Lee Van Cleef was one of great Western actors. He also carved a niche in gangster movies ofthe 1950’s. He was born in 1925 in New Jersey to Dutch parents. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War Two. After demob, he had a brief career as an accountant. He made his mark on film as one of the evil gunslingers eager to mow down Gary Cooper in the classic 1952 Western, “High Noon”. He went on to feature in “Kansas City Confidential”, “The Beat From 20,000 Fathoms” and “Vice Squad”. He was a prolific actor in the 1950’s and then became a major Western star with his lead role in 1965 with Cliont Eastwood in Sergio Leone’s “For A Few Dollars More”. He went on to star with Eastwood again in “The Godd, the Bad and The Ugly”. His last film was “Thieves of Fortune” in 1989, the year he died at the age of 64. He is one of my favourite actors.
“New York Times” obituary:
Lee Van Cleef, the film actor whose steely eyes and rugged features led to a long career portraying Western arch-villains, died, apparently of a heart attack, early today at St. John’s Regional Medical Center. He was 64 years old and lived in Oxnard. Mr. Van Cleef, who had a history of heart disease, collapsed at his home, about 60 miles north of Los Angeles, late Friday night, said a deputy Ventura County coroner, Craig Stevens.
Mr. Van Cleef got his first film break as one of the desperadoes faced down by Gary Cooper in the 1952 movie ”High Noon.” He went on to play a series of gunmen and caught the eye of the Italian director Sergio Leone, famous for his ”spaghetti Westerns.” ‘Real Violence Turns You Off’ Their association led to Mr. Van Cleef’s starring in ”The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” portraying ”the bad.”
Among Mr. Van Cleef’s other film credits were the Westerns ”A Fistful of Dollars” ”For a Few Dollars More,” ”Take a Hard Ride,” ”Sabata,” ”El Condor,” and ”The Magnificent Seven Ride!” He also acted in the science-fiction thriller ”Escape From New York.” ”I believe in showing real violence, not toy violence,” Mr. Van Cleef said in a 1970 interview. ”Real violence turns you off because you know it’s not the thing to do. If you show violence realistic enough people don’t want to do it.” Lee Van Cleef was born in Somerville, N.J., on Jan. 9, 1925. His first job was as a farm worker in his home state. He then worked as an accountant in Somerville before beginning in his movie career in 1950.
He is survived by his wife, the former Barbara Havelone, and three children from a previous marriage, Alan, Deborah and David.
IMDB entry:
One of the great movie villains, Lee Van Cleef started out as an accountant. He served in the U.S. Navy aboard minesweepers and subchasers during World War II. After the war he worked as an office administrator, becoming involved in amateur theatrics in his spare time. An audition for a professional role led to a touring company job in “Mr. Roberts”. His performance was seen by Stanley Kramer, who cast him as henchman Jack Colby in High Noon (1952), a role that brought him great recognition despite the fact that he had no dialogue. For the next decade he played a string of memorably villainous characters, primarily in westerns but also in crime dramas such as The Big Combo (1955). His hawk nose and steely, slit eyes seemed destined to keep him always in the realm of heavies, but in the mid-’60s Sergio Leone cast him as the tough but decent Col. Mortimer oppositeClint Eastwood in For a Few Dollars More (1965). A new career as a western hero (or at least anti-hero) opened up, and Van Cleef became an international star, though in films of decreasing quality. In the 1980s he moved easily into action and martial-arts movies, and starred in The Master (1984), a TV series featuring almost non-stop martial arts action. He died of a heart attack in December 1989, and was buried at Forest Lawn in the Hollywood Hills.
– IMDb Mini Biography By: Jim Beaver <jumblejim@prodigy.net>
The above IMDB entry can also be accessed online here.
Herbert MarshallHerbert Marshall Angel, poster, US poster art, from left: Marlene Dietrich, Herbert Marshall, 1937. (Photo by LMPC via Getty Images)
Herbert Marshall was a British actor who had an amazingly long career in Hollywood movies from the late 1920’s until the late 1960’s. He was born in London in 1890. He was a soldier in World War One and lost a leg in combat. He was leading man to some of the major actresses of their time, including Great Garbo, Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins and Joan Crawford. He was especially terrific in “The Little Foxes” in 1941. His last movie was “The Third Day” in 1965 with George Peppard and Elizabeth Ashley.
TCM overview:Urbane mature, British leading man whose good looks and finely modulated voice made him an ideal romantic lead. Marshall starred opposite such stars as Marlene Dietrich, in “Blonde Venus” (1932), and Greta Garbo, in “The Painted Veil” (1934), as well as in two Hitchcock films, “Murder” (1930) and “Foreign Correspondent” (1940). He proved an able opponent-husband to Bette Davis in “The Letter” (1940) and “The Little Foxes” (1941), both directed by William Wyler, and displayed a delightful flair for comedy in Ernst Lubitsch’s brilliant “Trouble in Paradise” (1932). The son of actors Percy F. Marshall and Ethel May Turner, he was married to actresses Edna Best (1928-1940) and Boots Mallory. Marshall lost a leg during WWI and his wooden replacement limb was known to trouble him considerably through the years.
Virginia Grey was a major character actress in Hollywood films especially in the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s. She is especially associated with the film s produced by Ross Hunter. She was born in 1917 in Los Angeles. Her major movies include “All That Heaven Allows” in 1955, “Back Street” in 1961, “Madame X” in 1965 and “Airport” in 1970. She died in 2004 aged 87.
“Telegraph” obituary:
Virginia Grey, who has died aged 87, spent a career before the cameras hoping for a role that would catapult her to international stardom; but she never showed the spark which launched her contemporaries Ruth Hussey and Laraine Day, and had to content herself with second lead ingenues.
In more than 100 films she had supporting roles to such stars as Joan Crawford, Betty Grable, Susan Hayward, and even the Marx Brothers (in The Big Store, 1941). Off screen she attracted publicity by dating Clark Gable; she gave him a dachshund. But although she waited patiently for his divorce from Rhea Langham to come through, Gable married Carole Lombard instead. Heartbroken, Virginia Grey vowed never to let herself become too close to a man again and, although George Raft became a figure in her life, she never married. Pressed to talk about her affair with Gable in 2003, she replied simply: “I adored him, I always will.”
Virginia Grey was born in Hollywood on March 22 1917, the daughter of Ray Grey, an original Keystone Cop who became Universal Studio’s comedy films director; among her babysitters was the actress Gloria Swanson. After Ray’s death in 1925, Virginia’s mother became a film cutter at the studio.
When Mrs Grey heard that the studio was planning to remake Uncle Tom’s Cabin in 1927, she encouraged young Virginia to do a screen test, which won her the role of Little Eva. Parts followed in Heart to Heart, with Mary Astor (1927); Jazz Mad, with Marian Nixon and George Lewis (1928); and the western The Michigan Kid, about two boys who become rivals for the same girl (1928).
Virginia Grey then retired for three years to go to school, but – after starting to train as a nurse – she returned to the screen in the indifferent comedy Misbehaving Ladies.
Tall and elegant with shoulder-length hair, Virginia Grey embarked on a tireless journey through pictures, playing small parts in Mary Pickford’s Secrets (1933) and in the musicals Dames (1934), Gold Diggers of 1935 (1934), and in The Great Ziegfeld (1936), which won Luise Rainer an Oscar for Best Actress. At the same time, Virginia Grey modelled for Vanity Fair.
Her fortunes rose in 1937 when she was given the lead in the MGM “B” movie Bad Guy, opposite Bruce Cabot. She was then loaned to Republic Pictures for Ladies in Distress (1938), only to become one of “Les Blondes” chorus line in Idiot’s Delight (1939), in which Clark Gable was a dancer. Her next big chance came when MGM gave her a sizeable build-up in Thunder Afloat (1939), in which she played Wallace Beery’s daughter. The veteran actor thought that she had an understated talent, and told the studio head Louis B Mayer: “Let her free. You might learn something.”
Her next film was The Women (1939), in which she had a small part as a perfume-counter assistant; one critic singled her out as “particularly catty” and “a delight”. Virginia Grey recalled that while Joan Crawford was sweet to her, the star bickered with Norma Shearer over billing. Virginia Grey’s other films of that period included Sweet Rosie O’Grady (1943), Wyoming (1947) and Cecil B De Mille’s Unconquered (1947).
With the advent of television, she rode the range in such westerns as The Fighting Lawman (1952), Desert Pursuit (1952) and The Last Command (1955). Some regarded her finest role on the small screen as that of the ailing former sweetheart of Ward Bond in Wagon Train; but she also made a mark as a fading star who sees Kim Novak winning “her” part in the stage production of Rain.
Most important for Virginia Grey’s film career during the 1960s was her close friendship with the producer Ross Hunter. He first used her in his plush All That Heaven Allows, then cast her as a succession of well-dressed spinsters, secretaries and as a headmistress in Tammy, Tell Me True (1961). In Airport (1970), she had a tiny part as a passenger with a precocious brat of a child.
Perhaps her most interesting role during the twilight of her career was that of Irene Talbot, a bored, rich housewife living in Mexico who seeks the pleasures of a gigolo in Love Has Many Faces (1965). Bejewelled, and sporting Edith Head creations and an unconvincing blonde wig to make her look as youthful as possible, Virginia Grey had a somewhat desperate, eager-to-please look which was perhaps a telling commentary on her own life.
In 1980, after a short run in the play Sugar and Spice, which fizzled in Toronto, she found herself a new agent and appeared in the soap operas General Hospital, Moneychangers and Love, American Style.
Virginia Grey, who died on July 31, took a pragmatic view of her career: “I consider myself a professional who acts, not to express my soul or elevate the cinema, but to entertain and get paid for it.”
The above “Telegraph” can also be accessed online here.
John McCormack was a world famous tenor from the 1910s until the 1940’s. He was born in Athlone, Ireland in 1884. In 1905 he went to Italy to train for a singing career. In 1911 he sang with Dame Nellie Melba in Australia. He sang in all the major concert hall throughout the world. In 1929 he had the lead role in the Hollywood movie “Song O mY Heart” with Maureen O’Sullivan. In 1932 he sang before thousands of people in the Phoenix Park in Dublin at the Eucharistic Congress. He was subsequently made a Papal Count. In 1937 he was featured in the glorious British made “Wings of the Morning” with Annabella and Henry Fonda. He died in 1945.
The year was 1906. The setting was a stage in Savona, Italy, a northwestern port town south of Milan. The opera to be performed that particular evening was L’Amico Fritz by Pietro Mascagni, with a fresh-faced 21-year-old named Giovanni Foli included among the cast members. Though he had only a supporting role, Foli earned quite a bit of attention for his performance. This should not be surprising. After all, this performer would go on to conquer the world, becoming one of the most popular singers of the first half of the 20th century. He shattered box office records during his many trips to the U.S., where he became one of radio’s first mega-stars, and was, according to one account, “the best-paid concert singer in history.”
If you can’t recall any popular singers named Giovanni Foli, that’s because it was a decidedly operatic stage name for the acclaimed Irish tenor John McCormack (1884 – 1945).
“Almost everybody who owned a talking machine in the days of World War I was sure to have, along with Caruso’s Pagliacci, John McCormack’s ‘Mother Machree,’” Time noted, after McCormack died at the age of 61. “He sang up & down the land, and was always good for a benefit — for the Irish, the Red Cross, the Catholics, the U.S. (he sold a half-million dollars’ worth of Liberty Bonds).”
A Gala Concert To some, McCormack is simply Ireland’s greatest musical artist. Others have compared his massive U.S. popularity in the 1920s to that of Elvis Presley in the 1950s. McCormack also paved the way for later crooning stars such as Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra.
But while audiences and critics remain fascinated with Elvis, Sinatra and Crosby, McCormack’s light has dimmed somewhat. In terms of sheer talent and popularity, however, McCormack should always be remembered — especially by the Irish in America.
Towards that end, a very special concert will be held at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium in Manhattan on December 17, 2009. “Icon of an Age: A John McCormack Gala Tribute Concert” will feature songs made popular by McCormack.
Next year also marks the 80th anniversary of another important McCormack concert, this one in Dublin. The year was 1929, and the Irish were celebrating the 100th anniversary of Catholic emancipation. The world, of course, would soon be sinking into a Great Depression. Ireland itself was only a few years removed from a grueling Civil War. But McCormack was able to transcend these divisions, blending art, faith and history through his powerful music, which one critic has said “speaks from the heart, to the heart.”
So who, exactly, was John McCormack? How did a fellow dubbed Giovanni Foli become the first in a long line of popular Irish tenors? And what role did he play in cultivating Irish-American pride?
McCormack was born on June 14, 1884, the fourth of 11 children, and baptized at St. Mary’s Church in Athlone, County Westmeath. McCormack’s parents worked in nearby mills, but despite this working-class upbringing, young John was able to cultivate his impressive singing talents. Though countries such as Italy are better known for producing opera singers, Ireland’s musical tradition served McCormack well. John sang in the church choir as did his father Andrew. He went to the 1903 Feis Ceoil (the Irish National Music Festival) in Dublin and emerged as a gold medal winner.
McCormack first gained U.S. attention while performing at the Irish Village section of the 1904 World Exposition in St. Louis. His engagement was short-lived as he objected to the “stage-Irish” aspect of the show. He quit, but not before he met the love of his life, Lily Foley, also a member of the troupe, whom he would marry two years later.
It was a performance by another towering artist the following year that left a lasting impression upon McCormack. At London’s Covent Garden, McCormack watched Enrico Caruso in La Boheme. “The best lesson I ever received,” McCormack later said.
McCormack now knew what he wanted to do, and also knew he had the raw talent. So, he traveled to Italy, where the acclaimed Vincenzo Sabatini was charged with honing the Irishman’s technical singing skills.
McCormack then made his famous debut in Savano, before, in the fall of 1907, he made his London debut. McCormack was just 23 years old, making him the youngest principal tenor ever to sing at Covent Garden, according to the John McCormack Society, founded in 1960 to preserve the Irish tenor’s great achievements.
McCormack quickly showed he had the stuff to be an international star, selling out shows in Ireland, England, the U.S. and Australia. This wide appeal can be explained, in part, by the fact that McCormack blended high artistic music and more popular, accessible singing. In fact, McCormack biographer Gordon Ledbetter believes the tenor was the last singer to successfully bring together such divergent styles. Attempting to convey McCormack’s widespread fan base to contemporary audiences, another biographer said John McCormack was Pavarotti, Madonna and Johnny Carson all rolled up into one.
Though he was a hit around the world, Irish songs were always a favorite of McCormack’s. Given the events of the day as well as his Irish background, it makes sense that McCormack’s was the first well-received version of “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary,” recorded after World War I broke out in 1914.
McCormack also recorded nationalist songs, such as “The Wearing of the Green,” which did cost him some British fans. But the singer’s devotion to his adopted country (he became a U.S. citizen) could never be questioned. McCormack donated thousands of dollars to the U.S. effort during World War I, after America entered the war in 1917.
This begins to illustrate why McCormack may have been so popular among Irish-Americans. “Growing up, almost every Irish household in New York would have a John McCormack record,” a distant McCormack relative (found driving a taxi cab in New York City) told one documentary filmmaker. But McCormack was not merely a great singer who happened to have been born in Ireland. The era in which McCormack performed was also important for the Irish. After all, many Irish nationalists on both sides of the Atlantic were skeptical about or openly opposed to U.S. involvement in World War I. This rekindled the old charge that Irish Catholics could never become truly American. U.S. President Woodrow Wilson was among those who suggested “hyphenated Americans” were inherently disloyal to the U.S. – especially the Irish, given their anger towards the British, who were America’s ally in World War I.
Enjoying McCormack’s music was one way Irish-Americans could prove they were patriotic, while also displaying pride in their native land.
Of course, it was not the just the Irish who embraced McCormack. He sold out venues all over the country, and when he came to any large city, he was greeted by their most famous residents, such as Detroit’s Henry Ford. By the time Caruso died in 1921, it was widely believed McCormack was not just the most popular, but also the most talented, singer alive.
As sales of recorded music increased, and the reach of radio widened, McCormack was there to ride the new technological wave. He also crossed over into the movies. In 1929, he was paid $500,000 to appear in a stage-Irish film entitled Song O’ My Heart.
At various times McCormack had an apartment on Park Avenue, a farm in Connecticut and a home in the Hollywood Hills. But despite his nearly global reach – he also toured Asia to great acclaim – McCormack never forgot where he came from.
In 1925, the McCormacks spent their summers on a large estate in Kildare. That same year he honored his parents at a Dublin concert, singing “When You Are Old and Grey” to his father, while seranading his mother with his show-stopper “Mother Machree.”
Understanding how blessed he was, McCormack also dedicated his life to helping others. The Red Cross and various Catholic charities were among the many causes to which he donated vast sums of money.
Following his performance at the 100th centennial of Catholic Emancipation in Dublin, McCormack was named a Count of the Holy Roman Empire, an honor he cherished. So dedicated to these causes was McCormack that at times he failed to take his own health into account, touring until he was exhausted. By 1938, McCormack had more or less retired, performing only at his son’s wedding in 1941.
McCormack died a few years later but his legacy clearly lives on. “The Irish tenor” is now a beloved brand on the international music scene, thanks to the trail first blazed by John McCormack. Meanwhile, every time the latest pop singer or rap star crosses over into movies or television, they should be reminded that McCormack did it almost a century earlier. Not only that, he worked tirelessly to return the many blessings he’d received. Not bad for a young kid from Athlone named Giovanni . . . uh, John, that is.
The above “Irish America” article can also be accessed online here.
Sheet music cover image of ‘It’s a Long, Long Way to Tipperary The Song They Sing as They March Along’ by Jack Judge and Harry Williams, with lithographic or engraving notes reading ‘Lithographograph courtesy of Leslie’s Weekly (copyrighted) of Tommy Atkins,’ New York, New York, 1912. (Photo by Sheridan Libraries/Levy/Gado/Getty Images)
Veronica Lake was one of the major Hollywood stars of the 1940’s. She was know for her glorious long blonde hair which fell over one eye. Born in 1922 in Brooklyn, New York. She came to fame in 1941 in “I Wanted Wings”. She starred in several films with Alan Ladd including “This Gun For Hire”, “”The Glass Key” and “The Blue Dahlia”. Her other films include “So Proudly We Hail” and “Sullivan’s Travel’s”. Her film career had waned significantly by the end of the 1940’s. She died in 1973 aged only 50 in Vermont.
TCM overview:
An icy blonde whose trademark hairstyle – a cascade of golden tresses that obscured one heavy-lidded eye – remained among the enduring images of Hollywood glamour, Veronica Lake was for a time, one of the most popular and sought-after actresses in motion pictures. She starred in a handful of features that, though the years, earned legendary status, including the film noirs, “This Gun for Hire” (1942) and “The Blue Dahlia” (1946), as well as the smart comedies, “Sullivan’s Travels” (1941) and “I Married a Witch” (1942). She also motivated a generation of women to imitate her cool sexuality and chic style, at the same time, causing an equal number of men – particularly fighting WWII G.I.s – to fall for her. Unfortunately, her success was short-lived, her star fizzling under the weight of personal tragedies, gossip and metal illness. Despite her fall from grace, Lake stood the test of time as a Tinseltown icon, inspiring tribute in songs, literature, and movies – most notably Kim Basinger’s Academy Award-winning turn in “L.A. Confidential” (1997), as a prostitute whose glacial beauty is modeled after Lake.
Born Constance Ockelman in Brooklyn, NY, on Nov. 14, 1919, Lake lost her father, oil company employee Harry Ockelman, when she was 12. Her mother, also named Constance, married Anthony Keane a year later, causing the family to move several times over the next few years. The diminutive teenager – legendarily standing only 4’11” – blossomed into a beauty in her teenage years. After gaining some fame in beauty pageants in Florida, she and her parents relocated to Beverly Hills, CA, enrolling Lake in the Bliss Hayden School of Acting in Hollywood. Her big break happened almost immediately. After signing with RKO, she made her film debut in John Farrow’s romantic drama, “Sorority House” (1939), in which she was initially billed as Constance Keane. Bit roles in other features followed – Lake’s parts were so small that her characters rarely had a name – but she persevered; even gaining a bit of attention for her unique, smoky look.
In 1940, she took time out from trying to become a star to marry art director John Detlie, giving birth to a daughter Elaine the following year. Ironically, the arrival of Elaine also heralded an upswing in her career; she was signed to a contract at Paramount in 1941, and while there, famed producer Arthur Hornblow redubbed her Veronica Lake – “Lake” being inspired by the blueness of her eyes, and according to Hornblow, the name Veronica suggesting a classic beauty.
Lake’s ascendancy to star status occurred almost immediately after signing with Paramount. She made a major impact as William Holden’s smoldering love interest in the military drama “I Wanted Wings” (1941), leaving producers wondering just who that girl w/ the hair was and lining up to offer her lead roles in their films. For the next two years, Lake appeared in a string of box-office hits, showing considerable comic talent as a struggling actress who accompanies Joel McCrea on his cross-country trip in Preston Sturges’ cutting social commentary, “Sullivan’s Travels” (1941) and as a 17th-century sorceress who falls for the ancestor of the man who condemned her to death in Rene Clair’s “I Married A Witch” (1941).
But it was her pairing with an equally diminutive co-star that, along with the cascading hair, created and solidified the Lake legend. Cast opposite screen newcomer Alan Ladd in the brutish noir thriller, “This Gun for Hire” (1942), the couple’s unexpected partnership proved very popular with film audiences – so popular, that they would appear together in seven films, including such moneymakers as “The Glass Key” (1942) and “The Blue Dahlia” (1946). Paramount liked them together too – especially because Lake was the only actress on the lot who was shorter than the 5’5″ Ladd – invariably removing the bothersome, embarrassing box Ladd was forced to stand on when filmed next to other leading ladies.
By the onset of WWII, Lake’s appeal with audiences transcended the box office. Women adored her signature hairstyle – dubbed “the peek-a-boo;” making Lake “the Peek-a-boo blonde” for all eternity – and tortured their hair in an attempt to match her color and wavy locks. Composers feted her in song, with famed composers Rogers and Hart citing her look in 1943’s “The Girl I Love to Leave Behind” and Lake even singing a tune about herself in the 1942 wartime morale booster film “Star-Spangled Rhythm.” Most importantly, G.I.’s placed her glamorous pin-up next to their Betty Grable and Rita Hayworth pics in almost equal frequency. Her impact on society was so dramatic, that during the war, she was forced by the government to temporarily change her peek-a-boo hair-do after women in factories were becoming injured when their long locks were catching in assembly-line machinery.
Some would later suggest that this dramatic change in appearance had a negative effect on Lake’s career, but in reality, there were a number of factors that contributed to the decline of her star status. Lake had a reputation for being difficult on the set, and many of her co-stars were open in their dislike of her; Fredric March refused to speak about her in interviews, and even the genial Eddie Bracken (her co-star in “Star-Spangled Rhythm”) had nothing but caustic words about her. In 1942, she divorced John Detlie, and the following year she stumbled over a cable during the making of “The Hour Before Dawn” (1944), which led to the premature birth of her son, William. To make matters worse, critics savaged her performance as a Nazi sympathizer in “Dawn.” Lake also reportedly began drinking during this period, with rumors of mental instability – which had plagued her since childhood – beginning to run through the industry.
Unfortunately for her, her next choice in companions was the least suited to her particular mental state. Lake married the reportedly violent director Andre De Toth in 1944, bearing a son, Andre, the following year. Around this time, her drinking apparently worsened and De Toth did little to encourage her to seek help. Paramount pushed her through a string of forgettable features – save for 1946’s “The Blue Dahlia,” which received an Academy Award nomination for its script by Raymond Chandler. Unfortunately, Lake’s reputation continued to dog her – both Chandler and Ladd were none too charitable in their comments about her – and by 1948, she was done at Paramount. The one positive note about this period: Lake took advantage of her down time and earned her pilot’s license; in 1946, eventually flying solo from Los Angeles to New York.
20th Century Fox picked up her contract in 1948 – the same year she gave birth to her fourth child, Diana. But like all wartime glamour girls, Lake’s career continued its inevitable downward spiral; her Fox films were even more disposable than her later Paramount films. By 1952, she was up to her neck in trouble. Her film “Stronghold” (1952) was a flop and would be her last for decades; the IRS was pursuing her for unpaid taxes; and her tumultuous marriage to de Toth finally came to a bitter end. Lake managed to find sporadic work on television and in touring stage productions. She even married again in 1955; this time to songwriter Joseph A. McCarthy. But the end was nearing.
The final turn of bad luck came in 1959, when she broke her ankle and found herself unable to show up for the pitiable second-string work she had managed to scrounge up. Alcoholism set in with a vengeance, and Lake disappeared from the public eye. She divorced McCarthy and made the news only when she was picked up by the police for disorderly conduct. A sad slide indeed, for a woman who had at one time inspired songs, literature and an army fighting for peace overseas.
In the early 1960s, a reporter discovered her working as a waitress at a hotel bar in Manhattan, and leaped on the obvious angle of “oh how the mighty have tumbled.” The publicity generated by the story – to say nothing of the sympathy factor it produced – gave her acting career a jolt. She served as the hostess of a weekly movie showcase in Baltimore and appeared in several small theater productions. In 1966, she made a return to feature films in the obscure Canadian production, “Footsteps in the Snow,” but the movie was largely unseen. Lake consequently went into semi-retirement in Hollywood, FL, where she penned a well-received autobiography, Veronica, which detailed her many struggles with temperament, mental illness and alcoholism. With one last ditch effort for her long-past-its-prime career, Lake managed to co-finance her final film, a dreary, Florida-lensed horror movie called “Flesh Feast” (1970), in which she played a doctor experimenting with a youth formula involving maggots. The film was not a box office success.
Lake relocated to England in the early ’70s, where she married again, this time to a commercial fisherman; the union was short-lived, and by 1973, she was back in the United States, hospitalized with declining health brought on by hepatitis and renal failure – both complications of her alcohol addiction. Her mental facilities were also in sharp decline. Lake had suffered from steadily increasing paranoia since the mid-’60s. Estranged from her children, Lake died alone on July 7, 1973. Rumor had it that it took days for someone to identify her body. Some of her ashes were scattered in the Virgin Islands three years later, but in 2004, it was discovered that another portion had reportedly remained in possession of a friend and that it had made its way to an antique store in the Catskills.
Despite – or maybe because of – her sad slide to the bottom, Lake remained a favorite of “old” Hollywood movie buffs. And if her life and career has faded in the minds of modern audiences, her ethereal glamour stayed as iconic as ever. References to Lake’s peek-a-boo style and ice queen demeanor were seen in everything from the neo-noir flick, “L.A. Confidential” to the animated femme fatale, Jessica Rabbit, who sports a scarlet version of Lake’s peek-a-boo in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” (1988). Pop singers Britney Spears and the late singer-actress, Aaliyah, both assumed the peek-a-boo in music videos in an attempt to summon Lake’s timeless appeal. Even the comics’ Archie Andrews’ longtime love, brunette vixen Veronica Rogers, got both her name and some of her feminine wiles from Lake. Decades after her death, Veronica Lake’s particular smoky appeal lingered as one of Hollywood’s most enduring and recognizable symbols of sexiness and class.
The above TCM overview can be also accessed online here.
Chuck Norris was born in 1940 in He was born in Oklaholma. He joined the U.S. Air Force in 1958. He became a martial arts expert. In 1968 he made his film debut in the Dean Martin movie “The Wrecking Crew”. His major movies include “Lone Wolf McQuade” in 1983, “The Delta Force” in 1986 and “Top Dog” in 1994.
TCM overview:
A martial arts master and competitive champion, Chuck Norris followed in the footsteps of Bruce Lee to become a popular action star on the big screen, before having his greatest success on television as the star of “Walker, Texas Ranger” (CBS, 1993-2001). In fact, Norris made one of his first feature impressions playing the villain opposite Lee in “Way of the Dragon” (1972), before branching out as the star of surprising box office hits like “Breaker! Breaker!” (1977) and “Good Guys Wear Black” (1978). He made his first studio film with “Silent Rage” (1982) and had one of the biggest hits of his career with “Lone Wolf McQuade” (1983). Following on both of those successes, Norris delivered perhaps his most popular movie, the jingoistic, action-packed “Missing in Action” (1984), which spawned two sequels of diminishing commercial and critical acclaim. Never one to be cited for his acting abilities, Norris received rare praise for just that with his turn as a hard-working cop in “Code of Silence” (1986), before topping the box office again with “Delta Force” (1986). But from there, his film career sagged considerably and Norris was unable to recover his commercial prowess. He did, however, draw sizeable ratings for eight seasons on “Walker,” and later became Internet-famous for the tongue-in-cheek Chuck Norris Facts, while rankling liberals with his staunchly conservative views as he became part of presidential politics in 2008, all of which he weathered with typical good humor.
Born Carlos Ray Norris on March 10, 1940 in Ryan, OK, Norris was one of three sons raised by his father, Ray, a truck driver and mechanic, and his mother, Wilma. As he described later in life, Norris’ childhood was an unhappy one – his father was an alcoholic and his parents eventually split when he was a teenager. He went on to live with his mother in Kansas, before settling in Torrance, CA. His experiences at North Torrance High School proved to be equally unpleasant for Norris. Mocked for his mixed heritage – his father was Cherokee – and painful shyness, he pined for a semblance of strength and focus in his life, which he found just a few years later by joining the military. After graduating North Torrance High School in 1958, Norris took bold strides to gain control of his future. He married Diane Holecheck that same year and joined the United States Air Force, which shipped him to South Korea to serve as an Air Policemen. While there, he developed a fascination for martial arts and began training extensively in Tang Soo Do, a Korean style of self defense, and eventually worked his way up to black belt. In 1962, he was sent back to the United States and honorably discharged from the military in August that same year. Norris then went to work for the Northrop Corporation while training for and competing in numerous martial arts tournaments.
Norris’ tournament record began with a two-year string of defeats starting in 1964. But by 1967, he had claimed the National Winter Karate Championship and the All-Star Championship, and was soon declared Middleweight Karate Champion in 1968. The following year, Norris swept the tournaments and was declared “Fighter of the Year” by the popular Black Belt magazine. Norris soon parlayed his wins into a string of martial arts schools throughout Southern California, where he taught his own martial arts style, Chun Kuk Do, or “Universal Way.” Steve McQueen’s son Chad was among his students and the actor was instrumental in encouraging Norris to pursue his own career in movies. He made his first onscreen appearances in cameos for “The Green Berets” (1968) and the Dean Martin spy spoof “The Wrecking Crew” (1969). Meanwhile, the 1970s marked a period of exceptional change in Norris’ life. He suffered a tremendous tragedy in the first year of the decade when his brother, Weiland, was killed while serving in the Vietnam War. Norris rebounded from the loss and finished his professional tournament career on a high note with a win in 1970. Following a draw in 1972, Norris announced his official retirement in 1974.
Also at the time, Norris made the acquaintance of fellow martial arts champ, Bruce Lee, who was enjoying massive popularity in Asia and America with his action films. Lee tapped Norris to play the villain in his martial arts feature “Way of the Dragon” (1972). Their elaborate fight sequence, which took place in Rome’s Coliseum, was the highlight of the film and an immediate fan favorite. At the behest of McQueen, Norris began taking acting classes at MGM Studios to expand his range, which resulted in substantial roles in low-budget features. But his initial movies were dreadful: “The Student Teachers” (1973) was a sexploitation thriller from Roger Corman’s New World Pictures, while “Slaughter in San Francisco” (1974) cast Norris as a karate killer in an American-Hong Kong co-production. Despite the dreadful aesthetics, both proved to be moneymakers on the drive-in and grindhouse circuits. Norris worked his way up to his first starring role in “Breaker! Breaker!” (1977), which combined his martial arts skills with then then-popular CB radio craze. The action-driven story featured Norris as a trucker who saves his brother from a corrupt sheriff. Critics lambasted both the film and Norris for his wooden performance, but the picture performed well at the box office and launched his career as an action hero in earnest.
Norris’ next film, “Good Guys Wear Black” (1978), was a more impressive showcase for his martial arts skills, featuring both his trademark roundhouse kick and a flying kick through the windshield of a moving car. He slowly worked his way through the independent feature world, expanding his profile with each subsequent feature in an attempt to make himself more palatable to mainstream audiences. Critics were brutal to him throughout this period, citing his stoic screen presence, but action fans ignored their cries and flocked to theaters to see him in “A Force of One” (1979), “The Octagon” (1980) and “An Eye for an Eye” (1981). Meanwhile, Norris made his first feature for a major Hollywood studio with “Silent Rage” (1982), a tawdry mix of his martial arts action and slasher films which pitted his small-town sheriff against a psychopathic killer genetically engineered by a mad scientist (Ron Silver). Its modest box office returns sent Norris packing to MGM for the more straight-ahead actioner “Forced Vengeance” (1982), which he hoped would catapult him to Clint Eastwood’s level of stardom, but the movie ultimately proved unsuccessful. His career resumed its winning streak with “Lone Wolf McQuade” (1983), a cartoonish action-adventure that led to a long relationship with independent studio Cannon Films, which resulted in the biggest hits of Norris’ career and his transition from B-movie star to Hollywood leading man.
Norris went on to star in one of his most popular movies, “Missing in Action” (1984), a jingoistic but action-packed military adventure where he played a former POW who returns to Vietnam to rescue former comrades still held hostage by Communist forces. A massive hit for the studio and the actor, the film was immediately followed by a prequel, “Missing in Action 2: The Beginning” (1985) which took place during Norris’ internment in Vietnam. The film was actually set for release prior to “Missing in Action,” but Cannon relented on the period piece in favor of the modern-day adventure. It was followed by a less successful third film, “Braddock: Missing in Action III” (1988), which marked the directorial debut of brother Aaron Norris, who had served as a stuntman on many of his brother’s pictures, and would subsequently direct most of his features and television efforts. Prior to that, Norris earned near-universal positive reviews for the first time with “Code of Silence” (1986), in which he had the chance to play a real, hard-working Chicago cop instead of an indestructible fighting machine. Unfortunately, the movie performed only moderately well at the box office, forcing Norris back to comic book adventures like “Invasion U.S.A.” (1985), in which he single-handedly fended off the Communist armies of Russia and Cuba in their attempt to overthrow the American government. The film was a substantial hit.
Norris followed up with another box office smash, “The Delta Force” (1986), where he teamed up with Lee Marvin – in his final film role – as American commandos who are dispatched to rescue a planeload of American and Israeli passengers from Palestinian terrorists. By the mid-1980s, Norris was firmly entrenched as one of Hollywood’s leading action heroes, enjoying the exposure and access that status granted him. In 1988, he published his autobiography,The Secret of Inner Strength, which managed to make the bestseller lists. He also launched his own youth programs, including Kick Start, which gave middle school children the inner strength and discipline he so craved at that age through martial arts training. Norris further expanded his connection to younger fans with his own cartoon series, “Chuck Norris Karate Kommandos” (syndicated, 1986-87), which featured the actor delivering a moral-heavy message at the end of each episode. But while his public profile increased, his movie career began to falter, starting with “Firewalker” (1986), an Indiana Jones-style adventure with Louis Gossett, Jr. that failed in its attempt to show Norris’ comedic side.
Norris’ slide continued when the third “Missing in Action” installment and “Hero and the Terror” (1988) also failed to connect with his fan base, while “Delta Force 2: The Columbian Connection” (1990) barely earned a theatrical release from MGM, which picked up the flick after acquiring Cannon Films’ library. The studio filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the late 1980s before undergoing protracted death throes which resulted in its complete dissolution in the early 1990s, leaving Norris without a studio contract. He slogged through subpar efforts for the next few years before striking on the idea of creating his own television series. Initially envisioned as a continuation of his “Lone Wolf McQuade” character, “Walker, Texas Ranger” (CBS, 1993-2001) was streamlined by the network into a straight-ahead action-adventure series with Norris as a Native American Texas Ranger who dispenses justice with his feet and fists instead of a gun. Despite the prevalence of fight scenes and other intrigue, the show was largely family-friendly and featured numerous uplifting storylines and moral-driven scripts. Critics pounced upon the show over Norris’ B-movie background, his crooning of the title song, and the show’s fanciful elements – Walker’s martial arts always trumped any villain, no matter how heavily armed – and spiritual elements, including numerous appearances by helpful ghosts, were prevalent, but audiences seeking escapist television clung to it faithfully for eight seasons.
After “Walker, Texas Ranger” left the airwaves in 2001, Norris tried to resume his film career, only to be met with little success. He made a few made-for-television movies, including “The President’s Man” (CBS, 2000), which saw Norris play a university professor by day, secret agent by night, followed by the sequel, “The President’s Man: A Line in the Sand” (CBS, 2002). A cameo as himself in episodes of the sitcom “Yes, Dear” (CBS, 2000-06) was followed by a revival of martial arts ranger Cordell Walker for the television movie, “Walker, Texas Ranger: Trial by Fire” (CBS, 2005). Of course the desire to appear on screen was never extinguished and Norris joined an all-star cast that included a smorgasbord of action stars like Jason Stratham, Jet Li, Jean-Claude van Damme, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger for Sylvester Stallone’s sequel, “The Expendables 2” (2012).
Gary Cooper was one of the true giants of the Golden Age of Hollywood. He won two Oscars, “Sgt York” in 1941 and “High Noon” in 1952. He was born in Helena in Montana in 1901. His first major role was in the silent film “Wings” in 1927. His career highlights include “The Devil and the Deep” in 1932, “A Farewell to Arms”, “Mr Deeds Goes to Town”, “For Whom the Bell Tolls”, “North-West Mounted Police”, “Love in the Afternoon”, “10 North Frederick” and “The Naked Edge”. His leading ladies included Ingrid Bergman, Audrey Hepburn, Marlene Dietrich, Lauren Bacall, Deborah Kerr, Madeleine Carroll, Paulette Goddard, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Loretta Young and Suzy Parker. He died in 1961.
TCM overview:
Gary Cooper’s rugged mug, soft-spoken demeanor and earnest, haunted eyes for decades made him the quintessential lonely American of motion pictures, a more stoic, human protagonist versus boisterous, bigger-than-life Hollywood supermen. Privately a debonair ladies’ man with a taste for high society, he crafted an image as just the opposite, from his prototype cowboy talkie “The Virginian” (1929) playing shy, stoic “aw-shucks” heroes. He built that image in such classics as Frank Capra’s “Mr. Deeds G s to Town” (1936) and “Meet John D ” (1941) and celebrated biopics like “Sergeant York” (1941) and “Pride of the Yankees” (1942). Though he cooperated with the U.S. government’s Hollywood witch hunts early in the Cold War, he nevertheless made a triumphant comeback in the anti-blacklisting parable “High Noon” (1952), refusing to dissociate himself from the film’s blacklisted writer, Carl Foreman, karmic punctuation to what had been, on screen anyway, a legacy of a weary everyman who nevertheless stood tall against mob mentality. He was born Frank James Cooper, second son of British immigrants Charles and Alice Cooper, in Helena, Montana on May 7, 1901. Charles Cooper worked as a lawyer and kept a 600-acre ranch outside Helena, where Frank and older brother Arthur spent their early years until their mother, hoping to acculturate her sons, sent them off to school in England. Frank returned to Montana at age 16, upon the U.S.’s entry into World War I, and eventually matriculated at Grinnell College in Grinnell, IA, where he attempted to nurture a passion for drawing – until a serious car accident ended his college days in the summer of 1920. He would recover from his severely injured hip through an odd but painful therapy, horseback riding. This would come in handy four years later as his search for a job as a political cartoonist bore no fruit and Cooper followed his parents to Los Angeles – where they’d moved after his father’s retirement form the Montana Supreme Court – and found work as a stunt horseman in motion pictures. The tall, lean Frank Cooper caught the eye of agent Nan Collins, who took him on as a client and, with somebody already working under his name in show business, redubbed him Gary Cooper, after her Indiana hometown. Another uncredited horseman role in “The Winning of Barbara Worth” (1926) expanded portentously when silent star Vilma Banky’s onscreen suitor fell out and Cooper found himself promoted to third-billing. Variety called the then-unknown Cooper “a youth who will be heard of on the screen,” Paramount made him a contract player at $150 a week and notoriously randy A-list actress Clara Bow set her sights on him, giving him a small role in her next picture “It” (1927) – originating the notion of the “It-girl,” the buzz around their romance making Cooper the original “It-boy.” That led to his first top-billing as a stereotype hero-cowboy in “Arizona Bound” (1927), then another turn supporting Bow in “Wings” (1927), the first film to win the Academy Award as Best Picture. He crossed over to partial-sound pics, most notably in “Wolf Song” (1929), which co-starred his latest love, Mexican actress Lupe Velez. His first full-fledged talkie, Victor Fleming’s “The Virginian” (1929), would take him to a new stratum of stardom, hitting big with audiences and creating an archetype for American westerns, Cooper playing the white-hat hero rigidly following his moral compass versus the black-hats of the chaotic west, along the way wooing the transplanted Eastern schoolmarm. Much in demand, he went on to crank out 11 more movies in the next two years, four of them westerns, but most notably “Morocco” (1930), a French Foreign Legion adventure that would make Marlene Dietrich his love interest both on and off camera. By the time he filmed “His Woman” (1931), his first pairing with screwball comedy ingénue Claudette Colbert, his schedule had worn down his health, as had a tempestuous, sometimes violent cohabitation with Velez and the meddling of his disapproving mother, all bringing Cooper to the brink of nervous exhaustion. Even as he embarked on a sabbatical, Velez notoriously pulled a pistol and fired several rounds at his train car as it departed for Chicago He traveled to Europe, in Italy finding another watershed relationship, with Countess Dorothy di Frasso-nee-Taylor, a socialite ten years his senior who had married into Euro-aristocracy out of Watertown, NY. They began a country-hopping affair, while she undertook his “Pygmallion”-esque refinement. Paramount c rced him back to Hollywood with threats of replacing him on its A-list with a young Cary Grant, then immediately shoved both into naval adventure compromised by a love triangle over stage great Tallulah Bankhead in “The Devil and the Deep” (1932). Cooper proved susceptible to her charms, as most her co-stars did, Bankhead soon ending her unhappy flirtation with the movies and returning to the theater, notoriously averring, “The only reason I went to Hollywood was to f–k that divine Gary Cooper.” His ladies’-man days would end not long after – at least officially – when he met a savvy 20-year-old New York debutante, Veronica “Rocky” Balfe, at a party in early 1933 and married her the next December. In the meantime he stretched his by-now-signature solemn-yet-upright character, sometimes in sober North American expatriate roles such as Hemmingway’s melodrama “A Farewell to Arms” (1932), “Today We Live” (1933) and the hit actioner “Lives of a Bengal Lancer” (1934), more spiritedly in comedies such as “Design for Living” (1933), “One Sunday Afternoon” (1933), “Desire” (1936) and “Mr. Deeds G s to Town” (1936). The latter two would prove pivotal for Cooper in developing his charming rube character, “Desire” reteaming him with Dietrich as a bright-eyed American abroad caught in her criminal web, “Deeds” codifying the character, by way of director Frank Capra, as an archetype of integrity and innocence in the face of sophisticated charlatanry. Longfellow Deeds, a tuba-playing small-town Vermonter inheriting a fortune, plus the big city swells and grifters that follow, “had to symbolize incorruptibility, and in my mind Gary Cooper already was that symbol,” Capra later wrote. His intuition paid off with a hit, earning Cooper his first Oscar nomination for Best Actor, not to mention a separate six-year contract with independent producer Samuel Goldwyn for a movie a year at $150,000 apiece. That move challenged the studios’ perceived exclusivity with their stars. Paramount sued and lost, the court ruling he could still fulfill his obligation to the studio. Cooper continued his share of adventure yarns, playing a mercenary in revolutionary China in “The General Died at Dawn” (1936), Wild Bill Hickok in Cecille B. DeMille’s “The Plainsman,” more conspicuously as the world-spanning explorer in “The Adventures of Marco Polo” (1938) and again as a Legionnaire in the blockbuster “Beau Geste” (1939). Bolstering his manly bona fides, he met Hemingway on vacation in Idaho in 1940, getting a sneak-peak at his forthcoming book, The Sun Also Rises. He kept his hand in comedy, reuniting with Colbert in “Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife” (1938), and with Capra in another rube-against-the-odds picture, “Meet John D ” (1941). A subtle indictment of the fascist machinations inflaming Europe, “D ” had Cooper as a vagabond hired by an unscrupulous newspaper to play the role of a made-up pundit, claiming to be the voice of America’s unheard everymen, unknowingly becoming the key to a plan by the paper’s industrialist owner to garner populist groundswell for his “iron-fist” presidential candidacy. The oft-corny film nevertheless signaled Cooper’s capacity, as a Time cover story posited, to render “a personality that de-schmaltzes sentiment and de-rants rhetoric.” The looming war would color an even more momentous project of 1941, director Howard Hawks in the World War I tale of Sgt. Alvin York, the hayseed pacifist drafted into the U.S. army, overcoming his personal objections and capturing an entire German company single-handed. “Sergeant York” scored 11 Oscar nominations, including Best Actor, which Cooper walked away with the next February. On a roll, he reteamed successfully with Stanwyck in “Ball of Fire” (1942), playing a nerdy English professor who hooks up with a mob-connected showgirl to learn new slang, and then went somber again, earning another Oscar nomination for director Sam Wood’s “Pride of the Yankees,” playing the baseball great Lou Gehrig, whose career was cut short by the disease that bears his name. The inspirational Gehrig farewell speech would become part of his routine when he entertained troops during the war. Wood directed him again in “For Whom the Bell Tolls” (1943), during which Cooper reverted to old ways, beginning an affair with co-star Ingrid Bergman. A meandering tale, it nevertheless proved box-office gold in Hollywood’s volume of wartime anti-fascist messages – curious given Cooper and Wood’s helping to found the right-wing Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals the next year. “The Alliance,” whose members also included Walt Disney, Robert Taylor and Clark Gable (not to mention its influential but unofficial godfather John Wayne), dedicated itself to winnowing “Red” influence out of motion pictures. The studio reteamed Cooper and Bergman in the period romance “The Saratoga Trunk,” shot in 1943 but released in ’45, but by then he had become he became increasingly dissatisfied with his work for Paramount. The contract lapsing that year, he would produce his own first post-studio picture, “Along Came Jones” (1945), as an early revisionist western, parodying his once-rote western roles. 1947 would prove momentous for Cooper, though not for his work. The Alliance invited the Red Scare’s primary catalyst, the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), to investigate subversive influences in film, an exercise in paranoia that would ruin careers and have Cooper as a “friendly witness.” Apologists say Cooper addressed the committee ambivalently and never named names of suspected Reds as did other Hollywood denizens who would later find themselves ostracized for their political convenience. Signing with Warner Bros., Cooper would link himself to right-wing canon in King Vidor’s attempt to film Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, a job made difficult by the controlling author. The film’s climactic scene had Cooper, as her heroic architect-turned-terrorist, giving the longest speech in movie history theretofore, but with Rand’s overwrought writing translating miserably to spoken dialogue, Cooper didn’t understand it, appealed to Vidor for it to be simplified, and Rand nearly shut down production until the studio guaranteed her a pristine reading. When released in 1949, the work intended as a testimonial to Rand’s exceptionalism proved a garish bomb. Rumors bubbling about troubles in his marriage also gained traction when he and his “Fountainhead” love interest, 22-year-old Patricia Neal, began an affair, which would become a long-term relationship and particularly problematic as Rocky, a devout Catholic, refused to consider divorce (though they separated in 1951). Cooper as a 50-year-old leading man, meanwhile, was hardly setting the box office afire with by-the-numbers period adventure/romantic fare such as “Dallas” (1950) and “Distant Drums” (1951) as he once did – at least until independent producers Stanley Kramer and Carl Foreman came calling with a Western that would rock the genre. “High Noon,” written by Foreman, told the tale of an aging marshal seeking the aid of townspeople to help fend off a gang whose leader he had put in prison, but finding no allies and only advice to flee with his young Quaker wife before the villains arrive. Cooper turned in a somber performance as the conflicted marshal, even as he reputedly began another amorous dalliance with his young co-star Grace Kelly. The film became a lightning rod, not only for its reversal of the sunny myths of square-jawed western superher s and intrepid pioneer-folk, but also for Foreman’s use of the story as allegory for HUAC witch hunts, with which he himself had refused to cooperate. An overwhelming success financially and critically, it nevertheless became a target of the Alliance and its allies, who lobbied furiously against the film winning any of the seven Oscars for which it had been nominated, Alliance president John Wayne, and Cooper friend, calling it “the most un-American thing I have ever seen in my whole life.” “High Noon” nevertheless won four Oscars, Cooper taking his second Best Actor statue and remaining friends with Foreman, who, now blacklisted, lost production credit on the film and moved to London. Cooper, shooting a new movie during the Academy Awards ceremony, asked Wayne to accept the award for him. With marriage impossible, his relationship with Neal had ended by 1953, and he reunited with Rocky the next year. That year, he did another gun-slinging adventure in “Vera Cruz,” this time as mercenaries with Burt Lancaster amid Mexico’s 1866 revolution, a tale of conscience versus the shifting morals intrinsic to power politics. It gave Cooper a monster hit with another revisionist Western, “Vera Cruz” greatly influencing the coming spaghetti Western movement. Ensuing years would see him work with some of the cinema’s top directors, Otto Preminger for “The Court Martial of Billy Mitchell” (1955), with Cooper as the brash prophet of military air power; William Wyler for “Friendly Persuasion” (1956), a poignant film that had Cooper the head of a Quaker family whose pacifism is tested by the American Civil War; Billy Wilder for “Love in the Afternoon” (1957), with Cooper as the unlikely suitor of Audrey Hepburn; and Anthony Mann for “Man of the West” (1958). Largely considered the best of his final films, “The Hanging Tree” (1959) had Cooper as a frontier doctor attempting to be the moral anchor of a bawdy, troubled mining town and live down a dark past. His last two films, nautical mystery “The Wreck of the Mary Dearer” (1959) and psychological thriller “The Naked Edge” (1961), both showed a diminished, ill-looking Cooper, the result of cancer diagnosed in 1960, but kept from the public. One of his good friends, Jimmy Stewart, knew of Cooper’s medical state when he emotionally accepted a special lifetime Oscar in spring 1961, Cooper spending his final days in his and Ricky’s home in L.A.’s Holm by Hills neighborhood, until his death on May 14, 1961. He and Sidney Poitier share the distinction of being the only actors to have five films in the American Film Institute’s 100 Most Inspiring Movies” list, with “Pride of the Yankees” at No. 22, “High Noon” at 27, “D ” at 49, “York” at 57 and “Deeds” at 83.
The above TCM overview can also be accessed online here.
It is terrific to see Meryl Streep in her 60’s in major leading roles. She has starred in leading roles since the 1970’s. She was born in 1949 in New Jersey. She began her career on the NY stage and acted with Joseph Papps Theatre. Her film debut was in 1977 in “Julia” with Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave. Her films include “The Deer Hunter” in 1978 with Robert De Niro and Christopher Walken, “Kramer Verus Kramer” with Dustin Hoffman, “Manhattan” with Woody Allen, “The French Lieutenant’s Woman” with Jeremy Irons, “Ironweed” with Jack Nicholson,”Silkwood”, “Out of Africa” with Robert Redford, “Mamma Mia” with Pierce Brosnan and “The Iron Lady”.
TCM overview:
Meryl Streep began her acting career with a level of worship typically reserved for seasoned veterans. From her early work in “The Deer Hunter” (1978) and “Kramer vs. Kramer” (1979), it quickly became apparent to the sharpest of critics – even the most casual of moviegoers – that the chameleon-like Streep was an unparalleled master of character, accents and genres. The benchmark was set for every working actress with Streep’s work as a Polish Nazi camp survivor, damaged by the unthinkable decision she was once forced to make in her Oscar-winning performance in “Sophie’s Choice” (1982). Through “Silkwood” (1983), “Out of Africa” (1985) and “A Cry in the Dark” (1988) Streep continued to set a standard few could hope to achieve, primarily with her mastery of accents that included Polish, Danish and Australian, among others. After her peak in the early 1980s, the multi-Oscar winner spent the subsequent decades maintaining her brilliance, showcasing yet another of her talents – singing competently – in “Postcards from the Edge” (1990) and “Mamma Mia” (2008), capturing the aching desire of an aging woman in “The Bridges of Madison County” (1995), and proving she could draw laughter as well as tears in “The Devil Wears Prada (2006). Simply put, Streep could do it all, and generations of actresses coming up behind her often cited her work as the reason they pursued the craft in the first place.
Mary Louise Streep was born on June 22, 1949 in Summit, NJ and raised in Bernardsville, the oldest sibling ahead of two older brothers, Harry and Dana. Her mother was a commercial artist; her father, an executive at a pharmaceutical company. Streep was extremely serious about music as a child, taking opera singing lessons from renowned coach, Estelle Liebling. By high school, shedding her braces and bespectacled appearance, she willed herself into a dynamic, blonde-haired social butterfly, cheerleading and swimming on the Bernards High School squads and ultimately becoming its homecoming queen. Her mother devised the shortened version of her name, and “Meryl” was christened. Streep also took acting classes in school, which became the dominant interest, leading her to Vassar College and an exchange program for one semester of playwriting and set design at Dartmouth. After earning her acting degree at Vassar in 1971, she headed to the prestigious Yale School of Drama, where her classmates and friends included actress Sigourney Weaver and playwright Wendy Wasserstein. Streep performed in over 40 plays, including “The Father” with Rip Torn, before obtaining her master’s degree in 1975.
Right out of Vassar, Streep had hit the New York stage and made her professional stage debut with “The Playboy of Seville” in 1971, with her Broadway debut coming years later at Lincoln Center in 1975, just out of Yale with “Trelawney of the Wells,” directed by Joseph Papp as part of the New York Shakespeare Festival. Streep would return over the coming few years to the festival to appear in several plays, including Shakespeare works like “Henry V,” “Measure for Measure” and “The Taming of the Shrew,” but in 1976, earned a Tony Award nomination for Tennessee Williams’ “27 Wagons Full of Cotton,” which she had doubled up alongside Arthur Miller’s “A Memory of Two Mondays.” Streep edged into both television and film by 1977, earning the media’s top honors after only a couple of projects under her belt. She burst onto television screens with CBS’ “The Deadliest Season” (1977) as the wife of a hockey player accused of murdering another player during game play. That year, she also made waves in her feature film debut, “Julia,” starring as the high society friend of Jane Fonda’s Lillian Hellman. Streep was considered for the title character, a WWII resistance member, but her lack of recognition led director Fred Zinnemann to cast Vanessa Redgrave instead.
Streep remained in the World War II period, starring opposite James Woods as Inga, a well-to-do German woman attempting to save her Jewish husband from the Nazi concentration camps in the epic NBC miniseries “Holocaust” (1978), for which she won a leading actress Emmy. Streep’s capacity for playing characters of exceptional depth already seemed vast as she closed the year in another big screen period piece, giving a tour de force performance as Linda, the wife of a Vietnam War soldier forced to cope with the war’s devastating effects and toll on her husband in Michael Cimino’s “The Deer Hunter” (1978). Streep had entered into her first serious romance with the film’s co-star, John Cazale, but was soon living in a hospital room, forced to watch bedside as he slowly succumbed to bone cancer. Six months later, she met a Yale-bred sculptor named Donald Gummer, who was asked by Streep’s brother, Harry to do some work on her Manhattan loft. The two became roommates and then fell in love, marrying in September of 1978.
After Tony and Emmy wins and just shy of her 30th birthday, Streep solidified her early reign over stage and screen with a supporting actress Oscar nomination for the five-time Oscar-winning “Deer Hunter.” Streep’s nod came on the heels of a small, but pivotal role opposite Woody Allen in his sweetly comical “Manhattan” (1979), with her character Jill, as Allen’s former wife, now living with a woman and writing a tell-all book about their love life. Heading into a new chapter of career and life, she was cultivating an audience of fans eager to watch the rising young star’s increasingly staggering command of craft. She wrapped up the decade with Robert Benton’s adaptation of “Kramer vs. Kramer” (1979). Streep won raves opposite Dustin Hoffman, as Joanna Kramer, an unhappy woman who leaves her husband and son, only to return to claim the child in a messy divorce case. Streep’s real life was quite the opposite, as she and Gummer blissfully welcomed a son, Henry, into the fold, with the couple vacating New York to raise their family in northern Connecticut.
At turns sympathetic and icy, Streep’s role in “Kramer” won her an Academy Award in 1980, and the film made winners out of Hoffman, Benton and a nominee out of eight-year-old Justin Henry. Her reputation for immersing herself in character and accents served her well as she donned an impeccable English accent to play both a modern actress and a destitute Victorian woman engaged in parallel love affairs in the Harold Pinter-adapted movie-in-a-movie, “The French Lieutenant’s Woman” (1981), bringing her back for a third Oscar nomination. Then came the part by which all others would be measured. Easing flawlessly into a Polish accent with “Sophie’s Choice” (1982), Streep played Sophie Zawistowski, a Brooklyn-based concentration camp survivor living with her schizophrenic lover whose past, as told to their neighbor, reveals her torment from an unthinkable, life-changing decision. Streep’s seamless technique made for one of cinema’s finest and most heartbreaking performances, garnering her a well-earned second Oscar in 1983, a prize rivaled only by that year’s birth of her first daughter, Mary Willa.
She continued to seek out characters with dramatic urgency, and Streep’s instincts proved to be rock solid, as evidenced in “Silkwood” (1983), an account of the doomed, feisty real-life factory whistleblower Karen Silkwood, which netted her another Oscar nomination. Streep lightened things up with the sentimental drama “Falling in Love” (1984), re-teaming with Robert De Niro in a tale of attraction between two modern-day married people, before returning to her trademark sweeping films with Sydney Pollack’s “Out of Africa” (1985). In the grand epic, she gave yet another Oscar-nominated turn as Karen Blixen, a Danish plantation owner embarking on a love affair with a hunter, Denys Finch Hatton (Robert Redford), amidst an unhappy politically motivated marriage. Following “Africa,” Streep and Gummer took time out to add to their family with a second daughter, Grace.
Looking to reach outside the dramatic confines of her career thus far, Streep inserted a touch of humor into her work with Nora Ephron’s fictionalized account of her failed marriage to Washington reporter Carl Bernstein, trading both loving glances and daggers with Hollywood’s requisite rogue charmer, Jack Nicholson, in “Heartburn” (1986). She and Nicholson played a more desperate pair in their follow-up together, “Ironweed” (1987), a former singer and major league ball player living drink-fueled homeless existences in depression-era America, which brought them both Oscar nominations in 1988. Expertly donning an Australian accent, she also went on to add yet another nomination to her impressive count with that year’s “A Cry in the Dark” (1988), which focused on the country’s infamous Lindy Chamberlain case. In the film, the black-wigged Streep played the pariah Chamberlain, who was accused of coldly murdering her baby despite her insistence that it was eaten by a dingo during a camping trip.
Amazingly, “Silkwood,” “Out of Africa,” “Ironweed” and “A Cry in the Dark” brought her an astounding four Oscar nominations in only five years, for a total of eight. Whatever the roles required and in whichever time or place they required her to be, Streep seemed capable of always finding the center. Still, when it came to comedy, despite inching closer, the weight of her dramatic work was often a liability toward her entry into other genres she was eager to tackle. As the 1980s came to a close, Streep started off her forties intent on indulging those interests. She got off to a rocky start with the ill-fitting “She-Devil” (1989), a dismal comedy vehicle for budding TV star Roseanne Barr which cast Streep as an icy, pulp romance novelist stalked by Barr for the crime of husband theft. Streep found a more suitable vessel channeling novelist/screenwriter Carrie Fisher’s loosely-based life with real-life mom, actress Debbie Fisher, in Mike Nichols’ adaptation of her book “Postcards from the Edge” (1990). In the critical hit, Streep’s actress and recovering addict Suzanne Vale tries to rebuild a bridge to the world by moving in with her alcoholic former actress mother, deftly portrayed by Shirley MacLaine, who managed to steal the scenes from her younger co-star, except when Streep was called on to sing. Not only did she have peerless acting ability, it turned out that had she also possessed surprisingly good pipes, bringing down the house with the film’s finale number, “I’m Checking Out.”
By the time another Oscar nomination came around for “Postcards,” an almost glowing Streep had found her comic groove, signing on to help veteran comic filmmaker Albert Brooks find love in the white-robed hereafter with the charming fantasy “Defending Your Life” (1991). She and Gummer had recently relocated to Brentwood, CA for her work, where Streep gave birth to one more daughter, Louisa. She took one more pass at outrageous humor with “Death Becomes Her” (1992). After finishing up with the Robert Zemeckis comedy, a macabre outing about dueling, immortal Hollywood vixens, she tried her hand at action movies with 1994’s “The River Wild,” starring as a matriarch forced into protector mode on a dangerous rafting excursion. Streep also gave animation voiceovers a try that year, lending her voice to the role of Bart Simpson’s brief church-defying girlfriend on Fox’s “The Simpsons” (1989- ).
In 1995, Streep was back in Connecticut and returned to the hallmark dramas of her early days, appearing with Clint Eastwood in his adaptation of the popular Robert Waller novel “The Bridges of Madison County” (1995), a flashback story of a daydreaming, Iowa-based, Italian-born housewife Francesca and her brief, passionate love affair with the photographer sent to take pictures of her town’s famed bridges. Eastwood and Streep displayed a palpable chemistry, with the actor-director putting Streep’s Academy Award-nominated role center stage. She then reunited with De Niro and along with co-stars Hume Cronyn, Diane Keaton and Leonardo DiCaprio, opened the door to “Marvin’s Room” (1996), playing Lee, a single mother of two, attempting to reconcile with her estranged Leukemia-ridden sister while looking out for their sickly father, Marvin. After a long absence from television, she racked up an Emmy nomination for ABC’s ” First Do No Harm” (1997), a telefilm focusing on the true story of Lori Reimuller, who took on the stubborn healthcare and medical industry in order to get her epileptic son an alternative method of treatment.
Approaching 50 years of age, Streep still had a luminosity that shined through even as she took on the role of the sick patient herself, the cancer-stricken matriarch Kate Gulden of “One True Thing” (1998), based on Anna Quindlen’s book. The film gave Streep her eleventh Oscar nomination in 1999. Before the end of that year, she was back on screens in “Music of the Heart” (1999), earning her 12th Oscar nomination. Madonna eventually landed the role Streep badly wanted – that of Eva Peron in “Evita” (1996) – but this time, Streep replaced Madonna in “Music” and its account of the real Roberta Guaspari, an inspirational Harlem music teacher responsible for initiating a violin program for underprivileged students. Streep’s exacting preparation methods led her to practice the violin for six hours a day for two straight months. In 2001, Streep who had only intermittently returned to the stage since taking up films, appeared as Arkadina alongside her son Henry in Chekov’s “The Seagull” at both New York’s Delacorte and Public Theater, her first appearance since workshopping Wendy Wasserstein’s “An American Daughter” in Seattle back in 1996.
Over the years, Streep actively drew meaning to her life beyond the screen. She was as tireless with her charitable campaigns for children and adults as she was with acting and her family life. The actress often lent her name and time to assisting the efforts of organizations working on the issues of AIDS research, arts and literacy issues, poverty and human rights among others. Not one to merely grandstand, however, Streep co-founded an organization of her own in Connecticut called Mothers & Others in 1989 which educated parents about the dangerous of pesticides in foods. The organization led a fight against the use of Alar, a pesticide used on various common foods such as apples and helped spearhead several government mandates, including the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act regulating pesticides on food before ceasing to exist in 2001.
The holiday season of 2002 brought two unique films for Streep. She was playing Clarissa Vaughan, a woman unraveling in the “Mrs. Dalloway”-inspired world of Michael Cunningham’s “The Hours” at the same time she could be seen playing Susan Orlean, the real author of The Orchid Thief, in “Adaptation,” a film comically documenting idiosyncratic screenwriter Charlie Kaufman’s nightmarish real-life attempts to adapt Orlean’s book about orchid poaching. With her 13th Oscar nomination arriving in 2003 for “Adaptation,” she also netted her a second Emmy Award by disappearing into the roles of a ghost, a mother and an old, male rabbi in Mike Nichols’ miniseries version of Tony Kushner’s play about the AIDS crisis, HBO’s “Angels in America” (2003).
The breathing room in Streep’s later career stage was evident, and with much more room to branch out, she seemed more vivacious than ever. In the era of Hollywood remakes, Streep took charge in “The Manchurian Candidate” (2004) as the cunning and ruthless Eleanor Shaw, a woman of political influence masterminding her meek, war veteran son’s vice-presidential nomination. Under the disguise of heavy makeup, she took to a small role in the dark children’s fable “Lemony Snicket: A Series of Unfortunate Events” (2004), for which she provided some comic relief as Josephine Anwhistle, a grammar-conscious, obsessively protective aunt of two orphans. “Lemony Snicket” was met with a mixed reception, but Streep fared slightly better in the comedy “Prime” (2005), as a meddling Jewish therapist trying to navigate her son’s interfaith romance with a woman who just happens to be her patient.
Streep’s prominence as an ensemble player was further displayed in Robert Altman’s meditative swan song, “A Prairie Home Companion” (2006), a funny and somber account of the fictitious last show of Garrison Keillor’s long-running radio program. As Yolanda, one of the country-flavored Johnson Sisters along with co-star Lily Tomlin, Streep acted and served up her robust singing voice yet again. At the same time, Yolanda was as warm as Miranda Priestly, the career-driven fashion editor of “The Devil Wears Prada” (2006), was cold. Her record 14th Oscar nomination showed Streep could even be good by being bad. With a Golden Globe Award for the role as well, she now laid claim to a record six Globe wins. In 2007, Streep also celebrated her first onscreen teaming with her oldest daughter, “Mamie” Gummer in “Evening,” with Gummer subbing for a young Streep as the 1950s Rhode Island bride Lila Wittenborn of Susan Minot’s adapted novel.
Through 2008, she had lined up a variety of projects that would see her slide easily from period pieces like the drama “Doubt” to a musical based on the music of ABBA, “Mamma Mia!” – both of which would garner her Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress in their respective genres. But it was her portrayal of the stern headmistress Sister Aloysius in “Doubt” that earned the decorated actress yet another Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, which was followed by a surprise win for Outstanding Female Actress at the 15th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. Streep had yet another banner year in 2009, starting with her dead-on portrayal of cooking maven and popular television personality, Julia Child, in Nora Ephron’s winning romantic comedy, “Julie & Julia.” For her portrayal of the famous chef, she earned a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy as well as an Oscar nod for Best Actress. After providing the voice for the animated Mrs. Fox in “Fantastic Mr. Fox” (2009), directed by Wes Anderson, she delivered another winning performance in the romantic comedy, “It’s Complicated” (2009). Streep was a well-adjusted divorceé who finds herself in a state of complicated affairs with her ex-husband (Alec Baldwin) and his much-younger wife (Lake Bell). The role earned Streep a second Golden Globe nomination that year in the same category.
She went on to earn considerable acclaim for her leading role in the biopic “The Iron Lady” (2011), in which she delivered an essence-capturing performance of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Despite some misgivings from Thatcher’s real-life family about her portrayal, the role earned Streep widespread critical acclaim at home and in England, and nabbed her a Golden Globe and an Oscar for Best Actress. Fresh off her latest Oscar win, Streep clearly had a bit of fun when she guest starred on the second season of the cable comedy “Web Therapy” (Showtime, 2011- ) as the founder of a sexual orientation camp endeavoring to help pioneering “web therapist” Fiona Wallice’s (Lisa Kudrow) husband with his sexual confusion. Predictably, the results were both painfully awkward and uproariously funny. For her next film project, she played one-half of a middle-aged couple looking to revitalize their marriage, both in and out of the bedroom, in “Hope Springs” (2012). Streep’s perfectly realized performance alongside Tommy Lee Jones in romantic comedy earned her yet another in a long line of Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress
The above TCM overview can also be accessed online here.
Larry Hagman was born in 1931 in Fort Worth, Texas. He was son of the major Broadway star Mary Martin. He began his career on the stage and appeared in London’s West End in the chorus of “South Pacific” which starred his mother in 1951. He made his film debut in 1963 in “Ensign Pulver” which starred Robert Walker Jnr and Millie Perkins. In 1965 he starred with Barbara Eden in the TV series “I Dream of Jeannie” which ran for five years. In 1978 he achieved worldwide fame with his role as ‘J.R. Ewing’ in “Dallas” which ran until 1991. In 2011 he resumed filiming of his role in the new series of “Dallas” but died in November 2012 aged 81.
Ronald Bergan’s “Guardian” obituary:
On 21 November 1980, 83 million people in the US and 24 million in the UK watched the TV show Dallas to see who had shot the villainous JR Ewing. While working late at the office, the boss of Ewing Oil was suddenly fired on by an unseen assailant. Who shot JR, and would he survive?
Any character who had ever come into contact with the oleaginousTexas oilman had good reason to do away with him, but there was no way he could really have been killed off. If JR had died, then the series would have died, because JR was Dallas – and Larry Hagman, who has died aged 81 after suffering from throat cancer, was JR.
Other actors were at times replaced in their roles, but Hagman was irreplaceable. Nevertheless, just in case, Hagman quickly renegotiated his contract with Lorimar Studios just after the episode in which he was shot, securing an annual salary of around $1m. JR thus survived the attempt on his life, and continued his scheming ways for another 10 seasons.
One should not underestimate Hagman’s achievement in becoming the man the whole world loved to hate, the focal character of this progressively preposterous soap opera. With his bug eyes, smarmy grin and dicey hairpiece, Hagman generated a certain lethal charm as he went about betraying trusts and manipulating innocent people. He was Machiavelli in a Stetson, the evil face of capitalism – though, according to Hagman, “JR has lost Ewing Oil more than $16m.”
Hagman, nominated twice for an Emmy award, though he never won, was the only member of the cast to be in all 357 episodes of Dallas from 1978 to 1991. Ironically, nothing in his previous acting career had indicated Hagman was other than a competent light-comedy actor whose fame would be strictly limited, despite being the son of Mary Martin, known as the “first lady of the Broadway musical”.
Born in Fort Worth, Texas, he was brought up for a while by his grandmother after his parents divorced when he was five; he was then shunted between his mother and his district attorney father, Benjamin Hagman, and was moved around various private schools and psychotherapists.
At the age of 20, Hagman moved to London as a member of the chorus of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific, which starred his mother as Nellie Forbush, the role she created on Broadway. Hagman and Sean Connery, a year older, were among the shirtless sailors who sang There Is Nothing Like a Dame.
After a year at Drury Lane, Hagman joined the US air force. Four years later he resumed his acting career in earnest, getting roles on television and in films. Hagman made little impression in his first Hollywood movies, as servicemen in Joshua Logan’s Ensign Pulver (1964) and in Otto Preminger’s In Harm’s Way (1965). However, he was very good playing weak men in two Sidney Lumet films: as the US president’s nervous Russian interpreter in the nuclear scare story Fail-Safe (1964), and as Joanna Pettet’s playwright husband with a penchant for wine and women in The Group (1966).
In Harry and Tonto (1974), he was the selfish, whining son of retired teacher Art Carney. He hammed it up as an incompetent, gung-ho American colonel in The Eagle Has Landed (1976), and as a caricatured Hollywood studio executive in Blake Edwards’s S.O.B. (1981).
But it was television that was the foundation of his career. Hagman had scores of TV appearances. His first real success came in I Dream of Jeannie (1965-70), in which he played a befuddled bachelor astronaut who finds himself master of a glamorous, 2,000-year-old genie (Barbara Eden). Continuing to display a deft light touch, Hagman went on to appear in other mildly amusing sitcoms.
Then came the long-running Dallas, which Variety initially called “a limited series with a limited future”. Robert Foxworth was originally cast as JR, but he wanted the role softened too much for the producer’s taste, and Hagman was the perspicacious second choice.
Hagman differed from JR in most aspects, being amiable and modest, though his liking for practical jokes and dressing up in different guises, such as an English bobby or French foreign legionnaire, gained him the nickname “Wacky Larry” and “The Mad Monk of Malibu”. He was, like JR, a heavy drinker, which led to his developing cirrhosis of the liver; he had a transplant that saved his life. Thereafter, Hagman was active in several organisations that advocated organ donation and transplantation. A passionate non-smoker, he also served as the chairperson of the American Cancer Society’s Great American Smokeout, from 1981 to 1992.
In 1996, Hagman reprised his infamous alter ego in a TV special called JR Returns, in which the dysfunctional Ewing family is reunited. Then, acting against type, he showed his range as a benevolent judge in Orleans (1997). Among Hagman’s few later feature films was Mike Nichols’s Primary Colors (1998), in which Hagman was convincing as a populist, plain-speaking Florida governor. Hagman himself, a member of the Peace and Freedom party, once described fellow Texan George Bush as “a sad figure, not too well educated, who doesn’t get out of America much. He’s leading the country towards fascism.”
In recent years, Hagman became a prominent campaigner for alternative energy, transforming his California home into one of the world’s biggest solar-powered estates. He revelled in the paradox of TV’s most famous oil man driving an electric car, and his disgust with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill led him to agree to star as JR in a SolarWorld TV advert, in which he parodied vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s use of the phrase “Drill, baby, drill” with the pro-solar slogan “Shine, baby, shine”.
Though he appeared in a couple of 2011 episodes of Desperate Housewives, Hagman largely retired from acting. Nonetheless, earlier this year he joined co-stars Linda Gray and Patrick Duffy in a new 10-episode season of Dallas, adding a further generation to the troubled family and its business.
Hagman married his wife, Maj Axelsson, in 1954. She survives him, as do their son and daughter.
The above “Guardian” obituary can also be accessed online here.
• Larry Martin Hagman, actor, born 21 September 1931; died 23 November 2012
