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1-50 of 113
- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Ossie Davis was born on 18 December 1917 in Cogdell, Georgia, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for Do the Right Thing (1989), Bubba Ho-Tep (2002) and Grumpy Old Men (1993). He was married to Ruby Dee. He died on 4 February 2005 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Actress
- Additional Crew
Titian-haired Margaret 'Maggie' Hayes was born Florette Regina Ottenheimer in Baltimore, Maryland, the daughter of Jacob 'Jack' Louis Ottenheimer (1882-1943) and Clara Bussy (1877-1966). While still at high school she worked with a local stock company to get into acting. She then studied for two years at John Hopkins University, briefly entertaining the notion of becoming a nurse. Before long, however, she had joined The Barnstormers troupe of performers to become their first ever female member. A trip to New York and a night at the Stork Club resulted in a chance encounter with several prominent newspaper columnists who were also in attendance, among them Walter Winchell. Winchell decided to change her name to 'Dana Dale'. Using this moniker, she did some modelling and auditioned unsuccessfully for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (1939). At this time, she was featured in several cigarette, automobile and fashion advertisements.
After a brief stint at Warner Brothers, and having finally settled on the stage name Maggie Hayes, she made her Broadway debut in 1940 and was signed by Paramount the following year. On screen, Maggie tended to be cast as second leads, often as 'the other woman', but was never quite fulfilled in her profession. Instead, she pursued diverse other career paths outside of acting, both in between performing and after her retirement in 1962: as fashion designer, model, owner of a boutique in Palm Beach and designing/selling jewelry in New York. She even worked for a while as a public relations executive for luxury goods department store Bergdorf Goodman on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. In the late 1940s, she became fashion editor for 'Life Magazine', before returning to the New York stage and acting in television where she had some of her best roles.
Maggie Hayes was married (and divorced) three times. Her second husband was the actor Leif Erickson (of The High Chaparral (1967) fame), her third the producer Herbert B. Swope Jr..- Actor
- Composer
- Music Department
Maurice Gibb was born on 22 December 1949 in Douglas, Isle of Man, UK. He was an actor and composer, known for Saturday Night Fever (1977), Ready Player One (2018) and Virtuosity (1995). He was married to Yvonne Gibb and Lulu. He died on 12 January 2003 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
At fourteen he worked as an usher at the NYC Paramount Theatre. His father was an electrician who played guitar and his mother taught piano. Damone attended PS 163 and sang in St. Finbar's choir and later attended the Alexander Hamilton Vocational High School and then Lafayette High School in Brooklyn. He left school at sixteen to support his family, but returned to graduate from Lafayette in 1997. Damone won first prize in an Arthur Godfrey talent scouts contest in 1945. His first night club appearance at the LA Martinique Club was set up by comedian Milton Berle. He was drafted and served in the army from 1951 to 1953. After he was discharged from the army he married actress Pier Angeli, whom he later divorced. Damone was later married to Becky Ann Jones from 1974 to 1982 and Diahann Carroll from 1987 to 1996. He married Rena Rowan, fashion designer and co-founder of Jones New York, in 1998. In 1999, he received a certificate of advanced study from Philadelphia University.- Writer
- Script and Continuity Department
- Actor
Walter Stone was born on 1 February 1920 in Dunellen, New Jersey, USA. He was a writer and actor, known for The Jackie Gleason Show (1966), That's Life (1968) and The Honeymooners (1955). He was married to Elizabeth Stone. He died on 20 October 1999 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Actor
- Art Department
- Soundtrack
The only career Nelson Eddy ever considered was singing. His parents, Isabel (Kendrick) and William Darius Eddy, were singers, his grandparents were musicians. Unable to afford a teacher, he learned by imitating opera recordings. At age 14 he worked as a telephone operator in a Philadelphia iron foundry. He sold newspaper advertising and performed in amateur musicals. Dr. Edouard Lippe coached him and loaned him the money to study in Dresden and Paris. He gave his first concert recital in 1928 in Philadelphia. In 1933 he did 18 encores for an audience that included an assistant to MGM studio chief Louis B. Mayer, who signed him to a seven-year contract. After MGM acting lessons and initial trials, his first real success came as the Yankee scout to Jeanette MacDonald's French princess in Naughty Marietta (1935), a huge box-office success made on a small budget. Eddy and MacDonald were paired twice more (Rose-Marie (1936), Maytime (1937)) when metropolitan Opera star Grace Moore was unavailable; they became an institution. Their last work together was in 1942. Critics nearly always panned his acting. He did have a large radio following (his theme song: "Short'nin Bread"). In 1959 Eddy and MacDonald issued a recording of their movie hits which sold well. In 1953 he had a fairly successful nightclub routine with Gale Sherwood which ran until his death in 1967. He and his wife Anne Denitz had no children.- Writer
- Producer
- Script and Continuity Department
Gene Markey was born on 11 December 1895 in Jackson, Michigan, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for You're the One (1941), The Hound of the Baskervilles (1939) and On the Avenue (1937). He was married to Lucille Parker Wright, Myrna Loy, Hedy Lamarr and Joan Bennett. He died on 1 May 1980 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Michael Hall was born on 7 September 1927 in Visalia, California, USA. He was an actor, known for The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), Matinee Theatre (1955) and Blood of Dracula (1957). He was married to Malmberg, Thomas. He died on 24 May 2020 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Cynthia Stone was born on 26 February 1926 in Peoria, Illinois, USA. She was an actress, known for That Wonderful Guy (1949), Short Short Dramas (1952) and Soldiers of Fortune (1955). She was married to Robert Davis McDougal III, Cliff Robertson and Jack Lemmon. She died on 26 December 1988 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Jean Ackerman was born Jeanette MacCraw on December 11, 1903 in New York City. Her father had immigrated from Scotland and her mother was from Germany. After graduating from high school she married Richard Ackerman. Jean separated from her husband and decided to pursue a career in show business. She joined the cast of the Ziegfeld Follies in 1927. Then she appeared in the Broadway musicals Whoopee and Smiles. Jean also worked as a model and appeared in ads for Lucky cigarettes. She was called "The World's Most Beautiful Brunette". During this time she was romantically linked to several prominent men including New York Mayor Jimmy Walker.
In 1929 she appeared in Ziegfeld's Midnight Frolic. Then she had a bit part in the 1931 film The Girl Habit. By this time she had divorced her husband and was dating Walter Hirshon, a wealthy stockbroker. Jean married him on May 31, 1931. The couple adopted a daughter named Wendy Jean. Unfortunately their marriage ended in divorce in 1940. She was awarded $750 a month in alimony. Jean had a brief romance with comedian Ed Wynn. Later she moved to Miami, Florida. Sadly on November 26, 1960 she died from cancer. She was only fifty-six years old. - Pat Henning was born on 5 July 1908 in Manhattan, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for On the Waterfront (1954), The Cardinal (1963) and The Jackie Gleason Show (1966). He was married to Elizabeth. He died on 28 April 1973 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Polish-born Meyer Lansky emigrated to New York with his family and grew up in the Lower East Side. It was there that he ran into Bugsy Siegel, at the time a teenaged neighborhood gangster, and the two would remain lifelong friends. When Lansky saw the kinds of money Siegel was making from his various illegal activities--mainly gambling--he decided that this was the line of work for him. His specialty was the floating crap game, and he was so successful at that and other gambling schemes that he and Siegel soon controlled a large gang that was known as the Bugs and Meyer Mob. The gang's size, and Lansky's business acumen, attracted the attention of another local gangster, Lucky Luciano, who approached Lansky and invited him to participate in his idea of forming a national criminal syndicate. The Prohibition Era was a goldmine for Lansky and other gangsters, and he, Siegel and Luciano became incredibly wealthy from bootlegging, prostitution, drug smuggling, gambling and other rackets. In the 1930s Luciano's dream of a national crime commission became a reality, and Lansky was appointed to a seat on its board of directors. Lansky's specialty was financial matters and he proved to be a genius at laundering the mob's illegal profits and squeezing every last penny from its legal and illegal investments. When his friend Luciano was sent to prison, Lansky managed to get him an early release by ensuring his cooperation with the U.S. government in its preparation for the invasion of Sicily. After Luciano was deported to Italy, Lansky took over the management of his empire. Friendship only went so far in the mob, however. His good friend Siegel got into trouble by wasting millions of dollars of "wiseguy" money building Las Vegas, and when the decision was made to have him killed, Lansky went along with it.
In the 1950s Lansky formed a friendship with Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista, and the mob was given basically a blank check to run all the rackets in Cuba, especially the gambling casinos, prostitution and drug smuggling, with a large cut of the profits going to Batista. From Cuba Lansky spread his gambling and prostitution rackets to other South American countries, and even had a hand--although not a public one--in the casinos in Hong Kong and Macao. Lansky's fortunes began to wane, however, in the late 1960s when the U.S. government went after him for income tax evasion. He fled to Israel, and claimed citizenship there as a returning Jew. However, after legal wrangling with the Israeli government, Lansky's visa was revoked and he was deported back to the U.S. He stood trial, but managed to avoid conviction, reportedly because of his extensive political connections. He settled into a comfortable life in Miami, Florida, where he died of a heart attack in 1983. - Frank 'Lefty' Rosenthal was born on 12 June 1929 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He was married to Geraldine ("Geri") McGee. He died on 13 October 2008 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Costume Designer
- Costume and Wardrobe Department
- Production Designer
Gianni Versace was born on 2 December 1946 in Reggio di Calabria, Italy. He was a costume designer and production designer, known for Judge Dredd (1995), Showgirls (1995) and Cover Up (1984). He died on 15 July 1997 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Young Lo was an actor and composer, known for EverybodyKnowsLo feat. Rich the Kid: McFlurry (2018), Young Lo Feat. Tyga: Boss I'm Supposed to Be (2010) and EverybodyKnowsLo: Sneak Dissin (2017). He died on 7 May 2023 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Jackie Gayle was born on 1 March 1926 in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for Bulworth (1998), Broadway Danny Rose (1984) and Tin Men (1987). He was married to Tracy Gayle. He died on 23 November 2002 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Helen Lynch was born on 6 April 1900 in Billings, Montana, USA. She was an actress, known for Romance of the Underworld (1928), Minnie (1922) and Bustin' Thru (1925). She was married to Carroll Nye. She died on 2 March 1965 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Jeff Gillen was born on 2 November 1942 in Ohio, USA. He was an actor and director, known for A Christmas Story (1983), Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach (1988) and Deranged (1974). He died on 27 June 1995 in North Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Writer
- Director
- Additional Crew
Legendary Broadway writer/producer/director George Abbott was born in 1887 in Forestville, New York. His father was mayor of Salamanca, New York, for two terms. In 1898 his family moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Abbott attended Kearney Military Academy. The family returned to New York, where Abbott attended Hamburg High School, graduating in 1907, and the University of Rochester (BA degree in 1911). He wrote the play "Perfectly Harmless" for University Dramatic Club. He attended Harvard University from 1911-1912, studying play writing under George Pierce Baker, and wrote "The Head of the Family" for Harvard Dramatic Club. In 1912 he won $100 in a play contest sponsored by the Bijou Theatre in Boston, Massachusetts, for "The Man in the Manhole", and worked at the Bijou for a year as assistant stage manager. He made his Broadway debut as an actor in 1913 in "The Misleading Lady" (as Babe Merrill, a drunken student), followed by "The Yeoman of the Guard" (1915), "The Queen's Enemies" (1916), "Daddies" (1918), "The Broken Wing" (1920), "Dulcy" (on tour) (1921), "Zander the Great" (1923), "White Desert" (1923), "Hell-Bent for Heaven" (1924), "Lazybones" (1924), "Processional" (1925) and "Cowboy Crazy" (1926). From that point he concentrated on writing and directing, with "The Fall Guy" (his Broadway's debut, 1925), "Three Men on a Horse" (1935), "Jumbo" (1935), "On Your Toes" (1936), "The Boys from Syracuse" (1938), "Too Many Girls" (1939), "Pal Joey" (1940), "Best Foot Forward" (1941), "On the Town" (1944), "High Buttom Shoes" (1947), "Where's Charley?" (1948), "Call Me Madam" (1950), "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" (1951), "Wonderful Town" (1953), "The Pajama Game" (1954), "Damn Yankees" (1955), "New Girl Town" (1957), "Fiorello!" (1959), "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Forum" (1962), "Flora, the Red Menace" (1965; Liza Minnelli's Broadway debut).
He won five Tony Awards and the Pulitzer Prize (for "Fiorello!"). He was nominated for an Oscar for writing All Quiet on the Western Front (1930). His daughter, Judith Abbott, is a stage actress/director and was married (1946-49) to Tom Ewell.- Gabriel Heatter, a radio journalist rivaled only by Walter Winchell and Edward R. Murrow in his time, was born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan to immigrant parents on September 17, 1890. The family soon moved to Brooklyn, where Heatter went to school. He was not a good student and found his high school studies particularly frustrating. However, he was well-spoken, well-read and had a lively interest in current events.
When he was 16 years old, Heatter harnessed his gift for communication and hit the hustings as a sidewalk campaigner for media baron and Congressman William Randolph Hearst's unsuccessful 1906 run for mayor of New York City. Although Hearst lost the race, his example as a progressive tribune of the people influenced the young Heatter to become a journalist. After graduating from high school, Heatter began working at the "East New York Record," a weekly paper where he reported on social functions. Heatter moved on to the "Brooklyn Times," and while working as a cub reporter for that paper, the Heast Corp. offered him a position as the Brooklyn reporter for The "New York Evening Journal," Hearst's flagship paper in the Big Apple. He accepted.
Heatter became well-known because of a 1931 article published by the liberal weekly "The Nation" in which he argued against the legality of the U.S. Socialist Party. New York radio station WMCA set up an on-air debate between Heatter and a prominent Socialist, and when his opponent failed to show up, Heatter went on the air and discussed his article in more depth. The response was so positive that a larger station, Mutual Broadcasting's WOR, offered him a job as a commentator and reporter. From then on, his career was in radio news.
Heatter became a prominent radio newsman in 1933 when he covered the "Trial of the Century," the trial of Bruno Richard Hauptmann, the German immigrant accused of kidnapping and murdering the child of American hero Charles Lindbergh. Now nationally famous, Heatter's commentary began to be a major influence on public opinion, and he became a peer and competitor of powerful radio newsman Walter Winchell. Heatter's heyday was World War II, when his upbeat reporting and commentary was popular with American audiences gloomy over the reversals of fortune in the immediate post-Pearl Harbor period.
In the first half of 1942 the news from the Pacific War was not good. One evening, after the U.S. Navy successfully sank a Japanese destroyer, Heatter came on the air declaring, "There is good news tonight." This became his catch phrase, and one he used throughout his career. He was seen as a morale booster looking for blue skies and silver linings in the dark clouds that comprised much of the news in those days. This optimism and lack of objectivity may be one reason why he is forgotten today, whereas the highly opinionated Winchell and the coldly objective-seeming (though by no means neutral) Murrow live on 'til this day (in Matt Drudge and the Murrow biopic Good Night, and Good Luck. (2005), respectively). - Actor
- Writer
- Additional Crew
Pat Patterson was born on 19 January 1941 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He was an actor and writer, known for WWF Superstars (1986), Attitude Era (2012) and Undertaker - He Buries Them Alive (1994). He died on 2 December 2020 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Andrew Cunanan was the youngest of four children in a prosperous but unhappy family in the San Diego, California, area. His status-conscious father was a former Naval officer and stockbroker and his naive, religious mother was a homemaker. His parents marriage was showing strains when Cunanan was born, with his father repeatedly accusing his mother of infidelity, in spite of the fact that there was no evidence to support that claim, and occasionally hit her. He even claimed that his oldest daughter wasn't his child. His mother was traumatized by this treatment, and for a while had to be treated for depression during Andrew's formative years. His father had to take the lead in raising him, and he was stern and quick with the strap, though not to the point of being abusive. In response, Andrew spent a lot of time alone in his room and often told his friends fantasy stories about his family and life. He was a highly intelligent child who could recite Bible verses and read from encyclopedias at an early age, and a good-looking and talkative boy who could converse with adults more easily than most children. In school, he was a high achiever academically and was always carefully dressed and well-groomed. As a result, he was more popular with teachers than his fellow classmates, that spread rumors about him. In response to these developments, his parents enrolled him into the exclusive Bishop's School when he became a teenager. While in that high school, he became lovers with a wealthy married man for a while, who bought him expensive gifts until the relationship ended. He enjoyed being a kept boy, but kept it from his parents, who were completely unaware of his secret life. Upon graduating, he entered college to please his parents, but devoted all his time to his social life. Meanwhile, his parents' lives fell apart. His father was accused of embezzling from his firm and fled to his native Phillipines to escape and avoid prosecution. His mother was forced to move into a small apartment on another side of town. Andrew briefly lived with his father, but quickly returned to the States and had no further contact with him. He immediately returned to being a companion for wealthy, closeted men, some of them married, and his looks, intelligence, and conversational skills made him very popular. He lived a life of luxury, accompanied with endless parties and anonymous sex, but close friends noticed he had dark moods and occasional fits of anger. Gradually, he began to use drugs and, as he reached his mid-twenties, he began to lose his attractiveness. One day, he suddenly left for Minneapolis to visit Jeffrey Trail and David Madson, with whom he he had brief relationships. Exactly what happened is unknown, but it ended with Cunanan murdering them. While on the run, he committed two more murders and was on the FBI's Most Wanted List. He hid out in Miami, and began stalking designer Gianni Versace, whom he had met at a party in San Fransisco several years earlier. On Tuesday, July 15th, 1997, Cunanan shot Versace to death and escaped, making headlines all around the globe. Cunanan evaded detection for eight days until his body was discovered and cornered on a vacant houseboat. Realizing he was nearly caught, Cunanan shot himself to death. He was 27.
- Writer
- Actor
Fernando Galiana was born on 19 November 1925 in Barcelona, Spain. He was a writer and actor, known for La ultima batalla (1993), Morir de madrugada (1980) and Santo in the Wax Museum (1963). He was married to Renée Dumas. He died on 1 February 1995 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.- Director
- Writer
- Editor
Nam June Paik was the first video artist who experimented with electronic media and made a profound impact on the art of video and television. He coined the phrase "Information Superhighway" in 1974, and has been called the "father of video art."
He was born Nam June Paik on July 20, 1932 in Seoul, South Korea. He was the fifth son of a textile manufacturer. Young Paik was fond of music and art, he studied piano in Seoul. In 1950 the Paik family fled from the Korean War, first to Hong Kong, and later to Japan. There he graduated from the University of Tokyo (1956), where he studied art, music history, and philosophy, and wrote a thesis on Arnold Schönberg.
Paik continued his music studies in Germany. He collaborated with Karlheinz Stockhausen and John Cage, who inspired his transition into electronic arts. In 1959 he performed his "Hommage a John Cage" with pre-recorded music and motorcycle, with participation of people and live chicken. Paik also carried out experimental work with Karlheinz Stockhausen in the Electronic Music Studio of the West Deutscher Rundfunk (WDR) in Cologne, Germany. Paik was a friend of Yoko Ono from 1963, when they first met at her home in Tokyo. At that time, he took part in the Post Neo-Dada art movement "Fluxus" with George Maciunas, Yoko Ono and other avant-garde artists.
Paik's modified TV monitors were first presented in 1963, in his solo show titled "Exposition of Music-Electronic Television" in Germany. In 1964 he moved to New York and continued experiments with music and video performance. His ground-braking interactive video-works began in 1965, when he started experiments with his video camera, with electromagnets, and with color TV. At that time Paik also collaborated with engineer Shuya Abe in Japan. He continued as artist-in-residence at WGBH public broadcaster in Boston, USA. There he constructed the first video synthesizer together with Shuya Abe in 1969. A large magnet outside the TV monitor was used to alter the image and create an abstract picture. He produced random patterns of light by causing distortions to the electron emission spot on a phosphorous screen. Paik later used multiple TV monitors and robots, made of TV sets, metal and electronic components. In his TV project " TV Buddha" a statue of a sitting Buddha is facing it's own image on a closed-circuit TV.
Paik was the founding father of Video Art. He advanced our perceptions of the temporal image and it's role in contemporary art. His largest project was "Wrap around the World" designed for the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, Korea. There he mounted a giant media-tower shaped like a birthday cake, called "The More the Better" and used 1003 TV monitors for a non-stop presentation of Video-Art images and performances by Korean drummers and international artists: Laurie Anderson, David Bowie, Merce Cunningham, Sergei Kuryokhin among others.
Nam June Paik is credited for creating the term "Electronic Super Highway" in his 1974 report, commissioned by the Rockefeller Foundation. In the 90s, when "information superhighway" became a hot phrase, he commented, "Bill Clinton stole my idea." In 1996 Paik became disabled after having a stroke, and was in a wheelchair for ten years in his later life, but his energy and intellect were as productive as ever. He was a highly creative member of society, a provocative experimental artist and thinker whose ideas and performances made a profound effect on the art of video and television. His works are now preserved in museum collections across the world. Nam June Paik died on January 29, 2006 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.
"He made the World Family wiser", said his friend Yoko Ono. A space rock was named "Paik" in his honor.- Marion McDonald was born on 14 May 1904 in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. She was an actress, known for Cameron of the Royal Mounted (1921), The Prince of Headwaiters (1927) and The Turning Point (1920). She died on 20 October 1956 in Miami Beach, Florida, USA.