TCM Remembers 2016
Those film luminaries who were included in TCM Remembers 2016.
The song used in this year's video is "Goin' Home" by Dan Auerbach, previously featured in Jason Reitman's 2009 film 'Up in the Air.'
The 2016 video was revised twice -- rather sloppily, which is uncharacteristic for TCM -- first to add Zsa Zsa Gabor, and then to shoehorn Carrie Fisher into the end of an already crowded tribute. Fisher, who died Dec. 27, was added despite the fact that their normal deadline for revision had long past, and seemingly with little thought or respect; Gabor and Fisher's appearances go by so quick and their odd placement disrupts the flow of the tribute. Adding to the insult, Fisher's mother, Debbie Reynolds, passed away just hours after the revised video with Fisher was released. Since TCM had already put edited and re-released the video past the deadline, they couldn't add Reynolds and re-release it again; and since they had already put Fisher in the 2016 tribute, they couldn't include her in the 2017 tribute with her mother.
With the revised 2016 video only airing for a few more days after its release, many viewers missed that version and thus were expecting for Carrie to have a spot in the 2017 video; her absence (short of a clip of Reynolds kissing a baby Carrie) angered and confused a lot of viewers. Hopefully TCM learned their lesson and won't alter and re-release future tributes once the deadline to do so has passed; it's not fair to viewers or to the late artists the video is supposed to be honoring.
As I said, when TCM has to re-edit their videos, it's usually very well done. The additions they had to make to the 2013 and 2018 tributes, for example, were seamless. They just dropped the ball this year by making a rushed edit when they should have left the video alone after adding Gabor and held off on Fisher until the next year's video.
Notable omissions:
Alexis Arquette | Actress
Jim Clark | Editor
Steven Hill | Actor
Gil Parrondo (see TCM Remembers 2017 notable omissions)
Peter Shaffer | Screenwriter / Playwright
Bud Spencer | Actor
Paul Sylbert | Production Designer
Director Jeffrey Hayden and actresses Michèle Morgan and Debbie Reynolds died too late in December 2016 to be included this year and are instead featured in TCM Remembers 2017.
The song used in this year's video is "Goin' Home" by Dan Auerbach, previously featured in Jason Reitman's 2009 film 'Up in the Air.'
The 2016 video was revised twice -- rather sloppily, which is uncharacteristic for TCM -- first to add Zsa Zsa Gabor, and then to shoehorn Carrie Fisher into the end of an already crowded tribute. Fisher, who died Dec. 27, was added despite the fact that their normal deadline for revision had long past, and seemingly with little thought or respect; Gabor and Fisher's appearances go by so quick and their odd placement disrupts the flow of the tribute. Adding to the insult, Fisher's mother, Debbie Reynolds, passed away just hours after the revised video with Fisher was released. Since TCM had already put edited and re-released the video past the deadline, they couldn't add Reynolds and re-release it again; and since they had already put Fisher in the 2016 tribute, they couldn't include her in the 2017 tribute with her mother.
With the revised 2016 video only airing for a few more days after its release, many viewers missed that version and thus were expecting for Carrie to have a spot in the 2017 video; her absence (short of a clip of Reynolds kissing a baby Carrie) angered and confused a lot of viewers. Hopefully TCM learned their lesson and won't alter and re-release future tributes once the deadline to do so has passed; it's not fair to viewers or to the late artists the video is supposed to be honoring.
As I said, when TCM has to re-edit their videos, it's usually very well done. The additions they had to make to the 2013 and 2018 tributes, for example, were seamless. They just dropped the ball this year by making a rushed edit when they should have left the video alone after adding Gabor and held off on Fisher until the next year's video.
Notable omissions:
Alexis Arquette | Actress
Jim Clark | Editor
Steven Hill | Actor
Gil Parrondo (see TCM Remembers 2017 notable omissions)
Peter Shaffer | Screenwriter / Playwright
Bud Spencer | Actor
Paul Sylbert | Production Designer
Director Jeffrey Hayden and actresses Michèle Morgan and Debbie Reynolds died too late in December 2016 to be included this year and are instead featured in TCM Remembers 2017.
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- Tall, dour-faced and slouch-shouldered character actor Abe Vigoda proved himself in both gritty dramatic roles and as an actor with wonderful comedic timing.
Vigoda was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Lena (Moses) and Samuel Vigoda, a tailor -- both Russian Jewish immigrants. His father was a tailor on the Lower East Side. He made his first stage appearance at the age of 17 and plodded away in small theater shows for over 20 years. For the majority of film-goers, Vigoda first came to prominence in The Godfather (1972) as the double-crossing Tessio, pleading to no avail with Robert Duvall to save his life "for old times' sake". Vigoda had roles in a few nondescript TV films before landing the plum role of the dour, unsmiling, urinary tract-tormented Sgt. Phil Fish on the sitcom Barney Miller (1975), his best-known role. The character of Fish proved popular enough to be spun off to his own (albeit short-lived) series, Fish (1977).
With his long, blank, rarely smiling face, he remained in high demand in mafioso-type roles, and for a while in the mid-1980s, he was mistakenly believed to have been dead, leading a producer to remark, "I need an Abe Vigoda type actor", not realizing Vigoda was still alive. The 1990s and beyond became busy again for Vigoda, making appearances in North (1994), The Misery Brothers (1995), A Brooklyn State of Mind (1998), and Crime Spree (2003). He continued acting into his 90s, surprising audiences with his entertaining style.
Vigoda died in his sleep on January 26, 2016, , a month before his 95th birthday, in suburban Woodland Park, New Jersey. He was interred in Beth David Cemetery in Elmont, New York.Actor - Nicole Courcel was born Nicole Marie-Anne Andrieux, the daughter of a journalist, in the Parisian suburb of Saint Cloud. Some of her early childhood was spent in Catholic boarding schools (an unhappy experience) and with her grandmother (much happier) in the small township of Martel (renowned for its truffles). While in her mid-teens she began acting in amateur theatre, eventually completing her dramatic training at the venerable acting school René Simon in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. Courcel entered films as a small part actress in 1947 and adopted the stage name Courcel two years later from a character in Jacques Becker's romantic youth comedy Rendezvous in July (1949). This was her first leading role. An actress of considerable poise, beauty and sensitivity, Courcel reached the peak of her popularity just prior to the beginning of the New Wave movement. Many of her films were commercially successful and directed by leading auteurs of the period, including Marcel Carné (in La Marie du Port (1950), co-starring opposite Jean Gabin), Jean Cocteau (in Testament of Orpheus (1960)) and Serge Bourguignon (in Sundays and Cybèle (1962)). The latter role -- as nurse to an emotionally crippled war veteran -- was arguably her most famous and complex, contrasting tender care with obsessive jealousy.
Rare international appearances saw her as a French piano teacher and romantic interest in a typical Heinz Rühmann comedy, Ein Mann geht durch die Wand (1959); as a nurse in a minor cold war drama, Stop Train 349 (1963) (starring Sean Flynn, son of the famous Errol); and a small part, as Raymonde, in the excellent wartime thriller The Night of the Generals (1967), directed by Anatole Litvak. As movie roles began to diminish in the early 70's, Courcel confined her acting to the small screen -- often in period drama -- notably in the title role as Madame Bovary (1974) and as the heroine's grandmother, Jeanne De Breuil, in an adaptation of Milady and the Three Musketeers (2004). Courcel was the mother of French television personality and food critic Julie Andrieu.Actress - Actor
- Writer
- Director
Alan Rickman was born on a council estate in Acton, West London, to Margaret Doreen Rose (Bartlett), of English and Welsh descent, and Bernard Rickman, of Irish descent, who worked at a factory. Alan Rickman had an older brother (David), a younger brother (Michael), and a younger sister (Sheila). When Alan was 8 years old, his father died. He attended Latymer Upper School on a scholarship. He studied Graphic Design at Chelsea College of Art and Design, where he met Rima Horton, who would later become his longtime partner.
After three years at Chelsea College, Rickman did graduate studies at the Royal College of Art. He opened a successful graphic design business, Graphiti, with friends and managed it for several years before his love of theatre led him to seek an audition with the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA). At the relatively late age of 26, Rickman received a scholarship to RADA, which started a professional acting career that has lasted nearly 40 years, a career which has spanned stage, screen and television, and overlapped into directing, as well. In 1987, he first came to the attention of American audiences as the Vicomte de Valmont in "Les Liaisons Dangereuses" on Broadway (he was nominated for a Tony Award for his performance in the role). Denied the role in the film version of the show, Rickman instead made his first film appearance opposite Bruce Willis in Die Hard (1988) as the villainous Hans Gruber. His take on the urbane villain set the standard for screen villains for decades to come.
Although often cited as being a master of playing villains, Rickman actually played a wide variety of characters, such as the romantic cello-playing ghost Jamie in Anthony Minghella's Truly Madly Deeply (1990) and the noble Colonel Brandon of Sense and Sensibility (1995). He treated audiences to his comedic abilities in such films as Dogma (1999), Galaxy Quest (1999) and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005), and roles like Dr. Alfred Blalock in Something the Lord Made (2004), and as Alex Hughes in Snow Cake (2006), showcased his ability to play ordinary men in extraordinary situations. Rickman even conquered the daunting task of singing a role in a Stephen Sondheim musical as he took on the role of Judge Turpin in the movie adaptation of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007). In 2001, Rickman introduced himself to a whole new, younger generation of fans by taking on the role of Severus Snape in the film versions of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001). He continued to play the role through the eighth and last movie Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011).
Alan Rickman died of pancreatic cancer on 14 January 2016. He was 69 years old.Actor- Actor
- Soundtrack
Ken Howard was elected the National President of The Screen Actors Guild on September 24, 2009. He was a working member of SAG for over forty years. The Tony and two-time Emmy Award-winning actor, most recently received an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie playing Phelan Beale in critically-acclaimed Grey Gardens (2009). The Emmy and Golden Globe-winning film starred Golden Globe-winner Drew Barrymore and fellow Emmy-winner Jessica Lange.
He starred opposite Jimmy Smits in the CBS drama Cane (2007) as "Joe Samuels". Howard portrayed the world-wise retired Detective Lieutenant "Max Cavanaugh" on NBC's Crossing Jordan (2001) and is perhaps best known for his performance as a street-savvy teacher in the classic drama The White Shadow (1978). He taught master classes at the American Repertory Theatre Institute and was an instructor at Harvard University and Harvard Law School. His teaching experience helped form the basis for his book, ACT NATURAL: How to Speak to Any Audience, published by Random House in 2003.
In 1968, two years into the three-year program at the Yale School of Drama, he accepted a small role on Broadway in Neil Simon's "Promises, Promises". He originated the role of Thomas Jefferson in the Tony-winning musical 1776 (1972), directed by Peter H. Hunt, receiving a Theatre World Award. Howard earned his Tony for his work as a young gym coach at a Catholic Boys' school in "Child's Play". He starred on Broadway in "Seesaw", "The Norman Conquests", "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" and the national tour of "Equus". In 2008, Howard starred in the one-man play, "According to Tip". His award-winning performance as Tip O'Neill was critically acclaimed.
His feature-film debut was in Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon (1970), opposite Liza Minnelli. Additional films: 1776 (1972), Such Good Friends (1971), Clear and Present Danger (1994), The Net (1995), At First Sight (1999), 2:13 (2009), A Numbers Game (2010) and The Beacon (2009). He delighted movie audiences in 2005 with his work in FOX 2000's In Her Shoes (2005), with Cameron Diaz, Toni Collette and Shirley MacLaine, and in Dreamer (2005), for Dreamworks, co-starring Kurt Russell and Dakota Fanning. He starred with Sylvester Stallone in Rambo (2008) (aka "Rambo IV"), Michael Clayton (2007) with George Clooney and Smother (2008) opposite Diane Keaton. He became firmly established in the public's mind as "Coach Ken Reeves" on MTM's prestigious The White Shadow (1978), a series which he co-created, based on his own experiences as the only white player on his high school basketball team. "White Shadow" fans can revisit the critically-acclaimed series of seasons 1 and 2 on DVD. He co-starred on the series It's Not Easy (1982), The Colbys (1985) and Dynasty (1981). He guest-starred in numerous prime-time shows: Boston Legal (2004), Dirty Sexy Money (2007), Eli Stone (2008), Cold Case (2003), Brothers & Sisters (2006), Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (1999), Arli$$ (1996), The West Wing (1999), Conviction (2006), Ghost Whisperer (2005), George Lopez (2002) and Showtime's Huff (2004), opposite his dear friend, Blythe Danner. He had a recurring role on Curb Your Enthusiasm (2000) and The Practice (1997). He starred in Sacrifices of the Heart (2007) for the Hallmark Channel. Miniseries include Perfect Murder, Perfect Town: JonBenét and the City of Boulder (2000), The Thorn Birds (1983), Rage of Angels (1983), OP Center (1995), Mastergate (1992), He's Not Your Son (1984), The Country Girl (1982), Murder in New Hampshire: The Pamela Smart Story (1991), Memories of Midnight (1991). Howard's first Emmy Award was for the on-camera narration of "Facts for Boys: The Body Human". His voice can be heard on more than 30 best-selling books on tape. A kidney transplant success (the gift of longtime friend and stunt-woman Jeannie Epper), Howard was appointed Chancellor of the National Kidney Foundation, and worked with their efforts to encourage people to donate their organs. He was a member of the Board of the Los Angeles Alzheimer's Committee and, along with his wife, Linda, served as Board members of Shambala Animal Preserve. He was also the national spokesperson for the Onyx and Breezy Foundation. Howard resided in Los Angeles, with his wife, retired stunt-woman Linda Fetters Howard Howard, and their recently rescued dogs, Harley Hoops and Hannah Henrietta.Actor- Music Artist
- Composer
- Actor
Prince Rogers Nelson was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Mattie Shaw, a jazz singer and social worker, and John L. Nelson, a lyricist and pianist. His father's stage name was "Prince Rogers". His parents were both from African-American families from Louisiana. They separated during his youth, which lead him to move back and forth. Prince had a troubled relationship with his step-father which lead him to run away from home. Prince was adopted by a family called the Andersons. Prince soon after became friends with the Anderson's son, Andre Anderson (Cymone) together along with Charles Smith they joined a band called Grand Central. The band later renamed themselves Champagne and were a fairly successful live band, however soon diminished.
Prince at the age of eighteen started working on high-quality demo tracks with Chris Moon. With these demo tracks Prince eventually ended up signing a recording contract with Warner Brothers Records and was the youngest producer associated with the label. Prince made his debut on the record label with his 1978 album, For You. It wasn't a strong successful album, however it was fair for a beginning artist and ranked 163 on the U.S. Pop Charts. Prince's next releases would tend to do much better on the charts with his singles, "Why You Wanna Treat Me So Bad?" and I Wanna Be Your Lover in 1979. This would start to introduce Prince as a person who presented sexually explicit material into the music industry. However Prince didn't begin to attract mainstream artists until he release his single, 1999. This single began to be noticed by M.T.V. viewers and this would make him a part of the main-stream music media. Prince released two more singles called Little Red Corvette and Delirious. The album featured Prince's new band, The Revolution. In 1984 Prince would release what would be seen as an admired and profound masterpiece the feature film/sound-track album, Purple Rain in 1984. Prince's father contributed to this album, by cowriting the chord sequence for a couple of his songs. Prince continued to give cowriting credit to his father on several other albums, as his famous chord sequence would be used in several of Prince's singles and albums.
A lot of Prince's songs did not agree with listeners and one of his songs, Darling Nikki prompted a group of people to start a censorship organization called, Parents Music Resource Center (P.M.R.C.) as the track implemented grinding ludicrous acts such as masturbating, which stunned listeners. Prince however continued to release various other singles with the same platform his memorable releases being, Around The World In A Day, Parade, Love Sexy, and Batman.
Prince released a sequel to Purple Rain in 1990 called Graffiti Bridge, a soundtrack album accompanied this movie entitled, Graffiti Bridge. The film did terrible in box-office and was nominated for several Razzie awards. Many people saw the sound-track album, as the high point of the film.
In 1991, Prince assembled a new band called, The New Power Generation with this band he would release singles such as Diamond And Pearls, Cream, and Gett Off. Prince eventually changed his stage name from Prince to a symbol, which lead people to call him, "The Artist Formerly Known As Prince". Prince soon took back his old stage name.
In the 1990s, Prince continued to release singles such as Came, The Gold Experience, Chaos And Disorder, and Emancipation. With the rise of the new millennium, Prince released material such as a religious album called The Rainbow Children,One Nite Alone,The Chocolate Invasion,The Slaughter House, and had a collaboration with Stevie Wonder on Stevie's single called, What The Fuss in 2005.
Prince died on April 21, 2016 in Chanhassen, Minnesota, at his Paisley Park recording studio complex. He was 57.
Prince will be remembered as a musician and artist who inspired millions through his music, and set an inspirational platform which others still abide by.Musician / Actor- Music Artist
- Actor
- Composer
David Bowie was one of the most influential and prolific writers and performers of popular music, but he was much more than that; he was also an accomplished actor, a mime and an intellectual, as well as an art lover whose appreciation and knowledge of it had led to him amassing one of the biggest collections of 20th century art.
Born David Jones, he changed his name to Bowie in the 1960s, to avoid confusion with the then well-known Davy Jones (lead singer of The Monkees). The 1960s were not a happy period for Bowie, who remained a struggling artist, awaiting his breakthrough. He dabbled in many different styles of music (without commercial success), and other art forms such as acting, mime, painting, and play-writing. He finally achieved his commercial breakthrough in 1969 with the song "Space Oddity", which was released at the time of the moon landing. Despite the fact that the literal meaning of the lyrics relates to an astronaut who is lost in space, this song was used by the BBC in their coverage of the moon landing, and this helped it become such a success. The album, which followed "Space Oddity", and the two, which followed (one of which included the song "The Man Who Sold The World", covered by Lulu and Nirvana) failed to produce another hit single, and Bowie's career appeared to be in decline.
However, he made the first of many successful "comebacks" in 1972 with "Ziggy Stardust", a concept album about a space-age rock star. This album was followed by others in a similar vein, rock albums built around a central character and concerned with futuristic themes of Armageddon, gender dysfunction/confusion, as well as more contemporary themes such as the destructiveness of success and fame, and the dangers inherent in star worship. In the mid-1970s, Bowie was a heavy cocaine abuser and sometime heroin user.
In 1975, he changed tack. Musically, he released "Young Americans", a soul (or plastic soul as he later referred to it) album. This produced his first number one hit in the US, "Fame". He also appeared in his first major film, The Man Who Fell to Earth (1976). With a permanently-dilated pupil and skeletal frame, he certainly looked the part of an alien. The following year, he released "Station to Station," containing some of the material he had written for the soundtrack to this film (which was not used). As his drug problem heightened, his behavior became more erratic. Reports of his insanity started to appear, and he continued to waste away physically. He fled back to Europe, finally settling in Berlin, where he changed musical direction again and recorded three of the most influential albums of all time, an electronic trilogy with Brian Eno "Low, Heroes and Lodger". Towards the end of the 1970s, he finally kicked his drug habit, and recorded the album many of his fans consider his best, the Japanese-influenced "Scary Monsters". Around this time, he appeared in the title role of the Broadway drama The Elephant Man, and to considerable acclaim.
The next few years saw something of a drop-off in his musical output as his acting career flourished, culminating in his acclaimed performance in Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence (1983). In 1983, he released "Let's Dance," an album which proved an unexpected massive commercial success, and produced his second #1 hit single in the United States. According to producer Nile Rodgers, the album was made in just 17 days and was "the easiest album" he'd ever made in his life. The tour which followed, "Serious Moonlight", was his most successful ever. Faced with this success on a massive scale, Bowie apparently attempted to "repeat the formula" in the next two albums, with less success (and to critical scorn). Finally, in the late 1980s, he turned his back on commercial success and his solo career, forming the hard rock band, Tin Machine, who had a deliberate limited appeal. By now, his acting career was in decline. After the comparative failure of Labyrinth (1986), the movie industry appears to have decided that Bowie was not a sufficient name to be a lead actor in a major movie, and since that date, most of his roles have been cameos or glorified cameos. Tin Machine toured extensively and released two albums, with little critical or commercial success.
In 1992, Bowie again changed direction and re-launched his solo career with "Black Tie White Noise", a wedding album inspired by his recent marriage to Iman. He released three albums to considerable critical acclaim and reasonable commercial success. In 1995, he renewed his working relationship with Brian Eno to record "Outside." After an initial hostile reaction from the critics, this album has now taken its place with his classic albums. In 2003, Bowie released an album entitled 'Reality.' The Reality Tour began in November 2003 and, after great commercial success, was extended into July 2004. In June 2004, Bowie suffered a heart attack and the tour did not finish its scheduled run.
After recovering, Bowie gave what turned out to be his final live performance in a three-song set with Alicia Keys at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York in November 2006. He also returned to acting. He played Tesla in The Prestige (2006) and had a small cameo in the comedy David Bowie (2006) for fan Ricky Gervais. In 2007, he did a cartoon voice in SpongeBob SquarePants (1999) playing Lord Royal Highness. He had a brief cameo in the movie ''Bandslam'' released in 2009; after a ten year hiatus from recording, he released a new album called 'The Next Day', featuring a homage cover to his earlier work ''Heroes''. The music video of ''Stars are Out Tonight'' premiered on 25 February 2013. It consists of other songs like ''Where Are We Now?", "Valentine's Day", "Love is Lost", "The Next Day", etc.
In 2014, Bowie won British Male Solo Artist at the 2014 Brit Awards, 30 years since last winning it, and became the oldest ever Brit winner. Bowie wrote and recorded the opening title song to the television miniseries The Last Panthers (2015), which aired in November 2015. The theme used for The Last Panthers (2015) was also the title track for his January 2016 release, ''Blackstar" (released on 8 January 2016, Bowie's 69th birthday) was met with critical acclaim. Following Bowie's death two days later, on 10 January 2016, producer Tony Visconti revealed Bowie had planned the album to be his swan song, and a "parting gift" for his fans before his death. An EP, No Plan, was released on 8 January 2017, which would have been Bowie's 70th birthday. The day following his death, online viewing of Bowie's music skyrocketed, breaking the record for Vevo's most viewed artist in a single day.
On 15 January, "Blackstar" debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart; nineteen of his albums were in the UK Top 100 Albums Chart, and thirteen singles were in the UK Top 100 Singles Chart. The song also debuted at #1 on album charts around the world, including Australia, France, Germany, Italy, New Zealand and the US Billboard 200. At the 59th Annual Grammy Awards, Bowie won all five nominated awards: Best Rock Performance; Best Alternative Music Album; Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical; Best Recording Package; and Best Rock Song. The wins marked Bowie's first ever in musical categories. David Bowie influenced the course of popular music several times and had an effect on several generations of musicians.Musician / Actor- Actress
- Soundtrack
Nancy Reagan was born on 6 July 1921 in New York City, New York, USA. She was an actress, known for Hellcats of the Navy (1957), Night Into Morning (1951) and Donovan's Brain (1953). She was married to Ronald Reagan. She died on 6 March 2016 in Los Angeles, California, USA.Actress- Margaret "Maggie" Blye attended the University of Texas, before transferring to UCLA in her senior year. She was quickly spotted by a talent agent, and the agent booked Maggie for her first audition in the Oscar-nominated film "Summer and Smoke" starring Geraldine Page. Maggie went on to participate, and star, in many feature films, working with some of the best in the business: "Hombre" with Paul Newman, "Waterhole #3" with James Coburn, "Hard Times" with Charles Bronson, "Diamonds Are For Breakfast" with Marcello Mastroianni, "Ash Wednesday" with Elizabeth Taylor, and the original "The Italian Job" with Michael Caine. In addition, her television roles included extensive guest stars and in numerous television series pilot trials. Maggie joined the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1968. Maggie was active in organizations, serving for many years on the Foreign Language Film Award (FLFA) Screening Committee. After a two year battle with cancer, Maggie passed away peacefully on March 24, 2016 at her home in West Hollywood, California, with her sister, Judy Blye Wilson, and her brother, John Richard Blye by her bed side. Per her wishes, Maggie was laid to rest next to her parents at Forest Park Lawn in Houston, Texas on March 30, 2016.Actress
- Writer
- Director
- Editor
Abbas Kiarostami was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1940. He graduated from university with a degree in fine arts before starting work as a graphic designer. He then joined the Center for Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, where he started a film section, and this started his career as a filmmaker at the age of 30. Since then he has made many movies and has become one of the most important figures in contemporary Iranian film. He is also a major figure in the arts world, and has had numerous gallery exhibitions of his photography, short films and poetry. He is an iconic figure for what he has done, and he has achieved it all by believing in the arts and the creativity of his mind.Director- Writer
- Producer
- Actor
Bill Richmond was born on 19 December 1921 in Muhlenberg, Kentucky, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for The Carol Burnett Show (1967), The Nutty Professor (1996) and Wizards and Warriors (1983). He died on 4 June 2016 in Calabasas, California, USA.Writer- Director
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
- Writer
Typically British stiff-upper-lip war dramas and action adventure laced with moments of sophisticated comedy were Guy Hamilton's trademark. The son of a British diplomat, he spent most of his youth with his family in France, seemingly destined to be groomed for a career in the diplomatic service. Growing up, he became enthralled with French cinema (and, particularly, with the films of Jean Renoir). This instilled in him a burning ambition to become a director himself. In 1939 Hamilton got his first job as a clapper boy with Victorine Studios in Nice (now known as Studios Riviera). He worked his way up the hard way via the accounting department and as a producer's assistant. At the outbreak of World War II, British personnel were evacuated from France and Hamilton found work in the cutting room of British Paramount News which provided him with an excellent background in editing (albeit briefly--his career was soon interrupted by wartime duties in the Royal Navy with the 15th Motor Gunboat Flotilla).
After the war, Hamilton got back into the movie business as a third assistant director (an experience he later described as amounting -- more or less -- to be a "gofer" and tea boy for the first assistant director). His big break eventually arrived courtesy of Carol Reed who took him under his wing as first assistant director for The Fallen Idol (1948). Reed became his mentor and a kind of father figure and exerted a profound influence on the budding filmmaker. Hamilton went on to work with Reed on The Third Man (1949) and Outcast of the Islands (1951)). For John Huston, he then served in the same capacity on The African Queen (1951) (one of his duties included building a pontoon made up of four or five pirogues to provide room for the cameras, as the "Queen" was too cramped to film on).
Hamilton's first film as director in his own right was The Ringer (1952), a minor thriller based on an Edgar Wallace story. He established himself properly with The Colditz Story (1955), a prisoner-of-war drama enlivened by deft humor and a pointedly "British" style. In the 1960s, his acquaintance with Albert R. Broccoli led to his directing four entries in the James Bond franchise (though he had turned down previous offers to helm the opener, Dr. No (1962)): Goldfinger (1964), Diamonds Are Forever (1971), Live and Let Die (1973) and The Man with the Golden Gun (1974). In a later interview, Hamilton recalled that he (and writer Tom Mankiewicz) particularly enjoyed putting Bond into the "snake-pit" in situations of mortal peril, then working out a way to extricate him within 50 seconds. Hamilton's "intellectual" interpretation of Bond, the witty, at times facetious humor --usually in the midst of hair-raising situations-- contributed greatly to the popular and commercial success of these films. While these films established his reputation, much of his later work (Force 10 from Navarone (1978), Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985) proved less endearing.
In the mid-1980s, Hamilton retired to the island of Majorca with his second wife, actress Kerima (who had co-starred in "Outcast of the Islands"). He died there on 20 April 2016 at the age of 93.Director- Actor
- Soundtrack
Burt Kwouk was a British actor, who was best known for his role as Cato in the Pink Panther films, and for playing Mr Ling in the third James Bond film, Goldfinger.
Kwouk was born in Warrington, but was brought up in Shanghai. He made his film debut in the 1957 film Windom's Way. In Goldfinger (1964) he played Mr. Ling, a Chinese expert in nuclear fission; in the non-Eon spoof Casino Royale (1967) he played a general and in You Only Live Twice (1967) Kwouk played the part of a Japanese operative of Blofeld.
He also made appearances in many television programmes, including a portrayal of Imperial Japanese Army Major Yamauchi in the British drama series Tenko and as Entwistle in Last of the Summer Wine.
Kwouk died on 24 May 2016, at the age of 85.Actor- Director
- Writer
- Producer
Andrzej Wajda is an Academy Award-winning director. He is the most prominent filmmaker in Poland known for The Promised Land (1975), Man of Iron (1981), and Katyn (2007).
He was Born on March 6, 1926, in Suwalki, Poland. His mother, Aniela Wajda, was a teacher at a Ukrainian school. His father, Jakub Wajda, was a captain in the Polish infantry. Wajda described his childhood as a happy pastoral country life before the Second World War. In 1939, Poland was invaded by Nazi Germany and Soviet Union. In 1940, Wajda's father was killed by Stalin's agents in the Katyn massacre.
Young Wajda survived the Second World War with his mother and his brother in Nazi-occupied Poland. In 1942, Wajda joined the Polish resistance and served in the Armia Krajowa until the war ended in 1945. In 1946 he moved to Kraków. There Wajda went to Academy of Fine Arts. He studied painting, particularly the impressionist and post-impressionist painting, and was especially fond of Paul Cezanne. From 1950-1954 he studied film directing at the High Film School in Lódz under directors Jerzy Toeplitz and Aleksander Ford. Later, Wajda described the influential and eye-opening experience from seeing French avant-garde films, like Ballet mécanique (1924) by artist-director Fernand Léger.
In 1955 he made his debut as director of full-length A Generation (1955), about the generation of youth coming of age during the Nazi occupation of Poland. His award-winning Kanal (1957) and Ashes and Diamonds (1958) concluded the trilogy about life in Poland during WWII. Although he was under pressure from the Soviet-dominated Polish authorities, Wajda positioned himself as an artist who was above the conflict. He still managed to show the undeclared civil war between two anti-Nazi Polish forces, which were divided by political ideology: the Polish communists and the partisans - folk heroes of the Home Army.
His Oscar-nominated The Promised Land (1975) was a work of multi-layered allegory and Symbolism. Wajda's witty depiction of the 19th century capitalism in Poland actually alluded to the contemporary Communist politics. The shooting of workers in the final scenes was actually unmasking of the official politics of killing workers in the Soviet Union in 1962, under Nikita Khrushchev, and in Poland a few years later. The story of a film student who traces the life of defamed "hero" in Man of Marble (1977) was a deconstruction of the false impressions that official propaganda was using to brainwash the public. The same main characters in Man of Iron (1981) continued unmasking the Communist regime's manipulations against working class people. In 1981, Wajda joined the "Solidarity" labor movement of Lech Walesa.
From 1989 to 1991 Wajda was elected Senator of the Republic of Poland. From 1992 to 1994 he was Member of Presidential Council for Culture. In 1994 he founded the Center of Japanese Art and Technology in Kraków, and was awarded the Order of Rising Sun in Japan (1995). Wajda was President of Polish Film Association (1978-1983). He was Member of "Solidarity" Lech Walesa Council (1981-1989). He won an honorary Oscar (2000) for his contribution to cinema, and an honorary Golden Bear (2006) at the Berlin Film Festival.
Wajda's Katyn (2007) was nominated for Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year in 2008, and received many other awards and nominations. The film shows historic events in Katyn during WWII, where Wajda's father was among thousands of Polish officers killed by Soviet communists under the dictatorship of Joseph Stalin. Wajda's film was well received by the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, who initially opened the facts about Katyn to help people understand each other and overcome the tragic past.
"We never hoped to live to see the fall of the Soviet Union, to see Poland as a free country", said Andrzej Wajda.Director- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Although François Truffaut has written that the New Wave began "thanks to Rivette," the films of this masterful French director are not well known. Rivette, like his "Cahiers du Cinéma" colleagues Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol and Éric Rohmer, did graduate to filmmaking but, like Rohmer, was something of a late bloomer as a director. He made two shorts (At the Four Corners (1949) and The Quadrille (1950), starring Jean-Luc Godard); in the mid-1950s he served as an assistant to Jean Renoir and Jacques Becker; and in 1958 he was, along with Chabrol, the first of the five to begin production on a feature-length film. Without the financial benefit of a producer, Rivette took to the streets with his friends, a 16mm camera, and film stock purchased on borrowed money. It was only, however, after the commercial success of Truffaut's The 400 Blows (1959), Resnais' Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) and Godard's Breathless (1960) that the resulting film, the elusive, intellectual, and somewhat lengthy (135 minutes) Paris Belongs to Us (1961), saw its release in 1960. In retrospect, Rivette's debut sketched out the path which all his subsequent films would follow; PARIS NOUS APPARTIENT was a monumental undertaking for the critic-turned-director, with some 30 actors (including Chabrol, Godard and Jacques Demy), almost as many locations, and an impenetrably labyrinthine narrative. His next film, the considerably more commercial The Nun (1966), was an adaptation of the Diderot novel which Rivette had staged in 1963. The least characteristic of all his features, it was also his first and only commercial success, becoming a succèss de scandal when the government blocked its release for a year. Rivette's true talents first made themselves visible during the fruitful period, 1968-74. During this time he directed the 4-hour Mad Love (1969), the now legendary 13-hour Out 1 (1971) (made for French TV in 1970 but never broadcast; edited to a 4-hour feature and retitled Out 1: Spectre (1972)), and the 3-hour Celine and Julie Go Boating (1974), his most entertaining and widely seen picture. In these three films, Rivette began to construct what has come to be called his "House of Fiction"--an enigmatic filmmaking style influenced by the work of Louis Feuillade and involving improvisation, ellipsis and considerable narrative experimentation. Unfortunately, Rivette seems to have no place in contemporary cinema. On the one hand, his work is considered too inaccessible for theatrical distribution; on the other, although his revolutionary theories have influenced figures such as Jean-Marie Straub & Danièle Huillet and Chantal Akerman, he is deemed too commercial to be accepted by the underground cinema; he still employs a narrative and uses "name" actors such as Jean-Pierre Léaud, Juliet Berto, Anna Karina and Maria Schneider. Since CÉLINE AND JULIE, Rivette's career has been as mysterious as one of his plots. In 1976 he received an offer to make a series of four films, "Les Filles du Feu." Duelle (1976), the first entry, received such negative response that the second, Noroît (1976)--which some critics call his greatest picture--was held from release. The final two installments (one of which was due to star Leslie Caron and Albert Finney) were never filmed. The 1980s proved no kinder. He made five films, but only one of them, Love on the Ground (1984), opened in the US (it received disastrous reviews). Although he continues to be an innovative and challenging artist, Rivette has failed to find the type of audience that has contributed to the commercial success of his New Wave compatriots.Director- Director
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Hector Babenco was born on 7 February 1946 in Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was a director and writer, known for Carandiru (2003), Pixote (1980) and Foolish Heart (1998). He was married to Bárbara Paz, Xuxa Lopes and Raquel Arnaud. He died on 13 July 2016 in São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.Director- Production Designer
- Art Department
- Art Director
Ken Adam was a British movie production designer, best known for his set designs for the James Bond films of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as for Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964).
His first major screen credit was as production designer on the British thriller Spin a Dark Web (1956). In 1961 he was hired for the first James Bond film, Dr. No (1962).
Adam did not work in the second James Bond film, From Russia with Love (1963) because he was working in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964). This enabled him to make his name with his innovative, semi-futuristic sets for further James Bond films, such as Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), You Only Live Twice (1967), Diamonds Are Forever (1971), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), and his last Bond film was Moonraker (1979).
Adam returned to work with Kubrick on Barry Lyndon (1975), for which he won an Oscar. He also worked in The Ipcress File (1965) and its sequel Funeral in Berlin (1966), Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1969), Sleuth (1972), and The Madness of King George (1994), for which he won his second Oscar for Best Art Direction.
In 2003, Adam was knighted for services to the film industry and Anglo-German relations.
He died on 10 March 2016 at his home in London at the age of 95.Production Designer- Actor
- Soundtrack
Bill Henderson was born on 19 March 1926 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He was an actor, known for Clue (1985), City Slickers (1991) and The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984). He was married to Ritsuyo Moriyasu. He died on 3 April 2016 in Los Angeles, California, USA.Actor- Writer
- Producer
- Actor
Garry Kent Marshall (November 13, 1934 - July 19, 2016) was an American actor and filmmaker. He started his career in the 1960s writing for The Lucy Show and The Dick Van Dyke Show before he developed Neil Simon's 1965 play The Odd Couple for television in 1970. He gained fame for creating Happy Days (1974-1984), Laverne and Shirley (1976-1983), and Mork and Mindy (1978-1982). He is also known for directing Overboard (1987), Beaches (1988), Pretty Woman (1990), Runaway Bride (1999), and the family films The Princess Diaries (2001) and The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement (2004). He also directed the romantic comedy ensemble films Valentine's Day (2010), New Year's Eve (2011), and Mother's Day (2016).Director / Actor- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Pierre Étaix was born on 23 November 1928 in Roanne, Loire, France. He was an actor and writer, known for Le Grand Amour (1969), As Long as You've Got Your Health (1966) and Yoyo (1965). He was married to Odile Crepin, Annie Fratellini and Denise bernard. He died on 14 October 2016 in Paris, France.Actor / Director- Director
- Producer
- Actor
Arthur Hiller was born on 22 November 1923 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. He was a director and producer, known for Love Story (1970), The Hospital (1971) and See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1989). He was married to Gwen Hiller. He died on 17 August 2016 in Los Angeles, California, USA.Director- Actress
- Music Department
- Composer
"Loverly" soprano Marni Nixon ensured herself a proper place in film history although most moviegoers would not have recognize her had they passed her on the street. But if you had heard her, that might be a horse of a different color. She was one of those unsung (or "much sung") talents given short shrift at that time.
For those who think film superstars such as Deborah Kerr, Natalie Wood, and Audrey Hepburn possessed not only powerhouse dramatic talents but amazing singing voices as well ... think again. Kerr's Anna Leonowens in The King and I (1956), Natalie's Maria in West Side Story (1961), and Audrey's Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady (1964) were all dubbed by the amazing but uncredited Nixon.
Born Margaret Nixon McEathron on February 22, 1930, in Altadena, California, she was a child actress. Once a soloist with the Roger Wagner Chorale in the beginning, she trained in opera. Possessing a versatile voice for pop music and easy standards as well, she not only sang for Arnold Schönberg and Igor Stravinsky, but also recorded light songs. During the war era, she appeared uncredited in the musicals Born to Sing (1942) and The Bashful Bachelor (1942), and later voiced one of the singing flowers in the Disney film Alice in Wonderland (1951).
Marni made her Broadway musical debut in 1954 in a show that lasted two months but nothing came from it. In 1955, the singer contracted to dub Deborah Kerr in The King and I (1956) was killed in a car accident in Europe and a replacement was needed. Marni was hired...and the rest is history. Much impressed, the studios brought her in to "ghost" Kerr's voice again in the classic tearjerker An Affair to Remember (1957). From there, she went on to make Natalie Wood and Audrey Hepburn sound incredibly good with such classic songs as "Tonight" and "Wouldn't It Be Loverly."
Providing the voice of the geese in Disney's Mary Poppins (1964), she finally appeared on screen in the box-office musical The Sound of Music (1965), starring Julie Andrews, who physically resembled Marni. The role was a minor one, however, and she was only given a couple of ensemble scenes and solo lines in "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?" as a singing nun.
Marni's vocal career in films dissolved by the mid 1960s, but she continued on with concerts and in symphony halls, while billing herself as "The Voice of Hollywood" in one-woman cabaret shows. Throughout the years, she has played on the legit stage, including the lead roles in "The King and I" and "The Sound of Music," and in her matronly years has been seen as Fraulein Schneider in "Cabaret," and in the musicals "Follies" and "70 Girls 70."
Appearing very sporadically on the small screen, Marni appeared on such programs as "The Mothers-in-Law" (as herself), appeared in a filmed TV record of an off-Broadway musical entitled Taking My Turn (1985) and was featured in the romantic comedy film I Think I Do (1997) and made a final visual appearance on an episode of "Law & Order: SVU." Her last singing voice on film was as the grandmother in the animated feature Mulan (1998).
Married three times, twice to musicians, one of her husbands, Ernest Gold, by whom she had three children, was a film composer best known for his Academy Award-winning epic Exodus (1960). She died of breast cancer on July 24, 2016, in New York City, aged 86.Singer- Actor
- Soundtrack
John McMartin was born on 21 August 1929 in Warsaw, Indiana, USA. He was an actor, known for Blow Out (1981), All the President's Men (1976) and No Reservations (2007). He was married to Cynthia Baer. He died on 6 July 2016 in New York City, New York, USA.Actor- Actress
- Producer
Rita Gam was born on 2 April 1927 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. She was an actress and producer, known for The Thief (1952), King of Kings (1961) and Klute (1971). She was married to Thomas Henry Guinzburg and Sidney Lumet. She died on 22 March 2016 in Los Angeles, California, USA.Actress- Director
- Actor
- Producer
Only one film-maker can claim the title "Godfather of Gore." That peculiar but apt identification seems to be the exclusive property of Herschell Gordon Lewis. With an unusual background that included teaching English Literature to college students, producing and directing television commercials, and voicing radio and television commercials, Herschell literally - and single-handedly - established the "Splatter Film" category of motion pictures. He accomplished this by writing and directing (including the musical score) a mini-budget movie titled "Blood Feast," shot in Miami in 1963 and released theatrically the following year. As critics lambasted the primitive effects and inattention to script and sub-par acting, audiences flocked to theaters to see why friends who had reacted to the movie's fiery marketing campaign had said, "You gotta see this." Armed with boxoffice grosses, Herschell and his producer-partner David Friedman quickly decided to build onto their newly-discovered base. Herschell wrote and directed "Two Thousand Maniacs." The lead singer of the musical group hired to perform background music had a tenor voice. Herschell had written the title song, "The South Gonna Rise Ag'in." He wanted a baritone, and without hesitation he made the switch: the voice on the sound track is his. After their third splatter film, "Color Me Blood Red," David Friedman moved to California, engaging in a different type of motio0n picture. Herschell continued to grind out one success after another, with titles such as "The Gruesome Twosome," "The Wizard of Gore," and "The Gore-Gore Girls." When major film companies began to invade his splatter-turf, Herschell took a hiatus, shifting full time to his "other career," writing advertising and mailings for marketers worldwide. He became one of a handful of experts to be inducted into the Direct Marketing Association's Hall of Fame. (Author of 32 books on marketing including the classic "On the Art of Writing Copy," Herschell is often called on to lecture on copywriting, just as he is invited to sing the theme from "Two Thousand Maniacs" at horror film festivals.) Over the years, an unusual reality came into place: Herschell's old films continued to play not just on TV screens but in theatres, years after conventional movies would have disappeared altogether. The result has been renewal of his life as a film director. Thus it is that a new Herschell Gordon Lewis movie is hoving into view: "Herschell Gordon Lewis's BloodMania," produced by James Saito in Calgary, Alberta, Canada and planned for 2015 release. Both the producer and the director encapsulate their opinion of "Herschell Gordon Lewis's BloodMania" in a single word: Enthusiastic.Director- Actor
- Director
- Soundtrack
Brian Bedford was born on 16 February 1935 in Morley, Yorkshire, England, UK. He was an actor and director, known for Nixon (1995), Robin Hood (1973) and Grand Prix (1966). He was married to Tim MacDonald. He died on 13 January 2016 in Santa Barbara, California, USA.Actor