Country Music Hall of Famer Ferlin Husky, the innovative recording artist whose 1957 smash “Gone” helped usher in the pop-leaning Nashville Sound era, died today at his daughter’s home in Westmoreland. He was 85 and suffered from congestive heart failure.

Mr. Husky’s classic singles “Gone” and “Wings of a Dove” each topped country charts for 10 straight weeks, and each became Top 20 pop records. A well-rounded performer, Mr. Husky also starred in motion pictures and entertained with his comedic alter ego, “Simon Crum,” but he is best known for his contributions in sweetening the sound of Music Row in a way that allowed the music to appeal to twang-phobic audiences.

“By reaching #4 on the pop charts, ‘Gone’ demonstrated what became the ultimate goal for Nashville producers: A country hit that could ‘cross over’ to pop success,” wrote Rich Kienzle in the liner notes to Mr. Husky’s Vintage collection of Capitol Records material.

In addition to scoring hit records, Mr. Husky was a master of stagecraft, a dashing and energetic performer who impressed audiences and fellow artists.

“There were a lot of years when nobody in the business could follow Ferlin Husky,” Merle Haggard told The Tennessean last year. “He was the big live act of the day. A great entertainer.”

Thursday, March 17, 2011
Movies'Batman' star Michael Gough dies, aged 94
Thursday, March 17 2011, 9:33am EDT
British actor Michael Gough has passed away at the age of 94.

The screen star appeared in more than 150 film and TV roles, including the first four Batman movies as Bruce Wayne's butler Alfred Pennyworth and as The Celestial Toymaker in Doctor Who in 1966.

Born in Kuala Lumpur, Gough started his career in the 1947 movie Blanche Fury and gained a cult following for his parts in Hammer Films productions such as 1958's Dracula and 1962's Phantom Of The Opera.

He was cast by Tim Burton in the big screen relaunch of Batman in 1989 before Michael Caine took over the role in 2005's Batman Begins. Gough continued to work with Burton late into his career, featuring in Sleepy Hollow and taking on voice acting jobs in Corpse Bride and Alice In Wonderland.

Earlier this year he provided the voice of villain Parasite in the animated film All-Star Superman.

Gough's first wife Anneke Wills starred as the companion to William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton's Doctors in the the '60s incarnation of Doctor Who. The couple had two children together - one of whom died in 1982 - and divorced in 1979. He previously had a child with second wife Anne Leon.

Gough is survived by his fourth wife Henrietta Gough.










Rudy Warner Robbins (November 17, 1933-February 21, 2011) was a Western entertainer known for his singing, songwriting, acting, writing, and his past performance of film and television stunts.

He was the youngest of four children born in Evergreen in Avoyelles Parish in South Central Louisiana to Charles Robbins, a native of Mississippi, and the former Mary Alice Grimble.

When Rudy was two years old, the family moved to Port Arthur, where he was reared. He graduated in 1952 from Thomas Jefferson High School, now known as Memorial High School, and then, for one academic year, attended Lamar University in Beaumont, known at the time as Lamar Technical Institute. Himself a Baptist, Robbins graduated in 1956 from East Texas Baptist University in Marshall with credentials in business administration and sociology.

From 1957-1959 Robbins served in the United States Army and was on the Fourth Army track team. He set a record for the javelin throw, the same event in which he had lettered at ETBU.

In the Army, he met the son of a film producer who told him about the job opportunities in Hollywood as a stuntman. After military service, he moved to Bandera, and worked for a time as a wrangler at the Dixie Dude Ranch until he was offered a speaking but unnamed role as one of the Tennessee Volunteers in John Wayne's Epic The Alamo. In The Alamo, Robbins was involved in a short dialogue repeated several times during the film: a fellow Tennessean would review a developing situation and ask Robbins, "Do this mean what I think it do?" Robbins would reply "It do." Thereafter John Wayne called Robbins by the nickname "It Do"; one of Robbins' treasured possessions was a souvenir Alamo mug addressed to "It Do" from "Duke", Wayne's nickname.

After the Alamo, Robbins went to Hollywood but returned semi-permanently to Bandera in 1971. Wayne introduced Robbins to legendary director John Ford, who hired him as an actor in Two Rode Together with James Stewart and Richard Widmark, and later for stunts in Cheyenne Autumn, also with Widmark, and in three other Wayne Films, McClintock with Maureen O'Hara, The Green Berets, and Rio Lobo. Robbins' other parts were uncredited stunts in The Rounders in 1965, and Sugarland Express in 1974. He also appeared as a mechanic in Sugarland Express. He did stunts for CBS's Gunsmoke in 1964, acting as a double for series star James Arness. In 1966, Robbins played Josh Cutler in NBC's Daniel Boone with Fess Parker. Robbins held Parker, later a large Los Angeles developer, in high esteem because Parker paid him in advance: "He knew I was hard up. When I showed up on Monday morning, he handed me an envelope with my first episode's pay in advance," recalled Robbins. Along with Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Charlton Heston, Robbins was awarded honorary membership in the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures. Robbins also trained horses for other stuntmen and became a production manager for various shows. In 1967. He was selected by the United States Department of Commerce to go to Europe as a "Cowboy Goodwill Ambassador" to introduce and promote the sale of denim jeans. Later he joined Montie Montana, Jr., to re-create Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. With a cast of 125 cowboys, cowgirls, and Indians and 135 bison, longhorns, and horses, the show toured worldwide from London to Brazil to Singapore. The group was particularly well received in Japan, where it performed four to five shows daily for four months. The last wild west performance was near Glacier National Park in northern Montana. Back in Texas, Robbins produced the Rudy Robbins Western Show and the All American Cowboy Get-Together, a two-day event of music, poetry, cooking, arts, crafts, and demonstrations. He was also active in the "Keep Bandera Western" campaign.

Rudy formed the Spirit of Texas, a western harmony group, which in 1991 was named by the Texas State Senate as the "Official Cowboy Band for Texas". Modeled on the old Sons of the Pioneers, the band performed for such celebrities as Roy Rogers and Dale Evans Rogers, Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash, and Tom Selleck, as well as General Norman Schwarzkopf and Texas Governors Ann W. Richards and George W. Bush. Robbins and the Canadian Yodeler Shirley Field co-authored "How to Yodel the Cowboy Way", which can still be obtained through Amazon.com. Robbins also wrote short stories for Cowboy Magazine. He is featured in the Museum of the Gulf Coast, which is administered by the Port Arthur Historical Society. Among his awards, Rudy was made honorary town Marshal of Tombstone, Arizona, honorary deputy Sheriff of Pima County (Tucson), Arizona, and "Outstanding Cowboy of the 20th Century" for Bandera County. He was commissioned an admiral in the Texas Navy by former Governor Bill Clements. He was awarded a plaque for excellence by the Texas Stuntmen's Association.

Rudy is the father of one son, Jody Eldred and his fiancee‚ Pam Cablayan of Marina Del Rey, California. Jody is a producer, director, and cameraman in the film and television industry. He is also survived by his sister Barbara Miles and husband Jim of Florida, 2 brothers, Lon Robbins and wife Betty of Nederland, and Charles "Doo" Robbins of Nederland and numerous nieces and nephews.

A longtime head usher at First Baptist Bandera, Rudy and his son were privileged to travel to the Holy Land together in 2000. Rudy would be quick to tell you that none of his accomplishments or honors begin to compare to the eternal life Jesus bought for him on the cross. As his days on this earth were ending he often remarked, "My bags are packed and I
have my ticket in my hand, paid in full by Jesus. I'm ready to go." And at 10:25 AM Monday February 21, with his family and friends at his side, the angels punched his ticket and took him home.

The family will receive friends at the Funeral Home on Saturday, February 26, 2011 from 4-6 PM.

Funeral services will be held on Sunday, February 27, 2011 at 2:30 PM at the First Baptist Church in Bandera with Bro. David Collett and Bro. Larry Taylor officiating. Interment will follow at Bandera Cemetery.

Eddie Serrato, the original drummer on Question Mark and the Mysterians' song "96 Tears," passed away Thursday morning.

Serrato was due to be released from Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit this morning after having surgery. Instead, his daughter told TV5 he had a heart attack. Serrato was 65.

While Serrato was from the Saginaw area, ? and the Mysterians first formed in Bay City in 1962. The band received a gold record for the song "96 Tears" and appeared on "The Dick Clark Show."


Max Wilk, Playwright, Showbiz Journalist and O'Neill Center Dramaturg,
Dead at 90

By Kenneth Jones
February 24, 2011


Max Wilk, a novelist, a nonfiction chronicler of show business
subjects, playwright, screenwriter — and a dramaturg for the National
Playwrights Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center for more
tham 25 years — died Feb. 19 at his home in Westport, CT, the O'Neill
Festival reported. Mr. Wilk was 90.


At the O'Neill, Mr. Wilk helped both emerging and established
playwrights develop their new works. Among the authors who benefited
from his expertise were Pulitzer Prize winners August Wilson, David
Lindsay-Abaire and John Patrick Shanley; Lee Blessing; OyamO; James
Yoshimura; Jeffrey Hatcher; Wendy McLeod; Doug Wright; Willy Holtzman;
Judy GeBauer; Charles Shulman; Sam Hunter; Ursula Rani Sarma; and Lucy
Caldwell.


Amy Saltz, a frequent director for the National Playwrights Conference
said in a statement, "Max loved the O'Neill and he loved show
business. He was smart and sassy and blunt. He had great knowledge and
experience, both of which he was anxious to share. I was at the
O'Neill for 17 summers and he was there every year and long after,
helping writers, offering support, and demanding the best of everyone.
He made an indelible impression and will be missed."


Preston Whiteway, O'Neill executive director. said, "Max will remain a
legend at the O'Neill always. His intelligence, wit and friendship
shaped the O'Neill and the National Playwrights Conference for
decades, impacting hundreds of playwrights and the American theatre
itself. I will miss Max holding court on the porch, and his insights,
which were invariably correct."


Skip Mercier, scenic and costume designer for NPC and a longtime
friend of Mr. Wilk, said, "In typical Max form, plagued with growing
dementia for his last week, he told me how hard it was not to have any
ideas. Then his eyes got wide and he said: 'You know all the pictures
on the wall in my study?' [Many friends covered his walls; most
deceased and famous]. I nodded. 'Well they are all in train windows —
there's a train just behind the walls you know. It's waiting for me
but I don't know where it's going! I hope it's fun.' …To the end, he
was creative, funny, and with a unique take on life and whatever is
beyond."


Mr. Wilk graduated from the Yale School of Drama in 1941. Following
his graduation, he toured with Irving Berlin's This is the Army and
wrote training films in the First Motion Picture Unit AAF. After the
war, Mr. Wilk continued writing — for theatre, film and television. He
wrote three Broadway shows (the revue Small Wonder in 1948-49, the
play Cloud 7 in 1958 and the revue A Musical Jubilee in 1975-76). He
also wrote the play Mr. Williams and Ms. Wood, about Tennessee
Williams and literary agent Audrey Wood, which he adapted for the
stage from his book "Represented by Audrey Wood," which he co-wrote
with Wood.


Mr. Wilk's other books include "They're Playing Our Song: The Truth
Behind the Words and Music of Three Generations"; "OK! The Story of
Oklahoma!: A Celebration of America's Most Beloved Musical"; and "The
Golden Age of Television: Notes from the Survivors," among many
others.


Mr. Wilk won both an Emmy and Peabody award for his two-hour
television show "The Fabulous Fifties."


A memorial service to celebrate the life of Mr. Wilk is currently
being planned by the family in Westport for April. The O'Neill is
planning a gathering during its 2011 summer season.


Mr. Wilk was pre-deceased by his wife, artist Barbara Wilk, and is
survived by his three children, seven grandchildren and one great-
grandchild, according to Connecticut's The Ridgefield Press.
Serrato's daughter said in the last few years he was involved in producing Tejano music in Texas.

Still heavily into music, she estimated he owned 5000 CDs and more than 60,000 songs on his computer hard drive.

Funeral services are being arranged through Diesler Funeral Home in Saginaw Township.

http://www.wnem.com/news/26984568/detail.html

From Lightfoot News

Terry Clements was an integral part of the signature Lightfoot sound. His seamless and inventive playing added a unique imprint onto every song he played - on record or on the stage. He began playing with Lightfoot in 1971 after Lightfoot had met him in Los Angeles while Terry was working on the soundtrack to an early Burt Reynolds movie. Up until then Terry had been working with Buck Owens as a house writer and with producer Lou Adler (Mamas and the Papas). Terry told me he recorded an album of his own around that time, but I've never been able to track it down.

After their first meeting, Lightfoot asked Terry to join the band, as Red Shea was wanting to get off of the road. Eventually Terry accepted and he remained a fixture with Lightfoot for the next 40 years.

He will forever be associated with his work with Lightfoot, whether on the haunting, iconic solos of The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald, the soulful grace of The Watchman's Gone, the sublime dexterity of Carefree Highway, the list of highlights of Terry's playing go on and on. He was always so creative, yet never repetitive, his style inhabiting the music, never seeming to be added on as an afterthought, but instead always feeling like a part of the fabric of the song.

He will be missed...

For 10 years, the actor Alfred Burke, who has died aged 92, starred as the downbeat private detective Frank Marker in the popular television series Public Eye (1965-75). The character was intended as a British rival to Raymond Chandler's American gumshoe Philip Marlowe. Tough, unattached and self-sufficient, Marker could take a beating in the service of his often wealthy clients without quitting. "Marker wasn't exciting, he wasn't rich," Burke said. "He could be defined in negatives."

An ABC TV press release introduced the character as a "thin, shabby, middle-aged man with a slightly grim sense of humour and an aura of cynical incorruptibility. His office is a dingy south London attic within sound of Clapham Junction. He can't afford a secretary, much less an assistant, and when he needs a car, he hires a runabout from the local garage."

Tall, sharp-featured, saturnine and with an incisive voice, Burke was perfectly cast as Marker. He thought up the character's name himself – originally the detective was to be called Frank Marvin. In 1972 the role brought him a Bafta nomination for best actor. The following year, Marker was voted the most compulsive male character in a TV Times poll.

Burke – who was always known as Alfie – was born in Peckham, south-east London, to Irish parents. His father, William, worked in a fur warehouse. He left school in 1933 to take a job as an office boy with a firm that specialised in repairing railway wagons. Soon afterwards he became a steward in a City club for businessmen, but left after an uncharacteristic dispute with a barmaid which ended with her squirting a soda siphon in his face.

He dared not tell his parents that he was out of work, so he ran away to Brighton, returning to London to take a job in a silk warehouse in Cheapside. He began to perform with a local amateur dramatic group run by a headteacher who persuaded him to apply for a London county council scholarship to Rada. Before the principal, Sir Kenneth Barnes, and his colleagues, Burke declaimed, "Is this a dagger I see before me?", read a Tennyson poem and played two parts from The Last of Mrs Cheyney. He took up his place at Rada in 1937.

Two years later he appeared on stage professionally for the first time, in The Universal Legacy at the Barn theatre in Shere, Surrey. The second world war then intervened. Burke registered as a conscientious objector, and was directed to work on the land. After the war, he went back to theatre work at Farnham, Surrey, where he met Barbara Bonelle, a stage manager, who became his wife.

Burke then did a series of tours with the Council for the Encouragement of Music and the Arts (which became the Arts Council). The tours were aimed at bringing culture to "the people" – in his case, in the Welsh valleys and the Lake District.

In the late 1940s, he joined the Young Vic company and went on to spend time in Manchester at the Library theatre, at the Nottingham Playhouse and in London, appearing in Pablo Picasso's play Desire Caught By the Tail at the Watergate theatre. He was at Birmingham Rep for the three parts of Henry VI, which transferred to the Old Vic in London in 1953.

By the late 1950s, Burke had established himself as a serious stage actor and a useful character actor in films including the war movies Bitter Victory (1957) and No Time to Die (1958). He played the industrial agitator Travers in The Angry Silence (1960), in which a worker (Richard Attenborough) is shunned by his colleagues for refusing to take part in a strike. In 1964 he appeared in the science-fiction movie Children of the Damned, a sequel to Village of the Damned.

On TV, he took roles in episodes of The Saint, The Avengers and Z Cars, as well as several editions of ITV's Play of the Week. In 1964 his own script, Where Are They Now?, written under the pen name of Frank Hanna, was produced as a Play of the Week. The following year, he slid into the arms of a welcoming public as Marker. In between starring in seven series of Public Eye, he had leading roles at the Leeds Playhouse in Luigi Pirandello's Henry IV, in 1970, and in Pictures in a Bath of Acid, as the writer August Strindberg, in 1971.

Burke enhanced his TV popularity with parts including the father in The Brontës of Haworth (1973), Long John Silver in Treasure Island (1977) and Major Richter, a German commandant in occupied Guernsey, in the series Enemy at the Door (1978). He portrayed Richter as essentially decent, despite the dire obligations of war.

After a recurring role in the series Sophia and Constance (1988), based on Arnold Bennett's novel The Old Wives' Tale, he continued to take small TV parts throughout his 70s and 80s. He had his highest-profile role for years when he appeared – albeit briefly – as Armando Dippet, the former Hogwarts headteacher, in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002).

He and Barbara had two sets of twins – Jacob and Harriet, and Kelly and Louisa – and they remained on good terms. He spent the last 25 years with Hedi Argent. They all survive him, along with 11 grandchildren.



Michael Coveney writes: As he grew older, Burke's stage voice became even huskier and more distinctive. Along with his natural authority and imposing presence, this served him well over many seasons with the Royal Shakespeare Company from the 1980s into the new century, both at Stratford-upon-Avon and in their new London home in the Barbican Centre.

As Duncan in the RSC's Macbeth (1986) and Egeus in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1994), he summoned a powerful sense of another age and morality. He played the best ever Gonzalo in Nicholas Hytner's The Tempest (1988); a fine Lepidus in John Caird's Antony and Cleopatra (1992); a wonderfully frail but deserving old Adam in As You Like It, directed by David Thacker (1992); and a not-to-be-messed-with Escalus in Michael Boyd's Romeo and Juliet (2000). In Steven Pimlott's 2000 production of Richard II, he delivered John of Gaunt's "sceptred isle" speech with more retrospective anger than sing-song melancholy.

Burke continued to return to the stage in the new century, appearing in his 90th year at the National theatre as the Shepherd in Frank McGuinness's version of Oedipus.

The most interesting of his later stage performances, however, were perhaps his two roles in John Barton' s 1994 Peer Gynt, translated by Christopher Fry. He played both Solveig's father and the Button Moulder. Barton had unearthed a previously unperformed scene in which the stern and implacable father promised his daughter's hand in marriage, as long as Peer atoned for all his sins. This gave Burke's appearance in the fifth act as the Button Moulder, who comes to collect Peer's soul, an unusual and surprising resonance.


• Alfred Burke, actor, born 28 February 1918; died 16 February 2011.


Nancy Carr, SVP corporate communications for Hallmark Channels, died today after suddenly falling ill earlier this week. She was 50. Carr, a 20-year PR veteran, joined Hallmark in 2005 as VP corporate communications. Before that, she spent 15 years at CBS, rising to VP communications where she oversaw publicity for the network's movies and miniseries as well as such series as CSI, CSI: Miami, Everybody Loves Raymond and Without a Trace. Carr served on the Board of Governors of the TV Academy and served as treasurer of the TV Publicity Executives Committee. She was also very passionate about cat rescue. There will be no service, however people are invited to make a donation to two organizations which Nancy supported and meant a lot to her: feralcatcaretakers.org and fixnation.org.

"Hallmark Channels is saddened by the passing of our friend and colleague, Nancy Carr," the company's president and CEO Bill Abbott said. "We are grateful to Nancy for guiding the company’s corporate media strategy for more than five years. On the personal side, those of us who cared deeply for and about Nancy will never forget her dedication to life’s smallest creatures, as she worked tirelessly for animal rights and animal rescue. The company sends deep and sincere condolences to Nancy’s family."

“It’s a very sad day," Carr's former colleagues at CBS' communications department said in a statement. "Our thoughts are with her husband, Ronnie and her family. We’ll remember Nancy as the architect behind some of CBS’s biggest mini-series and live events campaigns, as well as, an exceptionally dedicated colleague and most importantly, a kind and caring person.”


Walter Seltzer dies at 96; former Hollywood press agent made a successful leap to producing

He led successful ad campaigns for 1935's 'Mutiny on the Bounty' and 1955's 'Marty' and later helped Charlton Heston make 'Soylent Green' and 'The Omega Man.' In retirement he was a tenacious fundraiser for the Motion Picture and Television Fund.

Walter Seltzer, a Hollywood press agent-turned-producer who started out at MGM in the 1930s and made an enduring mark on the industry in the 1980s as a tenacious fundraiser for the Motion Picture and Television Fund, has died. He was 96.

Seltzer died Friday of age-related illness at the Motion Picture and Television Fund's retirement home in Woodland Hills, said Jennifer Fagen, a spokeswoman for the fund.

His successful ad campaign for MGM's "Mutiny on the Bounty" (1935) helped him land a job in the studio's publicity department, where employees alternated giving stories to the gossip columnists of the day — Hedda Hopper and Louella Parsons — and were told how to mark their Oscar ballots, Seltzer later recalled.

In charge of marketing for the heartwarming 1955 movie "Marty," Seltzer inadvertently helped Burt Lancaster's production company make film history: The producers were the first to spend more on an Oscar campaign — about $60,000 more — than they did to make the low-budget film, according to "Reel Winners: Movie Award Trivia" (2005).

Part of the $400,000 spent on marketing went toward private screenings.

"We offered to send a print of the picture, a projector and a projectionist to the home of anyone who would invite 20 academy members to a screening," Seltzer told the Associated Press in 2005.

He was credited with "reawakening a sleeper": "Marty" received four Academy Awards, including for best picture.

By the late 1950s, Seltzer was helping to run Marlon Brando's production company and in the 1960s began making a series of movies with his close friend, actor Charlton Heston. The films included the 1970s science-fiction thrillers "Soylent Green" and "The Omega Man."

"Though through the years we disagreed violently politically, we were a good team," Seltzer said of Heston in the New York Sun after the actor died in 2008.

Seltzer was part of a raft of press agents who made the leap to producing with "remarkable success," according to a 1964 New York Times article that ran under the headline "Hollywood Turnabout: Flicks From Former Flacks."

Retired from filmmaking by the late 1970s, Seltzer devoted himself to the Motion Picture and Television Fund, which cares for aging actors and others in the industry at its 40-acre campus in Woodland Hills. He served on its board for 40 years.

In the 1980s, Seltzer co-chaired a capital campaign that raised about $50 million for the fund, which supports a hospital and retirement home.

Old-fashioned arm twisting and the star power of his famous friends helped him reel in donations.

He and co-chair Robert Blumofe, a retired producer, prevailed upon such actors as Heston, Lancaster and Kirk Douglas to dine with business leaders before they were asked to support the cause.

The third member of the fundraising team was Edie Wasserman, wife of Hollywood mogul Lew Wasserman. She oversaw the overall campaign but refused to take a title, Blumofe later said.

In 1986, the Motion Picture and Television Fund honored Seltzer with its Silver Medallion for humanitarian achievement. One previous recipient was actor Jean Hersholt, who in 1940 found the property that became the fund's campus.

Both as an active donor and advocate, Seltzer "continued to work for and support the mission of the fund until the very end," Ken Scherer, chief executive of the fund's foundation, said in a statement

The son of a pioneering film exhibitor, Seltzer was born Nov. 7, 1914, in Philadelphia.

His older brothers also worked in the industry — Frank N. Seltzer produced films in the 1940s and '50s and Julian Seltzer was an advertising director for Hal Roach Studios and 20th Century Fox. Both brothers died in their late 70s.

Growing up, Walter Seltzer worked as a theater usher before attending the University of Pennsylvania from 1932 through 1934.

He came to Hollywood in 1935 as a publicist for Fox West Coast Theaters

Moving to MGM in 1936, Seltzer helped craft the public image of such stars as Mickey Rooney, Clark Gable and Joan Crawford, according to the 2004 book "Hal Wallis: Producer to the Stars."

At a 1939 meeting, Howard Strickling, MGM's longtime head of publicity, told his 60-member staff that "through the generosity of the studio" they were all members of the motion picture academy, Seltzer later recalled.

"He had enrolled everyone and paid the initiation fee," Seltzer told the Associated Press in 2005. "There was general jubilation and thanks, then he proceeded to tell us how to vote." (With the decline of the studio system, bloc voting ended in the 1950s.)

After stints in the publicity departments at Warner Bros. and Columbia Pictures, Seltzer served in the Marines for four years during World War II.

After the war he spent nearly a decade as director of publicity at Hal Wallis Productions, where he met Heston, then embarking on a movie career.

Seltzer was versed in "the arcane mysteries" of the studio system, Heston wrote in his 1995 autobiography. "He was an intelligent, decent, and warmly witty man who, with his wife, Mickey, quickly became my first friends in Hollywood."

Tired of begging Wallis for what he later described as "five-dollar raises," Seltzer became publicity director for a production company formed by Lancaster and producer Harold Hecht.

At Pennebaker Productions, Brando's independent film company, Seltzer stepped firmly into producing. He made five films, including the 1959 drama "Shake Hands With the Devil" with James Cagney and "One-Eyed Jacks," a 1961 western starring Brando, who also directed.

Working with Brando had been an "interesting challenge" for Seltzer, Heston wrote in his autobiography.

"After some months of total inactivity, Walter urged Brando to pick one of the several projects the studio had optioned for him, so they could put it into production," Heston recalled.

"How can you talk about making a movie when we got 800,000 people starving in India?" replied Brando, ever the social activist.

Brando's company "died of inertia," Heston wrote, which freed Seltzer to produce the medieval drama "The War Lord," the first of seven films he made with Heston between 1965 and 1976.

Another Seltzer-Heston production was 1968's "Will Penny," "one of the best films on the cowboy/loner to come out of Hollywood," according to Leonard Maltin's "Movie Guide."

The partnership also produced "The Omega Man" (1971) and "Soylent Green" (1973), two films with the same subject at their core. They came about partly because the pair "thought that the greatest social problem of our time was overpopulation," Seltzer said in 2008 in the New York Sun. "We became a little obsessed with the idea."

Seltzer had no immediate survivors, Fagen said.

valerie.nelson@latimes.com

Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times

The star of 'Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!’ suffered from heart failure.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Tura Satana, who gained cult status for her role in the 1965 Russ Meyer movie Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! has died of heart failure at age 72.

The Los Angeles Times reports Satana's death was confirmed by her manager, Siouxzan Perry, who said Satana died Friday at a hospital in Reno, Nev.

In Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! Satana played Varla, the leader of a trio of thrill-seeking go-go dancers who kills a man with her bare hands. The women then set out to rob a wealthy older man who lives on a desert ranch with his two sons.

Meyer has said the movie was an "absolute loser" when released but was rediscovered by the 1990s. It has since been shown at film festivals and art house cinemas.

Satana's other credits include the 1963 film Irma La Douce and the television shows Burke's Law and The Man From U.N.C.L.E.

Evelyn Page, Broadway Actress, Dies at 90
By Robert Simonson
Playbill
18 Feb 2011

Evelyn Page, an actress with several Broadway credits, died Feb. 6 in Manhattan, Variety reported. She was 90.


A native of Nebraska, she appeared as a resident of Greenwich Village in the original production of Wonderful Town in 1953, was a standby for several roles in Little Me, was Mrs. Hatch in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, and was the Miller's Wife in the 1969 musical version of Canterbury Tales.

She toured with Canterbury Tales, as well as Stop the World—I Want to Get Off, Me and My Girl and Anything Goes. Off-Broadway, Ms. Page was seen in Waste at American Place Theatre in 2000. Regionally, she performed often with American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, MA.

'Narnia' executive producer Perry Moore found dead in SoHo home after
apparent overdose
BY Simone Weichselbaum and Joe Kemp
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
Friday, February 18th 2011, 4:00 AM

The executive producer of the "Chronicles of Narnia" trilogy was found
dead in his SoHo apartment on Thursday after an apparent overdose,
sources said.

Perry Moore, 39, was found unconscious in the bathroom at about 9:30
a.m. by his partner, Hunter Hill, inside the W. Houston St. home they
shared, the sources said.

"We're in shock," said the producer's father, Bill Moore, 69, adding
that he just spoke to his son the night before.

"He was in a great, great mood," he said. "No one was expecting this."

Moore - who with beau Hill wrote and directed "Lake City," starring
Sissy Spacek and Rebecca Romijn - was pronounced dead shortly after
responders arrived. The exact cause of death has not been determined,
but sources said it appeared to be an overdose of OxyContin.

"We're so sad," said his father. "He's been able to reach out and
touch a lot of people."

The "Chronicles of Narnia" series, which was based on the C.S. Lewis
novels, grossed over $1.5 billion and is the 16th highest-grossing
film series of all time, according to BoxOfficeMojo.com.

The elder Moore said his son was awaiting news on a new screenplay.
"He was set to do some mighty good things," he said. "Parents are not
meant to bury their children."

Bridgett Rollins Hanne



HANNE Bridgett Rollins Hanne, died February 12, 2011, peacefully, and at
home with her husband, Paul, and sister, Yvonne, at her side. She was 54.
She bravely fought a 4 year battle with cancer. Bridgett was born
September 7, 1956 in Smyrna, Tennessee to John Evon Rollins Sr. and Ruth
Marie Hunt Kampa. She was raised in Paxton, Illinois. She began her
modeling career with the Lady Elaine Modeling Agency in Chicago. She was a
Playboy Centerfold. Her last modeling job was the Glamourcon 50 show in
Long Beach, California on November 13 and 14, 2010. Her greatest
accomplishment was creating the best home possible for her children. She
is survived by her husband of 21 years, Paul Kerby Hanne; daughter, Sara
Jane Stewart Cantwell and husband, Chad; sons, Evan Davis Stewart, Seaman
3rd Class, U.S. Navy, John Rollins Hanne, Private First Class U.S. Army;
grandchildren, Grace Elaine Cantwell, Abiageal Marie Cantwell and Orin
Peden Cantwell. She is survived by four sisters and two brothers, Elvira
Maria Gavilan Leon, Shirley Ann Gavilan Valez, William Allen Gavilan, Sr.,
and wife, Isabel, John Evon Rollins, Jr. and wife, Evelyn, Yvonne Marie
Rollins Sterner, Joy Rollins Abbuehl and husband, Dan; many nieces and
nephews; and her beloved dog, Dottie. The Family is greatly indebted for
the caring service from their beloved friend and Physician, Dr. David
Butler. A memorial Service will be held at 11 a.m. March 5, 2011 in the
Sanctuary at Bethany United Methodist Church, 10010 Anderson Mill Rd.,
Austin, Texas, 78750. Memorial contributions may be made to The American
Cancer Society , www.cancer.org, or Hospice of Austin,
www.hospiceaustin.org. Condolences may be made at www.beckchapels.com.

ANNISTON, Ala. — B-movie producer David F. Friedman has died in Anniston at the age of 87.

Friedman's niece, Bridgett Everett, said he died of heart failure Monday morning at a nursing home.

Friedman was an independent movie producer who was credited with helping create "gore" or splatter movies. He produced "Blood Feast" in 1963 for $24,500. His niece says the cult classic ended up netting $6.5 million for him and the other investors.

Friedman spent much of his career in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. He moved to Anniston in 1988 to be near family.

Visitation will be from 1-5 p.m. Saturday at K.L Brown Funeral Home in Anniston.

—Copyright 2011 Associated Press

Joanne Siegel, the wife of Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel and the model for Lois Lane, died today in California at the age of 93.

Her daughter, Laura Siegel Larson, is making funeral arrangements.

Mike Olszewski, president of the Cleveland-based, Siegel and Shuster Society, was stunned by the news.

"Joanne Siegel stands as a shining example for us all of a person who fought for justice for herself, her family and her husband's memory and did so with great dignity and resolve," he said. "She was the true model for Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's Lois Lane and lived up to the high standards they gave that character in real life."

Joanne Siegel delighted in telling the story about how she met Siegel and Shuster when she was just a teenager, 15 or 16 years old, in Depression-era Cleveland.

She placed an advertisement in the classified section of the Plain Dealer offering to model. Shuster contacted her and she modeled for him, never realizing that she would become the basis for Superman's love interest.

Over the years, other women in Cleveland claimed they were the model for Lois Lane, but Jerry Siegel said it was Joanne. He did admit that some of the traits of other women he knew might have influenced the character.

Joanne met Jerry in the 1930s, but they did not marry until 1948, after his divorce from Bella Siegel became final.

Joanne stuck with Jerry through the lean years in the late 1950s and the 1960s when Siegel found it hard to find work as a writer in the comic book field that he created. With the pending release of Warner Brothers Superman movie in 1978, and with the backing by the biggest names in the comic book industry at the time, Joanne and Jerry convinced DC Comics to give the Superman creators a lifelong stipend.

In 1999, three years after Jerry's death, the families filed a lawsuit for partial ownership of the character. After years of legal wrangling, a federal judge ruled in 2008 that the Siegel and Shuster families own a large share of Superman. The details are still being worked out.

Comics were not Siegel and Shuster's first choice. After failing to interest newspaper syndicates in their creation, they sold Superman to DC Comics and the familiar blue, red and yellow costumed character made his first appearance in "Action Comics" No. 1, in 1938.

Superman's fame grew exponentially until he became arguably the best know fictional character in the world.

Siegel wrote hundreds of stories over the years for DC, Archie and Marvel and other comic companies, but most of them were uncredited. It would be years before DC Comics agreed to include "created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster" at the beginning of every Superman story.

After Jerry died in 1996, Joanne Siegel returned to Cleveland and tried to find a place to lay half of her husband's ashes, something that he had asked her to do. She wanted to create a permanent memorial to her husband somewhere in the city where it could be viewed by the public. She wanted to donate his typewriter, scripts, his glasses and other items for the memorial, but no one in Cleveland was interested.

Some of the items eventually ended up at the Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood for the permanent Siegel and Shuster exhibit.

Joanne was last in Cleveland in 2009 for the first gathering of the Siegel and Shuster families during the Superman-themed Screaming Tiki comic book convention.

During that weekend, she visited Jerry Siegel's former house on Kimberley Avenue in Glenville which had recently been restored. Fans from around the world raised more than $100,000 in an Internet auction that sold works of art and other items donated by the biggest names in the comic book business.

A large Superman-style shield and a steel fence was erected in from of the house. A similar shield and reproduction of the pages of the first Superman story decorate a fence on Amor Avenue at the site of the apartment where Shuster lived.

Last week, the city put up street signs bearing the familiar stylized "S" insignia for Superman and honorary street names "Joe Shuster Lane" and "Lois Lane."

The signs are at the intersection of Amor Avenue and Parkwood Drive, at the site of the former Shuster home.Similar signs have been erected at East 105th Street and Kimberley Avenue, where Siegel lived and where the two did much of their work.

Many of the relatives are members of the Cleveland-based Siegel and Shuster Society, a group formed to honor the memory of the Man of Steel and his creators.

"It saddens me that she is gone," said Jerry Siegel's cousin, Irving Fine, who is a member of the society. "I wish she could have been around to see some of the things the society plans to do."


The veteran character actor with a flair for German-type accents also starred as the Nazi playwright in "The Producers."

Kenneth Mars, a farcical character actor best known for playing the police inspector with a creaky prosthetic arm in Mel Brooks’ 1974 classic Young Frankenstein, died Saturday of pancreatic cancer at his home in Granada Hills, Calif. He was 75.

With a flair for German-type accents, Mars also appeared as the insane Nazi playwright who creates Springtime for Hitler in Brooks’ The Producers (1968) and as a Yugoslavian shyster in Peter Bogdanovich’s What’s Up, Doc? (1972).

Mars has regular roles on TV as ranch owner Otto Mannkusser on the Fox series Malcolm in the Middle, as W.D. “Bud” Prize on Norman Lear’s Fernwood Tonight and its offshoot, America Tonight, in the late 1970s and as Paula Prentiss and Richard Benjamin’s fireman neighbor in He & She, a 1967-68 CBS series.

The Chicago native cultivated a robust career as a voice actor during his 40-plus years in show business, working on such projects as The Jetsons, The FIintstones Kids, The Little Mermaid, Duckman and Life With Louie. He was Grandpa Longneck in many installments of The Land Before Time series that ran on film, video and TV.

In a take-off on Lionel Atwill’s local police Inspector Krogh character with a mechanical wooden arm in 1939’s Son of Frankenstein, Mars’ Inspector Kemp in Young Frankenstein sports an eye patch and monocle over the same eye, a disjointed wooden arm that moves in all manner of ways and an accent so thick even his own countrymen can’t understand him.

Mars also appeared in the Woody Allen films Radio Days (1987) and Shadows and Fog (1991), and in another dramatic turn, opposite Shirley MacLaine in 1971’s Desperate Characters. His stage appearances included the role of Martin Eliot in The Affair and Sir Evelyn Oakleigh in Anything Goes.

Survivors include daughters Susannah Mars Johnson and Rebecca Mars Tipton; their husbands, Gary Johnson and Wayne Tipton; and grandchildren Alex Tipton, Kate Johnson, Noah Tipton, Nick Tipton, Olivia Johnson and Sam Tipton.

Services will be private. Remembrances on his behalf can be made to Smile Train in Washington D.C.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/young-frankenstein-actor-kenneth-mars-99482

FROM: The San Francisco Chronicle ~
By John Shea



When Gino Cimoli stepped in the batter's box at Seals Stadium on April 15,
1958, major-league baseball was born on the West Coast.


Cimoli was a Brooklyn Dodger but a San Franciscan at heart. He was inserted
atop the lineup by manager Walter Alston, who knew the significance of the
North Beach legend and kid from Galileo High School becoming the first
big-league batter following the Giants' and Dodgers' relocation from New
York.


Cimoli died Saturday morning of kidney and heart complications. He was 81.


"Gino was just an all-around nice guy," said friend Bob Tobener, who had
helped organize functions in recent years at which Cimoli spoke. "He was a
great athlete. Out of high school, people said he was a better basketball
player than baseball player. . . .
He was a really good hitter."


Cimoli struck out off Ruben Gomez to begin California's inaugural big-league
season, and the Dodgers lost 8-0 -- not quite as impactful for Cimoli as the
Dodgers' 1957 opener when he homered off Robin Roberts in the 12th to beat
Philadelphia.


In 1960, Cimoli contributed to the Pirates' stunning World Series triumph
over the Yankees, hitting a single to help trigger a decisive rally in Game
7. He hit .265 in 10 seasons and led the American League in triples in 1962.


He played for seven teams (including the Dodgers in both Brooklyn and L.A.),
and his daughter, Cherryl Keast, said, "Our life totally revolved around
baseball. Baseball was our life, not that that was a bad thing. We lived
where he played."


Keast called her father "just a very generous person."


With the Pirates down 7-4 in the final game of the '60 Series, Cimoli pinch
hit for Elroy Face and singled off Bobby Shantz to ignite a rally that put
the Pirates ahead 9-7. The Yanks tied it in the ninth, and, of course, Bill
Mazeroski won it for Pittsburgh with a Series-ending homer.


Cimoli played in one other World Series but never got an at-bat in 1956,
which featured Don Larsen's perfect game. "He said, 'If I was in that game,
I would've gotten a hit, " Tobener said. "That's the way Gino was. An
all-around nice guy."


Cimoli is survived by his companion of 39 years, Lorraine Vigli; two
daughters, Keast and Linda Close; three grandchildren and a great
grandaughter. His daughters' mother is Irene Cimoli.


Cimoli, born in 1929, had a long minor-league career before breaking into
the bigs with the '56 Dodgers. His final season came with the '65 Angels,
and he worked for UPS for many years while staying true to his North Beach
roots.


Two weeks ago, Cimoli and Vigli moved from San Francisco to Roseville.


"Just an all-around guy," Vigli said. "He loved to play cards, go to Reno,
enjoyed life in general. He followed the game. The Giants were still famous
to him, being a hometown boy."


The couple had planned to attend November's 50-year anniversary of the '60
Series -- including an NBC telecast of Game 7, shown on the MLB Network --
but the trip never materialized because of Cimoli's failing health.

Pamela Jean Bryant (born February 8, 1959, in Indianapolis, Indiana; died December 4, 2010) was an American model and actress. She was Playboy magazine's Playmate of the Month for its April 1978 issue. Her centerfold was photographed by Richard Fegley.

Bryant first appeared in Playboy in the September 1977 pictorial "The Girls of the Big Ten". (She was attending Indiana University at the time). She went on to have an extensive acting career, appearing in films such as H.O.T.S. (1979), Don't Answer the Phone (1980) and Private Lessons (1981). Bryant also appeared on TV shows such as Magnum, P.I.; Fantasy Island; and The Love Boat.

She worked as an artist before her death.

Sir George Shearing, the ebullient jazz pianist who wrote the standard "Lullaby of Birdland" and had a string of hits both with and without his quintet, has died. He was 91.

Shearing, blind since birth, died early Monday morning in Manhattan of congestive heart failure, his longtime manager Dale Sheets said.

"He was a totally one-of-a-kind performer," said Sheets. "It was something wonderful to see, to watch him work."

Shearing had been a superstar of the jazz world since a couple of years after he arrived in the United States in 1947 from his native England, where he was already hugely popular. The George Shearing Quintet's first big hit came in 1949 with a version of songwriter Harry Warren's "September in the Rain."

He remained active well into his 80s, releasing a CD called "Lullabies of Birdland" as well as a memoir, "Lullaby of Birdland," in early 2004. In March of that year, though, he was hospitalized after suffering a fall at his home. It took him months to recover, and he largely retired from public appearances after that.

Sheets said that while Shearing ceased working, he never stop playing piano.

"He was getting better periodically and doing quite well up into about a month ago," said Sheets.

In a 1987 Associated Press interview, Shearing said the ingredients for a great performance were "a good audience, a good piano, and a good physical feeling, which is not available to every soul, every day of everyone's life.

"Your intent, then, is to speak to your audience in a language you know, to try to communicate in a way that will bring to them as good a feeling as you have yourself," he said.

In 2007, Shearing was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his contribution to music. When the honor was announced, he said it was "amazing to receive an honor for something I absolutely love doing."

Shearing's bebop-influenced sound became identified with a quintet _ piano, vibes, guitar, bass and drums _ which he put together in 1949. More recently, he played mostly solo or with only a bassist. He excelled in the "locked hands" technique, in which the pianist plays parallel melodies with the two hands, creating a distinctly full sound.

Among the luminaries with whom Shearing worked over the years: Tito Puente, Nancy Wilson, Nat "King" Cole, Mel Torme, Marian McPartland, the Boston Pops, Peggy Lee, Billy Taylor, Don Thompson, Stephane Grappelli and Sarah Vaughan, whom Shearing called "the best contralto in pop."

When Torme won Grammys two years in a row in 1983-84, for "An Evening With George Shearing and Mel Torme" and "Top Drawer," he blasted the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences for failing to nominate his partner, Shearing, either time.

"It's hard to image a more compatible musical partner," Shearing said after Torme died in 1999. "I humbly put forth that Mel and I had the best musical marriage in many a year. We literally breathed together during our countless performances." And he told Down Beat magazine: "Mel was one of the few people that I played with whom I felt I worked with and not for."

Shearing wrote "Lullaby of Birdland" in 1952; it's named for the famous New York jazz club. He acknowledged composing it in just 10 minutes. "But I always tell people, it took me 10 minutes and 35 years in the business," he told The Christian Science Monitor in 1980. "Just in case anybody thinks there are any totally free rides left, there are none!"

At an 80th birthday celebration at Carnegie Hall in 1999, Shearing introduced "Lullaby" by joking: "I have been credited with writing 300 songs. Two hundred ninety-nine enjoyed a bumpy ride from relative obscurity to total oblivion. Here is the other one."

Among other songs recorded by the George Shearing Quintet: "I'll Never Smile Again," "Mambo Inn," "Conception," "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off" and "East of the Sun (and West of the Moon)."

The landmark albums he and the quintet made include "The Swingin's Mutual," backing up vocalist Wilson, and "Nat King Cole Sings/George Shearing Plays."

But Shearing laid the quintet to rest in 1978, except for occasional revivals.

"I needed a breath of fresh air and a chance to grow individually," he told the AP. "What I find as a soloist or working with a bassist, is that I can address myself more to the proposition of being a complete pianist; I find a lot more pianistic freedom."

He was already working at his memoir in 1987, saying he was using a Braille word processor. "I think there are a lot of things to be told from my view _ the world of sound and feel," he said. Years earlier, in a 1953 AP interview, he had said he referred to his blindness as little as possible because, "I want to get by as a human being, not as a blind person."

As he grew older, he spoke frankly of aging.

"I'm not sure that technique and improvisational abilities improve with age," the pianist said. "I think what improves is your sense of judgment, of maturity. I think you become a much better editor of your own material."

Shearing was born Aug. 13, 1919, to a working-class family and grew up in the Battersea district of London.

A prodigy despite his inability to see printed music, he studied classical music for several years before deciding to "test the water on my own" instead of pursuing additional studies at a university. Shearing began his career at a London pub when he was 16.

During World War II, the young pianist teamed with Grappelli, the French jazz violinist, who spent the war years in London. Grappelli recalled to writer Leonard Feather in 1976 that he and Shearing would "play during air raids. Was not very amusing."

Shearing had a daughter, Wendy, with his first wife, the former Trixie Bayes, whom he married in 1941. The marriage ended in divorce in 1973 and two years later he married singer Ellie Geffert.

The popularity of the Shearing quartet's records a half-century ago had some writers suggesting he didn't take his jazz seriously enough. In a 2002 New York Times piece, critic Terry Teachout said such talk was beside the point.

"The time has come," Teachout wrote, "for George Shearing to be acknowledged not as a commercial purveyor of bop-and-water, but as an exceptionally versatile artist who has given pleasure to countless listeners for whom such critical hairsplitting is irrelevant."

Shearing is survived by his wife, Geffert.

http://www.newser.com/article/d9lcme8g2/jazz-great-george-shearing-who-wrote-lullaby-of-birdland-dies-at-91.html

L.A. Weekly's 2005 Queen of the Angels, Betty Garrett, died Saturday morning of natural causes at UCLA Medical Center following a brief illness. She was surrounded by her family at the time of her death. She was 91.


A revered figure in the Los Angeles theater community, she was the recipient of nearly every artistic award the city could bestow, including Career Achievement Awards from the Los Angeles Drama Critics' Circle and the Ovation Awards, and the Queen of the Angels Award from L.A. Weekly. She was a founding member of the 49-year-old Theatre West, and was moderator of its Musical Comedy workshop until the time of her death. She frequently appeared on the Theatre West stage. Her final shows there included "Nunsense," the Los Angeles premiere of Noel Coward's "Waiting in the Wings," and a revue, "Betty Garrett, Closet Songwriter."


A Broadway star, she appeared in thirteen Broadway shows, among them "Call Me Mister," "Bells Are Ringing," "The Supporting Cast," the revival of "Follies," and the 1963 production of "Spoon River Anthology" originally developed at Theatre West.



She appeared in a dozen films, including classic Hollywood musicals including "Words and Music," "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," "Neptune's Daughter," "On The Town," "Hit Parade of 1951," and "My Sister Eileen."


She was also a popular television performer, best known for her work on "All in the Family," for which she received a Golden Globe ®, and "Laverne and Shirley." She received an Emmy ® nomination in 2003 for a guest appearance on "Becker." Her final TV appearance was on "Grey's Anatomy" in 2006.


Betty Garrett received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2003.


A longtime social activist, in her later years she was active in supporting activities of charities assisting those living with HIV/AIDS.


Widowed in 1975 from the late actor Larry Parks, she is survived by her son , actor Andrew Parks and his wife Katy Melody; her son, composer Garrett Parks and his wife, actor Karen Culliver Parks; and a granddaughter, Madison Claire Parks.


A memorial will be planned for a later date. Donations in Ms. Garrett's memory can be made to Theatre West, the Actors' Fund, or S.T.A.G.E.

Alex Napier, who played bass for the Cobras with Stevie Ray Vaughan and in the bands of both Charlie and Will Sexton, died Thursday morning after a bout with liver cancer. He was 59.

He was one of the white musicians from the Dallas-Fort Worth area, including Jimmie and Stevie Ray Vaughan, Paul Ray, Denny Freeman and Doyle Bramhall, who helped establish Austin's blues town reputation during the "cosmic cowboy" era.

During the late '60s, he did light shows at the Vulcan Gas Company and opened a club in Westlake that eventually became Soap Creek Saloon.

A founding member of the Leroi Brothers, Napier passed away at his home in DeSoto, his nephew Mark Stanley said.

In addition to being a noted bassist, Napier was an unforgettable character, with a great sense of humor and a sly grin.

"He had more stories than any book will ever be able to write about the Texas blues days in the '60s-2000s," said Steve Dean, who often booked Napier's bands at the old AusTex Lounge.


Tony Malinosky, the former Brooklyn Dodger who was the oldest-living
major-leaguer, passed away Tuesday at age 101, the Los Angeles Dodgers
said.


Malinosky played 35 games at third base and shortstop for Brooklyn in
1937, batting .228 in 79 at-bats. According to Baseball-Reference.com,
his career-best performance was a 3-for-5 day against the St. Louis
Cardinals. The Dodgers purchased his contract from the Pittsburgh
Pirates the previous winter.

Character actress, Peggy Rea, 89, known for her many roles in television series, and a number of films, died at her home in Toluca Lake on February 5th. She died of complications from congestive heart failure. Peggy was born in Los Angeles to her parents, Jack and Ruth Rea, on March 31, 1921. Peggy began her television acting career in the 1960's as a member of Red Skelton's TV stock company. Among her recurring roles in television were as Olivia Walton's cousin, Rose Burton, on "The Walton's", as man chasing, Lulu Hogg on "The Dukes of Hazzard", as Ivy Baker, the mother of Suzanne Sommers' character on "Step by Step", and as Brett Butler's mom, Jean Kelly on "Grace Under Fire". Peggy also appeared in such television programs as "I Love Lucy", "Sergeant Bilko", "Bonanza", "Gunsmoke" "Ironside", "Hunter", "Marcus Welby, M.D.", "Burke's Law", and "MacGyver". Among her many film credits are "Cold Turkey" (1971) "In Country" (1989), "Love Field" (1992), and "Made in America" (1993). Interment will take place at 11:00 a.m., on Monday, February 28, at Santa Barbara Cemetery, 901 Channel Drive. Santa Barbara, in the Mausoleum in the Pines Courtyard. Published in Los Angeles Daily News on February 9, 2011


Born Oct. 7, 1909 in Collinsville, Ill., Malinosky attended Whittier
College in California with Pres. Richard Nixon, according to the
Dodgers, and served in the U.S. Army in World War II.


The Dodgers honored him at Dodger Stadium in 2009 on the occasion of
his 100th birthday. He was living in Oxnard, Calif. when he passed
away.


"Tony lived an incredibly full life, both on and off the field," the
Dodgers said in a statement. "He remained a Dodger fan his whole life
and his visit to Dodger Stadium in 2009 gave the organization a great
opportunity to celebrate not only his 100th birthday, but the Dodger
chapter of his life that meant so much to him. He will be most
certainly missed by all who knew him."

TV/film actor who has mostly been on stage:
John McMartin, is there any newspaper articles or information on he and his career out there anywhere.
I saw him about a week ago on a Rockford Files as a killer, and it reminded me on how good of an actor he is.

Chuck Tanner, who led the Pittsburgh Pirates to the 1979 World Series championship, has died.

He was 81.

Born July 4, 1929 in New Castle, Lawrence County, Tanner led the Pirates to second-place finishes in the National League East during his first two seasons as manager. In 1979 they won 98 games, held off the Montreal Expos and captured the division by two games.

Tony Malinosky, the former Brooklyn Dodger who was the oldest-living major-leaguer, passed away Tuesday at age 101, the Los Angeles Dodgers said.


Malinosky played 35 games at third base and shortstop for Brooklyn in 1937, batting .228 in 79 at-bats. According to Baseball-Reference.com, his career-best performance was a 3-for-5 day against the St. Louis Cardinals. The Dodgers purchased his contract from the Pittsburgh Pirates the previous winter.

Born Oct. 7, 1909 in Collinsville, Ill., Malinosky attended Whittier College in California with Pres. Richard Nixon, according to the Dodgers, and served in the U.S. Army in World War II.

The Dodgers honored him at Dodger Stadium in 2009 on the occasion of his 100th birthday. He was living in Oxnard, Calif. when he passed away.

"Tony lived an incredibly full life, both on and off the field," the Dodgers said in a statement. "He remained a Dodger fan his whole life and his visit to Dodger Stadium in 2009 gave the organization a great opportunity to celebrate not only his 100th birthday, but the Dodger chapter of his life that meant so much to him. He will be most certainly missed by all who knew him."

http

After sweeping the Cincinnati Reds to claim the NL pennant, the Pirates beat the Baltimore Orioles in seven games in the World Series, their first title in eight years.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/pirates/s_722497.html

AMES, Iowa - Noted Midwestern raconteur Omer L. Baumgartner passed away at this home in Ames, Iowa on Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2011. He was 90 years old. Mr. Baumgartner had lived a long and passionate life dedicated to rambunctious performances and dairy products.

Born on a dairy farm in Walnut, Ill., Baumgartner was prodigious with the movement of manure from an early age, and exercising these and other talents, earned recognition for his National 4-H Grand Champion Dairy Heifer, Clementine's Ramona, in 1930 at the age of 10. After this debut, and as the Depression raged, Baumgartner cut his teeth in the livestock industry while attending hundreds of county and state fairs, showing and selling cattle, frying oysters, skinning rabbits, and drinking whiskey. While still a freshman at the University of Illinois, he successfully quelled the great dairy upraising of 1938, averting a desperate ice cream shortage in Chicago, and was immediately recruited, without finishing college, by the state's Guernsey Breeders Association as a field agent.
Despite never learning to cook anything other than fried oysters, Baumgartner attained the rank of captain during World War II for running mess halls feeding over 5,000 in Tennessee and Alabama for the Army Air Corps. He was wildly popular with the troops for his mess hours bongo drum performances accompanied by dancing girls. Baumgartner notably worked for L.S. Heath and Company, running the dairy division and inventing Heath Bar ice cream in 1951. He also co-ran Wilkinson's Office Supplies with his wife Jattie Wilkinson Baumgartner, serving one-third of the state of Illinois and parts of Iowa. Baumgartner disliked vegetables his whole life. Despite consuming more than 2,000 pounds of butter, he never suffered from any kind of heart disease. His last meal was ice cream.
Baumgartner is survived by his daughters, Donna Prizgintas in Ames, Iowa, and Mary Baumgartner Levner in Portsmith, Va.; and grandchildren Diana Prizgintas in New Zealand, Jack Levner in New York, Arion Thiboumery in Minnesota, and Stephanie Levner in New York; and great-grandchildren Max Prizgintas and Ada Levner.
Memorials may be directed to: Red Oak United Methodist Church, Walnut, Ill.
Online condolences may be sent to www.grandonfuneralandcremationcare.com. Published in The Register-Mail on February 12, 2011

Frank Whitten, the New Zealand actor famous for playing Grandpa Ted West on the television series Outrageous Fortune, has died at the age of 68.

A statement from South Pacific Pictures in Auckland last night said Whitten, who has been a familiar face on New Zealand and Australian television and cinema screens, died peacefully in his sleep on Saturday morning.

"All of us are deeply saddened to hear of Frank Whitten's passing," said John Barnett, the company's chief executive.

Barnett acknowledged Whitten's three decades performing on various platforms on TV ONE's Breakfast this morning.

"Frank had created a character that, I think, was a favourite in hundreds of thousands of households, but he had a very long and distinguished career as an actor," he said.

When asked if he represented a person New Zealanders could relate to, Barnett pointed out two characteristics: "His irreverent take on the world and his ability to express a view that many people feel but often don't say.

"He wasn't like Ted West, but he certainly had that sense of humour and he certainly had a healthy disregard for, shall we say, some structures. And he was a lot of fun," he said.

Whitten won a best supporting actor award at the Air New Zealand Screen Awards in 2007 for his performance in Outrageous Fortune.

Speaking on behalf of her Outrageous Fortune cast mates, Whitten's co-star and friend Robyn Malcolm said: "We feel deeply for Frank's family and our thoughts, love and grief are with them.

"We were Frank's screen family for only a few years but in that time we got to know him and adore him as a wicked, irreverent man of lethal wit, a heart of gold and one of the best actors we'll ever work with. We all respected him enormously but in good 'Outrageous' spirit we treated him with the disrespect and irreverence he loved.

"Like his screen character he never said a lot but when he did it mattered. He'll hate that we are saying lovely things about him, but tough Frank - you deserve it."

Whitten's family will hold a small private funeral service this week.

L.A. Weekly's 2005 Queen of the Angels, Betty Garrett, died Saturday morning of natural causes at UCLA Medical Center following a brief illness. She was surrounded by her family at the time of her death. She was 91.


A revered figure in the Los Angeles theater community, she was the recipient of nearly every artistic award the city could bestow, including Career Achievement Awards from the Los Angeles Drama Critics' Circle and the Ovation Awards, and the Queen of the Angels Award from L.A. Weekly. She was a founding member of the 49-year-old Theatre West, and was moderator of its Musical Comedy workshop until the time of her death. She frequently appeared on the Theatre West stage. Her final shows there included "Nunsense," the Los Angeles premiere of Noel Coward's "Waiting in the Wings," and a revue, "Betty Garrett, Closet Songwriter."


A Broadway star, she appeared in thirteen Broadway shows, among them "Call Me Mister," "Bells Are Ringing," "The Supporting Cast," the revival of "Follies," and the 1963 production of "Spoon River Anthology" originally developed at Theatre West.



She appeared in a dozen films, including classic Hollywood musicals including "Words and Music," "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," "Neptune's Daughter," "On The Town," "Hit Parade of 1951," and "My Sister Eileen."


She was also a popular television performer, best known for her work on "All in the Family," for which she received a Golden Globe ®, and "Laverne and Shirley." She received an Emmy ® nomination in 2003 for a guest appearance on "Becker." Her final TV appearance was on "Grey's Anatomy" in 2006.


Betty Garrett received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2003.


A longtime social activist, in her later years she was active in supporting activities of charities assisting those living with HIV/AIDS.


Widowed in 1975 from the late actor Larry Parks, she is survived by her son , actor Andrew Parks and his wife Katy Melody; her son, composer Garrett Parks and his wife, actor Karen Culliver Parks; and a granddaughter, Madison Claire Parks.


A memorial will be planned for a later date. Donations in Ms. Garrett's memory can be made to Theatre West, the Actors' Fund, or S.T.A.G.E.