiming that the tumultuous state of world affairs caused him more confusion than his own inner unrest.

After reading John Ruskin's Unto This Last, he decided to change his life style and create a commune called Phoenix Settlement.

Upon returning to India from South Africa, where he had enjoyed a successful legal practice, he gave up wearing Western-style clothing, which he associated with wealth and success. He dressed to be accepted by the poorest person in India, advocating the use of homespun cloth (khadi). Gandhi and his followers adopted the practice of weaving their own clothes from thread they themselves spun, and encouraged others to do so. While Indian workers were often idle due to unemployment, they had often bought their clothing from industrial manufacturers owned by British interests. It was Gandhi's view that if Indians made their own clothes, it would deal an economic blow to the British establishment in India. Consequently, the spinning wheel was later incorporated into the flag of the Indian National Congress. He subsequently wore a dhoti for the rest of his life to express the simplicity of his life.


Faith

Gandhi was born a Hindu and practised Hinduism all his life, deriving most of his principles from Hinduism. As a common Hindu, he believed all religions to be equal, and rejected all efforts to convert him to a different faith. He was an avid theologian and read extensively about all major religions. He had the following to say about Hinduism:

"Hinduism as I know it entirely satisfies my soul, fills my whole being ... When doubts haunt me, when disappointments stare me in the face, and when I see not one ray of light on the horizon, I turn to the Bhagavad Gita, and find a verse to comfort me; and I immediately begin to smile in the midst of overwhelming sorrow. My life has been full of tragedies and if they have not left any visible and indelible effect on me, I owe it to the teachings of the Bhagavad Gita."

Gandhi wrote a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita in Gujarati. The Gujarati manuscript was translated into English by Mahadev Desai, who provided an additional introduction and commentary. It was published with a Foreword by Gandhi in 1946.[27][28]

Gandhi believed that at the core of every religion was truth and love (compassion, nonviolence and the Golden Rule). He also questioned hypocrisy, malpractices and dogma in all religions and was a tireless social reformer. Some of his comments on various religions are:

"Thus if I could not accept Christianity either as a perfect, or the greatest religion, neither was I then convinced of Hinduism being such. Hindu defects were pressingly visible to me. If untouchability could be a part of Hinduism, it could but be a rotten part or an excrescence. I could not understand the raison d'etre of a multitude of sects and castes. What was the meaning of saying that the Vedas were the inspired Word of God? If they were inspired, why not also the Bible and the Koran? As Christian friends were endeavouring to convert me, so were Muslim friends. Abdullah Sheth had kept on inducing me to study Islam, and of course he had always something to say regarding its beauty." (source: his autobiography)
"As soon as we lose the moral basis, we cease to be religious. There is no such thing as religion over-riding morality. Man, for instance, cannot be untruthful, cruel or incontinent and claim to have God on his side."
"The sayings of Muhammad are a treasure of wisdom, not only for Muslims but for all of mankind."
Later in his life when he was asked whether he was a Hindu, he replied:

"Yes I am. I am also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a Jew."
In spite of their deep reverence to each other, Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore engaged in protracted debates more than once. These debates exemplify the philosophical differences between the two most famous Indians at the time. On January 15, 1934, an earthquake hit Bihar and caused extensive damage and loss of life. Gandhi maintained this was because of the sin committed by upper caste Hindus by not letting untouchables in their temples (Gandhi was committed to the cause of improving the fate of untouchables, referring to them as Harijans, people of Krishna). Tagore vehemently opposed Gandhi's stance, maintaining that an earthquake can only be caused by natural forces, not moral reasons, however repugnant the practice of untouchability may be.


Writings

Gandhi was a prolific writer. For decades he edited several newspapers including Harijan in Gujarati, Hindi and English; Indian Opinion while in South Africa and, Young India, in English, and Navajivan, a Gujarati monthly, on his return to India. Later Navajivan was also published in Hindi.[29] In addition, he wrote letters almost every day to individuals and newspapers.

Gandhi also wrote a few books including his autobiography, An Autobiography or My Experiments with Truth, Satyagraha in South Africa about his struggle there, Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule, a political pamphlet, and a paraphrase in Gujarati of John Ruskin's Unto This Last.[30] This last essay can be considered his program on economics. He also wrote extensively on vegetarianism, diet and health, religion, social reforms, etc. Gandhi usually wrote in Gujarati, though he also revised the Hindi and English translations of his books.

Gandhi's complete works were published by the Indian government under the name The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi in the 1960s. The writings comprise about 50,000 pages published in about a hundred volumes. In 2000, a revised edition of the complete works sparked a controversy, as Gandhian followers accused the government of incorporating changes for political purpose.[31]


Books on Gandhi

Several biographers have undertaken the task of describing Gandhi's life. Among them, two works stand out: D. G. Tendulkar with his Mahatma. Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in 8 volumes, and Pyarelal and Sushila Nayar with their Mahatma Gandhi in 10 volumes.


Followers and influence

Gandhi influenced important leaders and political movements. One of the leaders of the civil rights movement in the United States, Martin Luther King, drew from the writings of Gandhi in the development of his own theories about non-violence.[32] Anti-apartheid activist and former President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela, was inspired by Gandhi.[33] Others include, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan[34] Steve Biko, and Aung San Suu Kyi.[35]

Gandhi's life and teachings inspired many who specifically referred to Gandhi as their mentor or who dedicated their lives to spreading Gandhi's ideas. In Europe, Romain Rolland was the first to discuss Gandhi in his 1924 book Mahatma Gandhi. Lanza del Vasto went to India in 1936 in the aim to live with Gandhi. He later returned to Europe to spread Gandhi's philosophy and founded the Community of the Ark in 1948 (modeled after Gandhi's ashrams). Madeleine Slade (known as "Mirabehn") was the daughter of a British admiral who spent much of her adult life in India as a devotee of Gandhi.

In addition, the British musician, John Lennon, referred to Gandhi when discussing his views on non-violence.[36] At the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival in 2007, former U.S. Vice-President and environmentalist, Al Gore, spoke of Gandhi's influence on him.[37]


Legacy

Gandhi's birthday, October 2, is a national holiday in India, Gandhi Jayanti. On 15 June 2007, it was announced that the "United Nations General Assembly" has "unanimously adopted" a resolution which has declared October 2 to be "the International Day of Non-Violence."[38]

The word Mahatma, while often mistaken for Gandhi's given name in the West, is taken from the Sanskrit words maha meaning Great and atma meaning Soul. It is similar to the British honorifics like Your Excellency or Sir. But, unlike these that are officially conferred, the reference to Gandhi is an unofficial title that Indians use as though it were an official one.

Most sources, such as Dutta and Robinson's Rabindranath Tagore: An Anthology, state that Rabindranath Tagore first accorded the title of Mahatma to Gandhi.[39] Other sources state that Nautamlal Bhagavanji Mehta accorded him this title on January 21, 1915.[40] In his autobiography, Gandhi nevertheless explains that he never felt worthy of the honour.[41] According to the manpatra, the name Mahatma was given in response to Gandhi's admirable sacrifice in manifesting justice and truth.[42]

Time Magazine named Gandhi the Man of the Year in 1930, the runner-up to Albert Einstein as "Person of the Century" at the end of 1999, and named The Dalai Lama, Lech Wałęsa, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Cesar Chavez, Aung San Suu Kyi, Benigno Aquino, Jr., Desmond Tutu, and Nelson Mandela as Children of Gandhi and his spiritual heirs to non-violence.[43] The Government of India awards the annual Mahatma Gandhi Peace Prize to distinguished social workers, world leaders and citizens. Nelson Mandela, the leader of South Africa's struggle to eradicate racial discrimination and segregation, is a prominent non-Indian recipient.


The centennial commemorative statue of Mahatma Gandhi in the center of downtown Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.In 1996, the Government of India introduced the Mahatma Gandhi series of currency notes in rupees 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1000 denomination. Today, all the currency notes in circulation in India contain a portrait of Mahatma Gandhi. In 1969, the United Kingdom issued a series of stamps commemorating the centenary of Mahatma Gandhi.

In the United Kingdom, there are several prominent statues of Gandhi, most notably in Tavistock Square, London near University College London where he studied law. January 30 is commemorated in the United Kingdom as the "National Gandhi Remembrance Day." In the United States, there are statues of Gandhi outside the Union Square Park in New York City, and the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site in Atlanta, and on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington, D. C., near the Indian Embassy. The city of Pietermaritzburg, South Africa?-where Gandhi was ejected from a first-class train in 1893?-now hosts a commemorative statue. There are wax statues of Gandhi at the Madame Tussaud's wax museums in London, New York, and other cities around the world.


Gandhi never received the Nobel Peace Prize, though he was nominated five times between 1937 and 1948, including the first-ever nomination by the American Friends Service Committee.[44] Decades later, the Nobel Committee publicly declared its regret for the omission, and admitted to deeply divided nationalistic opinion denying the award. Mahatma Gandhi was to receive the Prize in 1948, but his assassination prevented the award. The war breaking out between the newly created states of India and Pakistan could have been an additional complicating factor that year.[45] The Prize was not awarded in 1948, the year of Gandhi's death, on the grounds that "there was no suitable living candidate" that year, and when the Dalai Lama was awarded the Prize in 1989, the chairman of the committee said that this was "in part a tribute to the memory of Mahatma Gandhi."[46]

In New Delhi, the Birla Bhavan (or Birla House), where Gandhi was assassinated on January 30, 1948, was acquired by the Government of India in 1971 and opened to the public in 1973 as the Gandhi Smriti or Gandhi Remembrance. It preserves the room where Mahatma Gandhi lived the last four months of his life and the grounds where he was shot while holding his nightly public walk.

A Martyr's Column now marks the place where Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated.

On January 30 every year, on the anniversary of the death of Mahatma Gandhi, in schools of many countries is observed the School Day of Non-violence and Peace (DENIP), founded in Spain in 1964. In countries with a Southern Hemisphere school calendar, it can be observed on March 30 or thereabouts.


Gandhi in film, literature, plays, and popular culture

Cinematic depictions of and references to Mahatma Gandhi

1963: Nine Hours to Rama (J. S. Casshyap) · 1982: Gandhi (Ben Kingsley) · 1993: Sardar (Annu Kapoor) · 1996: The Making of the Mahatma (Rajit Kapur) · 1998: Jinnah (Sam Dastor) · 2000: Hey Ram (Naseeruddin Shah) · 2000: Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar (Mohan Gokhale) · 2001: Veer Savarkar (Surendra Rajan) · 2004: Swades · 2005: Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara (himself) · 2005: Mangal Pandey: The Rising (himself) · 2005: Water (Mohan Jhangiani) · 2006: Lage Raho Munna Bhai (Dilip Prabhavalkar) · 2007: Shankar Dada Zindabad (Dilip Prabhavalkar) · 2007: Gandhi, My Father (Darshan Jariwala)



Criticism and controversies

Gandhi's rigid ahimsa implies pacifism, and is thus a source of criticism from across the political spectrum.


Concept of partition

As a rule, Gandhi was opposed to the concept of partition as it contradicted his vision of religious unity.[47] Of the partition of India to create Pakistan, he wrote in Harijan on 06 October 1946:

[The demand for Pakistan] as put forth by the Moslem League is un-Islamic and I have not hesitated to call it sinful. Islam stands for unity and the brotherhood of mankind, not for disrupting the oneness of the human family. Therefore, those who want to divide India into possibly warring groups are enemies alike of India and Islam. They may cut me into pieces but they cannot make me subscribe to something which I consider to be wrong [...] we must not cease to aspire, in spite of [the] wild talk, to befriend all Moslems and hold them fast as prisoners of our love.[48]

However, as Homer Jack notes of Gandhi's long correspondence with Jinnah on the topic of Pakistan: "Although Gandhi was personally opposed to the partition of India, he proposed an agreement [...] which provided that the Congress and the Moslem League would cooperate to attain independence under a provisional government, after which the question of partition would be decided by a plebiscite in the districts having a Moslem majority."[49]

These dual positions on the topic of the partition of India opened Gandhi up to criticism from both Hindus and Muslims. Muhammad Ali Jinnah and contemporary Pakistanis condemned Gandhi for undermining Muslim political rights. Vinayak Damodar Savarkar and his allies condemned Gandhi, accusing him of politically appeasing Muslims while turning a blind eye to their atrocities against Hindus, and for allowing the creation of Pakistan (despite having publicly declared that "before partitioning India, my body will have to be cut into two pieces"[50]). This continues to be politically contentious: some,like Pakistani-American historian Ayesha Jalal argue that Gandhi and the Congress' unwillingness to share power with the Muslim League hastened partition; others, like Hindu nationalist policician Pravin Togadia have also criticized Gandhi's leadership and actions on this topic, but indicating that excessive weakeness on his part led to the division of India.

Gandhi also expressed his dislike for the idea of partition during the late 1930s in response to the topic of the partition of Palestine. He stated in Harijan on 26 November 1938:

Several letters have been received by me asking me to declare my views about the Arab-Jew question in Palestine and persecution of the Jews in Germany. It is not without hesitation that I venture to offer my views on this very difficult question. My sympathies are all with the Jews. I have known them intimately in South Africa. Some of them became life-long companions. Through these friends I came to learn much of their age-long persecution. They have been the untouchables of Christianity [...] But my sympathy does not blind me to the requirements of justice. The cry for the national home for the Jews does not make much appeal to me. The sanction for it is sought in the Bible and the tenacity with which the Jews have hankered after return to Palestine. Why should they not, like other peoples of the earth, make that country their home where they are born and where they earn their livelihood? Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English or France to the French. It is wrong and inhuman to impose the Jews on the Arabs. What is going on in Palestine today cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct.[51], [52]

Gandhi was criticized for this and responded in his follow-up articles, "Questions on the Jews" [53], "Reply to Jewish Friends,"[54] and "Jews and Palestine."[55]


Rejection of violent resistance

Gandhi also came under some political fire for his criticism of those who attempted to achieve independence through more violent means. His refusal to protest against the hanging of Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Udham Singh and Rajguru were sources of condemnation among some parties.[56][57]

Of this criticism, Gandhi stated, "There was a time when people listened to me because I showed them how to give fight to the British without arms when they had no arms [...] but today I am told that my non-violence can be of no avail against the [Hindu-Moslem riots] and, therefore, people should arm themselves for self-defense."[58]

Gandhi commented upon the 1930s persecution of the Jews in Germany within the context of Satyagraha. In the November 1938 article on the Nazi persecution of the Jews quoted above, he offered non-violence as a solution:

The German persecution of the Jews seems to have no parallel in history. The tyrants of old never went so mad as Hitler seems to have gone. And he is doing it with religious zeal. For he is propounding a new religion of exclusive and militant nationalism in the name of which any inhumanity becomes an act of humanity to be rewarded here and hereafter. The crime of an obviously mad but intrepid youth is being visited upon his whole race with unbelievable ferocity. If there ever could be a justifiable war in the name of and for humanity, a war against Germany, to prevent the wanton persecution of a whole race, would be completely justified. But I do not believe in any war. A discussion of the pros and cons of such a war is therefore outside my horizon or province. But if there can be no war against Germany, even for such a crime as is being committed against the Jews, surely there can be no alliance with Germany. How can there be alliance between a nation which claims to stand for justice and democracy and one which is the declared enemy of both?"[59], [60]

In the same article, Gandhi continued by stating that:

If I were a Jew and were born in Germany and earned my livelihood there, I would claim Germany as my home even as the tallest Gentile German might, and challenge him to shoot me or cast me in the dungeon; I would refuse to be expelled or to submit to discriminating treatment. And for doing this I should not wait for the fellow Jews to join me in civil resistance, but would have confidence that in the end the rest were bound to follow my example. If one Jew or all the Jews were to accept the prescription here offered, he or they cannot be worse off than now. And suffering voluntarily undergone will bring them an inner strength and joy [...] the calculated violence of Hitler may even result in a general massacre of the Jews by way of his first answer to the declaration of such hostilities. But if the Jewish mind could be prepared for voluntary suffering, even the massacre I have imagined could be turned into a day of thanksgiving and joy that Jehovah had wrought deliverance of the race even at the hands of the tyrant. For to the God-fearing, death has no terror.[61]

Also, in Harijan, December 17, 1938, Gandhi asserted that Jews "so far as I know, have never practised non-violence as an article of faith or even as a deliberate policy," and alleged that Jews sought to "punish Germany for her persecution and to deliver them from oppression." [62], [63]

Gandhi was criticized by a number of people for these and related remarks. He responded by stating that, "friends have sent me two newspaper cuttings criticizing my appeal to the Jews. The two critics suggest that in presenting non-violence to the Jews as a remedy against the wrong done to them, I have suggested nothing new....what I have pleaded for is renunciation of violence of the heart and consequent active exercise of the force generated by the great renunciation. [64] Gandhi would later withdraw some of the statements that he made in an article published in Harijan on May 27, 1939. [65] [66] A friend of Gandhi's Martin Buber, wrote a critical open letter to Gandhi on February 24, 1939. Buber asserted that the comparison between British treatment of Indian subjects and Nazi treatment of Jews was inapposite. [67]


Early South African articles

Some of Gandhi's early South African articles are controversial. As reprinted in "The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi," (Vol. 8, p.120), Gandhi wrote in the "Indian Opinion" in 1908 of his time in a South African prison: "Many of the native prisoners are only one degree removed from the animal and often created rows and fought among themselves." Also as reprinted in "The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi," (Vol. 2, p.74), Gandhi gave a speech on September 26, 1896 in which he referred to the "raw kaffir, whose occupation is hunting and whose sole ambition is to collect a certain number of cattle to buy a wife with, and then pass his life in indolence and nakedness". The term "Kaffir" is considered a derogatory term today (it is worth noting, however, that during Gandhi's time, the term "Kaffir" had a different connotation than its present-day usage). Remarks such as these have led some to accuse Gandhi of racism.[68]

Two professors of history who specialize in South Africa, Surendra Bhana and Goolam Vahed, examined this controversy in their text, The Making of a Political Reformer: Gandhi in South Africa, 1893-1914. (New Delhi: Manohar, 2005).[69] They focus in Chapter 1, "Gandhi, Africans and Indians in Colonial Natal" on the relationship between the African and Indian communities under "White rule" and policies which enforced segregation (and, they argue, inevitable conflict between these communities). Of this relationship they state that, "the young Gandhi was influenced by segregationist notions prevalent in the 1890s."[70] At the same time, they state, "Gandhi's experiences in jail seemed to make him more sensitive to their plight [...] the later Gandhi mellowed; he seemed much less categorical in his expression of prejudice against Africans, and much more open to seeing points of common cause. His negative views in the Johannesburg jail were reserved for hardened African prisoners rather than Africans generally."[71]

Former President of South Africa Nelson Mandela is a follower of Gandhi,[72] despite efforts in 2003 on the part of Gandhi's critics to prevent the unveiling of a statue of Gandhi in Johannesburg.[68] Bhana and Vahed commented on the events surrounding the unveiling in the conclusion to The Making of a Political Reformer: Gandhi in South Africa, 1893-1914. In the section "Gandhi's Legacy to South Africa," they note that "Gandhi inspired succeeding generations of South African activists seeking to end White rule. This legacy connects him to Nelson Mandela [...] in a sense Mandela completed what Gandhi started."[73] They continue by referring to the controversies which arose during the unveiling of the statue of Gandhi.[74] In response to these two perspectives of Gandhi, Bhana and Vahed argue: "Those who seek to appropriate Gandhi for political ends in post-apartheid South Africa do not help their cause much by ignoring certain facts about him; and those who simply call him a racist are equally guilty of distortion."[75]

Recently, Nelson Mandela took part in the 29 January - 30 January 2007 conference in New Delhi which marked the 100th anniversary of Gandhi's introduction of satyagraha in South Africa.[76] In addition, Mandela appeared to the audience via video clip at the South African premiere of Gandhi, My Father in July 2007. Of this clip, the film's producer Anil Kapoor said, "Nelson Mandela sent a special message for the film's opening. Mandela not only spoke about Gandhi, he spoke about me. What was heart-warming and humbling was that he thanked me for making this film, whereas I should thank him and South Africa for letting me shoot 'Gandhi My Father' in their country and allowing me to hold the world premiere there. Mandela identified deeply with the film."[77] The current South African president, Thabo Mbeki, attended[78][79] along with the rest of the South African Cabinet.[80]


Other criticisms

Dalit leader B. R. Ambedkar condemned Gandhi's use of the term Harijans to refer to the Dalit community. This term meant "Children of God";[81] it was interpreted by some as saying that Dalits were socially immature, and that privileged caste Indians played a paternalistic role. Ambedkar and his allies also felt Gandhi was undermining Dalit political rights. Gandhi, although born into the Vaishya caste, insisted that he was able to speak on behalf of Dalits, despite the availability of Dalit activists such as Ambedkar.


Honors

In December 1999 Gandhi was among 18 included in Gallup's List of Widely Admired People of the 20th Century.

Groucho Marx
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Born October 2, 1890(1890-10-02)
New York, New York, U.S.A
Died August 19, 1977 (aged 86)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.A

Resting place Eden Memorial Park Cemetery
Nationality American
Other names Julius Henry Marx
Known for "Duck Soup," "A Night at the Opera," "You Bet Your Life"
Occupation Comedian, Actor, Quiz Show host
Religion Jewish
Spouse Ruth Johnson (1920-1942), Kay Marvis Gorcey (1945-1951), Eden Hartford (1954-1969)
Children Arthur Marx (1921), Miriam Marx (1927), Melinda Marx (1946)
Parents Minnie Schoenberg and Sam "Frenchie" Marx
Relatives Al Shean, Chico Marx, Harpo Marx, Gummo Marx, Zeppo Marx

Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx (October 2, 1890 - August 19, 1977), was an American comedian and film star. He is famed as a master of wit. He made 15 feature films with his siblings, the Marx Brothers as well as a successful solo career, most notably as the host of the radio and television game show, You Bet Your Life. [1] He had a distinctive image which included a heavy moustache, heavy eyebrows and glasses.




Biography

Childhood & Pre-Hollywood Successes

The Marx family grew up on the Upper East Side (E 93rd Street) of New York City, in a small Jewish neighborhood sandwiched between Irish-German and Italian neighborhoods. Groucho's parents were Minnie Schoenberg Marx and Sam Marx (called "Frenchie" throughout his life).

Minnie's brother was Al Schoenberg, who shortened his name to Al Shean when he went into show business. He was half of Gallagher and Shean, a noted vaudeville act of the early 20th century. According to Groucho, when Shean visited he would throw the local waifs a few coins so that when he knocked at the door he would be surrounded by child like adoring fans. Marx and his brothers respected his opinions and asked him on several occasions to write some material for them.

Minnie Marx didn't have an entertainment industry career, but she had intense ambition for her sons to go on the stage like their uncle. While pushing her eldest son Leonard (Chico Marx) in piano lessons, she found that Julius had a pleasant soprano voice and the ability to remain on key. Even though Julius' early career goal was to become a doctor, the family's need for income forced Julius out of school at the age of twelve. By that time, Julius had become a voracious reader, particularly fond of Horatio Alger. Throughout the rest of his life, Marx would overcome his lack of formal education by becoming very well-read.

After a few comically unsuccessful stabs at entry-level office work and other jobs suitable for adolescents, Julius took to the stage as a boy singer in 1905. Though he reputedly claimed that in the world of vaudeville, he enjoyed only "modest success" but was "hopelessly average", it was merely a wisecrack. By 1909, Minnie Marx successfully managed to assemble her sons into a low-quality vaudeville singing group. They were billing themselves as 'The Four Nightingales', Julius, Milton (Gummo Marx), Adolph (Harpo Marx) (later changed to Arthur), and another boy singer, Lou Levy, traveled the U.S. vaudeville circuits to little fanfare. After exhausting their prospects in the East, the family moved to La Grange, Illinois to play the Midwest.

After a particularly dispiriting performance in Nacogdoches, Texas, Julius, Milton, and Arthur began cracking jokes onstage for their own amusement. Much to their surprise, the audience liked them better as comedians than singers. They modified the then-popular Gus Edwards comedy skit, "School Days", and renamed it "Fun In Hi Skule". The Marx Brothers would perform variations on this routine for the next seven years.

For a time in vaudeville all the brothers performed using ethnic accents. Leonard Marx, the oldest Marx brother, developed the "Italian" accent he used as "Chico" to convince some roving bullies that he was Italian, not Jewish. Julius Marx's character from "Fun In Hi Skule" was an ethnic German, so Julius played him with a German accent. However, after the sinking of the RMS Lusitania in 1915, public anti-German sentiment was widespread, and Marx's "German" character was booed, so he quickly dropped the accent and developed the fast-talking wise-guy character he would make famous.

The Marx Brothers became the biggest comedic stars of the Palace Theatre, which billed itself as the "Valhalla of Vaudeville". Brother Chico's deal-making skills resulted in three hit plays on Broadway. No comedy routine had ever infected the hallowed Broadway circuit. But reports are unanimous that the Broadway audiences were just as convulsed with laughter as the vaudeville ones had been. The Marx Brothers were now more than a vaudeville sensation; they were a Broadway sensation.

All of this predated their Hollywood career. By the time the Marxes made their first movie, they were major stars, with sharply honed skills, and when Groucho was relaunched to stardom on You Bet Your Life, he had already been performing successfully for half a century.


Career highlights

Marx developed a routine as a wise-cracking hustler with a distinctive chicken-walking lope, an exaggerated greasepaint moustache and eyebrows, and an ever-present cigar, improvising insults to stuffy dowagers (often played by Margaret Dumont) and anyone else who stood in his way. His brothers and he starred in a series of extraordinarily popular stage shows and movies, often ad libbing. (See: Marx Brothers)

In the 1930s and 1940s Marx also worked as a radio comedian and show host. One of his earliest stints was in a short lived series in 1932 entitled Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel, co-starring Chico, who was the only one of his brothers also willing to appear on the show. Most of the scripts and discs were subsequently destroyed (except for the last shows), turning up only in 1988 in the Library of Congress.

In 1947, Marx was chosen to host a radio quiz program entitled You Bet Your Life, which moved over to television in 1950. The show consisted of Marx interviewing the contestants and ad libbing jokes. Then they would play a brief quiz. The show was responsible for the phrases "Say the secret woid [word] and divide $100" (that is, each contestant would get $50); and "Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?" or "What color is the White House?" (asked when Marx felt sorry for a contestant who had not won anything). It would run for 11 years on television.

One quip from Marx concerned his response to Sam Wood, the director of the classic film A Night at the Opera. Wood was furious with the Marx Brothers' ad-libs and antics on the set and yelled to all in disgust that he "cannot make actors out of clay." Without missing a beat, Groucho responded, "Nor can you make a director out of Wood."

A widely reported, but likely apocryphal, ad-lib is reportedly a response to a female contestant who had almost a dozen children. Marx asked why the contestant had so many children, to which the contestant replied "I love my husband." Marx responded, "Lady, I love my cigar, too, but I take it out once in a while." Hector Arce inserted the claim into Marx's memoir The Secret Word Is Groucho but Marx himself denied that it ever happened. [2]

Throughout his career he introduced a number of memorable songs in films, including "Hooray for Captain Spaulding", "Whatever It Is, I'm Against It", "Hello, I Must Be Going", "Everyone Says I Love You" and "Lydia the Tattooed Lady". Frank Sinatra, who once quipped that the only thing he could do better than Marx was sing, made a film with Marx and Jane Russell in 1951 entitled Double Dynamite.


The famous moustache and eyebrows

As much as Harpo and Chico were difficult to recognize without their wigs and costumes, it was almost impossible to recognize Groucho without his trademark glasses, or fake eyebrows and moustache.

The greasepaint moustache and eyebrows originated spontaneously prior to a vaudeville performance when he did not have time to apply the pasted-on moustache he had been using (or, according to his autobiography, simply did not enjoy the removal of the moustache every night - imagine tearing an adhesive bandage off the same skin every night!). After applying the greasepaint moustache, a quick glance in the mirror revealed his natural hair eyebrows were too undertoned and did not match the rest of his face, so Marx added the greasepaint to his eyebrows and headed for the stage. The absurdity of the greasepaint was never discussed on-screen, but in a famous scene in Duck Soup, where both Chico and Harpo are disguising themselves as Groucho, they are briefly seen applying the greasepaint, implicitly answering any question a viewer might have had about where he got his moustache and eyebrows.

Marx was asked to don the greasepaint moustache once more for "You Bet Your Life," but refused, opting instead to grow a real one, which he wore for the rest of his life.

He did paint the old character moustache over his real one on a few rare performing occasions, including a TV sketch with Jackie Gleason on the latter's variety show in the 1960s (in which they performed a variation on the song "Absolutely Mr. Gallagher, Positively Mr. Shean," written by Marx's uncle Al Shean) and the 1968 Otto Preminger film Skidoo. In his 70s at the time, Marx remarked on his appearance: "I looked like I was embalmed." He played a mob boss called "God" and, according to Marx, "both my performance and the film were God-awful!".


Personal life

Marx was married and divorced three times. His first wife was chorus girl Ruth Johnson (married 4 February 1920, divorced 15 July 1942) with whom he had two children, Arthur and Miriam. He had a daughter, Melinda, by his second wife, Kay Marvis Gorcey (married 24 February 1945, divorced 12 May 1951), former wife of Leo Gorcey. His third wife was actress Eden Hartford (married 17 July 1954, divorced 4 December 1969)[3]. All three wives were alcoholics. Many of his detractors wondered if he was just attracted to future alcoholics or if he drove them to it. Unfortunately there is a shred of truth there; if anyone was "always on", it was Groucho Marx. Except for the rarest of occasions, such as parts of his interview with Edward R. Murrow, Groucho played Groucho everywhere he went and in everything he did.

Often was the case, for instance, when the Marxes would arrive at a restaurant and be greeted by an interminable wait. "Just tell the maître d' who we are," his wife would nag. (In his pre-moustache days, he was rarely recognized in public.) Groucho would say, "OK, OK. Good evening, sir. My name is Jones. This is Mrs. Jones, and here are all the little Joneses." Now his wife would be furious and insist that he tell the maître d' the truth. "Oh, all right," said Groucho. "My name is Smith. This is Mrs. Smith, and here are all the little Smiths."

Similar anecdotes are corroborated by Groucho's friends, not one of whom went without being publicly embarrassed by Groucho on at least one occasion. Once, at a restaurant (the most common location of Groucho's antics), a fan came up to him and said, "Excuse me, but aren't you Groucho Marx?" "Yes," Groucho answered annoyedly. "Oh, I'm your biggest fan! Could I ask you a favor?" the man asked. "Sure, what is it?" asked the even-more annoyed Groucho. "See my wife sitting over there? She's an even bigger fan of yours than I am! Would you be willing to insult her?" Groucho replied, "Sir, if my wife looked like that, I wouldn't need any help thinking of insults." Also, Groucho's son, Arthur, published a brief account of an incident that occurred when Arthur was a child. The family was going through airport customs and, while filling out a form, Groucho listed his name as "Julius Henry Marx" and his occupation as "smuggler". Thereafter, chaos ensued.

Off-stage, Groucho was a voracious reader. He unceasingly lamented the fact that he had only a grammar school education and he compensated by reading everything he got his hands on. His knowledge of literature from all eras was extraordinary. Typical of his achievements, this one was discussed only demurely by Groucho himself: "I think TV is very educational," he once said. "Every time someone turns on a TV, I go in the other room and read." His friend Dick Cavett, speaking of Groucho and referencing a certain philosopher's writing, said "I, with my college education, had merely heard of the book, but Groucho had actually read it." Cavett also remarked that Groucho could never end a letter; there was always at least one postscript. In one letter he recalls, Groucho wrote "P.S. Did you ever notice that Peter O'Toole has a double-phallic name?"

Despite this lack of formal education, he wrote many books, including his autobiography, Groucho and Me (1959) (Da Capo Press, 1995, ISBN 0-306-80666-5), and Memoirs of a Mangy Lover (1963) (Da Capo Press, 2002, ISBN 0-306-81104-9). And he was personal friends with literary figures as T. S. Eliot and Carl Sandburg. Much of his personal correspondence with those and other figures is featured in the book The Groucho Letters (1967) with an introduction and commentary on the letters written by Groucho, who donated his letters to the Library of Congress.


"You Bet Your Life"

Groucho's radio life hadn't been as successful as his life on stage and in film, though historians such as Gerald Nachman and Michael Barson suggest that, in the case of the single-season Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel (1932), the failure may have been a combination of a poor time slot and the Marx Brothers' returning to Hollywood to make another film.

In the mid 1940s, during a depressing lull in his career (his radio show Pabst Blue Ribbon Town had failed to hold on, and the Marx Brothers looked finished as film performers), Groucho was scheduled to appear on a radio show with Bob Hope. Annoyed that he was made to wait in the waiting room for 40 minutes, Groucho went on the air in a foul mood. Hope started by saying, "Why, it's Groucho Marx, ladies and gentlemen. (applause) Groucho, what brings you here from the hot desert?" Groucho retorted, "Hot desert my foot, I've been standing in the cold waiting room for 40 minutes." Groucho continued to ignore the script, and although Hope was a formidable ad-libber in his own right, he couldn't begin to keep up with Groucho, who lengthened the scene well beyond its allotted time slot with a veritable onslaught of improvised wisecracks.

Listening in on the show was producer John Guedel, who got a brainstorm. He approached Groucho about doing a quiz show. "A quiz show? Only actors who are completely washed up resort to a quiz show." Undeterred, Guedel explained that the quiz would be only a backdrop for Groucho's interviews of people, and the storm of ad-libbing that they would elicit. Groucho said, "Well, I've had no success in radio, and I can't hold on to a sponsor. At this point I'll try anything."

You Bet Your Life premiered in October 1947 on radio on ABC and then on CBS and finally NBC and ran until May 1961 -- on radio only 1947-1950, on both radio and television 1950-1956, and on television only 1956-1961. The show was an utter sensation, one of the most popular in the history of radio and television. With one of the best announcers and, as it turns out, straight men in the business, George Fenneman, as his faithful foil, Groucho slayed his audiences with extraordinary improvised conversation, usually with the most ordinary of guests.


Ad-libbing controversy: was it scripted or not?

Groucho's competitors became so livid by the comedian's unexpected and colossal success that they circulated rumors that You Bet Your Life was completely scripted and Groucho wasn't ad-libbing at all. They felt vindicated when a photo surfaced, taken from backstage, showing Groucho looking at a transparent screen.[citation needed]

The critical consensus is that while some of Groucho's jokes were either "planned" or semi-scripted, most were ad-libbed. Admittedly, the staff did contain two writers who would contribute a few jokes. Nonetheless, the truth is that the scripting was not only minimal, but also more for the contestants' benefit. Groucho never once had a contestant on the show that he'd met previously, except for the occasional celebrity guest. The staff thus fed Groucho the questions they thought he should ask these unfamiliar people, but Groucho himself never knew what the answers would be.[citation needed]


Later years

By the time that You Bet Your Life debuted on TV on 5 October 1950, Groucho had grown a real mustache (which he sported earlier, in the 1950 film Love Happy), the lack of which had earlier been an effective means of hiding himself from fans.

During a tour of Germany in 1958, Marx, accompanied by his then wife, Eden, his daughter, Judith and Robert Dwan, climbed a pile of rubble that marked the site of Adolf Hitler's bunker. Once he reached the top of the pile, Marx performed a two minute charleston.[4]

Another TV show hosted by Groucho, Tell It To Groucho, premiered 11 January 1962 on CBS, but only lasted five months. On 1 October 1962, Groucho, after acting as occasional guest host of The Tonight Show during the six-month interval between Jack Paar and Johnny Carson, introduced Carson as the new host.

In 1965, Groucho did a weekly show for British TV titled Groucho which was poorly received and only lasted 11 weeks. He appeared as "God" in the movie Skidoo (1968), co-starring Jackie Gleason and Carol Channing and directed by Otto Preminger. The film got almost universally negative reviews. Skidoo proved to be Groucho's last theatrical film appearance. As a side note, writer Paul Krassner published a story in the February 1981 issue of High Times, relating how Groucho Marx "prepared" for his role in the LSD-related movie by taking a dose of the drug in Krassner's company, and had a moving, largely pleasant experience.

In the early 1970s, Groucho made a comeback of sorts doing a live one-man show, including one recorded at Carnegie Hall in 1972 and released as a double album, An Evening with Groucho, on A&M Records. He also made an uncredited cameo in the movie The Candidate in 1972 and an appearance on a short-lived variety show hosted by Bill Cosby, who idolized Groucho, in 1973. He also developed friendships with rock star Alice Cooper (the two were photographed together for Rolling Stone Magazine), and television host Dick Cavett, becoming a frequent guest on Cavett's late-night talk show. He met and befriended Elton John when the British singer was staying in California in 1972, insisting on calling him "John Elton" because "Elton John" was the wrong way around. According to writer Philip Norman, Groucho jokingly pointed his index fingers at Elton John as if holding a pair of six-shooters. Elton John put up his hands and said, "Don't shoot me, I'm only the piano player," so naming the album he had just completed. Elton John accompanied Groucho and the family hosting him in California to a performance of Jesus Christ Superstar, where Groucho offered two witticisms. As the lights went down in the theater, Groucho called out, "Does it have a happy ending?" During the Crucifixion scene, he declared, "This is sure to offend the Jews." [citation needed]

Groucho's previous works once again became popular and were accompanied by new books of interviews and other transcribed conversations by Richard J. Anobile and Charlotte Chandler. He had become quite frail by this time and his last few years were accompanied by descent into senility[5][6] and a controversy over a companionship he had developed with Erin Fleming, which consequently raised disputes over his estate.

He also accepted an honorary Academy Award in 1974, his final major public appearance, at which he took a bow for all the Marx Brothers.


Death

Marx's children, particularly his son Arthur, felt strongly that Fleming was pushing his weak father beyond his physical and mental limits. Writer Mark Evanier concurs with this.[5][6] Marx was hospitalized for pneumonia on June 22, 1977 and died on August 19, 1977 at Cedar Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. [1]

He was cremated, and the ashes were interred in the Eden Memorial Park Cemetery in Mission Hills, Los Angeles, California. (He had jokingly expressed desire to be buried on top of Marilyn Monroe.[citation needed]) Aged 86 at death, Groucho was the longest-lived of all three Marx brother actors, although his younger brother Zeppo outlived him by two years. His death undoubtedly would have received more attention at the time had it not occurred three days after that of Elvis Presley. In an interview, he jokingly suggested his epitaph read "Excuse me, I can't stand up", but his mausoleum marker bears only his stage name, a Star of David, and the years of his birth and death. [7]


Groucho's legacy

Various Groucho-like characters and Groucho references have appeared in popular culture, some long after Marx's death, a testament to the character's lasting appeal. Some of these references are listed below, although it is in no way an exhaustive list.

Actor Frank Ferrante has performed as Groucho Marx for several years under rights granted by the Marx family in a one-man show entitled "An Evening With Groucho" done in live theater throughout the United States. With piano accompaniment, Ferrante takes the audience from Marx' early years in Vaudeville to his final days, incorporating songs from several Marx Brothers movies. Gabe Kaplan has appeared in a filmed version.

Bugs Bunny has impersonated Groucho in multiple cartoons such as Slick Hare and Wideo Wabbit. In the Tiny Toon Adventures segment "A Night in Kokomo", Groucho and his brothers have been re-assembled (with Babs as Groucho), and Histeria! portrayed Karl Marx as being very Groucho-like. This is noteworthy because most of the target audience of the shows most likely never watched their movies. In addition, his semi-signature phrase "Of course you realize, this means war" was "borrowed" from the Marx Brothers.
In the films The Way We Were (1973) and Everyone Says I Love You, there are parties where everyone dresses as one of the Marx Brothers.
Alan Alda often vamped as Groucho on M*A*S*H and a minor semi-recurring character in the series (played by Loudon Wainwright III) was named Captain Calvin Spalding in a nod towards Groucho's character in Animal Crackers, Captain Geoffrey T. Spaulding.
Rob Zombie uses several Groucho Marx character names (Captain Spaulding from Animal Crackers, Otis Driftwood from A Night at the Opera, Rufus T. Firefly from Duck Soup, Hugo Z. Hackenbush from A Day at the Races, S. Quentin Quale from Go West, and Wolf J. Flywheel from The Big Store) for his movies, House of 1000 Corpses & The Devil's Rejects.
Two of Queen's albums, A Night at the Opera (1975) and A Day at the Races (1976) are named after two of the Marx Brothers' films.
The Vlasic Pickles stork mascot is clearly an homage to Groucho, holding the pickle like a cigar and having a very similar voice.

The Vlasic Pickles StorkIn a tribute to Groucho, the BBC remade the radio sitcom Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel, with contemporary actors playing the parts of the original cast. The series is currently being repeated on digital radio station BBC7.
In the 1977 Best Picture-winning Woody Allen film, Annie Hall, Woody opens the movie with a famous quotation, which he, reservedly, attributed to Groucho: "I refuse to belong to any club that will accept me as a member." The quotation was the end of an anecdote in Groucho's autobiography, "Groucho and Me" (although in reality, the sentiment may have originated with John Galsworthy[8]).
On the famous Hollywood Sign in California, one of the "O"s is dedicated to Groucho Marx. Alice Cooper contributed over $27,000 to remodel the sign, in memory of his friend Groucho Marx.
In a 2005 poll, The Comedian's Comedian, Groucho was voted the 5th greatest comedy act ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders. His glasses, nose, and moustache have become icons of comedy?-to this day, glasses with fake noses and moustaches (referred to as "Groucho glasses," "nose-glasses," and other names) resembling Groucho are still sold by novelty and costume shops, and worn by young people, some of whom may not understand their origin.

"Marx and Lennon"

The liberal political views of Groucho Marx and singer John Lennon were not lost on satirists, who capitalized on the coincidence of their surnames' similarity to Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin:

A book called 'Marx & Lennon: The Parallel Sayings' was published in 2005. As the title implies, it recorded the parallel sayings between Groucho Marx and John Lennon.
In 1994 the Republic of Abkhazia (an unrecognized state that is officially part of Georgia) issued two postage stamps featuring John Lennon and Groucho Marx, spoofing Abkhazia's communist past. [9]
The cover art for the Firesign Theatre's 1969 album How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You're Not Anywhere at All featured a Communist icon banner with pictures of the two enjoining "All Hail Marx and Lennon" printed in pseudo-Cyrillic lettering.
In his book It All Started With Columbus, first printed in the mid-1950s, humorist Richard Armour discussed Karl Marx and referred to him as "the funniest of the Marx Brothers".
In the comedy role-playing game Paranoia, the Communist faction carries pictures of Groucho Marx and sing John Lennon songs because of a lack of knowledge of communism itself.
Some members of the Parti Rhinocéros call themselves Marxist-Lennonist, (A parody of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada), in reference to Groucho Marx and John Lennon.

Witty remarks by Groucho Marx

Note that several of these come from his films and although spoken by Groucho were written by the various films' screenwriters.

A man's only as old as the woman he feels.
A woman is an occasional pleasure but a cigar is always a smoke.
Anyone who says he can see through women is missing a lot.
Behind every successful man is a woman, behind her is his wife.
From the moment I picked your book up until I laid it down, I convulsed with laughter. Someday I intend on reading it.
Go, and never darken my towels again.
I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members.
I find television very educational. Every time someone switches it on I go into another room and read a good book.
I have had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn't it.
I never forget a face, but in your case I'll be glad to make an exception.
I remember the first time I had sex - I kept the receipt.
I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury.
In Hollywood, brides keep the bouquets and throw away the groom.
Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who wants to live in an institution?
Marry me and I'll never look at another horse!
Military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.
Next time I see you, remind me not to talk to you.
One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I don't know (often misquoted as "I'll never know.")
Quote me as saying I was mis-quoted.
There is one way to find out if a man is honest; ask him! If he says yes you know he's crooked.
Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
Whoever named it necking was a poor judge of anatomy.
Why, I'd horse-whip you if I had a horse.
Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.
I thought my razor was dull, then I heard his speech.

Quotations about Groucho Marx

"Groucho Marx was the best comedian this country ever produced. [...] He is simply unique in the same way that Picasso or Stravinsky are." ?-Woody Allen
A famous French witticism (often attributed to Jean-Luc Godard) was, "Je suis Marxiste, tendance Groucho," that is, "I'm a Marxist of the Groucho variety". This line was notably heard in the 1972 comedy by Claude Lelouch "L'aventure c'est l'aventure", (starring Lino Ventura, Aldo Maccione, Jacques Brel, Johnny Hallyday and Charles Denner) where the would-be heroes get involved with a Central American guerilla; it spread to other nations as well in the 1960s and 1970s. In the United States, the Youth International Party, a 1960s-1970s ad-hoc political group of Anarcho-Marxists known for street theatre and pranks, were denounced in a Communist newspaper editorial as "Groucho Marxists".
In Tom Robbins' novel Another Roadside Attraction, protagonist Marx Marvelous is asked by the police if he was named for Karl Marx. He replies that he was named for the Marx Brothers.

Bud Abbott
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Born October 2, 1895(1895-10-02)
Asbury Park, New Jersey
Died April 24, 1974 (aged 78)

Occupation Actor, Comedian
Spouse(s) Betty Smith
Children Bud Abbott, Jr
Vickie Abbott

William Alexander "Bud" Abbott (October 2, 1895 - April 24, 1974) was an American actor, producer and comedian born in Asbury Park, New Jersey. He is best remembered as the straight man of the comedy team of Abbott and Costello, with Lou Costello.




Early years

Abbott was born into a show business family. His parents worked for the Barnum and Bailey Circus: his mother, Rae Fisher, was a bareback rider and his father, Harry, was an advance man. Bud dropped out of school as a child and began working at Coney Island. When Bud was 16, his father, now an employee of the Columbia Burlesque Wheel, installed him in the box office of the Casino Theater in Brooklyn. Eventually Bud began putting together touring burlesque shows. In 1918 he married Betty Smith, a burlesque dancer and comedienne. Shortly after his marriage, Abbott and his new wife began producing a vaudeville "tab show" called Broadway Flashes. This show toured on the Gus Sun Vaudeville Circuit.[1] Around 1924 Bud started performing as a straight man in an act with Betty. As his stature grew, Abbott began working with veteran comedians like Harry Steppe and Harry Evanson.[citation needed]


Lou Costello and Hollywood

Abbott crossed paths with Lou Costello in burlesque in the early 1930s. Abbott was producing and performing in Minsky's Burlesque shows, while Costello was a rising comic. They formally teamed up in 1936 and performed together in burlesque, vaudeville, minstrel shows, and cinemas.

In 1938 they received national exposure for the first time by performing on the Kate Smith Hour radio show, which led to the duo appearing in a Broadway musical, The Streets of Paris. In 1940, Universal signed Abbott and Costello for their first film, One Night in the Tropics. Although Abbott and Costello were only filling supporting roles, they stole the film with their classic routines, including "Who's On First?" (It is widely rumored that Abbott and Costello are the only two non-baseball players honored in the Baseball Hall of Fame, but this is actually not true.)[2]

During World War II, Abbott and Costello were among the most popular and highest-paid stars in the world. Between 1940 and 1956 they made 36 films, and earned a percentage of the profits on each. They were popular on radio throughout the 1940s, primarily on their own program which ran from 1942 until 1947 on NBC and from 1947 to 1949 on ABC. In the 1950s they brought their comedy to live television on the Colgate Comedy Hour, and launched their own half-hour series, The Abbott and Costello Show.


Split up

Relations between the two partners had been strained for years. In their early burlesque days, their salaries were split sixty-forty, favoring Abbott, because the straight man was always viewed as the more valuable member of the team. That was changed to fifty-fifty after they became burlesque stars.

Another version was that the sixty-forty split was Costello's idea. "A Good Straight Man is hard to find" is attributed to Costello.

The sixty-forty split had long irked Costello. Later, after Buck Privates made them movie stars, Costello insisted that the split be reversed in his favor, and it remained sixty-forty for the remainder of their careers. Costello's other demand, that the team be renamed "Costello and Abbott," was rejected by Universal Studios. The result was a "permanent chill" between the two partners, according to Lou's daughter Chris Costello, in her biography Lou's on First.

The team's popularity waned in the 1950s, and Abbott and Costello parted ways in July 1957. Lou Costello died on March 3, 1959.


Later years

Abbott attempted to begin performing again in 1960, with a new partner, Candy Candido, and received good reviews. But Abbott called it quits, remarking that "No one could ever live up to Lou." On TV, he performed in a dramatic episode of General Electric Theater titled "The Joke's On Me" in 1961. A few years later, Bud provided his own voice for the Hanna-Barbera animated series Abbott and Costello, with Stan Irwin providing the voice of Lou Costello.

Bud and Betty were married for 55 years. The couple adopted two children: Bud, Jr. in 1942, and Vickie in 1949. Bud Jr. died in January 1997 at the age of 57.

Bud Abbott has three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: the radio star is located on 6333 Hollywood Blvd., the motion pictures star is located on 1611 Vine St., and the TV star is located on 6740 Hollywood Blvd.


Death

Bud Abbott suffered from epilepsy and died of cancer at the age of 78 on April 24, 1974 in Woodland Hills, California. He was cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Pacific Ocean.[3] When Groucho Marx was asked about Abbott shortly after his death, his response was that Bud was "the greatest straight man ever."[4]

George McFarland
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




"Spanky" McFarland
Born October 2, 1928(1928-10-02)
Dallas, Texas, U.S.
Died June 30, 1993 (aged 64)
Grapevine, Texas, U.S.

Spanky McFarland (October 2, 1928 - June 30, 1993) was an American actor most famous for his appearances in the Our Gang series of short-subject comedies of the 1930s and '40s. The juvenile ensemble is also known as The Little Rascals.

McFarland was born George Robert Phillips McFarland in Dallas, Texas (not in Ft. Worth as many biographies report), to Emmett and Virginia McFarland. He had three siblings, Thomas ("Tommy," who himself had a brief stint in the "comedies" as "Dynamite"), Amanda, and Roderick ("Rod").[citation needed]

Prior to joining the comedies, Buddy, as he was then nick-named by his family, modeled children's clothing for a Dallas department store, and also was regularly seen around the Dallas area on highway billboards and in print advertisements for Wonderbread. This established "Buddy" early on in the local public's eye as an adorable child model, and also provided him experience in front of camera equipment and photographic sets. In response to a trade magazine advertisement from Hal Roach Studios in Culver City, California requesting photographs of "cute kids," Spanky's Aunt Dottie (Virginia's sister) sent in some pictures from Buddy's portfolio. Before long, an invitation to come to California for a screen test arrived, and the rest his history.[citation needed]

McFarland's nickname "Spanky" is said to have arisen from repeated warnings by his mother not to misbehave during one of the initial discussions with Hal Roach in his office. As the story goes, he had a habit of reaching out and grabbing things, and on doing so his mother Virginia would say, "Spanky, spanky, mustn't touch!" Spanky himself refuted this version in his later years, saying instead that the name was given to him by a Los Angeles newspaper reporter. Use of the Spanky name by McFarland for subsequent business or personal activities was expressly granted to McFarland in one of his studio contracts. In later years some in his family would affectionately refer to him as just "Spank".[1]

After his discovery at the age of three, he instantly became a popular member of the Our Gang children's comedy movie series and one of Hollywood's darlings. His earliest films show him as an outspoken toddler, grumpily going along with the rest of the gang. His sassy portrayals, natural comedic timing, hilarious facial expressions and ability to act soon brought him more attention, and by 1935 he was the de facto leader of the gang, often paired with Alfalfa and always the enterprising "idea man."[citation needed]

He remained with Our Gang through 1942. Spanky McFarland also appeared as a juvenile perfomer in feature films, including the Wheeler & Woolsey comedy Kentucky Kernels and two Fritz Lang features of the 1940s.[citation needed]

McFarland joined the Army Air Corps (now, the Air Force) at age 24, and on occsion would perform at military bases for troops during World War II. Upon his return to civilian life, indelibly typecast in the public's mind as "Spanky" from Our Gang, he found himself unable to find work in show business. In order to make ends meet, he took far less glamorous jobs including work at a soft-drink plant, a hamburger stand, and a popsicle factory. In the late 1950s, when the Our Gang comedies were sweeping the nation on TV, McFarland hosted an afternoon childrens' show, "Spanky's Clubhouse," on KOTV television in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The show included a studio audience, appearances by other celebrities such as James Arness, and ran Little Rascals shorts.[2]

After that stint, he continued down the "odd-job road" selling wine, operating a restaurant and night club, and selling appliances, electronics and furniture. One job saw him selling for Philco-Ford Corporation, where he worked his way up to national sales director. After his self-described "semi-retirement,", Spanky loaned his name and celebrity to help raise money for numerous charities, primarily by participating in golf tournaments. Spanky also had is own name-sake charity golf classic for 16 years, held in Marion, Indiana.[3]

McFarland continued to do personal appearances and cameo roles in films and television. His final television performance was an introductory vignette at the beginning of the popular Cheers episode, "Woody Gets an Election."

McFarland died suddenly of a heart attack on June 30, 1993, at age 64. In January 1994, "Spanky" joined fellow alumnus Jackie Cooper to become one of two Our Gang members to receive a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.