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Dominique Lavanant
Biography
Dominique Lavanant (born 24 May 1944) is a French film and theatrical actress. She is known for her comedy skills especially with posh and distinguished characters like Rosalind Russell's; characters often defined by the adjective BCBG, bon chic bon genre, and which refers to a particular stereotype of the French upper middle class – to be conservative in both outlook and dress.
Lavanant became known in the mid-1970s while filming Les bronzés with the acting troupe Le Splendid – (Gérard Jugnot, Josiane Balasko, Michel Blanc, Thierry Lhermitte, Christian Clavier, Marie-Anne Chazel).
She starred in the long-lasting French TV series Sœur Thérèse.com (2002–2011) playing a former policer who became a nun but is still a committed detective.
Source: Article "Dominique Lavanant" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA.
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Mike Kuchar
Biography
Mike Kuchar, cinematographer, painter and writer and brother of George Kuchar, was born in New York City. He began making 8mm movies in the 1950's, switching over to 16mm film production in 1960, and continues now, producing short motion pictures in the video and digital formats. Mike and George Kuchar were the co-recipients of the "Vanguard Director Award" at the 11th CineVegas Film Festival, 2009, and the 2009 "Frameline Award" at the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival.
"Film purists," says Mike, "tend to snub the digital medium — but as far as I'm concerned, if it allows the image to move and make noise, I'll gladly use it... and the format fits perfectly into my budgets too!"
Mike Kuchar is a 2017 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow for his work in film and video.
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Maureen Forrester
Biography
Maureen Kathleen Stewart Forrester (July 25, 1930 – June 16, 2010) was a Canadian operatic contralto.
Maureen Forrester was born and grew up in Montreal, Quebec, one of four children of Thomas Forrester, a Scottish cabinetmaker, and his Irish-born wife, the former May Arnold. She sang in church and radio choirs. At age 13, she dropped out of school to help support the family, working as a secretary at Bell Telephone.
When her brother came home from the war he persuaded her to take singing lessons. She paid for voice lessons with Sally Martin, Frank Rowe, and baritone Bernard Diamant. In the spring of 1951, Forrester appeared on the CBC radio talent competition Opportunity Knocks, singing "Ombra mai fu", and describing herself to the host as a "starving musician" and part-time switchboard operator. She was ultimately named first runner-up, and later competed on the similar shows Singing Stars of Tomorrow, and Nos Futures Étoiles.
She gave her debut recital at the local YWCA in 1953. She made her concert debut in Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra under Otto Klemperer.
She toured extensively in Canada and Europe with Jeunesses Musicales. She made her New York City debut in Town Hall in 1956. Bruno Walter invited her to sing for him; he was looking for the right contralto for a performance and recording of the Mahler Symphony No. 2 "Resurrection". This was the start of a warm relationship with great rapport. Walter had been a protégé of Mahler, and he trained Forrester in interpretation of his works. She performed at Walter's farewell performances with the New York Philharmonic in 1957.
In 1957, she married the Toronto violinist and conductor Eugene Kash. The couple had five children, including actors Linda Kash and Daniel Kash. Forrester converted to Judaism.
She performed regularly in concert and opera. At the New York City Opera, she sang Cornelia in Handel's Giulio Cesare (1966), opposite Norman Treigle and Beverly Sills, which was recorded by RCA in 1967. She sang at the Metropolitan Opera in New York in 1975 in Das Rheingold (Erda), Siegfried, and Un ballo in maschera. Forrester also provided the voice of the Bianca Castafiore character in the television series The Adventures of Tintin. She was a strong champion of Canadian composers, regularly scheduling their works in her programs, especially when she toured abroad. A notable example is composer Donald Steven, whose work "Pages of Solitary Delights" (winner of the 1987 Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year) was written for Ms. Forrester. From 1983-88 she served as Chair of the Canada Council.
In 1986, she co-authored her autobiography, Out of Character (ISBN 0-7710-3228-5), with journalist Marci McDonald.
Maureen Forrester died on June 16, 2010, aged 79, in Toronto, after a long battle with dementia. She was predeceased by Eugene Kash, her former husband, whom she had divorced in 1974, and who died in 2004. She was survived by her five children.
Source: Article "Maureen Forrester" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Ned Sparks
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ned Sparks (born Edward Arthur Sparkman, November 19, 1883 – April 3, 1957) was a Canadian-born character actor of the American stage and screen. Sparks was known for his deadpan expression and deep, gravelly voice.
Born in Guelph, Ontario, Sparks left home at age 16 and attempted to work as a gold prospector on the Klondike Gold Rush. After running out of money, he won a spot as a singer on a traveling musical company's tour. At age 19, he returned to Canada and briefly attended a Toronto seminary. After leaving the seminary, he worked for the railroad and worked in theater in Toronto. In 1907, he left Toronto for New York City to try his hand in the Broadway theatre, where he appeared in his first show in 1912.
While working on Broadway, Sparks developed his trademark deadpan expression while portraying the role of a desk clerk in the play Little Miss Brown. His success on the stage soon caught the attention of MGM's Louis B. Mayer who signed Sparks to a six picture deal. Sparks began appearing in numerous silent films before finally making his "talkie" debut in the 1928 film The Big Noise.
In the 1930s, Sparks became known for portraying dour-faced, sarcastic, cigar-chomping characters. He became so associated with the type that, in 1936, The New York Times reported that Sparks had his face insured for USD$100,000 with Lloyd's of London. The market agreed to pay the sum to any photographer who could capture Sparks smiling (Sparks later admitted that the story was a publicity stunt and he was only insured for $10,000). Sparks was also caricatured in cartoons including the Jack-in-the-Box character in the Disney short Broken Toys (1935), and the jester in Mother Goose Goes Hollywood (1938), a hermit crab in both Tex Avery's Fresh Fish (1939) and Bob Clampett's Goofy Groceries (1941), a chicken in Bob Clampett's Slap Happy Pappy (1940), Friz Freleng's Warner Bros. cartoon Malibu Beach Party (1940), and Tex Avery's Hollywood Steps Out (1940). Sparks also voiced the cartoon characters Heckle and Jeckle from 1947 to 1951.
Sparks appeared in ten stage productions on Broadway and over 80 films. He retired from films in 1947, saying that everyone should retire at 65
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Herbert Bunston
Biography
Herbert Bunston (15 April 1874 – 27 February 1935) was an English stage and screen actor. He is remembered for his role as Dr. John Seward in the Broadway and film versions of Dracula.
Bunston was born in Charmouth and briefly attended Cranleigh School in Surrey before working as an actor. Bunston emigrated to the United States in 1922. His first Broadway appearance was Arthur Wing Pinero's The Enchanted Cottage in 1923. Other short-running roles in That Awful Mrs. Eaton! and Simon Called Peter were followed by a critically noticed role in a run of 260 performances of 1925's Young Woodley. On October 5, 1927, Bunston debuted as Dr John Seward in a Broadway production of Dracula alongside Bela Lugosi.
Bunston's other Broadway credits include Young Woodley (1925), Simon Called Peter (1924), That Awful Mrs. Eaton (1924), The Enchanted Cottage (1923), and Drink (1903).
Bunston's stage success led to a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Between 1929 and 1935 he had mainly character roles in over 30 films, and 1931 he re-created his Broadway role in the film adaptation of Dracula. Bunston married Emily Fox Chaffey (1866-1939) in 1898 and they had two children, Margaret, and John. Bunston died of a heart attack on February 27, 1935.
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Richard Biggs
Biography
Richard James Biggs II (March 18, 1960 – May 22, 2004) was an American television and stage actor, known for his roles on the television series Days of Our Lives and Babylon 5. Born in Columbus, Ohio, Biggs attended the University of Southern California on scholarship, studying theatre. He briefly taught at a Los Angeles high school before landing his first major television role, that of Dr. Marcus Hunter on the soap opera Days of Our Lives.
Biggs was diagnosed with hearing problems when he was 13, and was partially deaf in one ear, completely deaf in the other. He frequently used his celebrity status to raise money for the Aliso Academy, a private school in Rancho Santa Margarita, California that serves deaf children.
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Lyndall Hobbs
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Lyndall Georgina Hobbs is an Australian film director and producer. She was born in Melbourne, Australia in March 1952. She was a close childhood friend of the journalist Amanda Zachariah of the Geelong Advertiser. She spent a considerable period of her life in the United Kingdom during which time she directed 'Steppin' Out' featuring top UK act Secret Affair before moving to Hollywood in the United States. For a period of her life, she had a relationship with the movie actor Al Pacino. She has one daughter, Lola Rose Thompson and adopted son, Nick David Hobbs.
Her story was told in a documentary by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, "In Her Father's Eyes".
Description above from the Wikipedia article Lyndall Hobbs, licensed under CC-BY-SA,full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Rita Johnson
Biography
Rita Ann Johnson (August 13, 1913 – October 31, 1965) was an American actress.
Early in her career, Johnson was busy in radio.
Johnson began acting on Broadway in 1935 and started her film career two years later. She played a murderer in Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941) and a doomed wife in the RKO film noir They Won't Believe Me (1947).
In an incident that was never fully explained, Johnson suffered a head trauma on September 6, 1948 that required brain surgery. Unsubstantiated rumors promulgated by gossip columnists such as Walter Winchell suggested she might have been abused by a boyfriend, but the only explanation she offered was that a large, industrial-grade hair dryer at her apartment had fallen on her. She was in a coma for two weeks and it was reported it took her a year to recover. Her left side was paralyzed temporarily and for a while she couldn't walk. The injury put a virtual halt to her film career. Her screen time in movies after that was limited due to her reduced mobility and powers of concentration. Johnson suffered from alcoholism from the time of her injuries until her death of a brain hemorrhage at age 52.
From Wikipedia.
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John Lazar
Biography
John La Zar was born and raised in San Francisco, California. He trained at the American Conservatory Theatre and has studied acting with Uta Hagen, Bill Ball, Jack Kosslyn, and Paul Shenar. La Zar was portraying the titular role in a University of Hawaii stage production of "Caligula" when he was approached by 20th Century Fox studio casting agent Phil Benjamin to audition for the part of deranged and debauched rock'n'roll music producer Ronnie 'Z-Man' Barzell in Russ Meyer's delightfully outrageous camp cult classic "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls." John's wonderfully wild and eccentric performance as 'Z-Man' should have led to bigger and better things, but alas did not. A majority of La Zar's subsequent roles have been decidedly minor: funny as sleazy pimp Carl McKinney in Meyer's typically off-the-wall "Supervixens," a Palestine general in the "David & Goliath" episode of "Greatest Heroes of the Bible," a limousine driver in "Eddie Presley," a warlock in "Night of the Scarecrow," and a strip club patron in "Stripteaser." However, on occasion John has landed a more substantial part; he's especially memorable as evil sorcerer Jarek in the enjoyably silly tongue-in-cheek sword and sorcery fantasy hoot "Deathstalker II." La Zar had a recurring role as scientist Dr. Fez on the soft-core cable TV series "Click." In addition to his regrettably sparse film and TV credits, John has acted in stage productions of such plays as "The Crucible," "Macbeth," "Carnival," "High Mass," "No Exit," and "Everyman." Outside of acting, La Zar is also a ballet dancer, master swordsman, and expert martial artist. He lives in Los Angeles, California.
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Mitchel Musso
Biography
Mitchel Tate Musso (born July 9, 1991) is an American actor and singer. He is best known for his Disney Channel roles as Oliver Oken in Hannah Montana, Jeremy Johnson in the animated series Phineas and Ferb, and his Disney XD role as King Brady on Pair of Kings as well as the host of Disney Channel's PrankStars.
He voiced DJ in the animated film, Monster House, and starred as Raymond Figg in the Disney Channel Original Movie, Life Is Ruff, released in 2005, as well as Cleatus Poole in the film, Hatching Pete in 2009. Musso's self-titled debut album was released on June 2, 2009, on Walt Disney Records. The album debuted at number 19 on the Billboard 200.
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