The RIP Famous Person Thread

[Happy As Larry]

William Calley, Army officer and face of My Lai Massacre, is dead at 80

William L. Calley Jr., a junior Army officer who became the only person convicted in connection with the My Lai Massacre of 1968, when U.S. soldiers slaughtered hundreds of unarmed South Vietnamese men, women and children in one of the darkest chapters in American military history, died April 28 at a hospice center in Gainesville, Fla. He was 80.

The Washington Post obtained a copy of his death certificate from the Florida Department of Health in Alachua County. His son, Laws Calley, did not immediately respond to requests for additional information. Other efforts to reach Mr. Calley’s family were unsuccessful.

The Post was alerted to the death, which was not previously reported, by Zachary Woodward, a recent Harvard Law School graduate who said he noticed Mr. Calley’s death while looking through public records.

Although he was once the country’s most notorious Army officer, a symbol of military misconduct in a war that many considered immoral and unwinnable, Mr. Calley had lived in obscurity for decades, declining interviews while working as a jeweler in Columbus, Ga., not far from the military base where he was court-martialed and convicted in 1971.

A junior-college dropout from South Florida, he had bounced around jobs, unsuccessfully trying to enlist in the Army in 1964, before being called up two years later. As the war escalated in Vietnam, he found a home in a military that was desperately trying to replenish its lower ranks.

Mr. Calley was quickly tapped to become a junior officer, with minimal vetting, and was soon promoted to second lieutenant, commanding a platoon in Charlie Company, a unit of the Army’s Americal Division. The company sustained heavy losses in the early months of 1968, losing men to sniper fire, land mines and booby traps as the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong launched coordinated attacks in the Tet offensive.

On the morning of March 16, 1968, the unit was airlifted by helicopter to Son My, a patchwork village of rice paddies, irrigation ditches and small settlements, including a hamlet known to U.S. soldiers as My Lai 4. Over the next few hours, Mr. Calley and other soldiers in Charlie Company shot and bayoneted women, children and elderly men, destroying the village while searching for Viet Cong guerrillas and sympathizers who were said to have been hiding in the area. Homes were burned, and some women and girls were gang-raped before being killed.

An Army investigation later concluded that 347 men, women and children had been killed, including victims of another American unit, Bravo Company. A Vietnamese estimate placed the death toll at 504.

For more than a year and a half, the details of the atrocity were hidden and covered up from the public. A report to headquarters initially characterized the attack as a significant victory, claiming that 128 “enemy” fighters had been killed. Gen. William C. Westmoreland, the top commander in Vietnam, praised American forces at My Lai for dealing a “heavy blow” to the Viet Cong.

Meanwhile, Ronald Ridenhour, a helicopter gunner who was not at the scene but had heard of the killings weeks later, did his own probing. While on home leave nearly a year after the massacre, he began writing letters to top political and military leaders about the bloodbath at My Lai — providing information that was credited with sparking official investigations.

Backed with photographs and witness testimony, the Army charged Mr. Calley with premeditated murder days before his scheduled discharge.
Although a four-paragraph Associated Press article appeared in September 1969, providing Mr. Calley’s name and reporting that he was being held for allegedly murdering an unspecified number of civilians, a more complete picture of the massacre was not revealed until that November, through articles by investigative reporter Seymour M. Hersh.

Acting on a tip by an antiwar activist, Hersh worked exhaustively to track down Mr. Calley. He finally located him in the unlikeliest of places for a man facing court-martial for what at the time was believed to be 109 murders: at the senior officers’ quarters of Fort Benning, now called Fort Moore, in Georgia.

Hersh’s articles, distributed to newspapers around the country by the independent Dispatch News Service, received the Pulitzer Prize for international reporting, shocked a nation that was already divided over the Vietnam War and thrust Mr. Calley into the national spotlight.

Almost from the very beginning, Mr. Calley polarized Americans who variously deemed him a war criminal or a scapegoat, a mass-murderer or an inexperienced officer made to take the fall for the actions of his superiors. Defenders argued that he had been forced into a brutal conflict with an often invisible enemy, then blamed for the horrors of the war.

To some, he seemed like a convenient target for military prosecutors, the lowest link in a chain of command that included Captain Ernest Medina, who was accused of bearing overall responsibility for the attacks, and Maj. Gen. Samuel W. Koster, the highest-ranking officer charged with trying to cover up the massacre.

Mr. Calley was convicted of murdering at least 22 noncombatants and sentenced to life at hard labor, after a military jury rejected his defense that he was just following orders. Amid appeals, he ultimately served about three years, much of it under house arrest.
“My Lai was the absolute low point in the history of the modern U.S. military,” said Pulitzer Prize-winning military correspondent Thomas E. Ricks, whose book “The Generals” traces the evolution of the post-World War II Army.
Beyond the atrocities committed by Mr. Calley, Ricks said it was important to remember “there were 1,000 causes here, bad people doing bad things up and down the chain of command,” including the “second grave sin” of the coverup.
“My Lai forced a reexamination of the U.S. Army,” Ricks noted, referring to its central role in later studies about revamping military professionalism. “It was not just that hundreds of civilians had been murdered, and a score raped, but that the acts of the day were covered up by the Army chain of command … including the destruction of documents, went all the way up to the rank of general, with two generals and three colonels implicated.”


‘Go and get them’
The attack on My Lai came a month and a half after the Tet Offensive. U.S. soldiers had visited the village a few times, interviewing residents while seeking intel about the Viet Cong, or VC. This time, Medina told his men in Charlie Company, the objective was to strike hard against a community believed to be harboring VC.
Destroy anything that is “walking, crawling or growling,” Medina declared in a pre-mission briefing, according to testimony given at Mr. Calley’s court-martial. Asked if that included women and children, he replied that according to military intelligence, ordinary villagers should be at a nearby market. Anyone left behind was either a guerrilla or a sympathizer.

“They’re all VC, now go and get them,” he said, according to trial testimony.
Around 7:30 a.m. the next morning, Mr. Calley and his platoon arrived at the village expecting heavy resistance. Instead they found a quiet community sitting down for breakfast.
Some soldiers thought it was a trap, according to court-martial accounts. Viet Cong explosives and mines had accounted for up 90 percent of American casualties in the previous months. As Mr. Calley’s men fanned out, some shot villagers while searching in vain for suspected fighters. Others used grenades to blow apart homes.

Mr. Calley’s platoon herded women, children and elderly men into groups. Accounts vary on what happened next: According to Mr. Calley, Medina grew irritated by the unit’s slow progress and told Mr. Calley to “get rid of” the civilians. Medina denied giving any order to harm civilians, although other soldiers remembered it differently, recalling that Medina made it clear that it was acceptable to “wipe the place out.” A few minutes later, Mr. Calley and a fellow soldier, Pfc. Paul Meadlo, were said to have opened fire.

At the court-martial, soldiers described a systematic slaughter of defenseless civilians. Entire families were wiped out by the attack. Witnesses said Mr. Calley shot a praying Buddhist monk and, when he saw a young boy crawling out of a ditch, threw the child back in and shot him. Pictures taken at the scene by an Army photographer, Ronald L. Haeberle, provided additional evidence of the massacre and were later published in newspapers and magazines.

The My Lai killings were further exposed in 1969 by Ridenhour. After leaving the service, he wrote to President Richard M. Nixon, Defense Secretary Melvin R. Laird and members of Congress with his findings. An Army investigation ensued, leading to the indictment of more than a dozen men, but several of the cases unraveled before trial or ended without convictions.

In the end, only Mr. Calley was held legally responsible for playing a direct role in the massacre. He was convicted on March 29, 1971, after one of the longest court-martials in military history.
“My troops were getting massacred and mauled by an enemy I couldn’t see, I couldn’t feel and I couldn’t touch — that nobody in the military system ever described them as anything other than Communism,” Mr. Calley said in a statement to the court. “They didn’t give it a race, they didn’t give it a sex, they didn’t give it an age. They never let me believe it was just a philosophy in a man’s mind. That was my enemy out there.”

The outpouring of support for Mr. Calley was captured in a spoken-word song, “Battle Hymn of Lt. Calley” — “Sir, I followed all my orders and I did the best I could / It’s hard to judge the enemy and hard to tell the good” — that was performed by Terry Nelson and sold more than 1 million copies.

After his conviction, Mr. Calley was removed from the stockade on Nixon’s orders and confined to his quarters at Fort Benning. His life sentence was quickly reduced to 20 years and, in 1974, the sentence was halved again, to 10 years, after the secretary of the Army found that Mr. Calley “may have sincerely believed that he was acting in accordance with the orders he had received and that he was not aware of his responsibility to refuse an illegal order.”

Later that year, Mr. Calley was freed on bail and paroled. He seldom spoke about My Lai, although in 2009 he delivered what was reportedly his first public apology for the massacre, at a meeting of the Kiwanis Club of Greater Columbus.
“There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai,” he said. “I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the American soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry.”
During the speech, he also said that he had just been following orders, a declaration that irritated critics who questioned whether he had experienced a change of heart.

An ‘average’ schoolboy
William Laws Calley Jr., the second of four siblings and the only son, was born in Miami on June 8, 1943. His father, a Navy veteran of World War II, sold heavy construction equipment. As the business prospered, the family began vacationing at a cottage in North Carolina, and a teenage Mr. Calley — nicknamed Rusty for his reddish-brown hair — was given his own car.

Mr. Calley was often described by peers and adults who knew him as an “average” American schoolboy: reserved, polite and pleasant but, at 5-foot-3 and 130 pounds, sometimes struggling for attention in school and social settings.
Academically, he was in a downward spiral. He was forced to repeat seventh grade after being caught cheating on an exam. He later spent two years attending military academies in Florida and Georgia before graduating from Miami Edison Senior High School in 1962 in the bottom quarter of his class.

After flunking out of Palm Beach Junior College, he supported himself with jobs as a hotel bellhop and restaurant dishwasher. During a bitter labor strike in 1963, Florida East Coast Railway hired Mr. Calley as a switchman and then promoted him to conductor. Among other incidents, Mr. Calley once let freight cars get loose and smash into a loading ramp.

Around this time, Mr. Calley’s home life grew unstable. His mother was dying of cancer, and his father, who developed diabetes, saw his business fall into bankruptcy. In 1964, William Calley first tried to enlist in the Army but was rejected because of a hearing defect.

He began drifting west and south in search of work. At one point, he was on assignment in Mexico for an American insurance investigator when he walked off the job, saying he was “bored and frustrated” and didn’t understand what he was doing. Mr. Calley left for San Francisco, where his backlog of mail began to catch up with him, including a Selective Service notice saying his earlier rejection was being reconsidered.

On his way back to Florida, his car broke down in Albuquerque. He walked into a local Army induction center, explained his situation and enlisted as a clerk-trainee in July 1966. He was soon selected for officer candidate school by a senior officer who took notice of Mr. Calley’s brief stints at military academies.

Despite the Army’s acute need for junior officers in Vietnam, historian Howard Jones wrote in his 2017 book “My Lai,” “The Citadel, West Point, and the Virginia Military Institute had been unable to fill the growing demand, and the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) had fallen out of favor on many college campuses. The army immediately needed more recruits from OCS — which opened the door to Calley.”

Mr. Calley graduated 120th in his OCS class of 156.
“One thing at OCS was nobody said, ‘Now, there will be innocent civilians there,’” Mr. Calley recalled in his 1970 memoir, “Lieutenant Calley: His Own Story,” written with journalist John Sack. “It was drummed into us, ‘Be sharp! On guard! As soon as you think these people won’t kill you, ZAP! In combat, you haven’t friends! You have enemies!’ Over and over at OCS we heard this and I told myself, I’ll act as if I’m never secure. As if everyone in Vietnam would do me in. As if everyone’s bad.”

After his release from military custody, Mr. Calley moved to Columbus and married Penny Vick, whose family owned a jewelry shop, in 1976. Smithsonian magazine later reported that their wedding guests included U.S. District Judge J. Robert Elliott, who had attempted to get Mr. Calley’s conviction overturned.

Mr. Calley and Vick had a son, Laws, and later divorced. Information on survivors was not immediately available.
Mr. Calley reportedly carried an umbrella at times to prevent photographers from taking pictures of him. He wished, he said, to “sink into anonymity.”
Curiously, his death certificate matched known details about his life — including information on his birth, career, name and nickname — but featured one notable omission. On a line asking if he had ever served “in U.S. armed forces,” the answer given was “no.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/obitu...-lai-massacre/

[misskit]

^ I remember when all of that came to light. The world is a better place without William Calley.

[david44]

A tragic chapter , the cover up philosophy is not unique to USA , loss of face and fear of superiors is a recurring thread from Stalin's NKVD ,C Mai immii or the Waffen SS.

The ability to safely challenge authority via the press , courts and similar channels is what distinguishes developed societies which oddly seem to have free medical care for all at point of use and military grade weapons restricted to the well military.

[helge]

The world is a better place without William Calley.

Guilty as hell...and a scapegoat.

[harrybarracuda]

A tragic chapter , the cover up philosophy is not unique to USA.

But they make a habit of it.

Pat Tillman, his mom and the 20-year torment of a friendly fire death - ESPN

[harrybarracuda]

Ex-Youtube CEO Susan Wojcicki dies aged 56 after cancer battle




Former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki who was one of Google’s first employees has died at the age of 56 after a two year battle with cancer.

In his post sharing the news of his wife’s death, Dennis Troper said Ms Wojcicki was “not just my best friend and partner in life, but a brilliant mind, loving mother, and a dear friend to many”.

“It is with profound sadness that I share the news of Susan Wojcicki passing. My beloved wife of 26 years and mother to our five children left us today after two years of living with non-small cell lung cancer,” Mr Troper wrote in a Facebook post.

“Her impact on our family and the world was immeasurable. We are heartbroken, but grateful for the time we had with her. Please keep our family in your thoughts at this time.”

Sundar Pichai, Google chief executive, said in a blog post: “Over the last two years, even as she dealt with great personal difficulties, Susan devoted herself to making the world better through her philanthropy, including supporting research for the disease that ultimately took her life.”

Mr Pichai, added on X: “Unbelievably saddened by the loss of my dear friend Susan Wojcicki after two years of living with cancer. She is as core to the history of Google as anyone, and it’s hard to imagine the world without her.”

One of the most prominent women in tech, Ms Wojcicki joined Google in 1999 to become one of the first few employees of the web search leader, years before it acquired YouTube. Google bought YouTube in 2006 for $1.65bn.

Before becoming CEO of YouTube in 2014, Ms Wojcicki was senior vice president for ad products at Google.

After nine years at the helm, Ms Wojcicki stepped down from her role at YouTube in 2023 to focus on “family, health, and personal projects”. She was replaced by her deputy, Neal Mohan, a senior advertising and product executive who joined Google in 2008. Ms Wojcicki at that time planned to take on an advisory role at Alphabet, Google’s parent company.

“Twenty-five years ago I made the decision to join a couple of Stanford graduate students who were building a new search engine. Their names were Larry and Sergey …. It would be one of the best decisions of my life,” Wojcicki wrote in a blog post on the day she left YouTube, referring to Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

“Today we at YouTube lost a teammate, mentor, and friend, Susan Wojcicki,” Mohan said in a post on X.

Earlier in her career, Wojcicki was credited with pushing Google executives to buy YouTube. She was named as one of TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world in 2015.

Ex-Youtube CEO Susan Wojcicki dies aged 56 after cancer battle

[misskit]

Wally Amos, founder of "Famous Amos" cookies, dies at 88

Wallace "Wally" Amos, Jr., founder of the "Famous Amos" cookies known and beloved nationwide, died at 88 on Wednesday, his family said.


The American entrepreneur died peacefully at his home with his wife Carol by his side after a battle with dementia, Amos' children, Sarah, Michael, Gregory and Shawn, said in a statement.


Born in Tallahassee, Florida, Amos built his brand from one bakery in 1975 in Hollywood, California, and a family recipe.


"Our dad inspired a generation of entrepreneurs," his children said, adding, "With his Panama hat, kazoo, and boundless optimism, Famous Amos was a great American success story, and a source of Black pride. It's also part of our family story for which we will forever be grateful and proud."

"Big was in, but Wally Amos dared to go small and perfected the ultimate bite-size chocolate chip cookie," the brand's website says. After that, Amos and his cookies became a Hollywood success story. "Iconic musicians and other Hollywood celebrities began singing the praises of the delicious cookies from a small bakery on Sunset," the website says.


Wally's son Shawn, a blues musician and author, helped create the first shop in Hollywood with his father. Shawn Amos' book, "Cookies and Milk," published in 2022, is based in part on his experiences growing up as the son of the Famous Amos founder.

"It's a book about joy, it's a book about fathers and sons who want to be seen by each other," he said on "CBS Mornings."


Shawn said he worked the front of the store while his father baked cookies in the back.


Amos' children praised their father for teaching them the value of hard work, believing in themselves, and chasing their dreams. "He was a true original Black American hero," they said in their statement.

Wally Amos, founder of "Famous Amos" cookies, dies at 88

[qwerty]

William Calley, Army officer and face of My Lai Massacre, is dead at 80


https://www.washingtonpost.com/obitu...-lai-massacre/

I was in the 8th grade in a school in Tallahassee Florida when he was being tried. We had a special assembly with one student defending his actions and another saying that he should be tried. Afterwards we all publicly voted as to whether he should be found guilty or innocent. I was the only student in the entire 8th grade who raised his hand when it was time to vote 'guilty'.

I was SOOOO glad to move from the South to California the next year!

[helge]

......


There was too much evidence for him to get off.

And he took the fall

No evidence and it would just have been another day in the paddies.


Perhaps that your class mates took that line of logic.


Terrible man.

Still got his book somewhere, which is a very interesting read

[harrybarracuda]

Gena Rowlands, acting powerhouse and star of movies by her director-husband, John Cassavetes, dies at 94



Gena Rowlands, hailed as one of the greatest actors to ever practice the craft and a guiding light in independent cinema, has died. She was 94.

Rowlands was a star in groundbreaking movies by her director husband, John Cassavetes, and later charmed audiences in her son's tear-jerker “The Notebook.”

Rowlands' death was confirmed Wednesday by representatives for her son, the filmmaker Nick Cassavetes. He revealed earlier this year that his mother had Alzheimer’s disease. TMZ reported that Rowlands died Wednesday at her home in Indian Wells, California.

Operating outside the studio system, the husband-and-wife team of John Cassavetes and Rowlands created indelible portraits of working-class strivers and small-timers in such films as “A Woman Under the Influence,” “Gloria” and “Faces.”

Rowlands made 10 films across four decades with Cassavetes, including “Minnie and Moskowitz” in 1971, “Opening Night” in 1977 and “Love Streams” in 1984.

She earned two Oscar nods for two of them: 1974's “A Woman Under the Influence,” in which she played a wife and mother cracking under the burden of domestic harmony, and “Gloria” in 1980, about a woman who helps a young boy escape the mob.

“He had a particular sympathetic interest in women and their problems in society, how they were treated and how they solved and overcame what they needed to, so all his movies have some interesting women, and you don’t need many,” she told the AP in 2015.

In addition to the Oscar nominations, Rowlands earned three Primetime Emmy Awards, one Daytime Emmy and two Golden Globes. She was awarded an honorary Academy Award in 2015 in recognition of her work and legacy in Hollywood.

“You know what’s wonderful about being an actress? You don’t just live one life,” she said at the podium. “You live many lives.”

A new generation was introduced to Rowlands in her son's blockbuster “The Notebook,” in which she played a woman whose memory is ravaged, looking back on a romance for the ages. Her younger self was portrayed by Rachel McAdams. She also appeared in Nick Cassavetes' "Unhook the Stars" in 1996.

In her later years, Rowlands made several appearances in films and TV, including in “The Skeleton Key” and the detective series “Monk.” Her last appearance in a movie was in 2014, playing a retiree who befriends her gay dance instructor in “Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks.”

One of her career triumphs was 1974's "Woman Under the Influence," playing a lower middle-class housewife who, the actress said, "was totally vulnerable and giving; she had no sense of her own worth." In "Gloria" (1980) she portrayed a faded showgirl menaced by her ex-boyfriend, a mobster boss. She was Oscar-nominated as best actress for both performances.

She and Cassavetes met at the American School of Dramatic Arts when both their careers were beginning. They married four months later. In 1960 Cassavetes used his earnings from the TV series "Johnny Stacatto" to finance his first film, "Shadows." Partly improvised, shot with natural light on New York locations with a $40,000 budget, it was applauded by critics for its stark realism.

Rowlands became a seasoned actor through live television drama and tours in "The Seven Year Itch" and "Time for Ginger" as well as off-Broadway.

Gena Rowlands, acting powerhouse and movie star, dies at 94

[helge]

Gloria was a bloody good film

[harrybarracuda]

Alain Delon: French movie actor, who starred in Purple Noon and The Leopard, dies at 88




French actor Alain Delon has died at the age of 88 after suffering from ill health, his family has announced.


The star was known for his roles in films such as Purple Noon in 1960, The Leopard in 1963, and Le Samourai in 1967.


A family statement said: "Alain Fabien, Anouchka, Anthony, as well as (his dog) Loubo, are deeply saddened to announce the passing of their father.


"He passed away peacefully in his home in Douchy, surrounded by his three children and his family."


He had been in poor health since suffering a stroke in 2019 and rarely left his estate in Douchy, in France's Val de Loire region.


Delon's last major public appearance was to receive an honorary Palme d'Or at the Cannes film festival in May 2019.


With his striking blue eyes, the actor was sometimes referred to as the "French Frank Sinatra" for his handsome looks - a comparison Delon disliked.


Directors from Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino to Hong Kong's John Woo have acknowledged a debt to Delon's performance as the silent killer in Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samourai, which set the template for one of Hollywood's favourite tropes - the mysterious, cerebral hitman.


A huge star in France and Japan, Delon never made it as big in Hollywood, despite starring alongside American cinema giants, including Burt Lancaster when the Frenchman played apprentice-hitman Scorpio in the 1973 film of the same name.


Off screen, he courted controversy with his outspoken views, including when he said he regretted the abolition of the death penalty and spoke disparagingly of gay marriage, which was legalised in France in 2013.


Delon publicly defended the far-right National Front and phoned founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, an old friend, to congratulate her when the party did well in the 2014 local elections.


Towards the end of his life, Delon was at the centre of a family feud over his care, which made headlines in the French media, and in April 2024 a judge placed him under "reinforced curatorship", meaning he no longer had full freedom to manage his assets.


Alain Delon: French movie actor, who starred in Purple Noon and The Leopard, dies at 88

[harrybarracuda]

Greg Kihn, he of Jeopardy fame, of Alzheimers aged 75.

Greg Kihn of 80s’ Jeopardy song fame dies aged 75 - LBC

[helge]

First person I remember seeing on US tv.

Phil Donahue is no longer among us

[harrybarracuda]

The man who was really responsible for bringing us Springer and Jeremy Kyle.

Probably not the legacy he wanted.

Talk show icon Phil Donahue dies at 88




OHIO - Phil Donahue, who flipped the script for daytime television by tackling controversial issues in front of a live audience, has died following a long illness, his family announced in a statement on Monday. He was 88. “Donahue died Sunday night at home surrounded by his family, including his wife of 44 years, Marlo Thomas, his sister, his children, grandchildren and his beloved golden retriever, Charlie,” his family said in a statement to CNN. The news of his passing was met with surprise and grief by many, including fellow talk show host Oprah Winfrey, who paid tribute to Donahue on social media. “There wouldn’t have been an Oprah Show without Phil Donahue being the first to prove that daytime talk and women watching should be taken seriously,” Winfrey wrote. “He was a pioneer. I’m glad I got to thank him for it. Rest in peace Phil.” The legendary host fronted “The Phil Donahue Show” for nearly three decades, from 1967 to 1996. Even though the show ended 28 years ago, Donahue was in the national spotlight as recently as May, when he and 18 other honorees received the Medal of Freedom from President Joe Biden. The award is the nation’s highest civilian honor. Phillip John Donahue was born on December 21, 1935, in Cleveland, Ohio. He honed his broadcasting skills as a radio and TV news anchor in Ohio. Donahue’s big break came in 1967, when Dayton’s WLWD TV launched “The Phil Donahue Show.” The host came up with the groundbreaking idea of asking the studio audience for questions. The show earned a reputation as a forum for hot-button topics at the time, like equal rights for women. The show moved to Chicago and then New York, while expanding to more stations across the US. National syndication led to higher-profile guests – including his future wife, actress Marlo Thomas. In 1977, audiences watched the couple seem to fall in love live on the show. “You are really fascinating,” Donahue told Thomas on stage, reaching for her hand. “But you are wonderful,” Thomas replied, clutching the host’s hand. “I said it when we are off the air. And I want to say you are loving and generous and you like women and it’s a pleasure. And whoever is the woman in your life is very lucky.”


Talk show icon Phil Donahue dies at 88

[harrybarracuda]

Sven Goran Eriksson dead at 76.



Sven-Goran Eriksson: Former England manager dies aged 76 | World News | Sky News

[misskit]

Brazilian Bossa Nova Musician Sergio Mendes Dies at 83

The family of Brazilian Bossa Nova musician Sergio Mendes confirmed with The Guardian on Friday that the pioneering pianist had died of health complications borne out of long Covid. “His wife and musical partner for the past 54 years, Gracinha Leporace Mendes, was by his side, as were his loving children,” the statement read. “Mendes last performed in November 2023 to sold out and wildly enthusiastic houses in Paris, London and Barcelona.” The family added that “his health had been challenged by the effects of long-term Covid.” Bossa Nova legend João Bosco praised Mendes as “thinker of Brazilian music” beyond his instrumental talents. Mendes had worked alongside Herb Alpert, his “brother from another country,” to bring the Bossa Nova sound to mass market in the 1960s. “He was a true friend and extremely gifted musician who brought Brazilian music in all its iterations to the entire world with elegance [and] joy,” Alpert said of Mendes on Instagram.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/brazil...=home?ref=home

[harrybarracuda]

Or the version without the talentless "rapper" shite...

Honestly misskit

[misskit]

^ That was from Mendes’ last album! He done it.

[harrybarracuda]

^ That was from Mendes’ last album! He done it.

Had to pay for all that long covid treatment somehow I suppose.

[Salsa dancer]

One of my all-time favourite musos...a real legend. RIP Sergio.

Some of his material was original, and some was his version of popular pieces. His wife Gracinha sings on some, and she has an amazing voice-you can actually hear her modulating notes by using her throat muscles.

In the 1990s he did two albums that were absolutely top notch. It was only after that when he was approached by The Black Eyed Peas rappers.

Here are two pieces...one from each of those great albums.

[harrybarracuda]

British bass guitarist legend Herbie Flowers, who played with some of the world's biggest music icons including David Bowie, Elton John, Paul McCartney and Marc Bolan, has died aged 86, as heartfelt tributes have been paid to the 'beautiful soul'.
Born Brian Keith Flowers, but known as 'Herbie' throughout his career, Flowers grew up in Isleworth, Middlesex before moving to Ditchling, East Sussex and was a member of the bands Blue Mink, T. Rex and Sky.
He also contributed his talents on hundreds of recordings and was also credited for creating the famous bass line in Lou Reed's Walk on the Wild Side from his album Transformer in 1972, lending the song its unforgettable twang.
It was the only song by Reed to reach the Top 20 in the US.
The news of Flowers' death on Thursday was confirmed by close family members on social media.

Herbie Flowers dies aged 86: Tributes to legendary bassist who played with Bolan, Bowie, McCartney, Elton… and gave Lou Reed's Walk On The Wild Side its unforgettable twang | Daily Mail Online

[harrybarracuda]

Will Jennings, the Oscar-winning lyricist of “My Heart Will Go On” and “Up Where We Belong,” has died. He was 80.



The songwriter died Friday at his home in Tyler, Texas, his agent Sam Schwartz of the Gorfaine/Schwartz Agency confirmed to The Times. “May his memory be a blessing,” he said of Jennings via email. No cause of death was disclosed.
Jennings, who was born in Texas in 1944, wrote tunes that were recorded by Dionne Warwick, Jimmy Buffett, Rodney Crowell, Peter Wolf, Mariah Carey, Faith Hill, Tim McGraw and Diana Ross, among others. He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2006.

His most well-known pop classics include Whitney Houston’s “Didn’t We Almost Have It All,” Barry Manilow’s “Looks Like We Made It,” Steve Winwood’s “Higher Love” and Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven,” the latter of which earned him the Grammy Award for song of the year — his first of three Grammys.
“A sad time, the passing of Will Jennings, a maestro, brilliant mind and a gentle spirit,” Wolf, who collaborated with Jennings on two albums, wrote on social media. “It was an enormous honor to have worked with such a musical genius.”


Jennings won Academy Awards for “Up Where We Belong,” written with Jack Nitzsche and Buffy Sainte-Marie and performed by Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes for the movie “An Officer and a Gentleman,” and “My Heart Will Go On,” written with James Horner and performed by Celine Dion for the film “Titanic.”
“[It] condensed that movie’s epic melodrama into five endlessly re-playable minutes of sweeping faux-Celtic majesty,” Times pop music critic Mikael Wood wrote of “My Heart Will Go On” in 2015. “The song also solidified Celine Dion’s place as one of music’s most reliable (and shameless) emoters.”
Jennings also contributed to “Where Are You Christmas?” from the movie “How the Grinch Stole Christmas!,” as well as “One Day I’ll Fly Away,” which was featured in the movie “Moulin Rouge!” (along with Jennings’ “Up Where We Belong”).

“I’m deeply saddened to learn of the passing of my friend & collaborator Will Jennings,” musician Christopher Cross wrote on X. “Working with Will was a master class in lyric writing for me. He was the consummate wordsmith and his gift to the world is eternal.”
“The love for your brilliant songs will go on forever,” songwriter Diane Warren said on X. “Write In Power, Will Jennings.”

https://www.latimes.com/entertainmen...ears-in-heaven

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James Earl Jones, legendary actor known for unmistakable baritone voice, dies at 93

One of the most famous voices of all time has gone silent.


James Earl Jones, whose prodigious acting talent was often overshadowed by his distinctive baritone over a seven-decade career both onstage and on the screen, died Monday, his representative said. He was 93.


A contemporary of Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte, Jones didn’t land the same coveted leading roles at a time when there were few to go around for Black actors in Hollywood, but he earned unmatched longevity as a character actor, from his first movie credit in 1964’s “Dr. Strangelove” to his reprisal of his role as King Joffer in the 2021 sequel to “Coming to America.”


“James Earl Jones doesn’t get enough credit for being a path-blazer for actors like Denzel Washington who came after him,” said Rae Dawn Chong, his co-star in the 1986 comedy “Soul Man.”

It was treading the boards of Broadway and beyond where Jones forged his place at the top of the marquee. Of his turn as the title character in the 1964 production of “Othello” in Central Park, The New York Times gushed: “Mr. Jones commands a full, resonant voice and a supple body, and his jealous rages and frothing frenzy have not only size but also emotional credibility.”


It was, of course, that resonant voice that would eventually become his trademark.


While he earned two Tony Awards, two Emmy Awards, an honorary Academy Award and a Grammy over his long career, he may be best remembered for an uncredited role in “Star Wars” — supplying the voice for Darth Vader, which has reverberated far beyond that galaxy far, far away.

MORE James Earl Jones, legendary actor known for unmistakable baritone voice, dies at 93

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James Earl Jones, dead at 93.

CNN —
You can’t think of James Earl Jones without hearing his voice.
That booming basso profundo, conveying instant dignity or menace, was Jones’ signature instrument. It brought power to all his stage and movie roles, most indelibly as Darth Vader in “Star Wars,” Mufasa in “The Lion King and as the voice of CNN. That remarkable voice is just one of many things the world will miss about the beloved actor, who died Monday, according to his agent. He was 93.

James Earl Jones, iconic voice of Darth Vader in ‘Star Wars’ and Mufasa in ‘The Lion King,’ dead at 93 | CNN