R.I.P. to an all time favourite.
He'd been suffering for a while....
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R.I.P. to an all time favourite.
He'd been suffering for a while....
'I ain't got no quarrel with them Viet Cong—no Viet Cong ever called me nigger'.
Dave Swarbrick, born April 5 1941, died June 3 2016
Dave Swarbrick, the violinist and singer, who has died aged 75, was one of the most influential folk musicians of the 1970s and 1980s, especially with the group Fairport Convention; in 1999 however, he joined a list of people, including Bob Hope, Mark Twain and Alfred Nobel, whose deaths have been announced prematurely – in Swarbrick’s case in a Daily Telegraph obituary.
The Telegraph, Swarbrick’s paper of choice (“I’m not a Tory but have always had a soft spot for its gung-ho attitude”), had received erroneous information that he had died in his home city of Coventry. When informed that the musician was still alive (though recovering in hospital from a bout of emphysema) the obituaries editor and his staff were said to be “distraught”. Luckily the piece made flattering reading, describing Swarbrick as “a small, dynamic, charismatic figure, cigarette perched precariously on his bottom lip, unruly hair flapping over his face, pint of beer ever at hand, who could electrify an audience with a single frenzied sweep of his bow”
After the initial shock and apologies Swarbrick could see the funny side, coming out with the priceless one-liner: “It’s not the first time I’ve died in Coventry.”
“After all, I’d enjoyed the text of the obit – it was very complimentary,” he explained. “And it had answered a question I’d often asked myself: whether any paper would bother when I died.” His wife, Jill, said: “He read the obituary and didn’t quarrel with any of the spellings or the facts – apart from the obvious one.”
In fact Swarbrick, or “Swarb” as he was known, went on to turn the newspaper’s error to his advantage, admitting that “I never got half as much attention playing as by dying.”
“In fact,” he told the Oxford Times in 2014, “I photocopied the obits, took them to gigs, signed them “RIP Dave Swarbrick” and sold them for £1. After all, where else are you going to get a signed obituary? I had to stop, though, when The Telegraph got in touch and told me I couldn’t do it as they had the copyright.”
In 2004, following two SwarbAid charity concerts by his Fairport Convention colleague Dave Pegg, Swarbrick received a double lung transplant and subsequently confounded both the press and medical profession by returning as a leading light on the British folk scene.
David Swarbrick was born at New Malden, Surrey, on April 5 1941. He was first drawn to folk music after taking up the guitar during the skiffle boom of the late 1950s. When he was 16, the pianist Beryl Marriott heard him at a skiffle event and invited him to join a ceilidh dance band. She also persuaded him to have another crack at the fiddle, which he had played as a child but which he had long since consigned to the attic.
In the 1960s Swarbrick was invited to play in some of the sessions of Ewan MacColl’s and Charles Parker’s Radio Ballads — setting stories about Britain’s fishermen, roadbuilders, miners, boxers and travellers to music. Through these he was introduced to Ian Campbell, a Scotsman who was turning his sights on the British folk tradition.
Swarbrick joined the Ian Campbell Folk Group in time to play on their first record, EP Ceilidh At The Crown (1962); he went on to help establish them as stars of the emerging folk club scene. The group had a minor hit with the first British cover of a Dylan song, The Times They Are A Changing. Swarbrick’s reputation rose rapidly, and in 1965 he was invited to play on Martin Carthy’s first album.
The next year he suddenly decided to emigrate to Denmark and marry his Danish girlfriend. With little money and no return ticket, he was detained at the Hook of Holland by customs, and promptly sent home again.
He ended up staying in London with Martin Carthy, with whom he went on to develop an important partnership. The intuitive interplay between Carthy’s guitar and Swarbrick’s fiddle was something entirely new. Their albums, Byker Hill (1967), But Two Came By (1968) and Prince Heathen (1969) broke the mould of traditional song arrangement and opened the door for the fusion of folk and rock.
When he was asked to play on a session for Fairport Convention in 1969, however, Swarbrick had never even heard of the band. At that time the idea of an electrified violin was so novel that, in order to create the desired effect, a telephone handset was taped to Swarbrick’s fiddle and connected to an amplifier.
Swarbrick was initially booked for one number only, but he ended up playing on four tracks on Fairport’s Unhalfbricking album (1969) and was invited to join the band full time.
His first album as a fully fledged member of Fairport Convention was Liege & Lief (1969), which broke new ground in marrying traditional songs with rock. Two members of the band, Sandy Denny and Ashley Hutchings, walked out after disputes about the direction of their music. This left Swarbrick and the guitarist Richard Thompson to take their place at the core of the band.
Over the next 15 years Fairport Convention undertook world tours and made more than a dozen albums.After Richard Thompson’s departure in 1970, Swarbrick developed into a surprisingly sensitive songwriter, and also took on the role of lead singer. In 1971 he was the prime creative drive behind Fairport Convention’s most ambitious project, Babbacombe Lee, an album based on the story of John Lee, a convicted murderer who was reprieved after three attempts to hang him at Exeter in 1885 had failed.
Swarbrick remained a constant presence throughout the numerous internal disputes which disrupted Fairport. But continual playing of the electric violin left him virtually deaf in one ear, and in 1984 he decided to retire. During his Fairport years he had also realeased three well- received solo albums, Swarbrick (1976), Swarbrick 2 (1977) and Lift the Lid and Listen (1978).
I’m always amazed to listen to my Fairport stuff. It’s so fast. What was I on?
Dave Swarbrick
He now reverted to the acoustic violin as he returned to folk clubs with fellow Fairport member Simon Nicol. In 1986 he formed a new band, Whippersnapper. He also made occasional returns to the Fairport fold, playing at their annual Cropredy Reunion Festival in Oxfordshire. “I’m always amazed to listen to my Fairport stuff,” he said in 2014. “It’s so fast. What was I on?”
In 1988 Swarbrick linked up again with Martin Carthy. They made some successful tours, and produced a couple of fine albums, Life and Limb (1990) and Skin and Bone (1992). He made cameo appearances in several films, including Far From The Madding Crowd, while his musical adaptation of Babbacombe Lee became the subject of a television documentary. He also spent some years in Australia, working with the guitarist and singer Alistair Hulett, with whom he recorded the impressive The Cold Grey Light (1998), before returning home.
After his double lung transplant, in 2006 Swarbrick started touring again with fellow ex-Fairporter, Maartin Allcock, and Kevin Dempsey – calling themselves, with a wink to the Telegraph’s premature obituary, Swarb’s Lazarus, producing the album Live and Kicking (2006) and appearing at the Cropredy Festival. He played fiddle for Steve Ashley, John Kirkpatrick, Bert Jansch, Pete Hawkes, and the Canadian reggae artist Jason Wilson and his band (an album, Lion Rampant, was released in 2014). He also reignited his partnership with Martin Carthy, with whom in later years he regularly hit the road for an autumn tour.
In 2007 Swarbrick joined the 1969 Fairport Convention line-up, with Chris While standing in for the late Sandy Denny, to perform the whole of the album Liege & Lief, and three years later, in 2010, he joined Fairport Convention on stage for an impromptu performance of Sir Patrick Spens.
In 2010, backed by a stellar array of guest musicians, he released Raison d’être, his first solo album for nearly 20 years. It was reviewed in more than 20 publications, the English Folk Dance and Song Society Magazine describing it as “the work of a fine fiddler who simply refuses to lie down and rest on his not inconsiderable laurels”.
Swarbrick did much work with up-and-coming artists, becoming patron of the Folkstock Foundation, set up to promote young acoustic talent. In April and May 2014, at his personal request, he did a 17-venue tour of Britain, organised by Helen Meissner of the Foundation, supported by the folk trio Said the Maiden, and also featuring young folk artists.
Blunt, funny and charming, after his premature demise Swarbrick went on a receive a clutch of awards. In 2003 he received the Gold Badge from the English Folk Dance and Song Society and the Gold Badge of Merit from the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters.
In 2004 he received a lifetime achievement award in the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, and in 2006 Fairport’s Liege & Lief album was voted “Most Influential Folk Album of All Time” by Radio 2 listeners. At the 2007 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, he and Martin Carthy won the “Best Duo” Award. In 2012 he received another lifetime achievement award at the 2012 Fatea awards.
Swarbrick, who was married several times, is survived by his wife, the painter Jill Swarbrick-Banks, whom he married in 1999, and by a son and two daughters.
RIP Muhammad Ali.
FFS are you retarded. If you want to DISCUSS the individual, start a thread, just don't start a discussion on here.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dragonfly94
RIP Dave Swarbrick (again)
"Them doughnuts are really vicious..........."
Nice one Carla and thanks to all the above who have moved on but enriched our lives.
Gotta love Ali's attitude.
Peter Shaffer, 'Amadeus' and 'Equus' playwright and Oscar winner, dies at 90
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Peter Shaffer, the Academy Award-winning British playwright whose stage dramas "Amadeus" and "Equus" were turned into acclaimed movies, has died. He was 90.
Shaffer died early Monday at the Marymount hospice in County Cork, Ireland, according to a statement from his agents at Macnaughton Lord Representation in London. He was traveling in Ireland with friends and family to celebrate his birthday last month.
Shaffer experienced a short illness, the agency said, but it didn't provide a cause of death.
Shaffer achieved his greatest popular success with "Amadeus," his account of the rivalry between composers Antonio Salieri and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
"Amadeus" premiered in London, where it opened in 1979 at the National Theatre. It transferred to Broadway in 1980, where it won the Tony Award for best play and ran for three years.
The play was turned into a movie by director Milos Forman in 1984. It won eight Oscars, including one for Shaffer for adapted screenplay and one for best picture.
Shaffer also received an Oscar nomination in 1977 for his adaptation of "Equus," which tells the story of a disturbed stable boy who has an extreme obsession with horses.
The playwright's twin brother, Anthony Shaffer, was also an acclaimed writer who penned the drama "Sleuth." Anthony Shaffer died in 2001.
[email protected]
Peter Shaffer, 'Amadeus' and 'Equus' playwright and Oscar winner, dies at 90 - LA Times
Chess legend Korchnoi dies in Switzerland aged 85
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Chess legend Korchnoi dies in Switzerland aged 85 - BBC NewsQuote:
Chess grandmaster Viktor Korchnoi, who defected from Russia to the West in 1976, has died in Switzerland aged 85.Born in 1931 in what is now St Petersburg, Korchnoi survived the siege of Leningrad during World War Two and is seen as one of the best players never to be World Champion.
He was a four-time USSR champion and ranked number one in the world in 1965.
However, he became convinced he had to leave the Soviet Union after being banned from playing internationally.
He played three matches against Soviet rival Anatoly Karpov, losing the 1974 final of the Candidates Tournament - which determines the challenger to play the world champion.
Mr Karpov became world champion in 1975 after the American Bobby Fischer refused to defend his title.
Korchnoi was then allowed by the Soviet authorities to compete internationally again the following year and sought political asylum in the Netherlands after a tournament there.
He later progressed to the World Championship final in 1978 and 1981, but lost to Mr Karpov on both occasions.
Korchnoi continued playing chess well into old age.
He was the oldest active chess grandmaster on the international tournament circuit for many years and won the World Senior Chess Championship in 2006
I have a couple of his books on the King's Gambit, an opening that initially filled me with dread (I preferred Queen's Gambit or Spanish openings) but once learnt is a 'must have'.
R.I.P. -- Good innings
was a great player I remember him well from the cold war days of the 1970s.
long before computers spoilt chess
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"My conscience won’t let me go shoot my brother, or some darker people, or some poor hungry people in the mud for big powerful America. And shoot them for what? They never called me nigger, they never lynched me, they didn’t put no dogs on me, they didn’t rob me of my nationality, rape or kill my mother and father…. How can I shoot them poor people? Just take me to jail".Quote:
Originally Posted by wjblaney
Janet Waldo, the voice of Penelope Pitstop and Judy Jetson, dead at 96
She was the voice of the "glamour gal of the gas pedal", a character fleeing the hot pursuit of her nemesis the Hooded Claw with her trademark Southern-belle cry "hay-ulp".
The hugely familiar voice behind Penelope Pitstop, Janet Waldo, has died aged 96.
One of the last remaining voice actors from the legendary Hanna-Barbera stable, Waldo died on Sunday in the US from a brain tumour, reports ABC7.
She was also the voice behind Judy Jetson, the teenage daughter of George and Jane Jetson, in The Jetsons about a family living a futuristic world in a space colony in the series which ran 1962-63.
She then took the wheel as Penelope Pitstop in Wacky Races in 1968. The only woman racer alongside competitors including Dick Dastardly and Muttley and the Ant Hill Mob, she competed in her trusty pink sports car the Compact Pussycat, which featured the unlikely gear settings of hairspray, lipstick, hairdryer and make-up, according to the show's intro.
Later, she voiced The Perils of Penelope Pitstop in 1969, in which she plays an heiress to a vast fortune who is in "perpetual peril from her fortune-seeking guardian Sylvester Sneekly who unbeknown to her is really the Hooded Claw".
Waldo also appeared on shows including I Love Lucy and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet in the 1950s. Her other voice credits included Pearl Slaghoople, the mother of Wilma, on The Flintstones and Josie on Josie and the Pussycats.
She was first discovered as a student at the University of Washington, after winning an award for theatre, which was given to her by Bing Crosby. Crosby a talent scout for Paramount Pictures accompanying him. Waldo was signed up by the studio and featured in a number of small roles before her career took off with work in radio and television.
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I'm thinking Muhammad Ali, Gordie Howe, and?...These two icons are waiting for the third great sport hero...
Alf star dead at 76
THE man who played Alf, Michu Meszaros, has died.
According to TMZ the 83cm tall star was found unresponsive at his home more than a week ago and had been in a coma, the gossip site reports. He was 76.
Meszaros’ manager could not immediately be reached for comment.
The actor wore the costume for four seasons of Alf in the ‘80s.
Paul Fusco voiced Alf.
The Budapest native started his career in 1973 as a member of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Meszaros was advertised as “the smallest man on earth,” according to his Facebook fan page
Michu Meszaros dead at 76: report | ?Alf? actor dead at 76
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Bloody hell that's a bit young.... Freak accident.
Because it's breaking they seem to have overlooked in the text that he is probably best known for playing Chekov in the Star Trek reboots.
‘Star Trek’ & ‘Green Room’ actor Anton Yelchin dies at 27 in accident
By Dan Bullock - Jun 19, 2016 20/06/2016 4:22 AM AEST | Updated 1 hour ago
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Horrible news today. Actor Anton Yelchin, who recently starred in the indie-hit “Green Room”, has died today at the age of 27.
TMZ and many other news sites are reporting that Anton died in a freak accident late last night. Apparently Mr. Yelchin was supposed to meet some friends for a rehearsal, but when he didn’t show they went to check up on him. When they arrived at his home they found him pinned between his brick mailbox and car. It would seem that the car had rolled down the driveway and hit him. Police are still investigating the incident, but don’t believe foul play was involved.
Whether by choice or by circumstance Anton Yelchin seemed to have a growing career in horror. In his short career Anton appeared in five horror films including “Odd Thomas”, “Burying the Ex”, The “Fright Night” remake, and “The Green Room.” With the “Green Room” he received a great deal of critical acclaim and showed his range and promise as an actor.
In the near future Anton was set to work with Guillermo Del Toro on his animated project “Trollhunters” and was to star in the Stephen King series “Mr. Mercedes.” He was a great actor and talented individual. Our thoughts are with his friends and family at this time.
Actor Anton Yelchin Has Died at the Age of 27 - HorrorMovies.ca
RIP, way too young to die.
I'm channeling the Sheriff,never heard of him.
Guess you're not a Trekkie then.Quote:
Originally Posted by bobo746
I'll just check the mail me duc.
Michael Herr Dead: Screenwriter for ‘Full Metal Jacket,’ ‘Apocalypse Now’ Dies at 76
June 25, 2016 @ 10:14 AM
By Joyce Chen
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Michael Herr, the Vietnam War reporter who wrote Dispatches and helped pen the screenplays for Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now, died of a long illness near his home in upstate New York on Thursday, June 23. He was 76.
The writer’s daughter, Claudia Herr, confirmed his death to the Washington Post, but declined to provide further details.
Herr was just 27 when he was dispatched to Vietnam to cover the war for Esquire in 1967. At the time, he had little journalistic experience outside of working on Syracuse University’s literary magazine and contributing the occasional piece of film criticism or travel piece.
He would later change the game of war reporting with his 1977 book Dispatches, which dived deep into the psyche of the Vietnam War and the men who fought it.
"I was there to watch," he wrote. "I went to cover the war and the war covered me; an old story, unless of course you've never heard it. I went there behind the crude but serious belief that you had to be able to look at anything. ... I didn't know, it took the war to teach it, that you were as responsible for everything you saw as you were for everything you did."
The writing of the book caused Herr to spiral into a breakdown of “real despair for three or four years,” he once told the London Observer. “Deep paralysis. I split up with my wife for a year. I didn’t see anybody because I didn’t want anybody to see me.”
Following the publication and critical acclaim of Dispatches, Herr tried to remain out of the spotlight, only reemerging to help pen the screenplays for Francis Ford Coppola’s epic Apocalypse Now in 1979 and Stanley Kubrick’s 1987 Full Metal Jacket, both surrounding the idea of madness in wartime.
Herr is survived by his wife, Valerie; daughters Catherine and Claudia; and his siblings, Steven Herr and Judy Bleyer.
Michael Herr Dead: Screenwriter for ?Full Metal Jacket,? ?Apocalypse Now? Dies at 76 - Us Weekly
It is very likely that the "Last Post" will be played at his funeral.Quote:
Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
Damn good movies. RIP Michael.Quote:
Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
^
Tell him I was asking for him, when your fast goes tits up
sigh...:sigh1:Quote:
Originally Posted by Iceman123
Italian actor Bud Spencer dies aged 86
1 hour ago
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Italian actor and filmmaker Bud Spencer, who starred in a number of Spaghetti Westerns, has died aged 86. He passed away peacefully on Monday in Rome "and did not suffer from pain", his son said.
Spencer, whose real name was Carlo Pedersoli, was known among his fans as the "big friendly giant" of the screen because of his height and weight. Spencer, who was also a professional swimmer, played in more than 20 films from the 1950s to the 1980s.
"He had all of us next to him and his last words were 'Thank you'," his son Giuseppe Pedersoli said. In a tweet (in Italian), Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi said: "Ciao #BudSpencer We loved you so much."
Spencer was born in the southern Italian city of Naples in 1929, but later moved to Rome, where he became a promising swimmer. In 1950, he was the first Italian to swim 100m in under one minute.
He later abandoned his sporting career and began playing in westerns and comedy films, often alongside Terence Hill. Spencer appeared in movies including Ace High, They Call Me Trinity and A Friend is a Treasure.
Spencer said he chose his name as a tribute to his favourite beer Budweiser and US actor Spencer Tracy.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-36648131
Until just now, I never realized both Bud Spencer and Terrence Hill were Italians. Saw several of the spaghetti westerns staring those two as a kid. The Trinity movies were so funny.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J78J-6PbhVo
Me eitherQuote:
Originally Posted by misskit
Me tooQuote:
Saw several of the spaghetti westerns staring those two as a kid.
Loved themThanks for the clip.Quote:
The Trinity movies were so funny.
'Future Shock' author and famed futurist Alvin Toffler dies at 87
By The Associated Press
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on June 29, 2016 at 11:22 PM, updated June 29, 2016 at 11:29 PM
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NEW YORK (AP) — Alvin Toffler, a guru of the post-industrial age whose million-selling "Future Shock" and other books anticipated the disruptions and transformations brought about by the rise of digital technology, has died. He was 87.
He died late Monday in his sleep at his home in the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, said Yvonne Merkel, a spokeswoman for his Reston, Virginia-based consulting firm, Toffler Associates.
One of the world's most famous "futurists," Toffler was far from alone in seeing the economy shift from manufacturing and mass production to a computerized and information-based model. But few were more effective at popularizing the concept, predicting the effects and assuring the public that the traumatic upheavals of modern times were part of a larger and more hopeful story.
"Future Shock," a term he first used in a 1965 magazine article, was how Toffler defined the growing feeling of anxiety brought on by the sense that life was changing at a bewildering and ever-accelerating pace. His book combined an understanding tone and page-turning urgency as he diagnosed contemporary trends and headlines, from war protests to the rising divorce rate, as symptoms of a historical cycle overturning every facet of life.
"We must search out totally new ways to anchor ourselves, for all the old roots — religion, nation, community, family, or profession — are now shaking under the hurricane impact of the accelerative thrust," he wrote.
Toffler offered a wide range of predictions and prescriptions, some more accurate than others. He forecast "a new frontier spirit" that could well lead to underwater communities, "artificial cities beneath the waves," and also anticipated the founding of space colonies — a concept that fascinated Toffler admirer Newt Gingrich, the former House Speaker and presidential candidate. In "Future Shock," released in 1970, he also presumed that the rising general prosperity of the 1960s would continue indefinitely.
"We made the mistake of believing the economists of the time," Toffler told Wired magazine in 1993. "They were saying, as you may recall, we've got this problem of economic growth licked. All we need to do is fine-tune the system. And we bought it."
But Toffler attracted millions of followers, including many in the business community, and the book's title became part of the general culture. Curtis Mayfield and Herbie Hancock were among the musicians who wrote songs called "Future Shock" and the book influenced such science fiction novels as John Brunner's "The Shockwave Rider." More recently, Samantha Bee hosted a recurring "Future Shock" segment on Comedy Central.
Toffler is credited with another common expression, defining the feeling of being overrun with data and knowledge as "information overload."
In the decades following "Future Shock," Toffler wrote such books as "Powershift" and "The Adaptive Corporation," lectured worldwide, taught at several schools and met with everyone from Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to network executives and military officials. China cited him along with Franklin Roosevelt, Bill Gates and others as the Westerners who most influenced the country even as Communist officials censored his work.
In 2002, the management consultant organization Accenture ranked him No. 8 on its list of the top 50 business intellectuals.
His most famous observation: "The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn."
After "Future Shock," Toffler also continued to sketch out how the world was changing and how to respond. In "The Third Wave," a 1980 best-seller that AOL founder Steve Case would cite as a formative influence, he looked to a high-tech society that Case, Steve Jobs and others were just starting to put in place. He forecast the spread of email, telecommuting, teleconferences, interactive media, devices that remind you "of your own appointments" and online chat rooms.
Overall, he pronounced the downfall of the old centralized hierarchy and looked forward to a more dispersed and responsive society, populated by a hybrid of consumer and producer he called "the prosumer."
Case told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Toffler was a "real pioneer in helping people, companies and even countries lean into the future."
"He will be missed," Case said.
Toffler collaborated on many of his books and other projects with his wife, Heidi, who survives him. He is also survived by a sister, Caroline Sitter. Toffler's daughter, Karen, died in 2000.
Toffler, a native of New York City, was born Oct. 4, 1928 to Jewish Polish immigrants. A graduate of New York University, he was a Marxist and union activist in his youth, and continued to question the fundamentals of the market economy long after his politics moderated. He knew the industrial life firsthand through his years as a factory worker in Ohio.
"I got a realistic picture of how things really are made — the energy, love and rage that are poured into ordinary things we take for granted," he later wrote.
He had dreamed of being the next John Steinbeck, but found his talents were better suited for journalism. He wrote for the pro-union publication Labor's Daily and in the 1950s was hired by Fortune magazine to be its labor columnist. The origins of "Future Shock" began in the 1960s when Toffler worked as a researcher for IBM and other technology companies.
"Much of what Toffler wrote in 'Future Shock' is now accepted common sense, but at the time it defied conventional views of reality," John Judis wrote in The New Republic in 1995.
"Americans' deepest fears of the future were expressed by George Orwell's lockstep world of 1984. But Toffler, who had spent five years in a factory, understood that Americans' greatest problem was not being consigned to the tedium of the assembly line or the office. As he put it: 'The problem is not whether man can survive regimentation and standardization. The problem ... is whether he can survive freedom.'"
'Future Shock' author and famed futurist Alvin Toffler dies at 87 | syracuse.com
Caroline Aherne
Comedy writer and actress Caroline Aherne has died at the age of 52.
Aherne, star and writer of The Royle Family and The Mrs Merton Show, had suffered from cancer, her publicist said.
The actress said two years ago that she had been diagnosed with lung cancer, having previously had bladder and eye cancer.
Aherne was also the narrator of Gogglebox and appeared in The Fast Show.
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Her publicist Neil Reading said on Saturday: "Caroline Aherne has sadly passed away, after a brave battle with cancer.
"The Bafta award-winning writer and comedy actor died earlier today at her home in Timperley, Greater Manchester. She was 52.
"The family ask for privacy at this very sad time."
'Wonderful talent'
Sue Johnston, who played Barbara - the mother of Aherne's character Denise - in The Royle Family, said: "I am devastated at her passing and I am numb with grief."
Fellow comics have been paying their tributes to Aherne.
Actor and writer Mark Gatiss said she was "so gifted" as he shared the "awful news".
Little Britain star David Walliams said on Twitter: "Absolutely devastating news about Caroline Aherne. A true comedy genius, her work was equally funny & touching."
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Media captionCaroline Aherne: How spoof radio agony aunt became TV star Jenny Eclair wrote: "Poor dear Caroline Aherne, how terribly sad."
Comedian Sarah Millican said: "So sad. What a wonderful talent she was."
David Baddiel paid tribute by writing: "The talent, you all knew about. But she was a really lovely woman. Vulnerable and complex and damaged but... lovely. #CarolineAherneRIP."
Some also recalled their favourite lines, with DJ and writer Danny Baker writing on Twitter: "Goodbye great Caroline Aherne. A gift & language that lives on. A vegetarian? That's a shame. Could she have some wafer-thin ham, Barbara?"
Image caption Aherne starred alongside a cast including Ralf Little, Ricky Tomlinson and Sue Johnston in The Royle Family Aherne was born in London but grew up in Wythenshawe, Manchester.
Her brother Patrick has said she was the family joker, adding: "Nobody else in the family was like that. But she was funny from the time she was really little."
She studied drama at Liverpool Polytechnic then started work as a secretary at the BBC before finding national fame in the mid 1990s with Mrs Merton, in which she starred as the eponymous chat show host, and The Fast Show.
The Royle Family, which ran for three series and featured in several specials, told the story of a dysfunctional family. Aherne wrote it with co-star Craig Cash, drawing on her own childhood experiences and the people she met growing up.
It won four awards, including best actress for Aherne, at the 1999 British Comedy Awards, before going on to pick up the best sitcom Bafta in 2000 and 2007.
In the Mrs Merton Show, a series of guests were subjected to questions in front of an audience of pensioners. One much-quoted example is when Mrs Merton asked Debbie McGee: "And what first attracted you to the millionaire Paul Daniels?".
The Mrs Merton Christmas Show won the best talk show Bafta in 1997. Aherne was nominated for Baftas for her performances in both shows, as well as for directing The Royle Family in 2001.
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-36694598
An extremely talented young lady.
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"It's harder to give up smoking than drinking."
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She has been ill for some time.
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Christmas with The Royle Family.
Caroline Aherne, star and writer of The Royle Family and The Mrs Merton Show, had suffered from cancer, her publicist said.
The actress said two years ago that she had been diagnosed with lung cancer, having previously had bladder and eye cancer.
Aherne was also the narrator of Gogglebox and appeared in The Fast Show.
Her publicist Neil Reading said on Saturday: "Caroline Aherne has sadly passed away, after a brave battle with cancer.
"The Bafta award-winning writer and comedy actor died earlier today at her home in Timperley, Greater Manchester. She was 52.
"The family ask for privacy at this very sad time."
RIP Young Lady. xx
Brilliant comedienne, much troubled in later life. Far too young, poor woman.
Still think her winding up Chris Eubank was brilliant.
Scorchio! :)
RIP
Bit of a shocker. I thought The Royle Family and Mrs Merton were brilliant. RIP.
Time smoking was banned
Famed Holocaust Survivor and 'Night' Author Elie Wiesel Dies At Age of 87
Nobel Peace Prize laureate and famed author Elie Wiesel, one of the few survivors of the Auschwitz concentration camp, died on Saturday at the age of 87, the Guardian reported.
Wiesel was best known for his haunting 1955 book Night, a recounting of his time at Auschwitz with his father, Shlomo Wiesel, who was murdered, along with his mother and one of his three sisters, by the Nazi regime in the camp system. According to the Guardian, it has sold over six million copies worldwide, and the book later became the first of a trilogy when he wrote two others titled Dawn and Day. By the end of his career, Wiesel had written over 40 books.
Menachem Z. Rosensaft, founding chairman of the International Network of Children of Jewish Survivors, penned a tribute to his late friend on Tablet Mag:
He often said that he could not, would not speak on behalf of the dead. He did, however, speak forcefully, eloquently for the collectivity of the survivors, and they revered and loved him for it. "Accept the idea that you will never see what they have seen—and go on seeing now," he wrote in his classic essay, "A Plea for the Survivors," perhaps subconsciously opening a window into his own heart, "that you will never know the faces that haunt their nights, that you will never know the cries that rent their sleep. Accept the idea that you will never penetrate the cursed and spellbound universe they carry within themselves with unfailing loyalty."According to the Jerusalem Post, Wiesel won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 "for what the Norwegian Nobel Committee called his 'practical work in the cause of peace ... atonement and human dignity' to humanity."
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Actress Noel Neill, the First Lois Lane of the Screen, Dies at 95
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She starred as the intrepid Daily Planet newspaper reporter in 1948 and '50 movie serials and in TV’s 'Adventures of Superman.'
Noel Neill, who played foolhardy Daily Planet reporter Lois Lane on the 1950s TV series Adventures of Superman, then walked away from show business, has died. She was 95.
Neill died Sunday at her home in Tucson, Ariz., after a long illness, her friend, manager and biographer, Larry Thomas Ward, told The Hollywood Reporter.
Neill became the first actress to play the legendary damsel in distress on the screen when she starred opposite Kirk Alyn as the Man of Steel in a 15-chapter serial for Columbia Pictures that played in movie theaters in 1948.
The pair then reunited in 1950 for another serial, Atom Man vs. Superman, which spanned 15 chapters as well.
Phyllis Coates played Lois in the first season (1952) of the syndicated Adventures of Superman, but when she committed to another project and could not return to the series, Neill reclaimed the role in 1953. She was rescued a countless number of times by George Reeves’ Superman in 78 episodes until the show’s conclusion in 1958.
Neill’s favorite episode was said to be the 1956 installment “The Wedding of Superman,” where the hero proposes to her. But alas, it was only a dream.
“She had this wonderful, perky touch to Lois Lane,” her late co-star Jack Larson (who played Jimmy Olson) said in 2003, “and she could basically do everything in one take, which is what they liked. If you blew a scene and had to do four takes, everyone was disgruntled."
Neill, who earned $225 an episode, quit acting after the series ended in 1958. “I just figured I’d worked enough, I didn’t have any great ambition,” she told The New York Times in a 2006 interview. “Basically, I’m a beach bum. I was married, we lived near the beach, that was enough for me.”
Neill was born on Nov. 20, 1920, which was Thanksgiving Day. Her father was an editor for the Minneapolis Star Tribune and wanted his daughter to become a reporter, arranging her to write for Women’s Wear Daily, but she wanted to be a performer. She played banjo in a musical trio on the fair circuit, and during a visit to Southern California, she got a job singing at a restaurant at the Del Mar racetrack.
Bing Crosby, who was a Del Mar shareholder, spotted her and helped her land a contract with Paramount Pictures, for whom she appeared in bit roles in such films as Henry Aldrich’s Little Secret (1944), with Crosby in Here Come the Waves (1944) and in The Blue Dahlia (1946).
Later, you could spot her in The Big Clock (1948), the Charlie Chan film The Sky Dragon (1949), The Greatest Show on Earth (1950), American in Paris (1951), Invasion U.S.A. with Coates (1952) and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953).
The 5-foot-2 Neill, who had dark red hair and blue-gray eyes, was past 25 when she played bobbysoxer Betty Rogers in a series of breezy “Teenager” musicals for Monogram Pictures that included Junior Prom (1946), Freddie Steps Out (1946), High School Hero (1946), Vacation Days (1947), Sarge Goes to College (1947), Smart Politics (1948) and Campus Sleuth (1948).
Sam Katzman, who had produced several of these films, thought she’s be just right for Lois in the first Superman serial, the first time the superhero was portrayed outside the comics or radio. (Later, Katzman produced the 1949 serial Batman and Robin, starring Robert Lowery as the Caped Crusader.)
“I had never heard of Superman,” Neill said in a 2003 interview. “Back then, comics were read mostly by boys.”
Neill had fulfilled her father’s wish that she become a reporter.
She kept her connection to the character when she briefly appeared as the mother of Lois (Margot Kidder) in Superman (1978), the hero’s return to the big screen that starred Christopher Reeve. (Alyn played Lois’ father in the Richard Donner film.)
Neill also showed up on a 1991 episode of the syndicated series Superboy, and she was Gertrude Vanderworth, who on her death bed signs all her money over to bad guy Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey), in the opening scene of Bryan Singer’s Superman Returns (2006), starring Brandon Routh.
Neill lectured at colleges and was a hit at comic-book conventions and fan gatherings through the decades, and in 2003 she was the subject of Truth, Justice and the American Way: The Life and Times of Noel Neill, the Original Lois Lane, an authorized biography by Ward.
"She did whatever she wanted to do," Ward said. "That was the beauty of her skill. Ultimately, only she truly knew what was best for her, and that came out time and again. She was very smart, quite astute about the acting business."
In 2010, the real-life city of Metropolis, Ill., unveiled a life-size bronze statue of Lois modeled on Neill, who came in from California for the occasion. (She also lived in Metropolis briefly a few years ago, Ward said, before moving to Tucson.)
Located along the Ohio River, Metropolis, Ill., was founded and named in 1839, long before the fictional Metropolis was first identified as Superman’s home in Action Comics in 1939. In addition to the Lois statue, there’s one of the Man of Steel in the middle of Superman Square a couple of blocks away.
Noel Neill Dead: Lois Lane Actress Was 95 - Hollywood Reporter
Tributes as ‘Happy Days’ creator Garry Marshall dies at 81
Thursday, July 21, 2016
Laura Harding
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Marshall, who also created Mork & Mindy starring Robin Williams and directed hit films including Pretty Woman, The Princess Diaries, Beaches, and Valentine’s Day, died of complications from pneumonia after a stroke.
Winkler shot to fame playing the rebellious Arthur ‘Fonzie’ Fonzarelli in the family comedy and has said he owes Marshall his career.
He wrote on Twitter: “Garry Marshall Rest In Peace... Thank you for my professional life. Thank you for your loyalty, friendship, and generosity.
“Larger than life, funnier than most, wise and the definition of friend.”
Marshall died in hospital in Burbank, California, on July 19, said his publicist, Michelle Bega.
Director Ron Howard, who starred in Happy Days as the clean-cut Richie Cunningham, said he missed Marshall already, writing: “RIP #GarryMarshall whose humour & humanity inspired. He was a world class boss & mentor whose creativity and leadership meant a ton to me.
“Garry’s mantra, to those who succeeded in entertainment was simple ... ‘Life is more important that show business’.
“I miss Garry already. He leaves a huge void for all who were lucky to be in his orbit. A great friend.”
Goldie Hawn, who starred opposite her partner Kurt Russell in Marshall’s film Overboard, wrote: “Our beloved Gary Marshall has passed! He was so special to our family and we will miss his gift of true joy and love!
"Thank you Gary for Overboard and all the films you made that had humanity, humour and goodness that lifted our spirits. God has you now. Rest dear one. We love you.”
Ashton Kutcher, who starred in Marshall’s films Valentine’s Day and New Year’s Eve, paid tribute, saying: “I lost a friend & mentor. We lost a beautiful man & masterful story teller. Gary Marshall I love you. I hope I get to go where you are.”
Topher Grace, who also starred in Valentine’s Day, wrote: “Oh man, this is a tough one. Honoured I spent time with this kind man. My love to his wife and family. #garrymarshall.”
Marshall, who was a former journalist, first found success in 1970 when he and his writing partner turned the Broadway show The Odd Couple into a TV series.
His first big screen success was Pretty Woman, starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere, in 1990. The film was such a hit the pair reunited for Runaway Bride in 1999.
He also made appearances on screen in supporting roles such as a casino boss in Albert Brooks’ 1985 film Lost In America. and interfering network boss Stan Lansing in 90s comedy Murphy Brown.
Tributes as ?Happy Days? creator Garry Marshall dies at 81 | Irish Examiner
Ex-Lebanon hostage Thomas Sutherland dies at age 85
USA TODAY NETWORK Jason Pohl, Fort Collins Coloradoan 10:30 p.m. EDT July 23, 2016
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FORT COLLINS, Colo. — Thomas Sutherland, a Colorado State University professor who was teaching in Beirut when he was taken hostage and held in darkness for more than six years, died Friday evening at his Fort Collins home. He was 85.
Family and friends on Saturday remembered Sutherland for both the optimism he brought the U.S. upon his return in 1991 as well as the youthful energy and characteristics of a gentleman exhibited through his final days.
“He just passed away so peacefully,” his wife, Jean Sutherland, said. “That’s just the way he wanted to.”
Thomas Sutherland was born on May 3, 1931, and raised on a Scottish dairy farm. He graduated from Glasgow University in Scotland and moved in the 1950s to the United States, where he attended graduated school at Iowa State University.
He became a professor of animal sciences at Colorado State, where he taught for nearly three decades before going on leave in 1983 and serving as a dean of faculty of agriculture and food science at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon.
Islamic militants captured Sutherland on June 9, 1985, near his Beirut home along with 53 other civilians, including Associated Press bureau chief Terry Anderson. He spent 2,354 days in captivity, never seeing the light of day, before being freed on Nov. 18, 1991.
“I spent six years out of the seven years I was in captivity with Tommy,” Anderson told The Associated Press on Saturday. “We were kept in the same cells and sometimes on the same chain. Whenever they moved us, generally Tommy would show up with me. He was a kind and gentle man.”
Sutherland taught him French when they were hostages, Anderson said. “He spoke beautiful French. We practiced irregular verbs,” he said.
Anderson said Sutherland “was a guy who remembered everyone he ever met. He never forgot anyone. I don’t know how he did it. He was such a people person that he remembered everybody. When we were in prison, we would sit and talk about things we had done and places he had gone. He always talked about the people he met there, and he remembered them. He was a very, very good man.”
Sutherland returned to Fort Collins on Dec. 1 of that year to much fanfare, celebration and hope.
in a posting Saturday on Colorado State’s website, CSU’s President Tony Frank said: “The entire Colorado State University community joins once again in honoring a true hero — who believed that an understanding of agricultural science could bring relief to people and communities in hunger — and that education could be a force for good and light in our world that would transcend borders and differences among nations,”
Sutherland and his wife were enthusiastic supporters of local philanthropic efforts. The couple established the Sutherland Family Foundation to support Fort Collins nonprofits with the $16.5 million they received as part of an award from a massive lawsuit against Iran for its involvement in the hostage situation.
Asked in 2001 how he hoped people would remember him, Sutherland said, “I would like them to remember that I was the recipient of an awful lot of kindness and goodwill and would like, if possible, to repay that. And that they could say when I die: ‘Here's a guy who did do something for other people.’ ”
Ex-Lebanon hostage Thomas Sutherland dies at age 85
Marni Nixon, the Voice Behind the Screen, Dies at 86
By MARGALIT FOXJULY 25, 2016
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Marni Nixon, the American cinema’s most unsung singer, died on Sunday in New York. She was 86.
The cause was breast cancer, said Randy Banner, a student and friend.
Classically trained, Ms. Nixon was throughout the 1950s and ’60s the unseen — and usually uncredited — singing voice of the stars in a spate of celebrated Hollywood films. She dubbed Deborah Kerr in “The King and I,” Natalie Wood in “West Side Story” and Audrey Hepburn in “My Fair Lady,” among many others.
Her other covert outings included singing for Jeanne Crain in “Cheaper by the Dozen,” Janet Leigh in “Pepe” and Ida Lupino in “Jennifer.” “The ghostess with the mostest,” the newspapers called her, a description that eventually began to rankle.
Before her Hollywood days and long afterward, Ms. Nixon was an acclaimed concert singer, a specialist in contemporary music who appeared as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic; a recitalist at Carnegie, Alice Tully and Town Halls in New York; and a featured singer on one of Leonard Bernstein’s televised young people’s concerts.
Her concerts and her many recordings — including works by Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Webern, Ives, Copland, Gershwin and Kern — drew wide critical praise. Yet as late as 1990, decades after Ms. Nixon had made good on her vow to perform only as herself, she remained, in the words of The Los Angeles Times, “the best known of the ghost singers.”
At midcentury, Hollywood was more inclined to cast bankable stars than trained singers in films that called for singing. As a result, generations of Americans have grown accustomed to Ms. Nixon’s voice, if not her face, in standards like “Getting to Know You,” from “The King and I”; “I Feel Pretty,” from “West Side Story”; and “I Could Have Danced All Night,” from “My Fair Lady.”
Deborah Kerr was nominated for an Academy Award in 1956 for her role as Anna in “The King and I”; the film’s soundtrack album sold hundreds of thousands of copies. For singing Anna’s part on that album, Ms. Nixon recalled, she received a total of $420.
“You always had to sign a contract that nothing would be revealed,” Ms. Nixon told the ABC News program “Nightline” in 2007. “Twentieth Century Fox, when I did ‘The King and I,’ threatened me.” She continued, “They said, if anybody ever knows that you did any part of the dubbing for Deborah Kerr, we’ll see to it that you don’t work in town again.”
Though Ms. Nixon honored the bargain, her work soon became one of Hollywood’s worst-kept secrets. She became something of a cult figure, appearing as a guest on “To Tell the Truth” and as an answer to clues featured by “Jeopardy!,” Trivial Pursuit and at least one New York Times crossword puzzle.
Her increasing renown helped bring her spectral trade into the light and encouraged her to push for official recognition. “The anonymity didn’t bother me until I sang Natalie Wood’s songs in ‘West Side Story,’ ” Ms. Nixon told The Times in 1967. “Then I saw how important my singing was to the picture. I was giving my talent, and somebody else was taking the credit.”
Although the studios seldom accorded Ms. Nixon the screen credit and royalties that she began to demand, both became customary for ghost singers.
Starting as a teenager in the late 1940s and continuing for the next two decades, Ms. Nixon lent her crystalline soprano to some 50 films, sometimes contributing just a line or two of song — sometimes just a single, seamless note — that the actress could not manage on her own.
The voice of an angel heard by Ingrid Bergman in “Joan of Arc”? It was Ms. Nixon’s.
The songs of the nightclub singer, played by Ms. Kerr, in “An Affair to Remember”? Also Ms. Nixon.
The second line of the couplet “But square-cut or pear-shape/These rocks don’t lose their shape,” with its pinpoint high note on “their,” from “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”? That was Ms. Nixon too. (The film’s star Marilyn Monroe sang the rest of the number, “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.”)
It was a decidedly peculiar calling — and not one on which Ms. Nixon had ever planned — entailing not so much imitating actors as embodying them.
“It’s fascinating, getting inside the actresses you’re singing for,” she told The New York Journal-American in 1964. “It’s like cutting off the top of their heads and seeing what’s underneath. You have to know how they feel, as well as how they talk, in order to sing as they would sing — if they could sing.”
Over time, however, Ms. Nixon came to regard her spectacular mimetic gift as more curse than blessing. For despite her myriad accomplishments as a singer of art songs, she was obliged to spend years exorcising her ghostly cinematic presence.
“It got so I’d lent my voice to so many others that I felt it no longer belonged to me,” she told The Times in 1981. “It was eerie; I had lost part of myself.”
A petite, fine-boned woman who resembled Julie Andrews, Ms. Nixon was born Margaret Nixon McEathron on Feb. 22, 1930, in Altadena, Calif., near Los Angeles.
She began studying the violin at 4 and throughout her childhood played bit parts — “the freckle-faced brat,” she called her typical role — in a string of Hollywood movies. At 11, already possessed of a fine singing voice, she won a vocal competition at the Los Angeles County Fair and found her true calling. She became a private pupil of Vera Schwarz, a distinguished Austrian soprano who had settled in the United States.
At 17, Ms. Nixon appeared as a vocal soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Leopold Stokowski, singing in Orff’s “Carmina Burana.” She later studied opera at Tanglewood with Sarah Caldwell and Boris Goldovsky.
During her teenage years, Ms. Nixon worked as a messenger at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Knowing of her musical ability — she had perfect pitch and was an impeccable sight reader — the studio began recruiting her to furnish the singing voices of young actresses. The work helped pay for Ms. Nixon’s voice lessons.
Her first significant dubbing job was singing a Hindu lullaby for Margaret O’Brien in “The Secret Garden,” released in 1949.
Ms. Nixon did occasionally take center stage, as when she played Eliza Doolittle in a 1964 revival of “My Fair Lady” at City Center in New York. (Ms. Andrews had played the part in the original Broadway production, which opened in 1956.) In 1965, Ms. Nixon was seen on camera in a small role as a singing nun in “The Sound of Music,” starring Ms. Andrews.
On Broadway, Ms. Nixon appeared in the Sigmund Romberg musical “The Girl in Pink Tights” in 1954 and, more recently, in the musical drama “James Joyce’s ‘The Dead’ ” (2000), the 2001 revival of Stephen Sondheim’s “Follies” and the 2003 revival of “Nine.”
Ms. Nixon’s first marriage, to Ernest Gold, a film composer who won an Oscar for the 1960 film “Exodus,” ended in divorce, as did her second, to Lajos Frederick Fenster. Her third husband, Albert Block, died in 2015.
Survivors include her daughters from her first marriage, Martha Carr and Melani Gold Friedman; her sisters Donyl Mern Aleman, Adair McEathron Jenkins and Ariel Lea Witbeck; six grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren. A son from her first marriage, Andrew Gold, a popular songwriter whose hit “Thank You for Being a Friend” became the theme of the NBC sitcom “The Golden Girls,” died in 2011 at 59.
Ms. Nixon’s other onscreen credits include “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.” In the 1970s and ’80s, she was the host of “Boomerang,” a popular children’s television show in Seattle, where she had made her home for some years before moving to the Upper West Side of Manhattan.
She also supplied the singing voice of Grandmother Fa in Disney’s animated film “Mulan,” released in 1998. (The character’s spoken dialogue was voiced by the actress June Foray.) She taught for many years at the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, where she was the founding director of the vocal department.
But it was her work as a ghost that is enshrined forever in the cinematic canon: “West Side Story” won the Oscar for best picture of 1961; “My Fair Lady” won for 1964. Both films remain perennials on television.
Ms. Nixon, who continued singing until she was in her 80s, eventually came to regard her heard-but-not-seen life with affection. She paid it homage in a one-woman show, “Marni Nixon: The Voice of Hollywood,” with which she toured the country for years.
She did likewise in a memoir, “I Could Have Sung All Night,” published in 2006. (The memoir was written with a ghost, Stephen Cole, whom Ms. Nixon credited prominently on the cover and the title page.)
In the few movie musicals made today, directors tend to cast actors who are trained singers (like Meryl Streep in “Into the Woods”) or those whose star power mitigates the fact that they are not (like Helena Bonham Carter in “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street”).
What this means is that the ghost singers who were once a Hollywood mainstay have now, for the most part, become ghosts themselves.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/26/ar...-86.html?&_r=0
Neighbours Mrs Mangel actress Vivean Gray dies aged 92
Vivean Gray, the British actress who played one of Neighbours' "greatest characters" Mrs Mangel, has died aged 92.
Gray played neighbourhood gossip Nell Mangel between 1986 and 1988 — a role that was originally meant to run for a short three-week stint.
Before she played the Ramsay Street villain, Gray landed roles in Prisoner and as Mrs Jessup in The Sullivans, once again playing the part of the nosy neighbour.
She left Neighbours partly because of abuse she received from fans who had trouble distinguishing Gray from her on-screen character.
Neighbours executive producer Jason Herbison said he was saddened by Gray's passing, but remembered her as a soap legend.
"Mrs Mangel was the ultimate busybody, remembered for her conservatism and her caustic wit," he said in a statement.
"She was a true soap legend and we thank her for all the wonderful memories."
Mark Little, Mrs Mangel's on-screen son, said Gray was a "legend many times over".
"I was privileged to know and work with her," he tweeted.
"We laugh a lot creating The Mangel."
YouTube: Mrs Mangel's last scene on Neighbours.
Alan Fletcher, better known as Ramsay Street's resident doctor Karl Kennedy, expressed his sadness on Twitter.
Born in Cleethorpes in Lincolnshire, Britain, Gray moved to Australia in 1953 to pursue acting.
Leaving behind three siblings and a family-run fish and chip shop, Gray landed roles in Power without Glory, Homicide, Division 4, All the Rivers Run and Anzacs.
As well as silver screen appearances in Picnic at Hanging rock and The Last Wave.
An image of Gray playing mathematics teacher Miss McGraw in Picnic at Hanging Rock appeared on an Australia Post stamp in 1995.
Neighbours Mrs Mangel actress Vivean Gray dies aged 92 - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)