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Howard Smith

Biography

Howard Irving Smith (August 12, 1893 in – January 10, 1968) was an American character actor with a 50-year career in vaudeville, theater, radio, films and television. In 1938 he performed in Orson Welles's short-lived stage production and once-lost film, Too Much Johnson, and in the celebrated radio production, "The War of the Worlds". He portrayed Charley in the original Broadway production of Death of a Salesman and recreated the role in the 1951 film version. On television Smith portrayed the gruff Harvey Griffin in the situation comedy, Hazel.
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Gina Kim

Biography

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Gina Kim (born 1973, Korea) is a director, documentary filmmaker, and academic. She is known for her deeply personal films that explore issues such as gender, race, and diaspora. Much of her work explores Korean culture in an explicitly self-reflexive and emotive way. Kim's first noted documentary was Gina Kim's Video Diary, begun in 1995 when she had recently arrived in Los Angeles, and completed in 2002. Invisible Light (2003) is about a woman married to a man named Jun and another involved in an affair with him.[1] Kim's fictional film, Never Forever (2007), featured a well-reviewed starring performance by actress Vera Farmiga and premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Her documentary, Faces of Seoul (2009), "reveals Korea's capital as a dynamic place where these opposing concepts--language vs. image, tradition vs. modern, native knowledge vs. exotic encounter--rub against each other without yielding a single dominant perspective." Kim studied at CalArts and was a full-time lecturer at Harvard University's Department of Visual and Environmental Studies (housed in the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts) between 2004 and 2007. Description above from the Wikipedia article Gina Kim, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Dorothy Davenport

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Dorothy Davenport (March 13, 1895 – October 12, 1977) was an American actress, screenwriter, film director, and producer who appeared in silent film for Biograph Studios under the direction of D.W. Griffith. While filming on location in Oregon for The Valley of the Giants (1919), Wallace Reid was injured in a train wreck. As a remedy for the pain from this injury, studio doctors administered large doses of morphine to Reid to which he became addicted. Reid's health slowly grew worse over the next few years, and he died of the addiction in 1923. After Reid's death, Davenport and Thomas Ince co-produced the film Human Wreckage (1923) with James Kirkwood, Sr., Bessie Love and Lucille Ricksen, a film that dealt with the dangers of narcotics addiction. Davenport took Human Wreckage on a roadshow engagement, followed up with another "social conscience" picture about excessive mother-love called Broken Laws in 1924, again billed as "Mrs. Wallace Reid" to capitalize on her husband's notorious death. She then produced The Red Kimona (1925) about white slavery. On screen she opens the film in silent narration or prologue. The details of the latter film were so realistic that Davenport was successfully sued. She would later direct Linda (1929), Sucker Money (1933), Road to Ruin (1934), and The Woman Condemned (1934) and worked as a producer, writer, and dialogue director. Among her last credits are co-author of the screenplay for Footsteps in the Fog (1955), and as dialogue director for The First Traveling Saleslady (1956) with Ginger Rogers. She and husband Wallace Reid had two children. She was married to him until his death on January 18, 1923. She never remarried. Dorothy Davenport died at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in 1977 in Woodland Hills, California. She is interred with her husband in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale. Description above from the Wikipedia article Dorothy Davenport, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Stephen Shortridge

Biography

Stephen Shortridge was born in Iowa and raised in Southern California. Stephen excelled in art throughout his schooling but had mainly studied commercial art. He took his first painting class while attending Idaho State University on a Water Polo Scholarship - Stephen was an All-American. Stephen enjoyed acting but finds painting to be much more creatively satisfying - the feeling to be able to have that total freedom to create is exciting to him. His style results from the influence of the French Impressionists, Monet in particular. However, his full colors and bold strokes have established him as a unique America Romantic Impressionist. Stephen's collectors include Patty Duke, Donna Summer & Rick Dees. While living in LA, he exhibited with fellow actor/artist, Peter Falk. Stephen resumes includes over 50 commercials. Over a fifteen year period he has appeared in commercials such as Mennen, Speedstick, Coke, Certs and Head and Shoulders to name just a few. Stephen currently lives with his family in Idaho.
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Arthur Jensen

Biography

Arthur Jensen was originally trained as a tailor and later educated at the Royal Theatre's student school 1920-23 and had an extensive theatre career. He experienced his heyday on television after passing the age of 70. He never achieved the same heights in film as he did in television, with roles such as caretaker Meyer in Huset på Christianshavn (1970-77) and clerk Schwan from Damernes Magasin in Matador (1978-81). With the exception of when he reprised the character of caretaker Meyer in Erik Balling's film version of the TV series, Ballade på Christianshavn (1971). It was his best film performance. He portrayed the two TV series characters shamelessly on his distinctive type: the comically aunty as caretaker Meyer and the sly and vain as clerk Schwan. What could have ended up as a gay caricature becomes human portraits in the garb of folk comedy, not least thanks to Arthur Jensen's humor, which at once shows solidarity and irony with the characters. It took a long time for Arthur Jensen to discovery who he was as an actor. After four silent film supporting roles at Fy&Bi, he formed a comedic duo with Ib Schønberg in several of Alice O'Fredericks' and Lau Lauritzen's energetic prank farces in the 1930s, but the fun is sporadic, and the inventions are often self-satisfied and infantile. His recurring role as a whiny spanking boy for the healthy guys in these films, including director Lauritzen himself, are particularly unfunny and almost unpleasant.
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Zamani Istifanus

Biography

Zamani Istifanus Nigerian-born video director, writer and photographer who is very passionate about storytelling and bringing African stories to a global audience. As a self taught filmmaker I believe in the power of creative images to tell stories that resonate across cultures and borders. My journey has been about capturing the essence of our experience, our heritage and our dreams. Through each project, from “Sarz: Sound from the Other Side” to “The Sahel Cuisine: Fura Da Nono” , I strive to use cinematic tools to craft visuals that speak to the heart, showcasing African narratives with authenticity and impact.
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Joe Tex

Biography

Yusuf Hazziez (born Joseph Arrington Jr.; August 8, 1935 – August 13, 1982), known professionally as Joe Tex, was an American singer and musician who gained success in the 1960s and 1970s with his brand of Southern soul, which mixed the styles of funk, country, gospel, and rhythm and blues. His career started after he was signed to King Records in 1955 following four wins at the Apollo Theater. Between 1955 and 1964, he struggled to find hits, and by the time he finally recorded his first hit, "Hold What You've Got" in 1964, he had recorded 30 previous singles that were deemed failures on the charts. He went on to have four million-selling hits: "Hold What You've Got" (1965), "Skinny Legs and All" (1967), "I Gotcha" (1972), and "Ain't Gonna Bump No More (With No Big Fat Woman)" (1977). Tex was nominated for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame six times, most recently in 2017. Description above from the Wikipedia article Joe Tex, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Omid Esmaeili

Biography

Iranian writer and director born in 1986 in Isfahan. Movies: The Empty Frame (Short), Not My Money (Short), The Painter (Short), The Anxiety of The Dead (Video Art), The Story of Iran (Documentary), He Died (Short), Doll (Short), Time (Video Art) Books: Couple Photo (Iran-USA), Window to Sin (USA), Me in the Past Me from the Past (Iran), Scarecrow (USA), Time of Revelation (Iran), Cuckoo Garden (Iran), The Secret of Creation (Tajikistan), Ivano and Four Other Stories (Tajikistan), The Secret of the Silent City Butterflies (Iran), Cold Show (Tajikistan).
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Pat Lalama

Biography

Pat Lalama is an American Emmy award winning, investigative journalist, as well as news correspondent, guest analyst, TV personality, writer, producer, author, and former news anchor. Her analysis and coverage has been seen on nearly every major news and information outlet including HLN, CNN, FOX NEWS, MSNBC, "Dateline NBC," CBS, "The Today Show," E!, ESPN, and numerous other global entities including the BBC, CBC and RAI (Italy). She has served as correspondent for the nationally syndicated news magazine shows "Celebrity Justice," "America's Most Wanted" and "Hard Copy." LaLama is a highly respected writer and producer whose credits include shows on the History and Discovery networks, as well as the award winning documentary "Talhotblond". She was married to actor and producer Anthony Brooklier until his death in 2016.
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Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy

Biography

Aleksandr Kaydanovskiy (23 July 1946 — 2 December 1995) was a Soviet actor and film director. His best known roles are in films such as Stalker, At Home Among Strangers, and The Bodyguard. Prior to pursuing an acting career, Kaydanovskiy attended technical college where he trained to become a welder. In 1965 he started studying acting at The Rostov Theatre School and the Shchukin theatrical school in Moscow. Before completing the course he took his first part in the film The Mysterious Wall and upon graduation in 1969, he worked as stage actor, making his debut at the Vakhtangov Theatre in 1969. In 1971, he was invited to join the prestigious Moscow Arts Theatre, a rare privilege for a 25-year-old graduate. He made his major film debut in At Home Among Strangers, and over the next few years appeared in some two dozen films, including the satirical comedy Diamonds for Dictatorship of the Proletariat and The Life of Beethoven. At his peak in the '70s Kaidanovsky was among the USSR’s most popular actors, and it was at this point that famed Soviet director Andrei Tarkovsky, impressed by the looks and the acting technique of Kaidanovsky in Diamonds, invited him to play the title role in his new film, Stalker. The role earned Kaydanovskiy international acclaim. In 1985 he directed A Simple Death, which was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival. In 1993 he directed Just Death, which was about the death of Leo Tolstoy.
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