Gone With or Without fanfare

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movieman1957
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

Post by movieman1957 »

In either a moment of wonderful coincidence or nice planning I stumbled on his reading a scripture at the beginning of religious broadcast. Someone, I suspect, was on their game and dug this one out to pay homage to him on his passing.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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Sweet, Chris!
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

Post by mrsl »

.
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Such a sad way to start a new month and week. I'm getting really tired of saying goodbye to old entertainment friends, especially two such as these, both fine actors, both charming men, one extremely good looking and the other although average looking, had a certain something about him that made you think; "This is a guy I would like to know".

Rest in Peace gentlemen.
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Anne


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* * * * * * * * What is past is prologue. * * * * * * * *

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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

Post by Nick »

Jackie Lynn Taylor (1925-2014) has died.
Jackie Lynn Taylor Fries, TV host and 'Our Gang' member, dies at 88

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Jackie Lynn Taylor Fries, a pioneering TV personality and show business veteran who was one of the Little Rascals in the beloved "Our Gang" comedy films, died Monday with Alzheimer's disease, her husband said. She was 88.

Known mostly as Jackie Lynn Taylor, Fries spent more than 70 years in the public eye as a Hollywood actor, TV host, news anchor, motivational speaker and ordained minister. During a series of dynamic, high-profile careers, she attracted friends and fans with a vivacious charm and a desire to entertain, inform and inspire.

The Citrus Heights, Calif., resident was best known to audiences around the world for her short-lived but standout role as one of the few girls in the Little Rascals. The group of youngsters was created by producer Hal Roach to appear in the "Our Gang" movies, which began in the 1920s as silent films and continued into the 1940s.

The enduring series is acclaimed by critics for its use of child performers who behaved naturally on screen and often were poor in real life and disregarded by rich, snobbish kids and overbearing adults. Also, in an era of racial and gender prejudice, the films accorded equal status among blacks and whites and boys and girls.

"We didn't have scripts," Fries told The Sacramento Bee in 2000. "We played together. We were kids who worked together, who played together and who went to school together. We weren't great actors, but we got along."

The tall 9-year-old was a fresh face as the female lead in five "Our Gang" movies released in 1934. She debuted as Jane, the "girlfriend" of gang leader Wally Albright, in "Hi-Neighbor," one of the most well-liked films in the series.

Like all the cast, she was replaced as she grew too "old" to be a Little Rascal. But she was proud that the episode - which was shown in clips at the Academy Awards - remained fresh and charming.

"I think that being a member of the Rascals has kept me young," she told The Bee in 2001.

Fries spent 15 more active years in Hollywood, including bit parts in 75 movies and performances in theater plays. By 1950, she was married to actor and drama teacher Ben Bard when she started a career as a host in the fledgling TV industry.

She interviewed big names in politics and entertainment for KTTV in Los Angeles as one of the first female TV co-hosts in Southern California. She went on to host the top TV show in San Diego and worked at stations in Bakersfield, Tulare and Stockton.

The San Francisco Examiner named her "TV woman of the year" in 1955. Three years later, NBC tried to hire her after a one-week appearance as a guest host on "Today," but the San Diego station where she was working refused to let her out of her contract.

She was divorced when she went to work in 1965 as a TV anchor and reporter in Salinas and later at KXTV Channel 10 in Sacramento. She married Sacramento native Jack Fries, a former CBS journalist and TV anchor and producer, in 1966. She left KXTV and the news business to live with her husband in Los Angeles, where he worked for a TV news show.

When the couple was hired by a savings and loan to give motivational speeches, audiences frequently asked Mrs. Fries about "Our Gang." She wrote a book about the Little Rascals called "The Turned-On Hollywood 7" and began hosting the "Little Rascals Family Theater" TV show in San Diego and Los Angeles with her husband.

By the late 1970s, the couple moved to Missouri and went from "giving bad news on TV to spreading the good news" as ministers in the nondenominational Unity Church, her husband said. They led congregations in Missouri, Southern California and Nevada before retiring and returning in 1993 to Sacramento, where Fries counseled girls in Juvenile Hall and ministered with her husband as chaplains in retirement communities.

"She was magnetic when she got in front of an audience," her husband said. "She liked to contribute and talk to people and help them feel good. She was a giver."

Born Jacqueline Devon Taylor on June 29, 1925, in Compton, Calif., Fries used variations of her name professionally and was widely known in ministry as Jackie Hope Fries. She won a child beauty pageant in Long Beach and got her start in show business when her mother, a nurse, took her to a Hollywood casting call.

She was inducted into the National Academy of TV Arts and Sciences Silver Circle and was honored by the San Diego Press Club for her pioneering work in broadcasting. After returning to Sacramento, she taught vocal classes with her husband at Sierra College in Rocklin.

Warm and gracious with people, she enjoyed talking about her early days in Hollywood to connect with seniors. In private, however, she told The Bee that she did not spend too much time in the past.

"It's fine to look back," she said, "but you have to move forward and live in the present."

Fries is survived by her husband.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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Nancy Malone who starred her career as an actress, co-founder of Women in Film and then moved into the executive suite at 20th Century Fox has died. She was 78.

From the Hollywood Reporter:

Nancy Malone, an actress, TV director and Emmy-winning producer who co-founded Women in Film and was a groundbreaking female executive at 20th Century Fox in the 1970s, has died. She was 79.

Malone died Thursday at City of Hope hospital in Duarte, Calif., of pneumonia that arose from complications attributed to a recent battle with leukemia, publicist Harlan Boll announced.

Malone played Libby Kingston, the girlfriend of young detective Adam Flint (Paul Burke), in 51 episodes of Naked City, the gritty docudrama that aired on ABC from 1958-63. She collected an Emmy Award nomination in 1963 for her work on the show.

The New York native won her Emmy (shared with Linda Hope and Don Mischer) in 1993 for producing the special Bob Hope: The First 90 Years. She also earned two other noms for directing for the series The Trials of Rosie O’Neill on CBS and Sisters on NBC.

In 1975, Malone produced her first telefilm, NBC’s Winner Take All, starring Shirley Jones, then joined Fox as director of TV development. Soon, she was promoted to vp television, putting her at an unprecedented level at a major studio.

Around this time, Malone co-founded Women in Film, the nonprofit organization dedicated to helping women advance in the entertainment, communication and media industries. In 1977, she was awarded one of the first Crystal Awards by WIF.

Malone was born March 19, 1935, on Long Island. She began her career at age 7 as a model and appeared in ads for Kellogg’s cereal, Ford cars and Macy’s. At 10, Malone was chosen for the cover of Life magazine's 10th anniversary issue, “The Typical American Girl.”

She appeared in one of TV’s first soap operas, CBS’ The First Hundred Years, and at 15 made her Broadway debut as the title character in Time Out for Ginger, also starring Melvyn Douglas.

When she returned to New York after a year touring with the production, Charles Laughton chose her to play Jenny Hill on Broadway in George Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara.

In the 1965-66 ABC drama The Long, Hot Summer, she starred as Clara Varner, the character played by Joanne Woodward in the movie on which the series was based.

Malone also appeared on such TV shows as Bonanza, The Fugitive, The Partridge Family, Big Valley, The Rockford Files, Outer Limits, Dr. Kildare, The Andy Griffith Show, Hawaii Five-0, The Twilight Zone and Lou Grant and worked opposite Burt Reynolds in the 1973 film The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing.

In 1975, Malone established Lilac Productions, which produced such telefilms as Sherlock Holmes in New York (1976), with Roger Moore, Patrick Macnee and John Huston; Like Mom, Like Me (1978) starring Linda Lavin; and The Violation of Sarah McDavid (1981), with Patty Duke.

In the 1980s, Malone completed the American Film Institute’s Directing Workshop for Women and then helmed the 1985 PBS telefilm There Were Times, Dear, starring Jones and Len Cariou.

The first film about Alzheimer’s disease, it was used as a fundraiser by Alzheimer’s chapters around the country and raised nearly $3 million to combat the disease.

In 1985, Malone directed an episode of Dynasty, after which she became a staff director at Aaron Spelling Productions and helmed installments of Hotel, Melrose Place and Beverly Hills, 90210.

For more: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/n ... tor-702851
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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Image
Above: Nancy Malone in the days when she appeared in shows such as Naked City, The Fugitive, Run For Your Life and more.

Nancy Malone discussed her remarkable career in a lively interview at The American Archive of American Television, touching on everything from Joan Crawford to John Huston to Rod Serling and more about her evolution behind-the-camera. Please click on the image below to see more about this interesting individual:

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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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So sorry to hear of her passing. Rest in Peace, Ms. Malone.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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Famed cinematographer Gordon Willis had died.

From the Hollywood Reporter:

Gordon Willis, the acclaimed cinematographer behind the Godfather trilogy and such Woody Allen films as Annie Hall, Manhattan, Broadway Danny Rose and Zelig, has died. He was 82.

Richard Crudo, the president of the American Society of Cinematographers, confirmed the news Sunday night. No other details were immediately available.

Willis' credits also include Klute (1971), The Paper Chase (1973), The Parallax View (1974), The Drowning Pool (1975), All the President's Men (1976), Comes a Horseman (1978), Allen's Interiors (1978), The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) and Stardust Memories (1980)

Willis received Oscar nominations for Zelig and The Godfather: Part III and earned the ASC's Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995. In 2010, he was awarded an Honorary Oscar "for unsurpassed mastery of light, shadow, color and motion."

He was given the nickname “The Prince of Darkness” by fellow cinematographer Conrad Hall for his daring use of using as little light as possible.
Willis was on the leading edge of a new wave of cinematographers in the 1970s who were changing film in radical ways. In The Godfather, he masked Marlon Brando's eyes to conceal his thoughts from the audience.

"I still can't believe the reactions," he said in an interview with the ASC before he received their highest honor. "People said, 'You can't see his eyes (Brando's).' Well, you didn't see his eyes in 10 percent of the movie, and there was a reason why. I remember asking, 'Why do you have to see his eyes in that scene? Based on what?' Do you know what the answer was? 'That's the way it was done in Hollywood.' That's not a good enough reason. There were times when we didn't want the audience to see what was going on in there (Brando's eyes), and then suddenly (snaps his fingers), you let them see into his soul for a while."

Later in his career, Willis worked on The Money Pit (1986), The Pick-Up Artist (1987), Bright Lights, Big City (1988), Presumed Innocent (1990), Malice (1993) and The Devil's Own (1997).

"No one showed more with less," screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie said on Twitter.

Willis' father was a make-up man for Warner Bros. in Brooklyn during the 1930s. He wanted to be an actor but soon became interested in stage lighting and set design, and he began shooting still pictures for a stock company.

Willis was assigned to a U.S. Air Force motion picture unit for four years during the Korean War, when he did documentaries and training films. In 1956, he returned to New York, where he worked as a freelance assistant cameraman in television.

For more: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/g ... lis-705524
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"Film is history. With every foot of film lost, we lose a link to our culture, to the world around us, to each other and to ourselves."

"For me, John Wayne has only become more impressive over time." Marty Scorsese

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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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An amazing talent. I don't even know much about the art. But I know what looks good. Gordon Willis knew it better than just about anybody.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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"An amazing talent" indeed. Never saw anyone make NYC look more ravishingly beautiful in black and white than Gordon Willis. Like the man says, "he romanticized it all out of proportion" but oh, that dreamlike Manhattan had such power (complemented aptly by Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" here):

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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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"he romanticized it all out of proportion"

He did. That was his job.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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For his work on The Godfather series (my favorite films of all time) with his brilliant and effective use of brown tones, I will always be grateful.

RIP Mr. Willis.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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He enriched so many films, and made them much more powerful and evocative of the times they depicted. RIP Mr. Willis.
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Re: Gone With or Without fanfare

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I passed Cafe Zoetrope this morning. No black bunting.
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