I got this from the web site Henshin! Online: http://www.henshinonline.com/index.html
A FINAL OVATION FOR KUNIO MIYAUCHI-Famed ULTRAMAN Composer Passes AwayAuthor: August RagoneSource: Various Japanese News Services
© 2006 Tsuburaya Productions/Licensed by Tsuburaya-Chaiyo. Courtesy BCI Eclipse.
-->TOKYO - Famous film and television composer, Kunio Miyauchi passed away on November 27 at 4:13 pm at the Fuchu City Hospital as a result of Colon Cancer. Miyauchi had been living at his son Toshiro’s residence in Iwato-Minami, Komae City, Tokyo. Miyauchi was 74 years old. Born in the Matsubara section of Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward on February 16, 1932, the youngest of five brothers, Miyauchi was surrounded by music as a child; his family was very keen on playing classical music, which filled their home. Since this was a normal part of his life, he took classical music for granted as he attended several prestigious schools such as the Nippon Gakuen. While attending middle-school, he and his brothers seemed to be more interested in Baseball than music. Even though Miyauchi's physical education instructor thought that he could make the pros, his parents decided to send him to music school. While attending Kunitachi Music Academy, the 16 year-old had an epiphany - not at school, but in a movie theater. During the U.S. Occupation of Japan, previously-banned American films were released in Japanese cinemas, and on one day in the Spring of 1947, Miyauchi and his friends went to see Irving Rapper's RHAPSODY IN BLUE (1945), a biography of celebrated American composer George Gershwin. The young man was shocked by the film - or more appropriately - by Gershwin’s unforgettable music. These pieces struck a deep emotional cord within Miyauchi, so profoundly that it had instantaneously changed the course of his life.
As jazz started to gain popularity in Japan, Miyauchi took up the trumpet, and together with three of his fellow students, formed a band. Working slowly at first, they practiced in their spare time, until they were able to devote more time to this project. Around the age of 18, they found themselves playing dance halls and picking up regular gigs - and earning serious money for the time. But, then things suddenly changed for the young musician. Miyauchi had contracted tuberculosis, was forced to leave the band, and leave his school behind. While he was expected to recover in a year, his protracted battle with the disease lasted more than three years before he was strong enough to pursue a career in music. After he was back on his feet, he began working on arrangements under famed orchestra leader Tadashi Hattori. Before long, through his sister who worked at Aoyama Gakuin University, he was able to connect with composer Akira Ito of Nippon Broadcasting (later NHK), and secured a job arranging music for their radio shows. From there, Miyauchi joined Fuji Television, where he was making quite a name for himself composing theme songs and background music for the network’s melodramas. Even in the early phases of his new career, Miyauchi would employ electronics, experiment with sparse instrumentation, and combine disparate musical instruments, thereby gaining quite a reputation as composer on the cutting edge.
During this period, he was working on as many as seven different programs per week, and so film composer Ichiro Saito suggested that Miyauchi try his hand at working in the relatively slower-paced motion picture industry. Miyauchi’s feature film debut was for the Nobuo Aoyagi comedy LONG LIVE THE PARTY LEADER’S TERRIFYING WIFE (1960). His next feature film job at Toho was his atmospheric score for Ishiro Honda’s THE HUMAN VAPOR (1960), starring Tatsuya Mihashi and Kaoru Yachigusa. Then came Masuo Maeda’s AFTER THE KILLER (1962) for Nikkatsu, and back to Toho for another Aoyagi comedy, DURING A MEDICAL EXAMINATION (1964). Honda’s GODZILLA’S REVENGE (1969) was his last original film score. Unlike his contemporaries Akira Ifukube and Masaru Sato, Miyauchi was something of a musical chameleon - his score for THE HUMAN VAPOR sounds nothing like his score for GODZILLA’S REVENGE.
During the early 1960s, Eiji Tsuburaya’s son, television director Hajime Tsuburaya, thought that Miyauchi would be perfect to bring a new, contemporary sound to Tsuburaya Productions’ initial series, WOO. Even though this production was cancelled, and eventually transformed into ULTRA Q (1966), Hajime was still lobbying on the behalf of Miyauchi. Needless to say, Miyauchi got the job. His theme for ULTRA Q is perhaps the single most famous television theme song in Japanese history - akin to THE TWILIGHT ZONE theme in the U.S. - and his Ventures-inspired surf guitar piece helped to immortalize the hugely popular science fiction series. For his score, Miyauchi returned to atonal sparse instrumentation, utilized early synthesizers, and employed traditional Chinese instruments, creating a highly evocative and atmospheric score. For his next assignment, ULTRAMAN (1966-67), Miyauchi decided on a more action-oriented, jazz-influenced work, which drew heavily upon scores from American action films and the Italian new wave cinema, such as Alessandro Cicognini’s score for THE BICYCLE THIEF (1948). Another concept Miyauchi relied upon while scoring ULTRAMAN, was approaching the overall series with the sensibility of a Musical - sometimes scoring original pieces he felt were required for a particular story, and composing straight from the teleplays. Another important element of ULTRAMAN was the theme song, which is also equally an elemental part of modern Japanese pop culture, even forty years after it was written. In fact, the ULTRAMAN theme song was played as a wake up call for Mamoru Mohri, the first Japanese astronaut to go into space in 1992.
Miyauchi also contributed theme songs for many television series, but did not compose the series’ music scores, including original theme songs for the Japanese versions of Hanna-Barbera’s THE HERCULOIDS (1967), THE FANTASTIC FOUR (1967), and P-Productions’ SPECTREMAN (1971-72). For the latter, he contributed four separate theme songs. Miyauchi enjoyed a long a prolific career in composing theme songs and background music for television, including Tsuburaya Productions series such as BOOSKA, THE FRIENDLY BEAST (1966-67), TRIPLE FIGHTER (1973) and DINOSAUR TASK FORCE: KOSEIDON (1979-80) - and his score for the animated series THE ULTRAMAN (1979-80) was recorded by the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra. While Kunio Miyauchi has now departed this floating world, he has left behind a rich body of work that will be treasured by many generations to come - and he will live forever in the hearts of his fans around the world.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
2008 Catch Up
November 27, 2008, 10:51 am ‘Miracle Worker’ Playwright Dies By New York Times
William Gibson, who wrote the play “The Miracle Worker,” about the relationship between Helen Keller and her teacher, Anne Sullivan, died on Tuesday, his agent, Mary Ann Anderson, said Thursday. He was 94 and lived in Stockbridge, Mass.First written for television and aired in 1957, “The Miracle Worker” was adapted for Broadway in 1959 and won the 1960 Tony Award for best play. Nearly half a century later, it is still performed at regional theaters around the country. Mr. Gibson’s other works include “Two for the Seesaw,” which opened on Broadway in 1958, the book for a musical adaptation of “Golden Boy” by Clifford Odets, “Golda’s Balcony” and “The Monday After the Miracle,” a sequel to “The Miracle Worker” that had a brief run on Broadway in 1982. A full obituary will appear later.
Michael Higgins, who performed on Broadway and Off-Broadway stages from the 1940s to the 1980s, winning two Obie Awards in the process, died Nov. 5 in Manhattan, where he lived.
Mr. Higgins received his first of two Obies in 1958, when the Village Voice had just begun to hand out the awards, which honored work in the rising world of Off-Broadway. He won for his performance as John Proctor in The Crucible by Arthur Miller. The second came 22 years later, in 1980, for his work in David Mamet's Reunion.In 1978, he received a Drama Desk Award as Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play for Molly.The Brooklyn-born actor made his Broadway debut in 1946, in a Guthrie McClintic-Katharine Cornell production of Antigone. Cornell was a very mature Antigone; he was the Third Guard. In 1951, he played Benvolio in a production of Romeo and Juliet starring Olivia de Havilland. In 1955, he performed opposite Julie Harris in Jean Anouilh's Joan of Arc tale, The Lark. He was Larry Slade in a famous 1973 Circle in the Square revival of O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh starring James Earl Jones as Hickey.Hr. Higgins was the father of disturbed teenager Alan Strang in Broadway's original Equus. His final Broadway appearance was in Mixed Couples in 1980, again with Julie Harris.
His first appearances on the small screen date to the early days of live television, and "Studio One" and "Kraft Television Theatre." He performed on the series "Ben Casey," "Gunsmoke," "The Defenders" and "The Andy Griffith Show." Films include "The Conversation,""The Stepford Wives," "The Seduction of Joe Tynan," "The Black Stallion,""Staying Alive," "Rumble Fish," "1918," "Death Becomes Her," "State and Main," "School Ties" and the recent "Synecdoche, New York."Besides his daughter, Deirdre Higgins, Mr. Higgins is survived by his wife, the former Elizabeth Lee Goodwin; and two sons, Sean and Christopher.
Irving Brecher dies at 94; Comedy writer got an Oscar nod for 'Meet Me in St. Louis'; also created 'The Life of Riley' and wrote for Milton Berle and the Marx Brothers.
By Dennis McLellan November 19, 2008
Comedy writer Larry Gelbart, a longtime friend, remembered Brecher for his great wit."He was always a treat whenever he spoke," Gelbart told The Times on Tuesday. "I, for one, am sorry he didn't do more [writing]. He had had such success so early."
Born in the Bronx on Jan. 17, 1914, Brecher was a teenage usher at a movie theater on 57th Street in Manhattan when he began sending one-liners on penny postcards to columnists Walter Winchell and Ed Sullivan.
Occasionally, some of his funny lines showed up in print with his name included.When he found he could make money selling lines to vaudeville comedians, he and a friend -- fledgling comedy writer Al Schwartz -- ran a small ad in Variety offering their gag-writing services.
Brecher said in an interview for Jordan Young's 1999 book "The Laugh Crafters" that at the time, a brash young comedian named Milton Berle had a self-promoted reputation for stealing other people's material. Brecher and Schwartz's ad offered "positively Berle-proof gags, so bad not even Milton will steal them."Their first customer: Milton Berle, who paid them $50 for a page of one-liners.Brecher, then 19, continued to write gags for Berle and other acts before he turned to radio.When Berle was signed by CBS in 1936 to do a radio program, "The Gillette Original Community Sing," Brecher became the program's only writer.And when Berle went to Hollywood to costar in the movie "New Faces of 1937," the radio show went west with him. So did Brecher, who continued to write the program as well as the final script for the movie.
Brecher was soon under personal contract to producer-director Mervyn LeRoy, who took him to MGM, where he wrote the screenplays for the Marx Brothers' "At the Circus" (1939) and "Go West" (1940) and shared an Oscar nomination for the screenplay for "Meet Me in St. Louis" (1944).
Among his other screenwriting credits are "Shadow of the Thin Man," "Du Barry Was a Lady," "Yolanda and the Thief," "Cry for Happy" and "Bye Bye Birdie.
"In the early '40s, Brecher also created, wrote and produced the radio series "The Life of Riley," starring William Bendix.
Brecher wrote and directed a 1949 feature film version of "The Life of Riley," and the show became an Emmy Award-winning TV series with Jackie Gleason as bumbling working-class everyman Chester A. Riley before Bendix took over the role he played on radio.
Brecher's directing credits include the 1952 Betty Hutton musical "Somebody Loves Me" and the 1961 Robert Wagner comedy "Sail a Crooked Ship," which was Ernie Kovacs' last picture.He also created and co-produced (with George Burns) "The People's Choice," a 1955-58 sitcom starring Jackie Cooper, which featured a pet basset hound named Cleo whose voice only the audience could hear.
Brecher recently wrote a book about the Hollywood figures he knew and wrote for -- "The Wicked Wit of the West," as told to Hank Rosenfeld -- to be published in January by Ben Yehuda Press.I t is subtitled "The Last Great Golden-Age Screenwriter Shares the Hilarity and Heartaches of Working with Groucho, Garland, Gleason, Burns, Berle, Benny & Many More."
Brecher met Groucho Marx in 1938 after LeRoy hired Brecher to punch up the comedy scenes in "The Wizard of Oz." As Brecher recalled in a 2001 interview with The Times: "The straw man, the tin man, the lion -- Mervyn LeRoy said, 'They're not funny enough.' "When LeRoy took Brecher into his office, Marx was sitting at LeRoy's desk, Brecher recalled in 2001 in the Newark Star-Ledger."I said, 'Hello, Mr. Marx.' He said, 'Hello? That's supposed to be a funny line? Is this the guy who's supposed to write our movie?' I probably turned white."Then I said, 'Well, I saw you say hello in one of your movies, and I thought it was so funny I'd steal it and use it now.' Grouch smiled, then he bought me lunch,"
Brecher said.In the 2001 interview with The Times, Brecher said he found it easiest to write for Groucho."I'm a complainer, a dissenter and a put-downer," he said. "He was my alter ego. I liked the anarchism."Brecher was preceded in death by his first wife, Eve Bennett; and his two children, Joanna Giallelis and Keon Brecher.In addition to Norma, his wife of 25 years, he is survived by his stepchildren Jane Ulman, Ellen Zoschak and Michael Waxenberg; and eight grandchildren.A funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. Thursday at Hillside Memorial Park.McLellan is a Times staff writer.
Composer Irving Gertz dies at 93. Wrote score for 'It Came From Outer Space'
By JON BURLINGAME
Irving Gertz, composer for dozens of B movies and sci-fi TV in the 1950s and '60s, died Nov. 14 in Los Angeles. He was 93.Gertz contributed music to more than 200 films, often without screen credit. His most notable efforts were in the science-fiction and horror genres, including "It Came From Outer Space," "The Monolith Monsters," "The Alligator People," "The Creature Walks Among Us" and "The Incredible Shrinking Man."He also penned music for TV, including scores for "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea," "The Invaders," "Land of the Giants" and "Daniel Boone"; and for radio, including NBC's "Screen Directors Playhouse."
Gertz was born in Providence, R.I., and studied at the Providence College of Music. After serving in the Army Signal Corps during World War II, he studed with noted West Coast composers Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Ernst Toch. He began writing music for films in 1947, working for Columbia, Universal, United Artists, RKO and 20th Century-Fox, as well as independent producers, through the late 1960s.He also penned a number of concert works, including a setting of Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" for chorus and orchestra.Survivors include his wife of 64 years, Dorothy; two daughters and four grandchildren.
Following a long bout with illness, Ennio De Concini died yesterday November 17 at the age of 84. La Stampa broke the news. Born December 9, 1923 DeConcini was a prolific Italian screenwriter and film director, winning the Academy Award in 1962 for the "Best Original Screenplay" for Divorce, Italian Style. He was the co-screenwriter of The Red Tent a 1969 film starring Sean Connery which was based on Umberto Nobile's disastrous 1928 expedition to the North Pole in the airship Italia. Among the 60 films to his credit are The Four of the Apocalypse (1975), Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973), Battle of the Worlds (1961), Black Sunday (1960), Long Night in 1943 (1960), Il Grido (1957), War and Peace (1956), and Mambo (1954).
William Gibson, who wrote the play “The Miracle Worker,” about the relationship between Helen Keller and her teacher, Anne Sullivan, died on Tuesday, his agent, Mary Ann Anderson, said Thursday. He was 94 and lived in Stockbridge, Mass.First written for television and aired in 1957, “The Miracle Worker” was adapted for Broadway in 1959 and won the 1960 Tony Award for best play. Nearly half a century later, it is still performed at regional theaters around the country. Mr. Gibson’s other works include “Two for the Seesaw,” which opened on Broadway in 1958, the book for a musical adaptation of “Golden Boy” by Clifford Odets, “Golda’s Balcony” and “The Monday After the Miracle,” a sequel to “The Miracle Worker” that had a brief run on Broadway in 1982. A full obituary will appear later.
Michael Higgins, who performed on Broadway and Off-Broadway stages from the 1940s to the 1980s, winning two Obie Awards in the process, died Nov. 5 in Manhattan, where he lived.
Mr. Higgins received his first of two Obies in 1958, when the Village Voice had just begun to hand out the awards, which honored work in the rising world of Off-Broadway. He won for his performance as John Proctor in The Crucible by Arthur Miller. The second came 22 years later, in 1980, for his work in David Mamet's Reunion.In 1978, he received a Drama Desk Award as Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play for Molly.The Brooklyn-born actor made his Broadway debut in 1946, in a Guthrie McClintic-Katharine Cornell production of Antigone. Cornell was a very mature Antigone; he was the Third Guard. In 1951, he played Benvolio in a production of Romeo and Juliet starring Olivia de Havilland. In 1955, he performed opposite Julie Harris in Jean Anouilh's Joan of Arc tale, The Lark. He was Larry Slade in a famous 1973 Circle in the Square revival of O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh starring James Earl Jones as Hickey.Hr. Higgins was the father of disturbed teenager Alan Strang in Broadway's original Equus. His final Broadway appearance was in Mixed Couples in 1980, again with Julie Harris.
His first appearances on the small screen date to the early days of live television, and "Studio One" and "Kraft Television Theatre." He performed on the series "Ben Casey," "Gunsmoke," "The Defenders" and "The Andy Griffith Show." Films include "The Conversation,""The Stepford Wives," "The Seduction of Joe Tynan," "The Black Stallion,""Staying Alive," "Rumble Fish," "1918," "Death Becomes Her," "State and Main," "School Ties" and the recent "Synecdoche, New York."Besides his daughter, Deirdre Higgins, Mr. Higgins is survived by his wife, the former Elizabeth Lee Goodwin; and two sons, Sean and Christopher.
Irving Brecher dies at 94; Comedy writer got an Oscar nod for 'Meet Me in St. Louis'; also created 'The Life of Riley' and wrote for Milton Berle and the Marx Brothers.
By Dennis McLellan November 19, 2008
Comedy writer Larry Gelbart, a longtime friend, remembered Brecher for his great wit."He was always a treat whenever he spoke," Gelbart told The Times on Tuesday. "I, for one, am sorry he didn't do more [writing]. He had had such success so early."
Born in the Bronx on Jan. 17, 1914, Brecher was a teenage usher at a movie theater on 57th Street in Manhattan when he began sending one-liners on penny postcards to columnists Walter Winchell and Ed Sullivan.
Occasionally, some of his funny lines showed up in print with his name included.When he found he could make money selling lines to vaudeville comedians, he and a friend -- fledgling comedy writer Al Schwartz -- ran a small ad in Variety offering their gag-writing services.
Brecher said in an interview for Jordan Young's 1999 book "The Laugh Crafters" that at the time, a brash young comedian named Milton Berle had a self-promoted reputation for stealing other people's material. Brecher and Schwartz's ad offered "positively Berle-proof gags, so bad not even Milton will steal them."Their first customer: Milton Berle, who paid them $50 for a page of one-liners.Brecher, then 19, continued to write gags for Berle and other acts before he turned to radio.When Berle was signed by CBS in 1936 to do a radio program, "The Gillette Original Community Sing," Brecher became the program's only writer.And when Berle went to Hollywood to costar in the movie "New Faces of 1937," the radio show went west with him. So did Brecher, who continued to write the program as well as the final script for the movie.
Brecher was soon under personal contract to producer-director Mervyn LeRoy, who took him to MGM, where he wrote the screenplays for the Marx Brothers' "At the Circus" (1939) and "Go West" (1940) and shared an Oscar nomination for the screenplay for "Meet Me in St. Louis" (1944).
Among his other screenwriting credits are "Shadow of the Thin Man," "Du Barry Was a Lady," "Yolanda and the Thief," "Cry for Happy" and "Bye Bye Birdie.
"In the early '40s, Brecher also created, wrote and produced the radio series "The Life of Riley," starring William Bendix.
Brecher wrote and directed a 1949 feature film version of "The Life of Riley," and the show became an Emmy Award-winning TV series with Jackie Gleason as bumbling working-class everyman Chester A. Riley before Bendix took over the role he played on radio.
Brecher's directing credits include the 1952 Betty Hutton musical "Somebody Loves Me" and the 1961 Robert Wagner comedy "Sail a Crooked Ship," which was Ernie Kovacs' last picture.He also created and co-produced (with George Burns) "The People's Choice," a 1955-58 sitcom starring Jackie Cooper, which featured a pet basset hound named Cleo whose voice only the audience could hear.
Brecher recently wrote a book about the Hollywood figures he knew and wrote for -- "The Wicked Wit of the West," as told to Hank Rosenfeld -- to be published in January by Ben Yehuda Press.I t is subtitled "The Last Great Golden-Age Screenwriter Shares the Hilarity and Heartaches of Working with Groucho, Garland, Gleason, Burns, Berle, Benny & Many More."
Brecher met Groucho Marx in 1938 after LeRoy hired Brecher to punch up the comedy scenes in "The Wizard of Oz." As Brecher recalled in a 2001 interview with The Times: "The straw man, the tin man, the lion -- Mervyn LeRoy said, 'They're not funny enough.' "When LeRoy took Brecher into his office, Marx was sitting at LeRoy's desk, Brecher recalled in 2001 in the Newark Star-Ledger."I said, 'Hello, Mr. Marx.' He said, 'Hello? That's supposed to be a funny line? Is this the guy who's supposed to write our movie?' I probably turned white."Then I said, 'Well, I saw you say hello in one of your movies, and I thought it was so funny I'd steal it and use it now.' Grouch smiled, then he bought me lunch,"
Brecher said.In the 2001 interview with The Times, Brecher said he found it easiest to write for Groucho."I'm a complainer, a dissenter and a put-downer," he said. "He was my alter ego. I liked the anarchism."Brecher was preceded in death by his first wife, Eve Bennett; and his two children, Joanna Giallelis and Keon Brecher.In addition to Norma, his wife of 25 years, he is survived by his stepchildren Jane Ulman, Ellen Zoschak and Michael Waxenberg; and eight grandchildren.A funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. Thursday at Hillside Memorial Park.McLellan is a Times staff writer.
Composer Irving Gertz dies at 93. Wrote score for 'It Came From Outer Space'
By JON BURLINGAME
Irving Gertz, composer for dozens of B movies and sci-fi TV in the 1950s and '60s, died Nov. 14 in Los Angeles. He was 93.Gertz contributed music to more than 200 films, often without screen credit. His most notable efforts were in the science-fiction and horror genres, including "It Came From Outer Space," "The Monolith Monsters," "The Alligator People," "The Creature Walks Among Us" and "The Incredible Shrinking Man."He also penned music for TV, including scores for "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea," "The Invaders," "Land of the Giants" and "Daniel Boone"; and for radio, including NBC's "Screen Directors Playhouse."
Gertz was born in Providence, R.I., and studied at the Providence College of Music. After serving in the Army Signal Corps during World War II, he studed with noted West Coast composers Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Ernst Toch. He began writing music for films in 1947, working for Columbia, Universal, United Artists, RKO and 20th Century-Fox, as well as independent producers, through the late 1960s.He also penned a number of concert works, including a setting of Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" for chorus and orchestra.Survivors include his wife of 64 years, Dorothy; two daughters and four grandchildren.
Following a long bout with illness, Ennio De Concini died yesterday November 17 at the age of 84. La Stampa broke the news. Born December 9, 1923 DeConcini was a prolific Italian screenwriter and film director, winning the Academy Award in 1962 for the "Best Original Screenplay" for Divorce, Italian Style. He was the co-screenwriter of The Red Tent a 1969 film starring Sean Connery which was based on Umberto Nobile's disastrous 1928 expedition to the North Pole in the airship Italia. Among the 60 films to his credit are The Four of the Apocalypse (1975), Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973), Battle of the Worlds (1961), Black Sunday (1960), Long Night in 1943 (1960), Il Grido (1957), War and Peace (1956), and Mambo (1954).
Update 2007
Reg Park: 7 June, 1928 - 22 November, 2007It is with great sadness that we have to inform Reg Park’s friends, fans and supporters around the world that Reg passed away this morning, 22 November 2007. Reg’s remaining time with us was spent with great dignity surrounded by a sea of love and good wishes from around the globe. He expressed his most sincere thanks and love to all who supported and loved him throughout his life. Reg and his family also wished to thank everybody who sent so many beautiful messages of support throughout his illness. The Legend will continue to live in our hearts and our souls.
Ground-breaking TV producer Lambert dies at 71 23 November 2007 by Matthew Hemley The Stage Verity Lambert, the BBC's first female TV producer, who worked on the original series of Doctor Who in 1963, has died aged 71. Lambert, who has produced shows including Minder, Rumpole of the Bailey, Jonathan Creek and Love Soup, passed away on November 22, just a few weeks before she was due to receive a lifetime achievement award at the Women in Film and Television Awards next month. She joined the BBC in 1963 as its youngest producer and as the Corporation's first female in such a role, before going on to oversee the first two series of Doctor Who. Later she moved to Thames Television, where she worked on the shows The Naked Civil Servant and was the chief executive of the company's film subsidiary Euston Films, which produced Minder. In the eighties, she set up her own production company called Cinema Verity, which made the sitcom May to December and the soap Eldorado. The company also made the BBC series The Cazalets, which was co- produced by Joanna Lumley. Speaking to The Stage, Lumley praised Lambert, saying "she was the top of her game all the time". She added: "I loved her dearly." Lambert received an OBE for services to film and television in 2002 and also won Bafta's Alan Clarke Award for outstanding contribution to television in the same year.
Anthologist Peter Haining, born 1940, died from a heart attack on November 19, 2007, at the age of 67. He is best known to 007 fans as the author of "James Bond: A Celebration" - one of the first books focussing on the cinematic series. As well as his 1987 Bond book, he edited numerous fantasy and horror anthologies. He began his career as a reporter in Essex and then moved to London where he worked on a trade magazine before joining the publishing house of New English Library. Peter achieved the position of Editorial Director before becoming a full time writer in the early Seventies. He edited a large number of anthologies, predominantly of horror and fantasy short stories, wrote non-fiction books on a variety of topics from the Channel Tunnel to Sweeney Todd and also used the pen names "Ric Alexander" and "Richard Peyton" on a number of crime story anthologies. In the Seventies he wrote three novels, including The Hero (1973), which was optioned for filming. He wrote several reference books on Doctor Who, including the 21st anniversary special Doctor Who: A Celebration Two Decades Through Time and Space (1983), and also wrote the definitive study of Sherlock Holmes on the screen, The Television Sherlock Holmes (1991) and several other television tie-ins featuring famous literary characters, including Maigret and Poirot. Peter Haining's most recent project was a series of World War Two stories based on extensive research and personal interviews: The Jail That Went To Sea (2003), The Mystery of Rommel's Gold (2004), Where The Eagle Landed (2004), The Chianti Raiders (2005) and The Banzai Hunters (2007). He won the British Fantasy Awards Karl Edward Wagner Award in 2001.
Actor and stuntman Roy Jenson (originally from Canada) died May 12th 2007. He was 80. He played many un-credited roles in films (including a “ghost” in William Castle’s 13th GHOSTS). Some of his non-stunt movie roles include CHINATOWN HARPER ANY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE and THE GETAWAY. He also appeared on several TV show.
Emmy Award winning Actor Roscoe Lee Browne died April 11th 2007. He was 81. Browne smooth recognizable voice was nearly as familiar as his face. Films include BLACK LIKE ME THE COMEDIANS Hitchcock’s TOPAZ THE COWBOYS CISCO PIKE SUPER FLY TNT UPTOWN SATURDAY NIGHT LOGAN’S RUN TWILIGHT’S LAST GLEAMING JUMPIN’ JACK FLASH and others. He made many TV appearances including a regular role on TV’s “Soap”. He was also a poet. His last film role was the narrator of EPIC MOVIE.
Character actor Paul Reed died April 27th 2007 at the age of 90. Best known to TV fans as Captain Block for two seasons on the police comedy “Car 54, Where Are You?” he also sang and acted on Broadway. Seen on many TV episodes of the ‘60’s, he was in a few movies including RIDE TO HANGMAN’S TREE FITZWILLY and DID YOU HERE THE ONE ABOUT THE TRAVELLING SALESLADY?
Actor Barry Nelson died April 7th 2007. He was 89. In 1954 Nelson became the first actor to portray James Bond in an American TV adaptation of “Casino Royale”. Films include SHADOW OF THE THIN MAN RIO RITA (with Abbott & Costello) THE HUMAN COMEDY A GUY NAMED JOE PETE N TILLIE AIRPORT ISLAND CLAWS and Kubrick’s THE SHINING plus many TV shows.
Dabbs Greer was a familiar character actor from 1949 right into the early part of the 21st Century. His film appearances include: THE BAD & THE BEAUTIFUL HOUSE OF WAX INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS THE VAMPIRE IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE I WANT TO LIVE! EVIL TOWN PACIFIC HEIGHTS HOUSE 4 and LITTLE GIANTS. I won’t even try to list some of his TV credits. Here’s picture of him instead!
He died April 28 at age 90.
Kurt Vonnegutt-1922-2007
ROBERT LAWSON Robert "Bob" Sterling Lawson went home to be with the Lord on May 11, 2007 at the Motion Picture Health and Welfare Home in Woodland Hills, California. He was born to Thomas and Honor Maude Lawson on August 6, 1910 in Jackson, Tennessee. Bob moved to Hollywood in the 1930s to pursue an acting career. He worked in the motion picture industry until his retireme nt. He had a long and successful career in an industry in which he loved; a career which included many parts as an actor and extra until the early 1990s. During the 1930s, in Hollywood, Bob met Helen McRuer who he fell in love with and married. He had three beautiful daughters. He lost Helen shortly after the birth of his third daughter. His fourth daughter followed a few years later. Bob is survived by his four daughters, Donna Lawson Wolfe, Teri Deland, Cheryl O'Dwyer and Darlene Bitminis; nin e grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren, one niece; and long time friend and companion, Carmen Dirigo. Bob was preceded in death by his parents, his loving wife Helen, his brother Ralph and his sister Myrtle. Bob lived in the San Fernando Valley for 68 years, which was broken up by five years of living and acting in Las Vegas during the 1990s. A funeral service was held on Monday, May 21, 2007, 2:00 p.m., in the Country House at the Motion Picture Health and Welfare Home in Woodland Hills, Calif ornia. Interment will follow at a later date in Jackson, Tennessee. Published in the Los Angeles Daily News on 5/22/2007.
BRUNO MATTEI has died in Rome, Italy. He was 75.The Italian director passed away earlier this week (begs21May07) after checking into a hospital complaining of a stomach pain. He died after falling into a coma.Mattei specialised in the horror genre and is best known for movies including Night Of The Zombies (1980), Rats: Night Of Terror (1984) and Cruel Jaws (1995).He also filmed several erotic movies, including a number of Emmanuelle films starring Laura Gemser.At the time of his death, Mattei was working on sequel Island Of The Living Dead 2. PR-Inside
Date Posted: May 25, 2007, 01:09:55pm
Telegraph George Sewell, the actor, who died on Sunday aged 82, had one of the best-known faces in Britain, thanks to dozens of appearances on television and in films, notably Get Carter (1971). With his sandblasted features and shifty, haunted looks, Sewell was as at home playing shady villains as he was in police and thriller roles, which dated from the early 1960s, when he appeared in series such as Z-Cars, to the 1990s comedy The Detectives. He was still working until recently, making television appearances in Doctors and The Bill (both 2005) and, last year, in Casualty. An accomplished stage actor, and nicknamed in the business "Chuck", he played principal roles in Oliver, Fings Ain't Wot They Used To Be and Oh! What A Lovely War in the 1960s, and more recently in Dial M for Murder (1998) and Who Killed Agatha Christie? (2002). His last stage appearance was touring in Francis Durbridge's drama The Gentle Hook in 2004.
But while the theatre was Sewell's preferred medium, it was his career in film and television, extending over 40 years, that ensured his celebrity. He appeared as Detective Chief Inspector Alan Craven in 25 episodes of Special Branch, a 1970s television drama series made by Euston Films in which he was cast opposite Patrick Mower as Haggerty. At the height of his Special Branch fame, his appearance on This Is Your Life topped the television ratings in December 1973. Twenty years later, Sewell played Supt Frank Cottam, a send-up of the same character, in The Detectives, with Robert Powell and Jasper Carrott. George Sewell was born on August 31 1924 at Hoxton in the East End of London. His father was a printer and his mother came from a family of florists, his grandmother having sold flowers and bird seed on the steps of St Paul's. He left school at 14 and started work as an apprentice printer. At the start of the Second World War he worked repairing bomb damage before joining the RAF in 1943; but the war ended before he had completed his training as a pilot and he was demobbed almost immediately. During the following three years Sewell took a string of jobs, among them street photographer, assistant road manager and drummer in a small rumba band. In 1948 he joined the Merchant Navy and became a steward on cruise ships, circling the world three times. On his return, he used his knowledge of languages to work for several seasons as a motor-coach courier for a travel company before making a late entry into acting in 1959 aged 35. A chance encounter with Dudley Sutton and a group of other actors in a West End pub led to an audition and a job with Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop. He made his debut in that company's production of Frank Norman and Lionel Bart's musical Fings Ain't Wot They Used To Be in the West End in 1960. Sewell went on to star in two more Littlewood productions, which later transferred to Paris and Broadway. He continued to make regular appearances on television, among his more notable parts being that of Col Alec Freeman in the science fiction series UFO (1970-73), and as Ratcliffe in Doctor Who (1988). On the cinema screen, Sewell appeared in several successful and important films, including Sparrows Can't Sing (1962), shot on location in Stepney, and Lindsay Anderson's bleak This Sporting Life (1963) as well as Get Carter, the gritty gangster classic set in Newcastle and in which he was cast with Michael Caine. In 2002, touring in Who Killed Agatha Christie? with the dancer Lionel Blair, Sewell reflected on a career in which he never quite achieved first-rank stardom. "I don't have enough energy to feel resentment," he said. "You couldn't keep on acting if you felt like that. I've been lucky to work so much. "We all know great actors who have struggled, so I feel lucky I've made a good living." Latterly Sewell divided his time between London and a holiday home at Cannes in the south of France.
Date Posted: April 08, 2007, 09:23:07am
Ground-breaking TV producer Lambert dies at 71 23 November 2007 by Matthew Hemley The Stage Verity Lambert, the BBC's first female TV producer, who worked on the original series of Doctor Who in 1963, has died aged 71. Lambert, who has produced shows including Minder, Rumpole of the Bailey, Jonathan Creek and Love Soup, passed away on November 22, just a few weeks before she was due to receive a lifetime achievement award at the Women in Film and Television Awards next month. She joined the BBC in 1963 as its youngest producer and as the Corporation's first female in such a role, before going on to oversee the first two series of Doctor Who. Later she moved to Thames Television, where she worked on the shows The Naked Civil Servant and was the chief executive of the company's film subsidiary Euston Films, which produced Minder. In the eighties, she set up her own production company called Cinema Verity, which made the sitcom May to December and the soap Eldorado. The company also made the BBC series The Cazalets, which was co- produced by Joanna Lumley. Speaking to The Stage, Lumley praised Lambert, saying "she was the top of her game all the time". She added: "I loved her dearly." Lambert received an OBE for services to film and television in 2002 and also won Bafta's Alan Clarke Award for outstanding contribution to television in the same year.
Anthologist Peter Haining, born 1940, died from a heart attack on November 19, 2007, at the age of 67. He is best known to 007 fans as the author of "James Bond: A Celebration" - one of the first books focussing on the cinematic series. As well as his 1987 Bond book, he edited numerous fantasy and horror anthologies. He began his career as a reporter in Essex and then moved to London where he worked on a trade magazine before joining the publishing house of New English Library. Peter achieved the position of Editorial Director before becoming a full time writer in the early Seventies. He edited a large number of anthologies, predominantly of horror and fantasy short stories, wrote non-fiction books on a variety of topics from the Channel Tunnel to Sweeney Todd and also used the pen names "Ric Alexander" and "Richard Peyton" on a number of crime story anthologies. In the Seventies he wrote three novels, including The Hero (1973), which was optioned for filming. He wrote several reference books on Doctor Who, including the 21st anniversary special Doctor Who: A Celebration Two Decades Through Time and Space (1983), and also wrote the definitive study of Sherlock Holmes on the screen, The Television Sherlock Holmes (1991) and several other television tie-ins featuring famous literary characters, including Maigret and Poirot. Peter Haining's most recent project was a series of World War Two stories based on extensive research and personal interviews: The Jail That Went To Sea (2003), The Mystery of Rommel's Gold (2004), Where The Eagle Landed (2004), The Chianti Raiders (2005) and The Banzai Hunters (2007). He won the British Fantasy Awards Karl Edward Wagner Award in 2001.
Actor and stuntman Roy Jenson (originally from Canada) died May 12th 2007. He was 80. He played many un-credited roles in films (including a “ghost” in William Castle’s 13th GHOSTS). Some of his non-stunt movie roles include CHINATOWN HARPER ANY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE and THE GETAWAY. He also appeared on several TV show.
Emmy Award winning Actor Roscoe Lee Browne died April 11th 2007. He was 81. Browne smooth recognizable voice was nearly as familiar as his face. Films include BLACK LIKE ME THE COMEDIANS Hitchcock’s TOPAZ THE COWBOYS CISCO PIKE SUPER FLY TNT UPTOWN SATURDAY NIGHT LOGAN’S RUN TWILIGHT’S LAST GLEAMING JUMPIN’ JACK FLASH and others. He made many TV appearances including a regular role on TV’s “Soap”. He was also a poet. His last film role was the narrator of EPIC MOVIE.
Character actor Paul Reed died April 27th 2007 at the age of 90. Best known to TV fans as Captain Block for two seasons on the police comedy “Car 54, Where Are You?” he also sang and acted on Broadway. Seen on many TV episodes of the ‘60’s, he was in a few movies including RIDE TO HANGMAN’S TREE FITZWILLY and DID YOU HERE THE ONE ABOUT THE TRAVELLING SALESLADY?
Actor Barry Nelson died April 7th 2007. He was 89. In 1954 Nelson became the first actor to portray James Bond in an American TV adaptation of “Casino Royale”. Films include SHADOW OF THE THIN MAN RIO RITA (with Abbott & Costello) THE HUMAN COMEDY A GUY NAMED JOE PETE N TILLIE AIRPORT ISLAND CLAWS and Kubrick’s THE SHINING plus many TV shows.
Dabbs Greer was a familiar character actor from 1949 right into the early part of the 21st Century. His film appearances include: THE BAD & THE BEAUTIFUL HOUSE OF WAX INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS THE VAMPIRE IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE I WANT TO LIVE! EVIL TOWN PACIFIC HEIGHTS HOUSE 4 and LITTLE GIANTS. I won’t even try to list some of his TV credits. Here’s picture of him instead!
He died April 28 at age 90.
Kurt Vonnegutt-1922-2007
ROBERT LAWSON Robert "Bob" Sterling Lawson went home to be with the Lord on May 11, 2007 at the Motion Picture Health and Welfare Home in Woodland Hills, California. He was born to Thomas and Honor Maude Lawson on August 6, 1910 in Jackson, Tennessee. Bob moved to Hollywood in the 1930s to pursue an acting career. He worked in the motion picture industry until his retireme nt. He had a long and successful career in an industry in which he loved; a career which included many parts as an actor and extra until the early 1990s. During the 1930s, in Hollywood, Bob met Helen McRuer who he fell in love with and married. He had three beautiful daughters. He lost Helen shortly after the birth of his third daughter. His fourth daughter followed a few years later. Bob is survived by his four daughters, Donna Lawson Wolfe, Teri Deland, Cheryl O'Dwyer and Darlene Bitminis; nin e grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren, one niece; and long time friend and companion, Carmen Dirigo. Bob was preceded in death by his parents, his loving wife Helen, his brother Ralph and his sister Myrtle. Bob lived in the San Fernando Valley for 68 years, which was broken up by five years of living and acting in Las Vegas during the 1990s. A funeral service was held on Monday, May 21, 2007, 2:00 p.m., in the Country House at the Motion Picture Health and Welfare Home in Woodland Hills, Calif ornia. Interment will follow at a later date in Jackson, Tennessee. Published in the Los Angeles Daily News on 5/22/2007.
BRUNO MATTEI has died in Rome, Italy. He was 75.The Italian director passed away earlier this week (begs21May07) after checking into a hospital complaining of a stomach pain. He died after falling into a coma.Mattei specialised in the horror genre and is best known for movies including Night Of The Zombies (1980), Rats: Night Of Terror (1984) and Cruel Jaws (1995).He also filmed several erotic movies, including a number of Emmanuelle films starring Laura Gemser.At the time of his death, Mattei was working on sequel Island Of The Living Dead 2. PR-Inside
Date Posted: May 25, 2007, 01:09:55pm
Telegraph George Sewell, the actor, who died on Sunday aged 82, had one of the best-known faces in Britain, thanks to dozens of appearances on television and in films, notably Get Carter (1971). With his sandblasted features and shifty, haunted looks, Sewell was as at home playing shady villains as he was in police and thriller roles, which dated from the early 1960s, when he appeared in series such as Z-Cars, to the 1990s comedy The Detectives. He was still working until recently, making television appearances in Doctors and The Bill (both 2005) and, last year, in Casualty. An accomplished stage actor, and nicknamed in the business "Chuck", he played principal roles in Oliver, Fings Ain't Wot They Used To Be and Oh! What A Lovely War in the 1960s, and more recently in Dial M for Murder (1998) and Who Killed Agatha Christie? (2002). His last stage appearance was touring in Francis Durbridge's drama The Gentle Hook in 2004.
But while the theatre was Sewell's preferred medium, it was his career in film and television, extending over 40 years, that ensured his celebrity. He appeared as Detective Chief Inspector Alan Craven in 25 episodes of Special Branch, a 1970s television drama series made by Euston Films in which he was cast opposite Patrick Mower as Haggerty. At the height of his Special Branch fame, his appearance on This Is Your Life topped the television ratings in December 1973. Twenty years later, Sewell played Supt Frank Cottam, a send-up of the same character, in The Detectives, with Robert Powell and Jasper Carrott. George Sewell was born on August 31 1924 at Hoxton in the East End of London. His father was a printer and his mother came from a family of florists, his grandmother having sold flowers and bird seed on the steps of St Paul's. He left school at 14 and started work as an apprentice printer. At the start of the Second World War he worked repairing bomb damage before joining the RAF in 1943; but the war ended before he had completed his training as a pilot and he was demobbed almost immediately. During the following three years Sewell took a string of jobs, among them street photographer, assistant road manager and drummer in a small rumba band. In 1948 he joined the Merchant Navy and became a steward on cruise ships, circling the world three times. On his return, he used his knowledge of languages to work for several seasons as a motor-coach courier for a travel company before making a late entry into acting in 1959 aged 35. A chance encounter with Dudley Sutton and a group of other actors in a West End pub led to an audition and a job with Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop. He made his debut in that company's production of Frank Norman and Lionel Bart's musical Fings Ain't Wot They Used To Be in the West End in 1960. Sewell went on to star in two more Littlewood productions, which later transferred to Paris and Broadway. He continued to make regular appearances on television, among his more notable parts being that of Col Alec Freeman in the science fiction series UFO (1970-73), and as Ratcliffe in Doctor Who (1988). On the cinema screen, Sewell appeared in several successful and important films, including Sparrows Can't Sing (1962), shot on location in Stepney, and Lindsay Anderson's bleak This Sporting Life (1963) as well as Get Carter, the gritty gangster classic set in Newcastle and in which he was cast with Michael Caine. In 2002, touring in Who Killed Agatha Christie? with the dancer Lionel Blair, Sewell reflected on a career in which he never quite achieved first-rank stardom. "I don't have enough energy to feel resentment," he said. "You couldn't keep on acting if you felt like that. I've been lucky to work so much. "We all know great actors who have struggled, so I feel lucky I've made a good living." Latterly Sewell divided his time between London and a holiday home at Cannes in the south of France.
Date Posted: April 08, 2007, 09:23:07am
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