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Cedric Gibbons
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Austin Cedric Gibbons (March 23, 1893 – July 26, 1960) was an Irish art director and production designer for the film industry. He also made a significant contribution to motion picture theater architecture from the 1930s to 1950s. He is credited as the designer of the Oscar statuette in 1928.
Gibbons was born in Dublin, Ireland and studied at the Art Students League of New York and worked for his architect father. While at Edison Studios from 1915, he first designed a set for a film released in 1919, assisting Hugo Ballin. But, after this first foray, the studio closed, and he signed with Samuel Goldwyn in 1918. This evolved to working for Louis B. Mayer at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1924 to 1956—a 32-year career.
Gibbons was one of the original 36 founding members of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and oversaw the design of the Academy Awards statuette in 1928, a trophy for which he himself would be nominated 39 times, winning 11.
He retired in 1956 with about 1,500 films credited to him: however, his contract with MGM dictated that he receive credit as art director for every MGM film released in the United States, even though other designers may have done the bulk of the work. Even so, his actual hands-on art direction may have been on about 150 films.
In 1930, Gibbons married actress Dolores del Río and co-designed their house in Santa Monica, an intricate Art Deco residence influenced by Rudolf Schindler. They divorced in 1941; three years later he married actress Hazel Brooks with whom he remained until his death at the age of 67.
Gibbons's grave is in the Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles.
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Carmelo Bene
Biography
The filmmaking career of Carmelo Bene (1937 - 2002) lasted from 1968 to 1973, six years out of a lengthy time spent in the theater that made Bene one of the most celebrated figures of the Italian avant-garde in the second half of the 20th century.
Bene first made a name for himself with a controversial production of Camus’ Caligula in Rome in 1959. Subsequent productions retained this sense of notoriety, and Bene (like Pasolini) quickly acquired a police record. Bene, however, would come to bemoan the controversy his work created, because it attracted an audience looking for shocks and titillation, while he himself was more concerned with reinventing the vocabulary of the theater: sets, gestures, texts.
Bene’s turn to cinema expanded that quest to reinvent. His films resist synopsis because, although they are often derived from narrative sources, Bene uses these sources against themselves and as a springboard for his critique of the stultifying traps of representation and interpretation. The films are wildly inventive and visually arresting on several levels: the performance styles of his actors, including eccentric movements, gestures and grimaces; the sets, costumes and makeup; the editing; and the use of the camera, with stable shots regularly punctuated by handheld camera work, extreme close ups and the occasional baroque use of zooms, dollies, cranes, elaborate pans and exaggerated camera angles. They resemble something like the work of Jack Smith crossed with the experimental Pasolini of Teorema and Pigsty.
One constant feature of Bene’s work is its satire of heterosexuality. The two sexes keep trying to communicate with each other, but always fail to do so. Bene’s work constantly deflates masculinist pretenses at mastery: his male characters tend to be hapless and often hysterical, while his female characters are alternately predatory and remote, and unknowable in either case. But this satire is merely the most visible form of Bene’s revolt against convention and communication. Over and over again in the films, everyday actions become hopelessly complicated or endlessly interrupted. His characters often end up staring quizzically offscreen or even into mirrors, as if they were no more sure than we are of the meaning of what they see. Indeed, identity and by extension agency seem to get suspended, along with meaning. What is left is glorious spectacle and enigmas for the eyes and ears: endless music; babbling, stuttering text; excessive and exciting images. – David Pendleton
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Jocelyne Béroard
Biography
Jocelyne Béroard (born 12 September 1954) is a Martinican singer and songwriter. She is one of the lead singers of the Zouk and Compas band Kassav'. As a solo artist, she helped create zouk Beton, a music genre started by Kassav'. The main members are from Guadeloupe and Martinique.
Béroard was born in Fort-de-France, Martinique, and studied in France, attending the National School of Fine Arts in Paris, before beginning to work with Caribbean artistes as a background singer in 1980. She has served as a lead singer of Kassav' since 1983. She has also recorded several albums as a solo artist. In 1986, she won a Gold Disc for her album Siwo (the all-time biggest seller for an album by a female in the West Indies). In 1987, she recorded a duet with Philippe Lavil, the hit single "Kolé séré", which peaked at number four in France. In 1999, she was made a Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur.
In 2014, she sang "On n'oublie pas" (written by Serge Bilé) with several artists and personalities including Alpha Blondy, Harry Roselmack and Admiral T. This song is a tribute to the 152 victims from Martinique of the crash of 16 August 2005, to remember this event and to help the AVCA, the association of the victims of the air disaster, to raise funds.
She helped American singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett write the song "Love and Luck", which appeared on the compilation album Boats, Beaches, Bars & Ballads. The song mentions the Kassav song "Kolé Sére".
On 1 April 2019, it was announced on Kassav's official Facebook page that Béroard was to marry her longtime fellow Jacob Desvarieux, singer and musician of the band and that the festivities were to take place on the day Kassav' will celebrate their 40 years. The announcement later proved to be a joke for April Fools' Day.
Source: Article "Jocelyne Béroard" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA.
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Sean Connery
Biography
Sir Thomas Sean Connery (August 25, 1930 – October 31, 2020) was a Scottish actor and producer. He won an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards (one being a BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award), and three Golden Globes, including the Cecil B. DeMille Award and a Henrietta Award. Connery was the first actor to portray the character James Bond in film, starring in seven Bond films (every film from Dr. No to You Only Live Twice, plus Diamonds Are Forever and Never Say Never Again), between 1962 and 1983. In 1988, Connery won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in The Untouchables. His films also include Marnie (1964), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), The Man Who Would Be King (1975), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Highlander (1986), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), The Hunt for Red October (1990), Dragonheart (1996), The Rock (1996), and Finding Forrester (2000).
Connery was polled in a 2004 The Sunday Herald as "The Greatest Living Scot" and in a 2011 EuroMillions survey as "Scotland's Greatest Living National Treasure". He was voted by People magazine as both the “Sexiest Man Alive" in 1989 and the "Sexiest Man of the Century” in 1999. He received a lifetime achievement award in the United States with a Kennedy Center Honor in 1999. Connery was knighted in the 2000 New Year Honours for services to film drama.
On October 31, 2020, Connery died at the age of 90.
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Lee You-mi
Biography
Lee Yoo-mi (이유미) is a South Korean actress. She made her acting debut in 2009. In the following years, her work was limited to minor roles in several film and television series. On September 28, 2020, it was announced that Lee has signed an exclusive contract with Varo Entertainment. In 2021, Lee rose to prominence outside South Korea for her role in the Netflix series Squid Game. Following the series' international success, Lee's follower count on Instagram increased from 40,000 to over 6.5 million in a matter of days. Lee Yoo-mi becomes first Korean actress to win ‘Outstanding Guest Actress’ at the Creative Arts Emmys.
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Isabel Coixet
Biography
Isabel Coixet Castillo (Catalan: [izəˈβɛl kuˈʃɛt]; born 9 April 1960; Sant Adrià del Besòs) is a Spanish filmmaker. She is one of the most prolific film directors of contemporary Spain, having directed twelve feature-length films since the beginning of her film career in 1988, in addition to documentary films, shorts, and commercials. Her films depart from the traditional national cinema of Spain, and help to “untangle films from their national context ... clearing the path for thinking about national film from different perspectives.” The recurring themes of “emotions, feelings, and existential conflict” coupled with her distinct visual style secure the “multifaceted (she directs, writes, produces, shoots, and acts)” filmmaker's status as a “Catalan auteur.”
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Michael B. Jordan
Biography
Michael Bakari Jordan (/bɑːˈkɑːri/ bah-KAR-ee; born February 9, 1987) is an American actor, producer, and director. His accolades include an Academy Award, three Actor Awards, and a Producers Guild Award, in addition to nominations for a British Academy Film Award, a Golden Globe Award and two Emmy Awards. Jordan was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time in 2020 and 2023, People's Sexiest Man Alive in 2020, and The New York Times ranked him 15th on its list of the 25 greatest actors of the 21st century.
Jordan initially broke out in television, playing Wallace in the first season of the HBO crime drama series The Wire (2002). He starred in the ABC soap opera All My Children (2003–2006) and the NBC sports drama series Friday Night Lights (2009–2011). He later starred in and produced the HBO television film Fahrenheit 451 (2018), for which he was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Television Movie.
Jordan's film breakthrough came as Oscar Grant in Ryan Coogler's biopic Fruitvale Station (2013), for which his performance received critical praise. He earned further acclaim for his performances in Coogler's subsequent films, including Creed (2015), Black Panther (2018), and Sinners (2025); the latter earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor. Jordan reprised his role of Donnie Creed in Creed II (2018) and Creed III (2023), the latter of which also marked his directorial debut. His other films include Chronicle (2012), That Awkward Moment (2014), Fantastic Four (2015), and Just Mercy (2019).
Aside from filmmaking, Jordan is also a co-owner of Premier League club AFC Bournemouth.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Michael B. Jordan, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Ela Weber
Biography
Manuela Hannelore "Ela" Weber (born 13 March 1966) is a German model, showgirl and actress.
Born in Dettelbach, in 1984 Weber moved to New York City, where she started working as a spokesmodel for Playtex. In the late 1980s she moved to Italy, and after minor roles in variety shows such as Scherzi a parte and Stranamore her breakout came in 1996, when she started co-hosting alongside Paolo Bonolis, the Canale 5 quiz show Tira e molla. Among her other television appearances, between 1998 and 2000 she hosted the sport talk show Goleada, and in 2000 she hosted the awards ceremony of the FIFA World Player of the Year. In 2008 Weber participated to the Raidue reality show L'Isola dei Famosi. Weber also appeared in several films and stage plays. In 2018 she appeared as a housemate in Grande Fratello VIP, the italian adaptation of Celebrity Big Brother.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Ela Weber, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Amro Ali
Biography
Amro Ali was graduated from High Cinema Institute in Cairo, Egypt. His short film (Coma) has won four international awards, including Best Short Film Award at Malmö Arab Film Festival and Rotterdam Arab Film Festival. In addition, he worked as an assistant director and second unit director and director in several TV series, including (Orkedia), (Al-Mohalab), (Haramlek) and (SpotLight 15). Amro Ali has wrote several TV series including (Safarbarlek) and (Love Crisis), and he has also directed several TV commercials, documentaries as well as many short and med-length films including (Coma), (Awakening), (The Visit), (Recovery), (Heart Attack) and (Cinema AlDunia). His first feature film project (Passage) has won Cairo Film Connection's Prize.
- Copy of IMDb Mini Biography By: Amro Ali
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Gavin Rothery
Biography
Gavin Rothery is a concept artist/writer/director specialising in Science Fiction.
Originally an illustrator and comic artist, he has been working in the games industry since 1996. Through graphic design and visual effects work, this led into advertising and then film. Rothery was responsible for the co-creation and design of the 2009 movie "Moon" with director Duncan Jones. Recent work includes ongoing starship designs for the computer game "Star Citizen" and the completion of his feature film writing and directing debut "Archive," set for release mid 2020.
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