Interesting, overlooked, and significant obituaries from around the world, as they happen, emphasizing the positive achievements of those who have died. Member, Society of Professional Obituary Writers.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Misbach Yusa Biran
Film director, screenwriter, journalist and film archivist -- via the Jakarta Post.
Martin Poll
Film producer -- via the L.A. Times. Responsible for films such as "The Lion in Winter" and "Love and Death," he was also instrumental in making New York City industry-friendly in terms of location shooting -- restoring filmmaking to the region.
Lewis Dymeck
Engineer and inventor; best known for creating weightlifting's curl bar -- via the Prescott, AZ Daily Courier.
Levon Helm
Drummer, vocalist, mandolinist; part of the great group The Band and later a renowned soloist and collaborator on traditional-music porjects; actor -- via the Poughkeepsie Journal.
Jonathan Frid
Actor in film, television and on stage -- via We Are Movie Geeks. This fine classically trained actor will be best remembered as the central character, vampire Barnabas Collins, in the wildly popular 1960's ABC daytime "gothic soap opera," "Dark Shadows."
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Dick Clark
Long-time host of "American Bandstand," radio and TV personality, entrepreneur and producer; "the world's oldest teenager" -- via USA Today.
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
Garry Walberg
Actor -- via the Chicago Tribune. A busy character actor who may be best remembered for his role as Lt. Monahan on the TV series "Quincy." This photo is of him in his appearance as Commander Hansen in the Star Trek episode "Balance of Terror."
Andrew Love
Masterful soul saxophonist -- via the New York Daily News. With Wayne Jackson, he constituted the Memphis Horns -- playing on hundreds of hits and helping define that city's unique sound.
Monday, April 16, 2012
Michael "Flathead" Blanchard
A colorful individual who penned his own obituary -- via the Denver Post.
From the New York Times: the obit-writing process
A nice story from NYT public editor Arthur S. Brisbane on the process and criteria of a New York Times obituary -- "Times obituaries go not to the conventionally
virtuous but to the famous, the influential, the offbeat and to others
whose lives, through writerly intervention, can be alchemized into
newsprint literature."
Hal Chester aka Harold Ribotsky
Film producer and actor -- via the Telegraph. He started off as a Dead End Kid -- then moved into the (I'm not kidding) "Little Tough Guy" series. He later produced the Joe Palooka films for Monograph (he got the film rights to be the popular comic strip through his friendship with Palooka creator Ham Fisher). Still later, he went to England, producing two memorable films -- Jacques Tourneur's "Night of the Demon" and Robert Hamer's "School for Scoundrels."
Side notes: 1) Chester infamously contracted someone to create and film the "demon" of the title of Tourneur's film, earning the eternal hatred of the director. Tourneur, who had directed such horror classics as "Cat People" and "I Walked with a Zombie," prided himself on being able to create a superlative atmosphere of dread through suggestion. Chester, however, did not trust Tourneur and overrode him. Anyone who compares the film cuts with and without the "demon" will have to agree with the director.
2) Although Hamer takes the director's credit for "Scoundrels," Cyril Frankel really directed the picture -- as Hamer turned up drunk every morning to work until he was fired.
Side notes: 1) Chester infamously contracted someone to create and film the "demon" of the title of Tourneur's film, earning the eternal hatred of the director. Tourneur, who had directed such horror classics as "Cat People" and "I Walked with a Zombie," prided himself on being able to create a superlative atmosphere of dread through suggestion. Chester, however, did not trust Tourneur and overrode him. Anyone who compares the film cuts with and without the "demon" will have to agree with the director.
2) Although Hamer takes the director's credit for "Scoundrels," Cyril Frankel really directed the picture -- as Hamer turned up drunk every morning to work until he was fired.
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