"The Postman Always Rings Twice" Actress Lana Turner Dies in Century City 1995

Lana Turner (February 8, 1921 – June 29, 1995) was an American actress.

Discovered and signed to a film contract by MGM at the age of sixteen, Turner first attracted attention in They Won't Forget (1937). She played featured roles, often as the ingenue, in such films as Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938). During the early 1940s she established herself as a leading actress in such films as Johnny Eager (1941), Ziegfeld Girl (1941) and Somewhere I'll Find You (1942), and her reputation as a glamorous femme fatale was enhanced by her performance in the film noir The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946). Her popularity continued through the 1950s, in such films as The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and Peyton Place (1957), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress.

In 1958, her daughter, Cheryl Crane, stabbed Turner's lover Johnny Stompanato to death. A coroner's inquest brought considerable media attention to Turner and concluded that Crane had acted in self defense. Turner's next film, Imitation of Life (1959), proved to be one of the greatest successes of her career, but from the early 1960s, her roles were fewer. She gained recognition near the end of her career with a recurring guest role in the television series Falcon Crest during 1982 and 1983.

Turner made her final television appearance in 1991, and died from throat cancer in 1995.

Early life

Born Julia Jean Turner in Wallace, Idaho, she was the daughter of John Virgil Turner, a miner from Hohenwald, Tennessee, and Mildred Frances Cowan, a sixteen-year-old Arkansas native.

Until her film career took off, she was known to family and friends as "Judy." Hard times eventually forced the family to re-locate to San Francisco, where her parents soon separated.

On December 14, 1930, her father won some money at a traveling craps game, stuffed his winnings in his left sock, and headed for home. He was later found dead on the corner of Minnesota and Mariposa Streets, on the edge of Potrero Hill and the Mission District in San Francisco, his left shoe and sock missing.[1][2] The robbery and murder were never solved. Soon after, her mother developed health problems and was advised by her doctor to move to a drier climate. With her ten-year-old daughter, she moved to Los Angeles in 1931.[2]

Mildred and Lana were very poor, and Turner was sometimes separated from her mother, living with friends or acquaintances so that the family could save money. Her mother worked as a beautician to support them. After Turner was discovered, her mother became the overseer of Turner's career.[3]

Film career

Turner's discovery at a Hollywood drug store is a show-business legend. As a sixteen-year-old student at Hollywood High School Turner skipped a typing class and bought a Coke at the Top Hat Cafe located on the southeast corner of Sunset Boulevard and McCadden Place (not Schwab's Pharmacy), where she was spotted by William R. Wilkerson, publisher of The Hollywood Reporter. Wilkerson was attracted by her beauty and physique, and referred her to the actor/comedian/talent agent Zeppo Marx. Marx's agency immediately signed her on and introduced her to film director Mervyn LeRoy, who cast her in her first film, They Won't Forget (1937). She also appeared as an extra that year in A Star Is Born—a part of the crowd at a boxing match, and in the Andy Hardy movie Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938).[4]

Turner earned the nickname "The Sweater Girl" from her form-fitting attire in a scene in They Won't Forget. In late 1937, she signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and graduated high school in between takes. Her first starring role for MGM was scheduled to be an adaption of The Sea-Wolf, co-starring Clark Gable, but the project was eventually canned.[5]

Turner reached the height of her fame in the 1940s and 1950s. During World War II, Turner became a popular pin-up girl due to her popularity in such films such as Ziegfeld Girl (1941), Johnny Eager (1942), and four films with Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer's "king of the lot," Clark Gable. The Turner-Gable films' successes were only heightened by gossip-column rumors about a relationship between the two. Turner even had a B-17 Flying Fortress—the Tempest Turner—named after her.[6]

After the war, Turner's career continued successfully with the release, in The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), which co-starred John Garfield.[7]. The now-classic film noir marked a turning point in her career. Reviews of the film, and in particular, Turner's performance, were glowing. While not exactly giving up her pin-up credentials, Turner established herself as a skilled actress.

During the 1950s, Turner starred in a series of films that failed to succeed at the box office, a situation MGM attempted to remedy by casting her in musicals. The first, Mr. Imperium (1951), was a flop, while The Merry Widow (1952) was more successful. She gave a widely praised performance in Vincente Minnelli's film, The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), and later starred with John Wayne in the adventure film The Sea Chase (1955). She was then cast in the epic The Prodigal (1955), but the film and her performance in general were not well received. After the film Diane (1956), MGM opted not to renew her contract. This was a difficult time for Hollywood's major studios because a recent court decision forced them to divest themselves of their movie theaters. In addition, television had caught on in a big way; the public was staying home. Turner was just one of MGM's star roster to be let go.

Turner's career recovered briefly after she appeared in the hugely successful big-screen adaptation of Grace Metalious's best-selling novel, Peyton Place (1957), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. Another few box-office failures followed (Another Time, Another Place (1958), for example) when the 1958 scandal surrounding her daughter's killing of Stompanato threatened to derail her career completely.

In the trail of the related negative publicity, Turner accepted the lead role in Ross Hunter's remake of Imitation of Life (1959) under the direction of Douglas Sirk. Universal Studios capitalized on her new-found notoriety; the result was one of the biggest hits of the year, as well as the biggest hit of Turner's career.[citation needed] Critics and audiences couldn't help noticing that the plots of both Peyton Place and Imitation of Life had borrowed heavily from Turner's private life. Each film depicted the troubled, complicated relationship between a single mother and her teenage daughter.

She made her last film at MGM starring with Bob Hope in Bachelor in Paradise (1961). Other highlights of this era include two Hunter productions (for whom she did Imitation of Life), Portrait in Black (1960) and Madame X (1966), which proved to be her last major starring role.

Personal life

Lana Turner in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941).Turner was well known inside Hollywood circles for dating often, changing partners often, and for never shying away from the topic of how many lovers she had in her lifetime.

Turner was married eight times to seven different husbands:

Bandleader Artie Shaw (1940) Married only four months, Turner was 19 when she and Shaw eloped on their first date. She later referred to their stormy and verbally abusive relationship as "my college education,"

Actor-restaurateur Joseph Stephen Crane (1942–1943, 1943–1944) Turner and Crane's first marriage was annulled after she discovered that Crane's previous divorce had not yet been finalized. After a brief separation (during which Crane attempted suicide), they re-married to provide for their newborn daughter, Cheryl.

Millionaire socialite Henry J. Topping Jr. (1948–1952) Topping proposed to Turner at the 21 Club in Los Angeles by dropping a diamond ring into her martini. Although worth millions when they married, Topping suffered heavy financial losses due to poor investments and excessive gambling. Turner finally divorced Topping when she realized she could no longer afford to keep them in the lavish lifestyle to which they had grown accustomed.

Actor Lex Barker (1953–1957), whom she divorced. In a book written by Cheryl Crane, Crane claimed that he repeatedly molested and raped her, and that it was after she told her mother this that they divorced.

Rancher Fred May (1960–1962)

Robert P. Eaton (1965–1969);[8] who later went on to write The Body Brokers, a behind-the-scenes look at the Hollywood movie world, featuring a character named Marla Jordan, based on Turner.

Nightclub hypnotist Ronald Pellar, also known as Ronald Dante or Dr. Dante (1969–1972). The couple met in 1969 in a Los Angeles discotheque and married that same year. After about six months of marriage, Pellar disappeared a few days after Turner had written a $35,000 check to him to help him in an investment; he used the money for other purposes. In addition, she later accused him of stealing $100,000 worth of jewelry.[9]

She later famously said, "My goal was to have one husband and seven children, but it turned out to be the other way around."

The Stompanato killing

Turner met Stompanato during the spring of 1957, shortly after ending her marriage to Barker. At first, Turner was susceptible to Stompanato's good looks and prowess as a lover, but after she discovered his ties to the Los Angeles underworld (in particular, his association with gangster Mickey Cohen), she tried to break off the affair out of fear of bad publicity. Stompanato was not easily deterred, however, and over the course of the following year, they carried on a relationship filled with violent arguments, physical abuse and repeated reconciliations.

In the fall of 1957, Stompanato followed Turner to England where she was filming Another Time, Another Place (1958) costarring Sean Connery. Fearful that Turner was having an affair with Connery, Stompanato stormed onto the set brandishing a gun. Connery managed to land a single punch to Stompanato's jaw and took away his gun. Stompanato was soon deported by Scotland Yard for the incident.[10]

On the evening of April 4, 1958, Turner and Stompanato began a violent argument in Turner's house at 730 N. Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills. Fearing her mother's life was in danger, Turner's fourteen-year-old daughter, Crane, grabbed a kitchen knife and ran to Turner's defense.[11]



Many theories abound as to what happened afterward, but it appears Crane stabbed Stompanato, killing him. The case quickly became a media sensation. It was later deemed a justifiable homicide at a coroner's inquest, at which Turner provided dramatic testimony. Some observers have said her testimony that day was the acting performance of her life.[12]

Later life

In the 1970s and 1980s, Turner appeared in several television roles, most notably one season (1982–1983) on the series Falcon Crest as Jaqueline Perrault, but the majority of her final decade was spent out of the public eye.



She died at the age of 74 in 1995 of complications from throat cancer, which was diagnosed in 1992 and which she had been battling ever since, at her home in Century City, Los Angeles, California. She was, until her death, a very heavy smoker.



Turner was survived by Crane, her only child, and Crane's life partner Joyce "Josh" LeRoy, whom she said she accepted "as a second daughter." They inherited some of Turner's sizable estate, built through shrewd real estate holdings and investments. However, the majority of her estate was left to her maid, Carmen Lopez Cruz.

For her contribution to the motion-picture industry, Turner has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6241 Hollywood Boulevard.

In literature

Turner is the subject of the poem "Lana Turner has collapsed" by the poet Frank O'Hara.
She was the visual basis for the character Janice Porter in the comic Batman: Dark Victory.

Turner and Stompanato appear as minor characters in James Ellroy's novel "L.A. Confidential."

References

1.^ Basinger, Jeanine (1976). Lana Turner. Pyramid Publications. p. 19.
2.^ Wayne, Jane Ellen (2003). The Golden Girls of MGM: Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Lana Turner, Judy Garland, Ava Gardner, Grace Kelly and Others. Carroll & Graf Publishers. pp. 164–165. ISBN 0786713038.
3.^ Fischer, Lucy (1991). Three Way Mirror: Imitation of Life. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press. pp. 3–28.
4.^ http://www.andyhardyfilms.com/andysgirls.htm
5.^ The Charleston Gazette, December 17, 1937, p. 4
6.^ Lana Turner Biography - LanaTurner.org
7.^ http://www.cmgww.com/stars/turner/biography.html
8.^ TIME
9.^ Jones, J. Harry (August 5, 2006). The Amazing Dr. Dante Has Seen It All. The San Diego Union-Tribune.
10.^ In Lana Turner's Bedroom
11.^ http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Studio/2024/page19.html
12.^ "Lana Turner's Daughter Tells Her Story". Larry King Live. August 8, 2001.

Further reading

Crane, Cheryl; with Jahr, Cliff (1988). Detour: A Hollywood Story. Arbor House/William Morrow.
Lewis, Brad (2007). Hollywood's Celebrity Gangster. The Incredible Life and Times of Mickey Cohen Enigma Books, New York. ISBN 978-1-929631-65-0.
Bernier, Michelle (2010). "Did these stories really happen?" Createspace.

Actress & Sex Symbol Jayne Mansfield 1967 Hollywood Forever Cemetery Cenotaph

Jayne Mansfield (April 19, 1933 – June 29, 1967) was an American actress working both on Broadway and in Hollywood. One of the leading blonde sex symbols of the 1950s, Mansfield starred in several popular Hollywood films that emphasized her platinum-blonde hair, hourglass figure and cleavage-revealing costumes.

While Mansfield's film career was short-lived, she had several box office successes. She won the Theatre World Award, a Golden Globe and a Golden Laurel. As the demand for blonde bombshells declined in the 1960s, Mansfield was relegated to low-budget film melodramas and comedies, but remained a popular celebrity.

In her later career she continued to attract large crowds in foreign countries and in lucrative and successful nightclub tours. Mansfield had been a Playboy Playmate of the Month and appeared in the magazine several additional times. She died in an automobile accident at age 34.

Death

While in Biloxi, Mississippi, for an engagement at the Gus Stevens Supper Club, Mansfield stayed at the Cabana Courtyard Apartments, which were near the supper club. After a June 28, 1967 evening engagement, Mansfield, Brody, and their driver, Ronnie Harrison, along with the actress's children Miklós, Zoltán, and Mariska, set out in Stevens' 1966 Buick Electra 225 for New Orleans, where Mansfield was to appear in an early morning television interview. Prior to leaving Biloxi, the party made a stop at the home of Rupert and Edna O'Neal, a family that lived nearby. After a late dinner with the O'Neals, during which the last photographs of Ms. Mansfield were taken, the party set out for New Orleans. On June 29 at approximately 2:25 a.m., on U.S. Highway 90, the car crashed into the rear of a tractor-trailer that had slowed because of a truck spraying mosquito fogger. The automobile struck the rear of the semi tractor and went under it. Riding in the front seat, the adults were killed instantly. The children in the rear survived with minor injuries.

Rumors that Mansfield was decapitated are untrue, though she did suffer severe head trauma. This urban legend was spawned by the appearance in police photographs of a crashed automobile with its top virtually sheared off, and what resembles a blonde-haired head tangled in the car's smashed windshield. It is believed that this was either a wig that Mansfield was wearing or was her actual hair and scalp. The death certificate stated that the immediate cause of Mansfield's death was a "crushed skull with avulsion of cranium and brain." Following her death, the NHTSA began requiring an underride guard, a strong bar made of steel tubing, to be installed on all tractor-trailers. This bar is also known as a Mansfield bar, and on occasions as a DOT bar.

Mansfield's funeral was held on July 3, in Pen Argyl, Pennsylvania. The ceremony was officiated by a Methodist minister, though Mansfield, who long tried to convert to Catholicism, had become interested in Judaism at the end of her life through her relationship with Sam Brody. She is interred in Fairview Cemetery, southeast of Pen Argyl. Her gravestone reads "We Live to Love You More Each Day."

A memorial cenotaph, showing an incorrect birth year, was erected in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, Hollywood, California. The cenotaph was placed by The Jayne Mansfield Fan Club and has the incorrect birth year because Mansfield herself tended to provide incorrect information about her age.

Legacy

Shortly after Mansfield's funeral, Mickey Hargitay sued his former wife's estate for more than $275,000 to support the children, whom he and his third and last wife, Ellen Siano, would raise. Mansfield's youngest child, Tony, was raised by his father, Matt Cimber, whose divorce from the actress was pending when she was killed. In 1968, wrongful-death lawsuits were filed on behalf of Jayne Marie Mansfield and Matt Cimber, the former for $4.8 million and the latter for $2.7 million. The Pink Palace was sold and its subsequent owners have included Ringo Starr, Cass Elliot, and Engelbert Humperdinck. In 2002, Humperdinck sold it to developers, and the house was demolished in November of that year. Much of her estate is managed by CMG Worldwide, an intellectual property management company.

Murder Victim "Hogan's Heroes" Actor Bob Crane 1978 Westwood Village Cemetery

Robert Edward "Bob" Crane (July 13, 1928 – June 29, 1978) was an American disc jockey and actor, best known for his performance as Colonel Robert E. Hogan in the television sitcom Hogan's Heroes from 1965 to 1971, and for his unsolved death.

Crane was born in Waterbury, Connecticut. He dropped out of high school[1] in 1946 and became a drummer, performing with dance bands and a symphony orchestra. That same year he also enlisted in the Army Reserve, where he was assigned the job of a clerk and given an honorable discharge a few years later.[2] In 1949, he married high school sweetheart Anne Terzian; they eventually had two children, Deborah Ann and Karen Leslie. Anne and Bob were briefly separated and living in different towns in the mid-1950s — after a few months they were reconciled and Anne later gave birth to their son, Robert David Crane. Bob later divorced Anne and married Patricia Olsen, an actress whose stage name was Sigrid Valdis. They had one son, Robert Scott Crane, and adopted a daughter, Ana Marie.

Career

Early career

In 1950, Crane started his broadcasting career at WLEA in Hornell, New York. He soon moved to WBIS in Bristol, Connecticut, followed by WICC in Bridgeport, Connecticut. This was a 500-watt operation where he remained until 1956, when the CBS radio network plucked Crane out to help stop his huge popularity from affecting their own station's ratings. Crane moved his family to California to host the morning show at KNX radio in Hollywood. He filled the broadcast with sly wit, drumming, and guests such as Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra, and Bob Hope. It quickly became the number-one rated morning show in the LA area, with Crane known as "The King of the Los Angeles Airwaves."

Crane's acting ambitions led to his subbing for Johnny Carson on the daytime game show Who Do You Trust? and appearances on The Twilight Zone, Channing, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and General Electric Theater. When Carl Reiner appeared on his show, Crane persuaded him to book him for a guest shot on The Dick Van Dyke Show, where he was noticed by Donna Reed, who suggested him for the role of neighbor Dr. Dave Kelsey in her eponymous sitcom from 1963 through 1965.

Hogan's Heroes (1965-1971)

In 1965, Crane was offered the starring role in a television comedy pilot about a German P.O.W. camp. Hogan's Heroes became a hit and finished in the Top Ten in its first year on the air. The series lasted six seasons, and Crane was nominated for an Emmy Award twice, in 1966 and 1967. During its run, he met Patricia Olsen who played Hilda under the stage name Sigrid Valdis. He divorced his wife of twenty years and married Olsen on the set of the show in 1970. They had a son, Scotty (Robert Scott), and adopted a daughter named Ana Marie.

In addition to playing the drums on the theme song, Crane's ability can be seen in the sixth season episode, "Look at the Pretty Snowflakes," where he has an extended drum solo during the prisoners' performance of the jazz standard "Cherokee."

In 1968, during the run of Hogan's Heroes, Crane and series costars Werner Klemperer, Leon Askin, and John Banner appeared, with Elke Sommer, in a feature film called The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz. The setting was the divided city of Berlin inside East Germany. Paula Schultz was being tempted to defect to the West, with Crane encouraging her to do so. Klemperer and Banner were involved as East German officials trying to keep Paula in the East.

Career after Hogan's Heroes (1973-1978)

Following the cancellation of Hogan's Heroes in 1971, Crane was frustrated that he was offered few quality roles. He appeared in two Disney films, 1973's Superdad with the title role and Gus from 1976 in a cameo.

In 1973, Crane purchased the rights to Beginner's Luck, a play that he starred in and directed. The production toured for five years, predominantly at dinner theatres from Florida to California to Texas, Hawaii and Arizona in 1978.[3] During breaks, he guest starred in a number of TV shows, including Police Woman, Quincy, M.E., and The Love Boat. A second series of his own, 1975's The Bob Crane Show, was canceled by NBC after three months.

During the run of Hogan's Heroes, sitcom costar Richard Dawson introduced Crane (a photography enthusiast) to John Henry Carpenter, who was of the video department at Sony Electronics and could acquire early video cassette recorder/VCRs.

Crane's murder

On the night of June 28, 1978, Crane allegedly called Carpenter to tell him that their friendship was over. The following day, Crane was discovered bludgeoned to death with a weapon that was never found (but was believed to be a camera tripod) at the Winfield Place Apartments in Scottsdale, Arizona. In Robert Graysmith's book The Murder of Bob Crane, he notes that investigators found semen on Crane's dead body and assumes the murderer may have ejaculated on him after killing him[4]. Crane had been appearing in Scottsdale in his Beginner's Luck production at the Windmill Dinner Theatre, now known as Buzz, located at the southeast corner of Shea Blvd and Scottsdale Rd.

AE's Cold Case Files account

According to an episode of AE's Cold Case Files, police officers who arrived at the scene of the crime noted that Carpenter called the apartment several times and didn't seem surprised that the police were there. This raised suspicion, and the car Carpenter had rented the previous day was impounded. In it, several blood smears were found that matched Crane's blood type. At that time, D.N.A. testing didn't exist to confirm if it was Crane's or not. Due to a lack of sufficient evidence, Maricopa County Attorney Charles F. Hyder declined to file charges and the case went cold.

Murder case reopened

In 1992, 14 years after the murder, the case was reopened. An attempt to test the blood found in the car Carpenter rented failed to produce any result due to improper preservation of the evidence. The detective in charge instead hoped a picture of what appeared to be a piece of brain tissue found in the rental car[5] (which had been lost since the original investigation) would incriminate Carpenter. He was arrested and indicted. In 1994 Carpenter was acquitted due to a lack of convincing evidence. Both the murder and the motive remain officially unsolved. Carpenter maintained his innocence until his death on September 4, 1998.

In July 1978, Bob Crane was interred in Oakwood Memorial Park in Chatsworth, California. Subsequently, over 20 years later, Crane's family had the actor's remains exhumed and transported about 25 miles southeast, to another cemetery, Westwood Village Memorial Park, located in Westwood, California.

Biographical film Auto Focus (2002)

Crane's life and murder were the subject of the 2002 film Auto Focus, directed by Paul Schrader and starring Greg Kinnear as Crane. The film, based on Graysmith's book Auto Focus: The Murder of Bob Crane, portrays Crane as a happily married, church-going family man and popular L.A. disc jockey who suddenly becomes a Hollywood celebrity, and subsequently declines into sex addiction.

Filmography

Return to Peyton Place (Uncredited, 1961)
Man-Trap (Uncredited, 1961)
The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz (1968)
Patriotism (educational short, 1972, re-released by Rifftrax in 2008)
Superdad (1973)
Gus (1976)

Television

The Twilight Zone (1 episode, 1961)
General Electric Theater (2 episodes, 1953–1961)
The Dick Van Dyke Show (1 episode, 1962)
Your First Impression (1 episode, 1962)
The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (1 episode, 1963)
Channing (1 episode, 1963)
The Donna Reed Show (63 episodes, 1963–1965)
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (1 episode, 1967)
Arsenic and Old Lace (1969)
Hogan's Heroes (168 episodes, 1965–1971)
Night Gallery (1 episode, 1971)
Love, American Style (4 episodes, 1969–1971)
Here's Lucy (1 episode, 1972)
The Delphi Bureau (1972)
Tenafly (1 episode, 1974)
Police Woman (1 episode, 1974)
The Bob Crane Show (14 episodes, 1975)
Joe Forrester (1 episode, 1976)
Ellery Queen (1 episode, 1976)
Gibbsville (1 episode, 1976)
Quincy, M.E. (1 episode, 1977)
The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries (1 episode, 1977)
The Love Boat (1 episode, 1978)

Award nominations

Emmy Award

Nominated: Outstanding Continued Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Comedy Series, Hogan's Heroes (1966)
Nominated: Outstanding Continued Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Comedy Series, Hogan's Heroes (1967)

References

1.^ "Cast - Bob Crane". Hogans Heroes Fan Club.
2.^ www.crimelibrary.com
3.^ Noe, Denise: [1] TruTV Crime Library, The Bob Crane Case
4.^ (p. 81)
5.^ "How did Bob Crane die, anyway?" from The Straight Dope

Further Reading

The Murder of Bob Crane by Robert Graysmith, published by Crown Publishers, New York, NY, 1993
"The Bob Crane Story: Everything but a Hero," by A.O. Scott, New York Times, October 4, 2002

Bounty Hunter Domino Harvey's West Hollywood OVERDOSE 2005

"Everybody wants to go to heaven,
but nobody wants to die."

-- Domino Harvey

Domino Harvey (August 7, 1969 – June 27, 2005) was an English bounty hunter, notable within that field for being female and from a privileged background. Though there is speculation as to whether or not she really was a model, there are in fact photographs which show her involved in what would appear to be modeling-related work. Harvey's fame was increased posthumously by the 2005 release of the film Domino that was loosely based on her life, with Harvey portrayed by Keira Knightley.

Domino Harvey was born to stage and Oscar-nominated screen actor Laurence Harvey and model Paulene Stone. Stone took the name Domino from Domino Derval, Bond girl in Thunderball portrayed by Claudine Auger, a model she had known. Stone liked the name and decided that if she had another daughter, she would use it.

Harvey had an older half-sister named Sophie, who was Paulene Stone's daughter from her first marriage to Take 6 fashion chain founder Tony Norris. Harvey was her father's only child and goddaughter to Peter Evans, a journalist and author who had introduced her parents to each other. After Laurence Harvey's death in 1973, Evans would co-write the book One Tear is Enough with Paulene Stone. Published in 1975, it was Stone's account of her time with Laurence Harvey.

Harvey was in and out of drug rehabilitation for years. On May 4, 2005, she was arrested at her home on a warrant issued in Mississippi after a federal grand jury indictment charged her and a co-defendant with conspiring to possess and distribute methamphetamines. She was awaiting trial and under house arrest at the time of her death. She would have faced up to 10 years in jail if she had been convicted.



On June 27, 2005, Harvey was found dead in a bathtub in West Hollywood after she became unresponsive while talking to Peter Dice, a "sobriety guardian." Domino had hired Dice to help control her drug use. On September 3, the Los Angeles County coroner reported that a toxicological exam determined that Harvey died from a overdose of fentanyl, an extremely potent opiate painkiller. Her mother Paulene Stone suggested that Harvey may have been prescribed fentanyl for injuries she sustained in February 2005 when she fell taking her dog for a walk. Her funeral took place on July 1, 2005. Among the attendees were Tony Scott, Mickey Rourke, and Steve Jones.



A July 22, 2005 article by the Los Angeles Times quotes her uncle, Warwick Stone, as saying: "she was considering suing several publications for describing her as a lesbian and was also considering suing one of the rehab facilities." Ed Martinez also stated that she had spoken to him about wanting to create a documentary, all based completely on her true life story.

A film loosely based on her life called Domino was released in October 2005. There have been tabloid reports that the ending was changed following her death, and also that she had been unhappy with her portrayal in the film. The film studio has countered that she had been involved with the project with Tony Scott for nearly 12 years. Promotional featurettes for the movie include Harvey on set with the cast and crew; she contributed to the songs on the soundtrack, and also attended the movie's wrap party in December 2004. Harvey herself appears at the very end of the cast credits of the film. She did not see the finished film before her death.

"Some Like It Hot" Actor Jack Lemmon 2001 Westwood Village Cemetery

John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925 – June 27, 2001) was an American actor. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts, Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger, The Out-of-Towners, The China Syndrome, Missing, Glengarry Glen Ross, Grumpy Old Men and Grumpier Old Men.

Early life

Lemmon was born in an elevator at Newton-Wellesley Hospital in Newton, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. He was the son of Mildred Burgess LaRue (née Noel) and John Uhler Lemmon, Jr., who was the president of a doughnut company.[1][2] Lemmon attended John Ward Elementary School in Newton and The Rivers School in Weston, Massachusetts. He later revealed that he knew he wanted to be an actor from the age of eight. Lemmon attended Phillips Academy (Class of 1943) and Harvard University (Class of 1947) where he lived in Adams House and was an active member of several Drama Clubs - becoming president of the Hasty Pudding Club - as well as a member of the Delphic Club for Gentleman, a final club at Harvard. After Harvard, Lemmon joined the Navy, receiving V-12 training and serving as an ensign. On being discharged, he took up acting professionally, working on radio, television and Broadway. He studied acting under Uta Hagen. He also became enthused with the piano and learned to play it on his own. He could also play the harmonica and the bass fiddle.

Career

Lemmon's film debut was a bit part as a plasterer/painter in the 1949 film The Lady Takes a Sailor but he was not noticed until his official debut opposite Judy Holliday in the 1954 comedy It Should Happen to You. Lemmon worked with many legendary leading ladies, among them Marilyn Monroe, Natalie Wood, Betty Grable, Janet Leigh, Shirley MacLaine, Romy Schneider, Doris Day, Kim Novak, Judy Holliday, Rita Hayworth, June Allyson, Virna Lisi, Ann Margret, Sophia Loren and many, many more. He was also close friends with Tony Curtis, Ernie Kovacs, Walter Matthau and Kevin Spacey. He made two films with Curtis and eleven with Matthau.

He became a favorite actor of director Billy Wilder, starring in his films Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Irma la Douce, The Fortune Cookie, Avanti!, The Front Page and Buddy Buddy. Wilder felt Lemmon had a natural tendency toward overacting that had to be tempered; the Wilder biography Nobody's Perfect quotes the director as saying, "Lemmon, I would describe him as a ham, a fine ham, and with ham you have to trim a little fat." The biography also quotes Jack Lemmon as saying, "I am particularly susceptible to the parts I play... If my character was having a nervous breakdown, I started to have one."

He also had a longtime working relationship with director Blake Edwards, starring in Days of Wine and Roses (1962), The Great Race (1965) and That's Life! (1986).

Lemmon recorded an album in 1958 while filming Some Like It Hot with Marilyn Monroe. Twelve jazz tracks were created for Lemmon and another twelve were added. Lemmon played the piano and recorded his own versions of Monroe's trademark songs, I Wanna Be Loved By You and I'm Through With Love, for the album which was released in 1959 as A Twist of Lemmon/Some Like It Hot.

Lemmon was awarded the Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1956 for Mister Roberts (1955) and the Best Actor Oscar for Save the Tiger (1973), becoming the first actor to achieve this double. He was also nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for his role in the controversial film Missing in 1982 and for his role in Some Like it Hot. In 1988, the American Film Institute gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award.

Days of Wine and Roses (1962) was one of his favorite roles. He portrayed Joe Clay, a young, fun-loving alcoholic businessman. In that film, Lemmon delivered the line, "My name is Joe Clay ... I'm an alcoholic." Three and a half decades later, he admitted on the television program, Inside the Actors Studio, that he was not acting when he delivered that line, that he really was a recovering alcoholic at the end of his life.

Lemmon's production company JML produced Cool Hand Luke in 1967. Paul Newman was grateful to Lemmon for his support and offered him the role later made famous by Robert Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid but Lemmon turned it down. He did not like riding horses and he also felt he'd already played too many aspects of the Sundance Kid's character before.[3]

Lemmon often appeared in films partnered with Walter Matthau. Among their pairings was 1968's The Odd Couple, as Felix Unger (Lemmon) and Oscar Madison (Matthau). They also starred together in The Fortune Cookie (for which Matthau won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor), The Front Page and Buddy Buddy. In 1971, Lemmon directed Matthau in the comedy Kotch. It was the only movie that Lemmon ever directed and Matthau was nominated for the Best Actor Oscar for his performance.

Additionally, Lemmon and Matthau had small parts in Oliver Stone's 1991 film, JFK (the only film in which both appeared without sharing screen time). In 1993, the duo teamed up again to star in Grumpy Old Men. The film was a surprise hit, earning the two actors a new generation of young fans. During the rest of the decade, they would go on to star together in Out to Sea, Grumpier Old Men and the widely panned The Odd Couple II.

A rare death scene for Lemmon came in The China Syndrome, for which he was awarded Best Actor at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1982, he won another Cannes award for his performance in Missing (which received the Palme d'Or). His characters died in very few films other than that one, 1989's Dad and 1999's Tuesdays With Morrie.

At the 1998 Golden Globe Awards, he was nominated for "Best Actor in a Made for TV Movie" for his role in Twelve Angry Men losing to Ving Rhames. After accepting the award, Rhames asked Lemmon to come on stage and, in a move that stunned the audience, gave his award to him. (The Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which presents the Golden Globes, decided to have a second award made and sent to Rhames.)

He received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1988.

Personal life

Kevin Spacey recalled that Lemmon is remembered as always making time for other people. When already regarded as a legend, he met the teenage Spacey backstage after a theater performance and spoke to him about pursuing an acting career.[4] Spacey would later work with Lemmon in Dad (1989), the critically acclaimed film Glengarry Glen Ross (1992) and on stage in a revival of Long Day's Journey Into Night. Lemmon's performance also inspired Gil Gunderson, a character on The Simpsons that is modeled on Lemmon's.

Lemmon was married twice. His son Chris Lemmon (b. 1954), was his first child by his first wife, actress Cynthia Stone (b. February 26, 1926, Peoria, Illinois). His second wife was the actress Felicia Farr, with whom he had a daughter, Courtney, born in 1966.

Jack Lemmon died of colon cancer and metastatic cancer of the bladder[5] on June 27, 2001. He had been fighting the disease, very privately, for two years before his death.

Chris Lemmon made several TV shows and movies, including scenes together with his father in That's Life! and portraying him at a younger age in Dad. Chris wrote a book named A Twist of Lemmon: A Tribute to My Father.



He is interred at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Westwood, California where he is buried near his friend and co-star, Walter Matthau. In typical Jack Lemmon wit, his gravestone simply reads 'Jack Lemmon — in.' After Matthau's death in 2000, Lemmon appeared with friends and relatives of the actor on a Larry King Live show in tribute. A year later, many of the same people appeared on the show again to pay tribute to Lemmon.

Personal quotes

Death ends a life, not a relationship. (Tuesdays with Morrie)
I won't quit until I get run over by a truck, a producer or a critic.
Failure seldom stops you. What stops you is the fear of failure.
If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.
It's hard enough to write a good drama, it's much harder to write a good comedy, and it's hardest of all to write a drama with comedy. Which is what life is.
Nobody deserves this much money - certainly not an actor.
Stay humble. Always answer your phone - no matter who else is in the car.
[on Marilyn Monroe] Difficult? Yes. But she was a wonderful comedienne and she had a charisma like no one before or since.
[on Judy Holliday] She was intelligent and not at all like the dumb blonds she so often depicted. She didn't give a damn where the camera was placed, how she was made to look, or about being a star. She just played the scene—acted with, not at. She was also one of the nicest people I ever met.
[on Billy Wilder] I've had directors who were marvelous at breaking scenes down and handling people. But when you would string all the pearls together, they wouldn't make a beautiful necklace. But Billy is the kind of picture-maker who can make a beautiful string of pearls. He makes the kind of movies that are classics and last forever.
[on Walter Matthau] Walter is a helluva actor. The best I've ever worked with.

Bibliography

Lemmon, Chris (2006). A Twist of Lemmon: A Tribute to My Father. Chapel Hill, N.C.: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill. ISBN 9781565124806.

References

1.^ Lemmon stated (on Inside the Actors Studio) that he had an Ulster-Scots heritage.1
2.^ Jack Lemmon Biography (1925-2001)
3.^ A slice of Lemmon for extra character, Bob Flynn, Panorama, p. 7, Canberra Times, August 15, 1998
4.^ YouTube - Charlie Rose - Kevin Spacey / Jamaica Kincaid
5.^ Find A Grave - Millions of Cemetery Records

Entertainer Michael Jackson 2009 Forest Lawn Glendale

Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer-songwriter, dancer, actor, choreographer, businessman, philanthropist, activist, record producer, and entertainer. Referred to as the King of Pop, he is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time and one of the most influential. His contributions to music, dance and fashion, and a much-publicized personal life made him a global figure in popular culture for over four decades.

Jackson made his debut in 1964 as lead singer and youngest member of The Jackson 5 alongside his brothers. His solo career started in 1971 and he produced ten studio albums. The 1982 album Thriller remains the best-selling album of all time, having sold more than 110 million copies. Four of his other albums rank among the world's best-sellers. Jackson is credited with having elevated the music video from a mere promotional tool into an art form. His videos for Billie Jean, Beat It and Thriller made him the first African American artist to amass a strong crossover following on MTV. He popularized a number of complicated dance techniques, such as the robot and the moonwalk. His distinctive musical style, vocal style, and choreography continue to transcend generational, racial and cultural boundaries.

Jackson has been inducted into twelve music halls of fame, more than any other act. He is one of the few artists to have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice. Other achievements include several Guinness World Records (including the Most Successful Entertainer of All Time); 15 Grammy Awards (including the Living Legend Award and the Lifetime Achievement Award); 26 American Music Awards (more than any other artist, and including recognition as Artist of the Century); 17 number-one singles in the US (including four as a member of The Jackson 5); and estimated global sales of over 780 million records, making him one of the best-selling recording artists ever. Jackson's personal life and relationships generated controversy for years. His changing appearance was noticed from the late 1970s onwards, as changes to his nose and skin color caused much media speculation. In 1993 he was accused of child sexual abuse, though no formal charges were brought. In 2005 he was tried and acquitted of similar allegations.

Jackson died on June 25, 2009 from a drug overdose, amidst preparations for his This Is It concert series. Before his death, Jackson had reportedly been administered drugs such as propofol and lorazepam. The Los Angeles County Coroner reported its conclusion that his death was a homicide. Prosecutors formally charged his personal physician with involuntary manslaughter. Jackson's death triggered a global outpouring of grief. It was estimated that as many as a billion people around the world may have watched his public memorial service on live broadcast television. On March 16, 2010, Sony Music Entertainment signed a record-breaking $250 million deal with Jackson's estate to retain distribution rights to his recordings until 2017 and release seven posthumous albums over the next decade.

On June 25, 2009, Jackson collapsed at his rented mansion at 100 North Carolwood Drive in the Holmby Hills district of Los Angeles. Attempts at resuscitating him by Conrad Murray, his personal physician, were unsuccessful. Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics received a 911 call at 12:22 (PDT) (19:22 UTC), arriving three minutes later at Jackson's location. He was reportedly not breathing and CPR was performed. Resuscitation efforts continued en route to the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, and for an hour after arriving there at 13:13 (20:13 UTC). Jackson's death triggered a global outpour of grief. He was pronounced dead at 14:26 local time (21:26 UTC).

Jackson's fans paid tribute to him at his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, shortly after the announcement of his death.

The news spread quickly online, causing websites to slow down and crash from user overload. Both TMZ and the Los Angeles Times suffered outages. Google initially believed that the input from millions of people searching for "Michael Jackson" meant that the search engine was under attack. Twitter reported a crash, as did Wikipedia at 3:15 p.m. PDT (6:15 p.m. EST). The Wikimedia Foundation reported nearly a million visitors to Jackson's biography within one hour, probably the most visitors in a one-hour period to any article in Wikipedia's history. AOL Instant Messenger collapsed for 40 minutes. AOL called it a "seminal moment in Internet history," adding, "We've never seen anything like it in terms of scope or depth."

Around 15% of Twitter posts—or 5,000 tweets per minute—reportedly mentioned Jackson after the news broke, compared to the 5% recalled as having mentioned the Iranian elections or the flu pandemic that had made headlines earlier in the year. Overall, web traffic ranged from 11% to at least 20% higher than normal. MTV and Black Entertainment Television (BET) aired marathons of Jackson's music videos. Jackson specials aired on multiple television stations around the world. The British soap opera EastEnders added a last-minute scene, in which one character tells another about the news, to the June 26 episode. Jackson was the topic of every front-page headline in the daily British tabloid The Sun for about two weeks following his death. During the same period, the three major U.S. networks' evening newscasts—ABC's World News, CBS Evening News, and NBC Nightly News—devoted 34 percent of their broadcast time to him. Magazines including TIME published commemorative editions. A scene that had featured Jackson's sister La Toya was cut from the film Brüno out of respect toward Jackson's family.

Jackson's memorial was held on July 7, 2009, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, preceded by a private family service at Forest Lawn Memorial Park's Hall of Liberty. Jackson's casket was present during the memorial but no information was released about the final disposition of the body. While some unofficial reports claimed a worldwide audience as high as one billion people the U.S. audience was estimated by Nielsen to be 31.1 million, an amount comparable to the estimated 35.1 million that watched the 2004 burial of former president Ronald Reagan, and the estimated 33.1 million Americans who watched the 1997 funeral for Princess Diana.

Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie, Mariah Carey, John Mayer, Jennifer Hudson, Usher, Jermaine Jackson, and Shaheen Jafargholi performed at the event. Berry Gordy and Smokey Robinson gave eulogies, while Queen Latifah read, "We had him," a poem written for the occasion by Maya Angelou. The Reverend Al Sharpton received a standing ovation with cheers when he told Jackson's children, "Wasn't nothing strange about your Daddy. It was strange what your Daddy had to deal with. But he dealt with it anyway." Jackson's 11-year-old daughter, Paris Katherine, cried as she told the crowd, "Ever since I was born, Daddy has been the best father you could ever imagine ... I just wanted to say I love him ... so much."

On August 24 several news outlets quoted anonymous sources as stating that the Los Angeles coroner had decided to treat Jackson's death as a homicide; this was later confirmed by the coroner on August 28. At the time of death, Jackson had been administered propofol, lorazepam and midazolam. Law enforcement officials are currently conducting a manslaughter investigation of his personal physician, Conrad Murray.

Jackson was buried on September 3, 2009, at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.

On February 8, 2010, Jackson's personal physician Conrad Murray was charged with involuntary manslaughter by prosecutors in Los Angeles. On November 7, 2011, Murray was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter. On November 29, Murray was sentenced to the maximum penalty of four years of incarceration. However, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff officials, he is expected to serve a little less than two years in the Los Angeles County Jail due to California prison overcrowding.[