The RIP Famous Person Thread

[harrybarracuda]

Julie Adams, an actress best known for playing the damsel in distress in the 1954 monster movie “Creature From the Black Lagoon,” died Sunday at age 92, according to her official website.


Guillermo del Toro, whose 2017 Oscar winner “The Shape of Water” was inspired by the Universal cult classic, paid tribute to Adams online. “I mourn Julie Adams passing. It hurts in a place deep in me, where monsters swim.”

During her long career in Hollywood, Adams starred opposite Rock Hudson in 1953’s “Lawless Breed,” Van Helfin in 1953’s “Wings of the Hawk” Elvis Presley in “Tickle Me,” and Dennis Hopper in 1971’s “The Last Movie.”


Her most recent film credit was a voiceover in Roman Polanski’s 2011 drama “Carnage.”


The Iowa native also had a long career in television, notably playing the Cabot Cove real estate agent Eve Simpson opposite Angela Lansbury in the long-running mystery “Murder, She Wrote” in the 1980s and early ’90s.

She also appeared on shows like “Perry Mason,” “Quincy” and the short-lived early ’70s series “The Jimmy Stewart Show” as Stewart’s wife.


But she will be best remembered for her role in “Creature From the Black Lagoon,” a horror movie update on “The Beauty and the Beast” that she was at first reluctant to do despite being under contract at Universal.

“I think the best thing about the picture is that we do feel for the creature,” she said in a 2013 interview with Horror Society. “We feel for him and his predicament.”

https://www.thewrap.com/julie-adams-...ar-dies-at-92/

[harrybarracuda]

Albert Finney: British actor dies aged 82




Oscar-nominated British actor Albert Finney has died aged 82 after a short illness.


He was a five-time Oscar nominee who began his career at the Royal Shakespeare Company before making his mark in film.

His big film break came as "angry young man" Arthur Seaton in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning.

He went on to star in Tom Jones, as Hercule Poirot in Murder on the Orient Express, Erin Brockovich and Skyfall.


A statement from a family spokesman said: "Albert Finney, aged 82, passed away peacefully after a short illness with those closest to him by his side.

"The family request privacy at this sad time."


Finney's other memorable roles include Winston Churchill in The Gathering Storm, for which he won a Golden Globe and a Bafta.

He also played the title role in Scrooge, billionaire Daddy Warbucks in Annie, Ed Bloom Senior in Tim Burton's Big Fish and the mobster Leo O'Bannon in Miller's Crossing.


Finney was nominated four times for a best actor Oscar and once in the best supporting actor category.

He got back-to-back nominations in 1984 and 1985 for The Dresser and Under the Volcano but never attended the ceremony itself, calling it "a waste of time".

He was the recipient of two Bafta Awards from 13 nominations and received a British Academy Fellowship in 2001.


The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) graduate continued working on the stage despite his film success, earning Tony nominations on Broadway for Luther and A Day in the Death of Joe Egg.

He won an Olivier Award for Orphans and was part of the original three-man cast of Art.

His last film role came in 2012 James Bond film Skyfall, in which he played the irascible gamekeeper Kincaid.

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-47175304

[Humbert]

So long Big Fish.

[kmart]

^ ^^ Just watched "Miller's Crossing" last week, Finney what a terrific actor and personality. Some brilliant films in his resume, going back to 1960.

Remained an "angry young man" until his death,apparently. Turned down a knighthood, CBE, and refused to attend the Oscars ceremonies. Bloke.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebri...-icon-13973002

[headhunter]

saturday night and sunday morning,great film with some great actors,apart from albert,there was norman rossington and the sexy rachel roberts.
after that film i JOINED the dirty mack brigade.

[harrybarracuda]

Actor Carmen Argenziano Dead at 75




The Stargate family mourns today at the passing of actor Carmen Argenziano. The veteran stage and screen actor died Saturday at the age of 75.


Born to an Italian family in Sharpsville, Pennsylvania, in 1943, Carmen left home at the age of 18 to study acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. In a 1996 interview with the L.A. Times he said that he was “kind of a shy, introverted young man” who wanted “to become forceful, to be something other than what I was, which seemed pretty well-contained and not terribly exciting to me.”

He found work selling concessions at Broadway shows before moving to Hollywood in 1966, where he took up residence at the famous Actors Studio (where he would become a lifetime member). There he mopped the floors to earn his keep, and participated in as many acting workshops as he could.


His acting career spanned nearly 50 years, beginning in earnest in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He landed a high-profile gig as a henchman to Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) in The Godfather, Part II. His work on the big screen also included The Accused and Stand and Deliver.

Carmen’s early television work included Kojak, Columbo, and The Rockford Files. In the 1980s and 90s his credits include the classics of the era — from The A-Team, Cheers, and L.A. Law to Melrose Place and 21 Jump Street.

Before he was cast as General Jacob Carter on Stargate SG-1 in 1998, science fiction fans already knew him as the Centauri Urza Jaddo, old friend to Londo Mollari, in the Babylon 5 episode “Knives.”

In a 2006 interview with GateWorld, Carmen described his career as that of a “journeyman” actor. “I remember an old acting teacher that told me, ‘Drama is revelation,'” he said. “The more you work on a role or character the more you discover about him. And in some cases there is self-discovery, too.”

In the end he had well over 200 acting credits to his name. He won an L.A. Drama Critics award for his role as a troubled police detective in the stage play “A Prayer For My Daughter.” And in 2016 he made his directorial debut on the stage.

https://www.gateworld.net/news/2019/...ano-1943-2019/

[harrybarracuda]

Gordon Banks dead at 81.

[harrybarracuda]

Last survivor of 'The Great Escape' dies aged 99: RAF airman Richard Churchill escaped death during the war because Nazis thought he might be related to Sir Winston




The last survivor of the Great Escape has died aged 99.


Airman Richard Churchill was among the 76 men who crawled through tunnels in 1944 to escape Stalag Luft III, a Nazi prisoner of war camp.

However, only three of the men got clean away and 50 were rounded up and shot on Hitler’s direct orders.

Mr Churchill was recaptured three days after the escape. He and his comrade Bob Nelson were found by farmers hiding in a barn and were handed over to the Germans. The RAF man believed he was not shot because the Nazis thought he may be related to Winston Churchill.
After his recapture Mr Churchill, of Crediton, Devon, was forced into gruelling winter marches across Germany.


The Great Escape was immortalised in the 1963 film starring Sir Richard Attenborough and Steve McQueen.

He told the BBC in July last year: 'You fell into a certain category.

'Were you going to sit and enjoy the very few delights of a barbed wire prison camp until you were rescued by your comrades, if you were rescued, or were you going to try and get out of the place and rejoin and drop something on them?

'You could be a quiet person, do nothing much, above all don't annoy the Germans or the Gestapo, or you can try and do the opposite and feel better as the result of doing it.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...s-aged-99.html

[harrybarracuda]

Bruno Ganz, actor who played Hitler in Downfall, dies aged 77







Sat 16 Feb 2019 16.05 GMT First published on Sat 16 Feb 2019 13.57 GMT

Bruno Ganz, the Swiss actor who played Adolf Hitler in the film Downfall, has died in Zurich at the age of 77, his agent said on Saturday.

The actor became internationally renowned for his 2004 portrayal of the dictator of Germany in the final days inside his Berlin bunker.

In a Guardian review of the film Rob Mackie described Ganz as “the most convincing screen Hitler yet: an old, bent, sick dictator with the shaking hands of someone with Parkinson’s, alternating between rage and despair in his last days in the bunker”.

His lengthy rants in the film became a recurrent meme with subtitles laid over the footage to create parodies of everything from sporting events to current affairs.

It is widely believed to be the cinematic footage most often shared online, as well as the cause of one of the world’s most productive internet memes.

Speaking to the Guardian in 2005, Ganz said that during the months of painstaking research, that involved looking at historical records including a secretly-recorded tape of Hitler, before taking on the role he became convinced that Hitler was suffering from Parkinson’s disease towards the end of his life.

He said: “There is newsreel of him presenting medals to the Hitler Youth a few days before his death, and you can see his hand shaking, so I visited a hospital and observed Parkinson’s sufferers.”

The actor also revealed that in taking on the role it was “useful to be able to put my Swiss passport between my heart and Mr Hitler, so that he couldn’t touch me”.

The actor said he was “fascinated” that “he was not just supported by the German people; he was loved”.

He added: “The relationship between him and them was almost religious. There was also that Wagnerian undercurrent – the hero dressed in white, standing against a corrupt world. Look at the bunker - the way Goebbels’s wife is willing to kill her children because she can’t imagine life after national socialism. It is like a cult. So it helped me that I am Swiss, not German.”

But Ganz added that he had not gained real insight into Hitler’s motivation, saying: “I cannot claim to understand Hitler. Even the witnesses who had been in the bunker with him were not really able to describe the essence of the man.”

On the actor’s 75th birthday the German news outlet Deutsche Welle reported that Ganz’s decision to quit school and pursue his dream of acting baffled his parents.

In the early days of his career he worked as a bookseller and a paramedic before he broke into film with roles in The Marquise of O, which won a special prize at Cannes in 1976, and Peter Stein’s drama Sommergäste (Summer Guests).

He also played a vampire in Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) and an angel in Wim Wenders’ Wings of Desire (1987) and its sequel Faraway, So Close! (1993).

In 2008 he appeared in The Baader Meinhof Complex and in 2018 he was in Lars von Trier’s The House that Jack Built.

At the time of his death Ganz was the holder of the Iffland-Ring – a diamond-studded ring stamped with the image of German actor August Wilhelm Iffland. It is passed from actor to actor to mark the recipient as the “most significant and worthy” German-speaking actor of their era.

It is not known to whom he had chosen to pass the heirloom at the time of his death.

Last year it was reported Ganz was suffering from intestinal cancer. He is survived by his son, Daniel.

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/feb/16/bruno-ganz-actor-who-played-hitler-in-downfall-dies-aged-77

[SKkin]

[harrybarracuda]

Sailor in iconic V-J Day Times Square kiss photo dies at 95




PROVIDENCE, R.I. — The ecstatic sailor shown kissing a woman in Times Square celebrating the end of World War II died Sunday. George Mendonsa was 95.


Mendonsa fell and had a seizure at the assisted living facility in Middletown, Rhode Island, where he lived with his wife of 70 years, his daughter, Sharon Molleur, told The Providence Journal.

Mendonsa was shown kissing Greta Zimmer Friedman, a dental assistant in a nurse's uniform, on Aug. 14, 1945 — known as V-J Day, the day Japan surrendered to the United States. People spilled into the New York City streets to celebrate the news.

Mendonsa planted a kiss on Friedman, whom he had never met.

An iconic photo of the kiss by Alfred Eisenstaedt was first published in Life magazine and is called "V-J Day in Times Square," but is known to most as "The Kiss."

It became one of the most famous photographs of the 20th century.

Another photographer, Victor Jorgensen, who was in the Navy, also captured the moment in a similar photo. The moment has been shared widely and is often seen on posters.

Several people later claimed to be the kissing couple, and it was years before Mendonsa and Friedman were confirmed to be the couple.

Mendonsa served on a destroyer during the war and was on leave when the end of the war was announced.

When he was honored at the Rhode Island State House in 2015, Mendonsa spoke about the kiss. He said Friedman reminded him of nurses on a hospital ship that he saw care for wounded sailors.

"I saw what those nurses did that day and now back in Times Square the war ends, a few drinks, so I grabbed the nurse," Mendonsa said, WPRI-TV reported .

Friedman said in a 2005 interview with the Veterans History Project that it wasn't her choice to be kissed.

"The guy just came over and kissed or grabbed," she told the Library of Congress.

She added, "It was just somebody really celebrating. But it wasn't a romantic event."

Mendonsa died two days before his 96th birthday. The family has not yet made funeral arrangements.

Friedman fled Austria during the war as a 15-year-old girl. She died in 2016 at the age of 92 at a hospital in Richmond, Virginia, from complications of old age.

Sailor in iconic V-J Day Times Square kiss photo dies at 95 - StarTribune.com

[harrybarracuda]

Scientist who popularized term “global warming” dies aged 87



YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 19, ARMENPRESS. Geologist and scientist Wallace Broecker, who popularized the term “global warming”, has died at the age of 87, Associated Press reported.


The longtime Columbia University professor and researcher died Monday at a New York City hospital, according to a spokesman for the university’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. Kevin Krajick said Broecker had been ailing in recent months.

Broecker brought “global warming” into common use with a 1975 article that correctly predicted rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere would lead to pronounced warming. He later became the first person to recognize what he called the Ocean Conveyor Belt, a global network of currents affecting everything from air temperature to rain patterns.

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/964754.html

[reddog]

Wonder if he was cremated and added to global warming.

[harrybarracuda]

Iconic fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld dead at the age of 85




The fashion world paid tribute to celebrity designer Karl Lagerfeld today after his death at the age of 85 after a battle with pancreatic cancer.


The German born fashion “Kaiser” - known for his trademark look of dark sunglasses, high collars and white ponytail - was admitted to the American Hospital on the outskirts of Paris last night and passed away early this morning.


According to sources who were close to Lagerfeld, he was rushed to hospital while suffering from the disease.


“He hadn’t gone on about his illness, but battled it very bravely,” said one source. “Karl was very proud of his fitness and healthy living, so the pancreatic cancer came as a huge shock.”


Rumours about Lagerfeld’s failing health had been circulating for several weeks after he failed to appear at the end of the Chanel spring/summer haute couture show in Paris for the first time. At the time aides said he was too “tired” to attend.


The designer, who up until his death was the creative director at Fendi, Chanel and his eponymous label, was thought to have been working right up until his death, even directing and passing on instructions to his team about the Fendi autumn/winter 2019 collection which is due to be shown at Milan Fashion Week this Thursday.


His death brings an end a remarkable 64 year career creating clothes for the world’s most famous women. It started in 1955 when he was hired as an assistant to Pierre Balmain.


Victoria Beckham: “So incredibly sad to hear this. Karl was a genius and always so kind and generous to me both personally and professionally. RIP.”


Designer and creative director of Dior Homme Kim Jones said: “Total respect, rest in peace.”


Model Gigi Hadid posted: “I’m so heartbroken I almost don’t have words. There will never be a Karl Lagerfeld. Every second with you was an honor, joy, and inspiration. I wish I could give you one last hug. I love you Karl, thank you for everything. Rest in Peace.”


Presenter Myleene Klass said: “Karl Lagerfeld, a man whose talent I worshiped. Goodbye to the Titan of the fashion world.”


Model Alexa Chung said: “Rest in peace, Karl. I remember being so scared to interview you and yet you were in fact incredibly witty and generous. Thank you for inviting me to some of the most glamorous experiences of my life, it was an honour to know you. Oh yeah and thanks for the dry shampoo tip, will always think of you as I powder my wig.”


Singer Lily Allen wrote: “You made me feel like a princess. I never quite understood what you saw in me but I am forever grateful for the support that you and Chanel have given me over the last 15 years. Rest In Peace Karl, you were a true genius and will be missed, so much.”


Bernard Arnault, chairman and CEO of LVMH, which owns Fendi, said: “With the passing of Karl Lagerfeld we have lost a creative genius who helped to make Paris the fashion capital of the world and Fendi one of the most innovative Italian houses.


“We owe him a great deal: his taste and talent were the most exceptional I have ever known. I will always remember his immense imagination, his ability to conceive new trends for every season, his inexhaustible energy, the virtuosity of his drawings, his carefully guarded independence, his encyclopedic culture, and his unique wit and eloquence. Fashion and culture has lost a great inspiration.”


He has been creative director at Chanel since 1985 and other other fans have included Madonna, Kylie Minogue and Princess Diana.


Bruno Pavlovsky, President of Fashion at Chanel, said: “Fashion show after fashion show, collection after collection, Karl Lagerfeld left his mark on the legend of Gabrielle Chanel and the history of the House of Chanel. He steadfastly promoted the talent and expertise of Chanel’s ateliers and Métiers d’Art, allowing this exceptional know-how to shine throughout the world. The greatest tribute we can pay today is to continue to follow the path he traced by – to quote Karl – ‘continuing to embrace the present and invent the future’.”


The fashion house also announced that Lagerfeld's longtime collaborator and Director of Chanel's Creation Fashion Studio, Virginie Viard, would continue with the creative work of the autumn/winter 2019 collection which will be shown at Paris Fashion Week Tuesday, March 5.


Lagerfeld was well known for entertaining at his lavish apartment on the Paris’s Left Bank, which he shared with the socialite Jacques de Bascher, up until his death from Aids in 1989.


The designer was the proud owner of a cat named Choupette, whom in 2013 he said he would ‘gladly marry’ if it were legal. The cat, reportedly given as a gift to the designer by French model Baptiste Giabiconi in December 2011, had its own Twitter and Instagram pages, with a combined following of about 200,000.


He was born to an affluent family in Hamburg in 1933 and is said to have fallen in love with fashion when he accompanied his monther to a Dior show in 1949.


In 1954 he won first prize in the coat category in a competition run by the International Wool Secretariat. The best dress award in the same contest went to a teenage Yves Saint-Laurent, sparking a life long rivalry.


Over the next six decades he worked for many of the world’s most prestigious design houses including Chloe and Fendi and also designed ranges for H&M as well as setting up his own brand.




https://www.standard.co.uk/fashion/iconic-fashion-designer-karl-lagerfeld-reported-dead-at-the-age-of-85-a4070546.html

[SKkin]

^Who is the old "butch" woman in the pic?

[tomcat]

...^she'll be sitting next to you in hell...

[VocalNeal]

Broecker brought “global warming” into common use with a 1975 article that correctly predicted rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere would lead to pronounced warming.

Which Thatcher used to justify converting power stations to oil and thereby destroying not only the miner's union but also the coal industry

[harrybarracuda]

Which Thatcher used to justify converting power stations to oil and thereby destroying not only the miner's union but also the coal industry

Yeah, that makes sense. "Let's stop burning fossil fuels to make electricity and use, er, fossil fuels instead".

She closed the mines because they were a nationalised industrial hole into which Britain was pouring millions because they couldn't sell British coal on the international market at competitive prices.

Plus the unions had brought the country to its knees under Heath and Callaghan and needed bringing down a peg or twenty. I can still remember freezing my nuts off by candlelight thanks to those c u n t s.

There might be a lot for which she can be criticised, but busting those entitled pricks wasn't one of them.

There are still 7 coal powered stations in the UK, and they are still being subsidised.

Thankfully they are on the way out.

[harrybarracuda]

Peter Tork: Monkees bassist and singer dies at age 77




The Monkees bassist and singer Peter Tork has died at the age of 77.


The star’s sister Anne Thorkelson confirmed the news to the Washington Post earlier today, but did not share the cause of death.

His official social media channels also shared a statement announcing his passing, which read: "It is with beyond-heavy and broken hearts that we share the devastating news that our friend, mentor, teacher and amazing soul, Peter Tork, has passed from this world."

Tork was previously diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma, a rare form of tongue cancer, in 2009, but made a full recovery.


The multi-talented musician sang and played keyboards, bass guitar and other instruments for The Monkees, the four-piece band who also appeared in an Emmy-winning NBC series.

He was the only member of the group allowed to play his own instruments on the band's first two albums, and wrote songs including For Pete's Sake and Lady's Baby.

Though he officially left the group in 1968, Tork later rejoined bandmates Davy Jones and Micky Dolenz for a 20th anniversary reunion tour, and went on to perform with The Monkees intermittently from 1986, while also playing with his own groups The Peter Tork Project and Shoe Suede Blues.

Most recently, he toured with Dolenz and Michael Nesmith to mark the 45th anniversary of their album Headquarters in 2012, and to pay tribute to Jones after his death in that year. They also played gigs in 2013 and 2014.


Dolenz lead tributes to his former bandmate, saying that he was "heartbroken" over the loss of his "Monkee brother."

"There are no words right now... heart broken over the loss of my Monkee brother, Peter Tork," he wrote on Twitter.

Beach Boys star Brian Wilson also shared a message of condolence, writing on Twitter: "I’m sad to hear about Peter Tork passing. I thought The Monkees were great and Peter will be missed. Love & mercy to Peter’s family, friends and fans."

https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/c...-a4073336.html

[headhunter]

i was YES,A DAYDREAM BELIEVER all my early days,then i became " i'm a believer" 1983 it eventually happened met and married my wife of TODAY.
remember,HEY HEY WE ARE THE MONKEYS.
R.I.P.PETER.

[harrybarracuda]

i was YES,A DAYDREAM BELIEVER all my early days,then i became " i'm a believer" 1983 it eventually happened met and married my wife of TODAY.
remember,HEY HEY WE ARE THE MONKEYS.
R.I.P.PETER.

Filleth thy galoshes....

[harrybarracuda]

Stanley Donen, one of the last surviving icons of Hollywood's Golden Age, also directed Funny Face and Two for the Road
By SAMANTHA MILLER





Stanley Donen, the director of Singin’ in the Rain and one of the last architects of Hollywood’s Golden Age, has died at age 94.


One of his sons confirmed the news to the Chicago Tribune on Feb. 23 — perhaps fittingly, on the eve of the Oscars, a night when Hollywood celebrates its legacy of style, glamour and moviemaking talent.

A former Broadway dancer and choreographer, Donen co-directed 1952’s Singin’ in the Rain — widely regarded as the best movie musical of all time — with its star, Gene Kelly. He went on to direct more classic musicals, including Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, It’s Always Fair Weather and Funny Face.

Donen was also acclaimed for sparkling, sophisticated romantic comedies and thrillers, reteaming with Audrey Hepburn for 1963’s Charade and 1967’s Two for the Road. (Hepburn’s Two for the Road costar, Albert Finney, died Feb. 7 at age 82.)


Donen was never nominated for an Academy Award himself — but he contributed one of the show’s most charming moments of all time when he accepted his honorary lifetime achievement Oscar in 1998. Holding up the statuette, he sang Irving Berlin’s classic song “Cheek to Cheek” (“heaven, I’m in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak…”), swaying along with his Oscar.

Donen was married and divorced five times and had three children. For the last two decades, his companion was comedy icon Elaine May, now 86.

https://people.com/movies/stanley-do...rector-oscars/

[kmart]

Mark Hollis; singer and songwriter for iconic band Talk Talk died, age 64.

Figures from the world of music have paid tribute to Mark Hollis, frontman of the band Talk Talk, after it was reported that he had died at the age of 64.
With Hollis as its singer and creative mastermind, the group made a name with 1980s hit singles such as .
His cousin-in-law Anthony Costello tweeted on Monday: “RIP Mark Hollis. Cousin-in-law. Wonderful husband and father. Fascinating and principled man. Retired from the music business 20 years ago but an indefinable musical icon.”
Talk Talk’s bassist Mark Webb, aka Rustin Man, paid tribute to Hollis on Instagram. “I am very shocked and saddened to hear the news of the passing of Mark Hollis,” he wrote. “Musically he was a genius and it was a honour and a privilege to have been in a band with him. I have not seen Mark for many years, but like many musicians of our generation I have been profoundly influenced by his trailblazing musical ideas.”

https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...64-reports-say

Bit of a shocker. One of my favourite bands / singers of the last 30-odd years. His voice will probably sound even more melancholy now..

RIP.

[harrybarracuda]

Andre Previn, the pianist, composer and conductor whose broad reach took in the worlds of Hollywood, jazz and classical music, has died at the age of 89.




His manager Linda Petrikova said Previn passed away on Thursday in his Manhattan home.

His ex-wife Mia Farrow today tweeted: 'See you in the Morning beloved Friend. May you rest in glorious symphonies.'

Previn won four Oscars for his film work and 10 Grammys for his recordings, as well as a lifetime achievement award from the Recording Academy.

Although he was German by birth and became a naturalised American in 1943, Previn had many associations with Britain.
But he will be principally remembered in the UK for his hilarious appearance on the Morecambe And Wise Christmas Special in 1971.


Previn was knighted in 1996, but as a foreign citizen he was not entitled to the form 'Sir Andre Previn', although he was entitled to use the letters KBE.

Previn was a child prodigy whose family fled Nazi Germany. As a teenager, he found work as a composer and arranger in the musical sweatshops of Hollywood, mostly at MGM, winning four Oscars for his orchestrations of such stylish musicals as 1964's 'My Fair Lady.'
Previn then abandoned Hollywood for a career as a classical conductor.

He was named musical director of the Houston Symphony in 1967, and went on to lead such renowned orchestras as the Los Angeles Philharmonic and London's Royal Philharmonic.

In 1998, his opera based on 'A Streetcar Named Desire' premiered at the San Francisco Opera.


Through his career, Previn continued to dip in and out of the jazz world. 'I don't ever consciously change gears when I play jazz or classical,' he once said. 'It's all music.'



Arguably, no one ever performed at so high a level in so many different genres of contemporary music. But Previn's versatility came at a price.
'Music critics have made it quite clear,' he once said, 'that any composer who ever contributed a four-bar jingle to a film was to be referred to as a `Hollywood composer' from then on, even if the rest of his output were to consist solely of liturgical organ sonatas.'

Previn became as close to a household name as anyone in his field - his fame burnished by his propensity for popping up in the gossip columns.


He married five times, including glittering collaborations with Farrow and violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter.

He was among those in Hollywood who early on experimented with LSD, and his memoir of his movie-studio days, 'No Minor Chords,' contained juicy revelations about everyone from Lenny Bruce to Ava Gardner.

The Korean orphan he and Farrow adopted, Soon-Yi, became the center of a tabloid scandal when she became involved with Farrow's then-boyfriend, Woody Allen, and eventually married him.


Previn never even heard jazz until he was a teenager. Born in 1929 into a wealthy Jewish family in Berlin, he was sent to eminent teachers to study classical music as his gifts became apparent.

But the family was forced to flee Germany in 1938, moving briefly to Paris before traveling to the United States.

'I was purely classically trained,' Previn recalled. 'And then when I was a kid in Los Angeles, someone gave me a record of (pianist) Art Tatum playing `Sweet Lorraine.' I was astonished and bewitched by it.'


One of his father's cousins worked as a musical director at Universal Studios, and Previn soon latched on at MGM.

While much of his Hollywood labors were spent on lesser films ('Challenge to Lassie,' for one), the work gave him 'a thorough schooling in the practical aspects of music making,' he once told The Washington Post. He said it allowed him to 'stand up in front of an orchestra of superlative players' and hone his conducting skills.

Hollywood also accorded Previn fame. He was nominated for 13 Academy Awards and won four. Besides 'My Fair Lady,' his Oscar-winning orchestrations included 'Gigi' (1958), 'Porgy and Bess' (1959) and 'Irma La Douce' (1963).

After leaving Hollywood, Previn also turned away from jazz, partly because he feared it would diminish his credibility among classical musicians.

'I must say it probably crossed my mind. It's a cowardly confession. ... But the other thing is that once I quit Hollywood in `65, I really needed to get going as a classical conductor. I was very determined and ambitious and worked very hard.'


Jazz continued to exert an irresistible attraction, though. In 1995, after conducting every major orchestra in Europe, Previn returned to pop, recording an album of jazz treatments of songs from 'Show Boat,' and an album of Jerome Kern songs with soprano Sylvia McNair.

'I missed some of my jazz musician friends very much and the atmosphere,' he said. 'I always liked improvising. During the time that I didn't play jazz, I always listened to it.'

Previn and Farrow, his third wife, had three children and adopted three others during their high-profile union.

After Soon-Yi's affair with Allen became known in the early 1990s, Farrow bitterly criticized the filmmaker for initiating a relationship with the young woman when he had been a father figure to her for years.

Allen and others countered that he had hardly known Soon-Yi while she was growing up and that Previn was not just a father figure, but her father.

'I would cheerfully run him over with a steamroller,' Previn said of Allen, who eventually adopted two children with Soon-Yi.

In August 2002, at age 72, Previn married Mutter, the violinist who has been a classical music superstar since her teens. She was 39. In 2005, their recording of 'Violin Concerto `Anne-Sophie,'' which he wrote for her, won a Grammy for best instrumental soloist performance with orchestra (conducted by Previn).

But the marriage ended in divorce in 2006.

Previn's second wife, Dory Previn, also has had a notable career as a singer and songwriter. She collaborated with Previn during their marriage on Oscar-nominated songs for the films 'Pepe,' 1960, and 'Two for the Seesaw,' 1962. After he left her for Farrow, she wrote about the experience in 'Beware of Young Girls.'

Previn's other wives were Betty Bennett and Heather Hales.


Previn was born Andreas Ludwig Prewin in Berlin. His father, Jack Prewin, was a distinguished lawyer, but as it became clear that Jews were unwelcome in Hitler's Germany, Prewin moved his wife, Charlotte, and their two sons to Paris. A year later, the family left for Los Angeles.
In this country, Jack Prewin was reduced to giving piano lessons, while 17-year-old Andre, after finding work at the film studio, assumed much of the burden of supporting the family.

Previn earned his first film credit as music director for 'She's for Me' in 1943. He cut his first record three years later and began composing film scores three years after that.

In 1958, he won the first of his numerous Grammys for the sound track for 'Gigi.' In 1960 he was awarded a Grammy for best jazz performance for selections from 'West Side Story.'

He won the same award the next year for 'Andre Previn Plays Harold Arlen.' In 1998, he received the Kennedy Center's lifetime achievement award - with ex-wife Farrow reading a tribute at the televised ceremony.

'Ever since we first met, you have been a true and trusted friend to me. Thanks for the music, toots, and for the memories,' she said.
Previn's longest stint as a principal conductor was the 11 years he spent with the London Symphony Orchestra from 1968-79. He made dozens of recordings with the LSO and other major orchestras.

In the twilight of his career, Previn was asked whether he felt he sometimes spread himself too thin.

'It's been thrown up to me most of my life: `Why don't I just concentrate on conducting or composing or my own playing or on jazz?'' he replied.
'But the thing is that I'm naturally curious about a lot of different disciplines in music and I enjoy doing them. And as long as people are nice enough to let me, I'll keep on trying.'

In 2007, Previn released his final recorded work, Alone: Ballads For Solo Piano.

The collection of decidedly relaxed yet emotionally charged standards saw him buoyed by familiar territory.

The record peaked at number eight in the Billboard jazz albums chart.

Three years later, the Recording Academy honoured Previn with a Grammy for lifetime achievement.

Gareth Davies, chairman of the London Symphony Orchestra, said: 'Like the majority of players in the present day LSO, Andre's time as principal conductor had ended before I'd begun, but it was the stuff of legend and I was fortunate enough to be able to perform with him several times over the last 20 years.

'I will never forget hearing the 1970s recording of Previn conducting the LSO in Rachmaninov's Second Symphony when I was about 15. It had me hooked.

'The sound, the phrasing, the passion. It changed the way I thought about orchestral music. When I got to play it a few years ago with Andre conducting, it was really a dream come true. Andre was one of a kind and a real friend to the LSO. We will all miss him.'

Previn stepped down as principal conductor after 11 years, the longest term at the time, becoming conductor laureate in 1992 and conductor emeritus in 2016.

A statement from the orchestra said: 'As a pianist, conductor and composer, working in jazz, classical and film music, there was not a single area of music in which he did not excel.

'He will be deeply missed by everyone at the LSO and remembered with great affection.'

Andrew Marriner, principal clarinet at the orchestra and lifelong friend of Previn, said: 'Andre's music-making thrilled me long before I was lucky enough to play with him; but when I did, it was the extraordinary sound he conjured from an orchestra, unmistakably his own, that dazzled.'
He added: 'Never one to suffer fools, his wicked sense of humour could be sharp, always hilarious.'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...s-aged-89.html

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