SullivansTravels
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Posts posted by SullivansTravels
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Wikipedia is reporting the death of actress Dana Wynter in an Ojai, California hospital on Thursday, May 5 at age 79. Nothing on AP, Los Angeles Times, etc. websites that I can find. Does anyone have confirmation?
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Thanks for the tip on the one-hour interview with Jonathan Schwartz. She is still sharp as a tack and very friendly, making me wonder again why she no longer appears in public. My own favorites amongst her films are "The Man Who Knew Too Much" and "The Pajama Game."
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I understand 1999's "Summer of Sam" suffered from walkouts in several cities.
Edited by: SullivansTravels on Mar 15, 2011 10:42 PM
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Robert De Niro: the John Carradine of our time. Then you had the ones at other extreme, such as Paul Scofield and Kim Stanley.
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You might Google "Loving the Classics" and "DVD Talk Forum" first.
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I can't help with GOLD FEVER, but did want to thank you for confirming that he's still alive. He took over the role of The Falcon in three films from the late 1940's, following in the footsteps of George Sanders and Tom Conway. I would never have guessed that he was still with us.
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Mamie Van Doren, from all accounts, still dates - don't give up!
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By Olga Craig, Ben Leach and Roya Nikkhah 9:05PM GMT 15 Jan 2011
She was the blue-eyed English rose with the china-white skin and cupid lips who epitomised the sensuality of the swinging Sixties. Sexy and demure by turn, Susannah York, who died yesterday from cancer at 72, held a generation of male admirers in her thrall.
Her wide-ranging career, which won her both a Bafta and an Oscar nomination, oscillated between powerful portrayals of either the dutiful woman or the wanton wife. The zenith of her career was surely her roles as Thomas More's daughter in A Man For All Seasons, in 1966, and her passionate performance as the feisty section officer who took on Kenneth More in the acclaimed film Battle of Britain in 1966.
But York was not an actress whose career was shaped by her artistic ambition. Instead, as a single mother with two children, she chose roles (at times unwisely) which provided income. But for all that, she was acclaimed as one of our best character actors whose professionalism was legendary.
Last night Ms York's son, the actor Orlando Wells, spoke movingly of his pride in and love for his mother. "She was an absolutely fantastic mother, who was very down to earth," he said. "She loved nothing more than cooking a good Sunday roast and sitting around a fire of a winter's evening. In some sense, she was quite a home girl. Both Sasha [Orlando's sister] and I feel incredibly lucky to have her as a mother.''
Sir Tom Stoppard, the playwright and screenwriter, last night paid tribute to York. "I remember back in 1961 when I was a young journalist, I interviewed her for a magazine for her film Greengage Summer, and I still remember how completely charmed I was.
"She was so pleasant to me ? she even let me interview her at home as long as I promised not to write that because journalists weren't normally allowed to go to her home. I still think of her with great affection."
Anthony Rudolf, a close friend and writer, said: "Everyone knows she was a great star, but it should not be forgotten that she made a great contribution to fringe drama."
York was born Susannah Yolande Fletcher in London in January 1939 ? although according to York, who was rightly vain about her looks, she always claimed she was born in 1942. Her father was a merchant banker, her mother the daughter of a diplomat. Her parents divorced when she was five and she saw her father only a handful of times during her childhood. Later, when her mother remarried to a Scottish businessman and moved the family to Scotland, her contact with her father ceased.
It was during her school years that Ms York's rebellious streak, which was to manifest itself many times throughout her lifetime, was born. In what was considered a risqu? incident when just 13, she was expelled for swimming naked at midnight in the school pool. In later life she laughingly remarked: "My biggest mistake was my sense of fair play. I wasn't even caught in the pool, but owned up anyway."
The young York was smitten by the stage from her school days. She won a small part as an Ugly Sister, and such was her delight at the plaudits that she determined to apply to RADA. When she was accepted, she wept with joy.
For the next few years, Ms York suffered rejections and applause in turn. But when she appeared in a production of Ibsen's A Doll's House, a Hollywood agent approached her and told her he would make her a star. When she won the role of Alec Guinness's daughter in Tunes of Glory (1960), she received rapturous reviews. She went on to appear with Glenda Jackson in The Maids (1974), and with Elizabeth Taylor (whom she called the world's most beautiful woman) in Zee and Co (1972).
At 18, in 1960, she had fallen in love with Michael Wells. He was a Rada contemporary and a married man. In an era when such indelicate behaviour was frowned upon, Ms York, with her winsome ways, soon turned the tide of public outrage. But the union hit the buffers when her career quickly overshadowed that of her husband. After the birth of a son and a daughter, the marriage ended bitterly in 1976.
From then on, Ms York, while still committed to her career, devoted her life to her children. She played Superman's mother in Superman (1978) and starred in two sequels.
On the small screen, too, her star shone bright. She appeared in Prince Regent (1979), as Mrs Fitzherbert, and in We'll Meet Again in 1982. But as she aged, her career waned. In the late 1980s, in deep humiliation, she was forced to sell deeply cherished paintings and jewellery to pay her mortgage. But for all that, Susannah York never lost the deep convictions and commitments that set her apart as a redoubtable actor. She had a keenly developed sense of justice, coupled with a volatile and prickly temper. When she was nominated for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for They Shoot Horses, Don't They?, she famously snubbed the Academy by declaring that it offended her to be nominated without being asked.
Ms York espoused many causes such as CND and the rainforests. But first and foremost, she was a devoted mother.
Orlando Wells and his sister were with her when she died. He said: ''She was a fantastic mother and the most extraordinary actress. She was a woman with grace and stature. She had advanced bone marrow cancer which she had an operation for. But, last Thursday, she had a scan and then the descent was fast. In the end, her death was painless and quick.''
Describing his mother as down to earth, Mr Wells said: "She was as happy in a pub theatre in Islington as she was in Hollywood."
From The Telegraph (London)
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From VARIETY
David Nelson, who grew up in front of America in "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet," died Jan. 11 in Century City, Calif., of complications from colon cancer. He was 74.
Nelson was the last surviving member of the Nelsons TV family: actor-bandleader Ozzie; his singing wife, Harriet Hilliard; and his teen-idol younger brother, Rick. The show, which originated on radio in 1952 as "Here Come the Nelsons," ran for 320 episodes from 1952 to 1966 as "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" on ABC. On the radio show, the boys were portrayed by pros, but they persuaded their parents to allow them to play themselves for the smallscreen.
In the show's later years, David Nelson also directed some episodes. His film career included roles on 1957's "Peyton Place," 1959's "The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker," "The Big Circus" (for which he won critical acclaim as a homicidal trapeze artist) and "Day of the Outlaw," 1962's "The Big Show," l965's "Love and Kisses," 1978's "Up in Smoke" and 1990's "Cry-Baby."
He also starred with Hilliard in 1976's "Smash-Up on Interstate 5."
Smallscreen roles included "The Love Boat," "Hondo," and telepics "A Family for Joe," "Swing out Sweet Land" and "High School USA."
Nelson also had a career as a director and a producer. Besides directing eps of "Ozzie and Harriet" he helmed episodes of "O.K. Crackerby," "Adam-12" and "Ozzie's Girls." Feature credits included 1969's "Childish Things," 1982's "Death Screams," 1983's "Last Plane Out" and 1984's "A Rare Breed."
He produced "Ozzie's Girls," "Last Plane Out" and "Easy to Be Free."
In 2006, he was nommed for a TV Land Award for "Ozzie and Harriet" and received a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.
Survivors include his wife of 36 years, Yvonne; four sons and a daughter; seven grandchildren; three nephews; Matthew, Gunnar and Sam; and a niece, Tracy.
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Los Angeles Times
January 3, 2011
Anne Francis, who costarred in the 1950s science-fiction classic
"Forbidden Planet" and later played the title role in "Honey West," the
mid-1960s TV series about a sexy female private detective with a pet
ocelot, died Sunday. She was 80.
Francis, who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2007 and underwent
surgery and chemotherapy, died of complications of pancreatic cancer at
a retirement home in Santa Barbara, said Jane Uemura, her daughter.
Friends and family members were with her, said a family spokeswoman,
Melissa Fitch.
A shapely blond with a signature beauty mark next to her lower lip,
Francis was a former child model and radio actress when she first came
to notice on the big screen in the early 1950s.
She had leading or supporting roles in more than 30 movies, including
"Bad Day at Black Rock," "Battle Cry," "Blackboard Jungle," "The Hired
Gun," "Don't Go Near the Water," "Brainstorm," "Funny Girl" and "Hook,
Line and Sinker."'
She also achieved cult status as one of the stars of "Forbidden Planet,"
the 1956 MGM movie costarring Walter Pidgeon and Leslie Nielsen and
featuring a helpful robot named Robby.
Francis, however, never became a major movie star and was more
frequently seen on television as a guest star on scores of series from
the late '50s and decades beyond, including an episode of "The Twilight
Zone" in which she played a department store mannequin who comes to life
at night.
But it's as the star of "Honey West," the first female detective to be
featured in a weekly TV series, that Francis may be best remembered.
Based on the title character in G.G. Fickling's series of Honey West
paperback mysteries launched in 1957, Francis' Honey West was introduced
to TV viewers in an episode of "Burke's Law" in the spring of 1965.
The episode served as the pilot for the half-hour "Honey West" series,
which was executive produced by Aaron Spelling and made its debut in the
fall of 1965.
In it, West, who inherited a Los Angeles detective agency from her late
father, had a partner named Sam Bolt (played by John Ericson), shared an
apartment with her Aunt Meg (Irene Hervey) and owned a man-hating pet
ocelot named Bruce Biteabit.
In what Francis later described as "a tongue-in-cheek, female James
Bond," her karate-chopping private eye drove a custom-built Cobra
convertible sports car and, when necessary, worked out of a specially
equipped mobile surveillance van that masqueraded as a TV service
vehicle.
Among her Bond-style gimmicks: a lipstick radio transmitter, a fake
martini olive on a toothpick for bugging conversations, earrings that
exploded with tear gas when they were thrown to the floor and a black
garter with pink lace that doubled as a gas mask.
As the glamorous and sexy Honey, Francis was outfitted in an
eye-catching wardrobe that included a black snakeskin trench coat, a
white beaded gown trimmed in sable and a tiger-skin bathing suit with
matching cape.
In a television era of Donna Reed and Harriet Nelson housewives, the
independent, take-charge Honey West has been described as being a role
model for young baby-boomer women.
"She was probably the forerunner of what we would call the good aspects
of female independence," Francis told the (Memphis) Commercial Appeal in
1997.
"Producers and writers I work with, young women in their 30s and 40s,
tell me all the time, 'You have no idea what an influence you had on me
with Honey West. You showed that I could do something unusual with my
life, that I could have my freedom and not be dependent on another human
being for my livelihood.'"
Francis won a Golden Globe as best female TV star and received an Emmy
nomination for her portrayal of Honey West.
The series received good ratings, but ABC canceled it in 1966 after 30
episodes. "They were able to buy 'The Avengers' [spy drama] from England
for less than it cost to produce our show," Francis later said.
She was born Sept. 16, 1930, in Ossining, N.Y. At the age of 7, after
her family moved to New York City, she was signed by the John Robert
Powers modeling agency.
Her career as a child model led to acting roles on the children's radio
shows "Let's Pretend" and "Coast-to-Coast on a Bus," and she then moved
on to radio soap operas. In 1941, she also appeared on Broadway, playing
Gertrude Lawrence as a child in "Lady in the Dark."
Francis arrived in Hollywood for the first time in 1946 and was signed
to a contract with MGM. But after a year of "grooming" at the studio,
during which she had a small part in the Mickey Rooney musical "Summer
Holiday," the teenage Francis returned to New York, where she began
appearing in live TV productions.
After playing a teenage prostitute with a baby in a girl's reform school
in "So Young, So Bad," a 1950 movie drama shot in New York, Francis was
signed to a contract at 20th Century Fox. After three years at Fox, she
was signed again at MGM and by the late '50s was freelancing.
While at MGM, she co-starred in "Forbidden Planet," a big-budget,
box-office hit that received an Oscar nomination for special effects.
Francis played Altaira, the alluring daughter of the scientist character
played by Pidgeon: the two sole-surviving human inhabitants of the
mysterious, technologically advanced planet.
"I got that part because I was under contract to MGM and I had good
legs," Francis, who wore futuristically abbreviated costumes, said in a
1992 interview for Starlog magazine.
At the time, she recalled, "I don't think that any of us really were
aware of the fact that it was going to turn into a longtime cult film,
probably much, much stronger today than it was then. . 'Forbidden
Planet' just had a life of its own, something that none of us was aware
was going to happen."
Francis, who wrote the 1982 memoir "Voices From Home: An Inner Journey,"
continued to appear on television throughout the '90s.
In addition to Uemura, the twice-divorced Francis is survived by another
daughter, Maggie, and a grandson, Fitch said.
dennis.mclel...@latimes.com
Copyright ??? 2010, Los Angeles Times
Reply Reply to author Forward Report
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The Jose Ferrer connection also links her to Debby Boone, Pat Boone and Red Foley, as well as Rosemary, Nick and George Clooney.
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When the private eye is interviewing a bartender, the bar will always be nearly deserted. The bartender will be cleaning the inside of a shot glass with a rag.
When a woman is being harassed by a threatening telephone caller, as soon as he ends his last cackle and hangs up, she will get an immediate dial tone.
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Sounds a little like "Since You Went Away" (1944)
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Watch that evening intro next chance you get (people gathering to watch movie projected onto a building) - it gives new meaning to the advertising term "18 to 34."
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On my screen, not only is his name rendered as "Leornard", but every review is in LATIN!
Are we dealing with the proverbial "disgruntled employee"??
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TCM is showing all 16 Andy Hardy films (in reverse chronology for some reason) in a 27-hour marathon beginning at 6am Eastern on Thursday December 16.
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No Man of Her Own (1950)
Edited by: SullivansTravels on Oct 28, 2010 12:18 AM
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The Girl He Left Behind (1956)
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That's "Trapped" (1973), an ABC made-for-TV movie with James Brolin.
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Imagine my surprise at the checkout counter tonight - Joan Fontaine, 92, and Olivia de Havilland, 94, have a front cover blurb on this week's issue of the supermarket tabloid Globe. I took a quick peek inside to see what the nature of their latest flareup was - all it was is the same tired stuff about they don't care for each other and have been feuding for the past 90 years. The only factual part was Joan being a no-show at Olivia's recent Legion of Honor award ceremony. They expect a 92-year old woman to travel 5700 miles
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This finishes off every pre-1963 soap. General Hospital is now the oldest.
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Easy to Wed (1946) Esther Williams, June Lockhart, Jean Porter (Fidel Castro was an extra)
Dancing in the Dark (1949) Betsy Drake, Sally Forrest, Marion Marshall
It's a Great Feeling (1949) Doris Day, Frank Cady, Nita Talbot (and "all-star" cameos from Patricia Neal and Eleanor Parker)
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This sounds fairly similar to Gary's "For Whom the Bell Tolls" (1943).
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WAH-rez is correct. That's why that little diagonal line points toward the letter "a."
Zanuck hits: Where are they?
in General Discussions
Posted
TCM is showing ALI BABA GOES TO TOWN next month as part of the Race & Hollywood: Arab Images on Film festival. July 14 is Arabs as a Subject of Ridicule night; ABGTT shares the evening with ROAD TO MOROCCO, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET THE MUMMY and THE SAD SACK, along with the Stooges short MUMMY'S DUMMIES and the cartoons POPEYE THE SAILOR MEETS ALI BABA AND THE FORTY THIEVES, SAHARA HARE, LITTLE BEAU PORKY and HARE-ABIAN NIGHTS, as well as the Charley Chase short ARABIAN TIGHTS. I believe these are the first cartoons TCM has shown since '08 or so.