The RIP Famous Person Thread

[katie23]

Re: Meat Loaf, I don't know his other songs. I only know "I'd do anything for love", from my younger days. I had to Google what "that" meant in the song.

RIP. From another article I've read, he had several health issues and he was supposed to have surgery on his back, but he passed away. He's lost a lot of weight in the recent months.

(so he was already immunocompromised but was still antivax? SMH)

[dirk diggler]

And the last thing I see is my heart, still beating,
Breaking out of my body and flying away
Like a bat out of hell

RIP Meatloaf, and thanks for your effort



We had a full bar... erm restaurant... singalong last night.

[harrybarracuda]

Why do you go out of your way to be a complete douche bag?

H thinks it's cool to be "edgy" and "controversial". He doesn't realise he comes across as a "complete cockhead".

[Iceman123]

Seen Meatloaf live Edinburgh Playhouse early 80’s
Big production, great show, I remember 3 male backing singers who were hitting the high notes, and I must admit they sounded more like Meatloaf than he did.

He had a great stage presence, all in all a great show. For no apparent reason he brought his wife Leslie on to introduce her at the end. She was a cute little blond thing.

[harrybarracuda]

Barry Cryer: Comedian and writer dies aged 86




Barry Cryer, who has died at the age of 86, was one of the most prolific scriptwriters in British comedy.

He wrote gags for The Two Ronnies and Morecambe and Wise. A hugely talented stand-up himself, he became famous in his own right for appearances on Radio 4's I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue.

And - leaving no stone unturned in the effort to make people laugh - he even starred in a nude review and had a number one hit record in Finland.

It was a life dedicated to comedy, but Cryer refused to delve too deeply into exactly how it was done.

"Analysing comedy is like dissecting a frog," he once said. "Nobody laughs and the frog dies."

Barry Charles Cryer was born in Leeds on 23 March 1935.

His father died when he was just five and, with his elder brother away in the Merchant Navy, he was brought up by his mother.

After attending Leeds Grammar School, where, he said he developed his talent for comedy in a bid to disarm playground bullies, he went to Leeds University to read English literature.

He harboured vague thoughts of becoming a journalist. However, he spent most of his time pursuing a hectic social life among the university's female undergraduates, and quit after failing his first-year exams.

He had been spotted performing comedy in university revues and was invited to audition at the Leeds City Varieties, a music hall that hosted the popular BBC series The Good Old Days.

Persuaded to try his luck in London, he was offered a comedy slot at The Windmill Theatre. He found himself performing six shows a day, six days a week, filling the gaps between the venue's famous nude revues.

But he began to suffer from bouts of eczema, which curtailed his ability to perform. During various spells in hospital, he began writing comedy as a way of filling the time and making some much-needed money.

Cryer moved on to work as a scriptwriter at Danny La Rue's nightclub, where he met and became friends with Ronnie Corbett and met his future wife, Terry, who was working as a dancer.

"I met my wife and Ronnie Corbett on the same day," he once quipped. "I tossed a coin and married her."

In 1957, he joined the cast of the musical Expresso Bongo and recorded a novelty song, The Purple People Eater, originally written and performed by Sheb Wooley.

Because of contractual issues, Wooley's version could not be released in Scandinavia so the record company used Cryer's version instead, and it topped the Finnish charts.

Cryer, who made occasional stage appearances at Danny La Rue's club, was spotted by David Frost, who invited him to join a team he had put together to launch a new show.

This led to Cryer being part of the writing team responsible for The Frost Report, which first aired on BBC TV in 1966.

There he found himself working alongside a number of future stars, including John Cleese, Ronnie Barker, Marty Feldman and Graham Chapman.

Cryer went on to work with Frost on a number of productions, including ITV sketch programme At Last the 1948 Show.

One episode featured Cryer as the wine waiter in the first TV appearance of the Four Yorkshiremen sketch that would later feature on Monty Python's Flying Circus.

By the beginning of the 1970s, Cryer had established himself as one of Britain's top comedy-writing talents. His material was used by most of the leading acts of the time, including Dave Allen, Les Dawson, Frankie Howerd and Kenny Everett.

He was also one of the main writers for the hugely successful comedy show The Two Ronnies, which starred his friend Corbett alongside Ronnie Barker.

Cryer also wrote material for Morecambe and Wise when their regular writer Eddie Braben was unavailable. When the comedy duo moved across to ITV in 1978, Cryer, together with John Junkin, wrote 12 complete shows including two of their famous Christmas specials.

Cryer recalled that he and Junkin would sit in a room working on the scripts, with Junkin delivering Morecambe's lines and Cryer those of Wise.

Despite his writing success, Cryer continued to perform, particularly as the new generation of up-and-coming comedians preferred to write their own material.

He appeared with Junkin and Tim Brooke-Taylor in the BBC radio comedy programme Hello Cheeky, and later presented the ITV quiz show Jokers Wild.

He was a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4's I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue, described as the antidote to panel games, which first aired in 1972.

Cryer had a brief stint sharing the role of chairman with Humphrey Lyttelton before becoming a regular member of the panel with Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden.

He also toured in a stage show, Two Old Farts in the Night, with comedian Willie Rushton before the latter's death in 1996.

In 2013, he finally achieved his ambition of getting the degree he'd missed out on in the 1950s, being awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Arts by Leeds Metropolitan University.

Despite his advancing years, he continued to write, and told an interviewer in 2013 that he had no intention of stopping work. "In my business you don't retire - the phone stops ringing."

Cryer, the master of the comedy sketch and the instant one-liner, was once asked by the Yorkshire Post for his favourite joke. He recalled one he had told in a student revue in 1955.

"A man drives down a country lane and runs over a cockerel. He knocks at a nearby farmhouse door and a woman answers.

"'I appear to have killed your cockerel,' he says. 'I'd like to replace it.' The woman replies: 'Please yourself - the hens are round the back.'"

Obituary: Barry Cryer - BBC News

[Mendip]

^ That's a real shame... Nicholas Parsons a couple of years ago and now Barry Cryer... 'Just a Minute' will never be the same again.

Regardless of the show, Barry Cryer was always one of my favourite guests.

[taxexile]

i believe he wrote the "samantha" jokes on isihac.

Record researcher Samantha has made one of her customary visits to the gramophone library where she runs errands for the kindly old archivists, such as nipping out to fetch their sandwiches. Their favourite treat is cheese with home made chutney, but they never object when she palms them off with relish...

Samantha is a qualified croupier and often works at an exclusive Soho club where gamblers pay top money to pay roulette all day and poker all night.

Samantha is off on a dinner date with a gentleman friend from Moscow who's brought over a variety of caviars and an array of vodka-based aperitiffs. She says he's going to offer her delicious food in his hotel room and then liquour out on the balcony.

...As usual, record researcher Samantha went to fetch the teams' records from the gramophone library earlier, where she found the kindly old archivist sampling wines for Christmas. He'd brought in a selection of French wines, but there wasn't much left by the time Samantha got there, so although she was disappointed he only had a Semillon, she thought it would be impolite not to taste it anyway...

[harrybarracuda]

Former Formula One boss Max Mosley dies at 81


Au



LONDON — Max Mosley, the former head of Formula One’s governing body who went on to become a high-profile privacy campaigner, has died aged 81 after suffering from cancer, his family said on Monday.

“The family of Max Mosley can confirm that he died last night after a long battle with cancer. They ask to be allowed to grieve in private,” a statement said.

His old friend and ally in the world of motor sport Bernie Ecclestone paid tribute, along with Mosley’s successor at the FIA helm Jean Todt.

“We were like brothers for 50 odd years,” Ecclestone, 90, told Reuters by telephone from Ibiza. “Better he’s gone than suffer the way he was suffering.”

The youngest son of Oswald Mosley, the leader of the British fascist movement in the 1930s, Mosley was a racing driver, a team owner and lawyer before becoming president of the International Automobile Federation (FIA) in 1993.

He stayed in office for 16 years, serving three terms, before handing over to former Ferrari boss Todt.

In 2008 he won a high-profile privacy case against the now-defunct News of the World newspaper after it published video footage of him taking part in what it called a “sick Nazi orgy.”

The tabloid said it involved Nazi-style role-play, which Mosley denied and the newspaper failed to back up in court.

Refusing to be shamed, Mosley acknowledged an interest in sado-masochistic sex but said he had nothing to hide.

He later gave financial backing to the court costs of claimants in newspaper phone hacking cases.

The Oxford-educated and aristocratic Mosley, whose mother was the socialite and Nazi sympathizer Diana Mitford, forged a close alliance in Formula One with Ecclestone, the son of a trawlerman.

Both were team bosses in the 1970s, Mosley a co-founder of March and Ecclestone owner of Brabham.

They had already tried their hand at racing, Mosley in Formula Two and Ecclestone failing to qualify for the 1958 Monaco Grand Prix, before realizing their talents lay elsewhere.

Together they formed a double act, controlling and growing the sport from amateurish beginnings into a $1 billion business, while also pushing through much-needed safety measures.

“We had differences of opinions but we could talk to each other about them and sort them out, whatever they were,” said Ecclestone, who acquired the sport’s commercial rights from the FIA on a 100-year lease.

Formula One’s rights are now controlled by U.S.-based Liberty Media. The sport hailed Mosley on Monday as “a huge figure in the transition of Formula One.”

“He was a very straightforward guy, Max. Did a lot for the sport, did a lot for the general industry to make sure that people were complying with the right regulations when they built road cars,” said Ecclestone.

“If he thought something needed to be done, and someone needed to be punished, Max was the guy to do it… he didn’t make too many mistakes.”

Such punishment famously included a $100 million fine for McLaren, who were also stripped of all their constructors’ championship points, in a 2007 spying controversy involving Ferrari data.

Damon Hill, Britain’s 1996 world champion, said Mosley’s sporting legacy would be the safety measures introduced after the death of Brazil’s triple world champion Ayrton Senna at Imola in 1994.

“He came in and imposed safety measures with authority and very swiftly,” said the Briton, who was Senna’s team mate at Williams.

“It became a shop window really for engineering safety, the drive towards what can be achieved if you put your mind towards it and what F1 could do.”

Former Formula One boss Max Mosley dies at 81 | Canoe.Com

[harrybarracuda]

Fingers on buzzers, starter for ten, no conferring.





Link

[david44]

One of the Chi boys a gem, met him once at the Goodhews, goodbye Bambi, Dad could nver understand when two N Unis competed as he always though tit was "Your starter this side of the Thames". There will be a tribute.

You have to be famous to have a pastiche

[david44]

Oh fr the Universally challenged it is a UK quiz show without the chance to win a cuddly boy nor a car, just hard University level Q's loved by many as the delivery was slow enough to play along at home. It's still going strong after five decades now hosted by snarling PAXO a perfect foil to smartarses the Neverna of correction the Lulu of I've spurted so I'll finish.

[Sleeper]

I'll confess that for a very long time I thought the teams were stacked one upon the other.

[harrybarracuda]

I'll confess that for a very long time I thought the teams were stacked one upon the other.

What? You mean they're not?!

[helge]

^^
.....

[TizMe]

Rugby League lost two greats in 2 days.

One of the original immortals, Johnny Raper died yesterday, and Olsen Filipaina died today.


Rugby league Immortal Johnny Raper dies aged 82 - ABC News

Rugby league legend Johnny Raper, one of the game's 13 Immortals, has died at the age of 82.

Raper's illustrious career started at Newtown in 1958, but he made his name at St George, where he won eight straight premierships from 1959 to 1966 alongside fellow Immortals Reg Gasnier, Graeme Langlands and Norm Provan.


Raper also played 39 Tests for Australia between 1959 and 1968, captaining Australia to victory in that year's World Cup.


He is widely seen as the prototypical lock, revolutionising and perfecting the position in the 1950s and 60s with his trademark low tackles behind the defensive line to cut runners down.

[TizMe]

New Zealand rugby league great Olsen Filipaina has died at the age of 64 - ABC News

Pioneering rugby league great Olsen Filipaina has passed away at the age of 64.

Filipaina was a trailblazer, becoming one of the first Polynesian players to play in the NSWRL, where he enjoyed stints with North Sydney, Balmain and Easts.


He was famously plucked from reserve grade in 1985 to play for New Zealand, leading the Kiwis to a historic win over a Wally Lewis-captained Australia.


The former five-eighth had been battling kidney failure and was admitted to Westmead Hospital in January.


"He was a fighter and fought for 16 days in ICU but our heavenly father needed a stand-off for his rugby league team, and now he has the best," his family said in a statement.

[Little Chuchok]

^Olsen was my hero as a youngster. Top bloke by all accounts.

[helge]

Olsen

Olsen as first name caught my attention.

Interesting

Can't dig anything up though

[hallelujah]

Olsen as first name caught my attention.

Interesting

Can't dig anything up though

My interest was piqued as a 2nd name...

[hallelujah]

One of the Chi boys a gem, met him once at the Goodhews, goodbye Bambi, Dad could nver understand when two N Unis competed as he always though tit was "Your starter this side of the Thames". There will be a tribute.

You have to be famous to have a pastiche

I don't think the other famous Gascoigne was ever gonna trouble the scoreboard.

Brilliant clip. The Young Ones was brilliant.

[Happy As Larry]

PJ O’Rourke, writer and humorist, dies aged 74

O’Rourke held a variety of roles, including editor-in-chief of National Lampoon and Rolling Stone’s foreign affairs desk chief
The conservative writer and humorist PJ O’Rourke, whose acerbic wit and writings often won admiration on both sides of America’s political divide, has died, media reports and colleagues said. He was 74 years old.
Peter Sagal, O’Rourke’s colleague and host of the NPR radio show Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!, said on Twitter: “I’m afraid it’s true. Our panelist and my dear friend PJ O’Rourke has passed away.”
The CNN host Jake Tapper reported that O’Rourke had died of cancer. “Our dear friend and cherished Grove Atlantic author P.J O’Rourke passed away this morning from complications of lung cancer,” Tapper quoted O’Rourke’s publisher as saying.
O’Rourke was one of the most quoted writers in America, dissecting US politics and culture with a withering disdain and a powerful line in put-downs – often laced with a warm, self-deprecating humanity.
He held a variety of roles that showcased his writing, commentary and reportage – and most importantly his humor. They included stints as editor in chief of National Lampoon and Rolling Stone’s foreign affairs desk chief.
His targets featured government and politicians in works like Parliament of Whores and Don’t Vote: It Just Encourages the Bastards but also ranged towards foreign reporting such as his war correspondent book Holidays in Hell. Nearly all his work was laced with tales from his own life and joy of hard partying, at least in his early writing.
Though he was notably – and briefly – a hippy in the late 196os and early 1970s O’Rourke found his home on the right of the political spectrum, though far from the conservative social values that many in the Republican party embraced. One of his best-known works was titled Republican Party Reptile: The Confessions, Adventures, Essays and Outrages of PJ O’Rourke.
Though O’Rourke often reserved his sharpest barbs for the left and Democrats, he admitted that in 2016’s election he would be supporting Hillary Clinton over the Republican nominee, Donald Trump. “She’s wrong about absolutely everything, but she’s wrong within normal parameters,” he said.
O’Rourke was from Toledo, Ohio, born the son of a car salesman. He went to university in Ohio and, later, Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. He was married twice, latterly moving to New Hampshire with his second spouse, Tina Mallon, with whom he had three children.
Numerous friends and former colleagues paid tribute to him.
“PJ was special. When he came by the office, the fun and wit went up a notch, sparks were in the air, and we all felt a certain joie de vivre. I cherish the memories,” wrote the conservative writer Bill Kristol of a shared time at the rightwing the Weekly Standard.
“PJ O’Rourke was one of the nicest writers I ever had the pleasure of meeting and drinking and (very rarely) corresponding with. No reason whatsoever for him to be decent to some junior editor at one of the many outlets he wrote for, and yet. What a loss,” posted Sunny Bunch, culture editor at the Bulwark.

[misskit]

Sad news about O’Rourke, even though he had drifted over to the dark side. .

I especially enjoyed his Holidays in Hell.

[harrybarracuda]

Singer Setha Sirachaya dies of cancer, aged 77

Singer Setha Sirachaya of The Impossibles has died of lung cancer. He was 77.
Puttida Sirachaya posted an Instagram image with a short message reading 4.42 and a dim sky to send a message that his father had died.

The number was believed to be the time that one of the country's greatest-ever singers passed away.

Setha died of lung cancer first detected in 2019. His last post on his Setha Sirachaya Facebook account was on Jan 15 when he received a bouquet of flowers and a gift basket from a representative of Their Majesties the King and Queen.

A religious ceremony for him will be held at Wat Dhepsirin.

Setha's friends and fans were posting condolences to his family after the loss. "Goodbye Phi Toy, my beloved brother, with love and high respect. Rest in peace in heaven," said actress Duangta Tungkamanee on her Instagram account. Duangta was one of his closest friends and Toy is Setha's nickname.

"I would like to send my deepest condolences to the Sirachaya family," said another actress, Mayura Savetsila.

Setha was best known as the frontman of the now-defunct The Impossibles, a legendary pop band with countless hits. After it disbanded in 1976, he continued to take the stage, either solo or with the remaining members of The Impossibles. The full band occasionally reunited for concerts, and played their final concert in 2018.

He was also an actor and a show host for numerous programmes, as well as running his own production company. He became chairman of the Foundation for the Welfare of Senior Actors set up in 2002 to support actors and actresses after their careers ended.

The multi-talente Setha was born in 1944 in Bangkok. He was awarded National Artist in 2001.

At a concert in 2015 - at the age of 71 - Setha sang for four hours, including one of the band's signature songs, Pen Mai Mai Dai (It's Impossible).

“It doesn’t get harder with age, I can still sing like when I was in my 20s,” he said in an interview with the media, including the Bangkok Post.

Setha said age could not stop him from working to prove the worthiness of a senior citizen and he did not want to be a burden for society.

“The moment you stop working, that’s when the despair and the weakness set in," he said. "The moment we become useless, the country will be in trouble.”

Singer Setha Sirachaya dies of cancer, aged 77

[Sleeper]

Puttida Sirachaya posted an Instagram image with a short message reading 4.42 and a dim sky to send a message that his father had died.

The number was believed to be the time that one of the country's greatest-ever singers passed away.

I guess that 442 will be a popular number in the next underground lottery.

[harrybarracuda]

I guess that 442 will be a popular number in the next underground lottery.

What is the "underground lottery"?