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Sean Connery

Biography

Sir Thomas Sean Connery (August 25, 1930 – October 31, 2020) was a Scottish actor and producer who 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 31 October 2020, it was announced that Connery had died at the age of 90. Description above from the Wikipedia article Sean Connery, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia
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Vittorio De Sica

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Vittorio De Sica (7 July 1901 – 13 November 1974) was an Italian director and actor, a leading figure in the neorealist movement. Four of the films he directed won Academy Awards: Sciuscià and Bicycle Thieves (honorary), while Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow and Il giardino dei Finzi Contini won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Indeed, the great critical success of Sciuscià (the first foreign film to be so recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences) and Bicycle Thieves helped establish the permanent Best Foreign Film Award. These two films are considered part of the canon of classic cinema. Bicycle Thieves was cited by Turner Classic Movies as one of the 15 most influential films in cinema history. De Sica was also nominated for the 1957 Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for playing Major Rinaldi in American director Charles Vidor's 1957 adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, a movie that was panned by critics and proved a box office flop. De Sica's acting was considered the highlight of the film.
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Macka Foley

Biography

Macka Foley was born on January 2, 1951 in Portland, Maine, USA as Martin Macka A. Foley, Jr., to the late Martin and Dorothy Dixie (Lee) Foley. He grew up in the West End, having attended St. Dominics School and graduating from Portland High School Class of 1969 where he was proud to have been voted most witty by his classmates. Macka was a well-known athlete and Captain of the basketball team. He enlisted in the United States Marine Corps following high school; Macka served two tours in the Vietnam War and was awarded the Purple Heart for wounds he sustained in the line of duty. Following his honorable discharge, Macka was a heavyweight boxer from 1969-1979 having had 54 professional fights. He fought bouts all over the world, and on every continent except Antarctica. He had an encyclopedic knowledge of the history of boxing and could name every champion in every division since they started recording it in this country. He moved to Los Angeles California in 1986 where he became a boxing trainer. Macka was proud of those he trained, especially his championship fighters, James Toney, Manny Pacquiao, and Brian Viloria. He also trained several actors and actresses in California, earning the recognition of being one of the best trainers in the business. For the last 10 years, Macka trained James Franco who was like a son to him. Franco recently posted on Facebook, I just heard that Macka Foley passed away. He was a boxing trainer and a saint of the sweet science. I spent years with him. He showed me that anything in life: boxing, acting or just living, is all about breathing and being relaxed in yourself. Ill never forget him. In addition to his training career, he appeared in over 500 television shows, several movies and many commercials to which he is known for his work on Ghost (1990), Parker Lewis Can't Lose (1990) and Death House (1988). Macka was very spiritual man who considered daily meditation a very important aspect of his life. He was known for being a comical, spontaneous, and quick witted man. He passed away unexpectedly on August 3, 2015 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
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Luciano Ricceri

Biography

Luciano Ricceri (26 April 1940 – 1 February 2020) was an Italian production designer and costume designer, winner of the David di Donatello for Best Sets and Decorations for the 1991 film Captain Fracassa's Journey and the 2001 film Unfair Competition. Ricceri began his career in the early 1960s, being an assistant to Piero Gherardi on the sets of Federico Fellini's 8½ and Juliet of the Spirits. He later became a loyal collaborator of Ettore Scola, working on many of his films, including Captain Fracassa's Journey, which earned him the Nastro d'Argento for Best Production Design, and Unfair Competition, for which he won the David di Donatello for Best Sets and Decorations. Ricceri was also a very prolific production designer for television series: he built the sets of Giuliano Montaldo's Marco Polo entirely in studios. He was later hired on Inspector Montalbano, building the sets of 19 episodes between 1999 and 2017. Ricceri died in Orte on 1 February 2020, at the age of 79. Description above from the Wikipedia article Luciano Ricceri, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Louis-Ferdinand Céline

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Louis Ferdinand Auguste Destouches (27 May 1894 – 1 July 1961), better known by the pen name Louis-Ferdinand Céline, was a French novelist, polemicist, and physician. His first novel Journey to the End of the Night (1932) won the Prix Renaudot but divided critics due to the author's pessimistic depiction of the human condition and his writing style based on working class speech. In subsequent novels such as Death on the Installment Plan (1936), Guignol's Band (1944) and Castle to Castle (1957) Céline further developed an innovative and distinctive literary style. Maurice Nadeau wrote: "What Joyce did for the English language...what the surrealists attempted to do for the French language, Céline achieved effortlessly and on a vast scale." From 1937 Céline wrote a series of antisemitic polemical works in which he advocated a military alliance with Nazi Germany. He continued to publicly espouse antisemitic views during the German occupation of France, and after the Allied landing in Normandy in 1944 he fled to Germany and then Denmark where he lived in exile. He was convicted of collaboration by a French court in 1951, but was pardoned by a military tribunal soon after. He returned to France where he resumed his careers as a doctor and author. Céline is widely considered to be one of the greatest French novelists of the 20th century but remains a controversial figure in France due to his antisemitism and activities during the Second World War. The only child of Fernand Destouches and Marguerite-Louise-Céline Guilloux, he was born Louis Ferdinand Auguste Destouches in 1894 at Courbevoie, just outside Paris in the Seine département (now Hauts-de-Seine). The family came originally from Normandy on his father's side and Brittany on his mother's side. His father was a middle manager in an insurance company and his mother owned a boutique where she sold antique lace. In 1905, he was awarded his Certificat d'études, after which he worked as an apprentice and messenger boy in various trades. Between 1908 and 1910, his parents sent him to Germany and England for a year in each country in order to acquire foreign languages for future employment. From the time he left school until the age of eighteen Céline worked in various jobs, leaving or losing them after only short periods of time. He often found himself working for jewellers, first, at eleven, as an errand boy, and later as a salesperson for a local goldsmith. Although he was no longer being formally educated, he bought schoolbooks with the money he earned, and studied by himself. It was around this time that Céline started to want to become a doctor. ... Source: Article "Louis-Ferdinand Céline" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Lara Flynn Boyle

Biography

Lara Flynn Boyle (born March 24, 1970) is an American actress and producer. She is best known for her role as Donna Hayward in the ABC cult television series Twin Peaks (1990–1991). After portraying Stacy in Penelope Spheeris's comedy Wayne's World (1992), Boyle had a lead role in John Dahl's critically acclaimed neo-noir film Red Rock West (1993), followed by roles in Threesome (1994), Cafe Society (1995), and Happiness (1998). From 1997 to 2003, Boyle portrayed Assistant District Attorney Helen Gamble in the ABC television series The Practice for which she was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. Description above from the Wikipedia article Lara Flynn Boyle, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Roman Polanski

Biography

Roman Polański (born 18 August 1933) is a Polish-French film director, producer, writer and actor. Born in Paris to Polish parents, Polański relocated with his family to Poland in 1937. After surviving the Holocaust, he continued his education in Poland and became a critically acclaimed director of both art house and commercial films. Polański's first feature-length film, Knife in the Water (1962), made in Poland, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. He has since received five more Oscar nominations, and in 2002 received the Academy Award for Best Director for his film, The Pianist. He has also been the recipient of two Baftas, four Césars, a Golden Globe and the Palme d'Or. He left Poland in 1961 to live in France for several years, then moved to the United Kingdom where he collaborated with Gérard Brach on three films, beginning with Repulsion (1965). In 1968 he moved to the United States, immediately cementing his burgeoning directing status with the 1968 groundbreaking Academy Award winning horror film Rosemary's Baby. In 1969, Polański's pregnant wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered while staying at the Polański's Benedict Canyon home above Los Angeles by members of the Manson Family. Following Tate's death, Polański returned to Europe and spent much of his time in Paris and Gstaad, but did not make another film until he filmed Macbeth (1971) in England. The following year he went to Italy to make What? (1973) and subsequently spent the next five years living near Rome. However, he traveled to Hollywood to direct Chinatown (1974) for Paramount Pictures, with Robert Evans serving as producer. The film was nominated for eleven Academy Awards, and was a critical and box-office success; the script by Robert Towne won for Best Original Screenplay. Polański's next film, The Tenant (1976), was shot in France, and completed the "Apartment Trilogy", following Repulsion and Rosemary's Baby. In 1977, after a photo shoot in Los Angeles, Polański was arrested for the sexual abuse of a 13 year old girl. He was charged with rape but pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a minor. To avoid sentencing, Polański fled to his home in London, and then moved on to France the following day. He has had a U.S. arrest warrant outstanding since then, and an international arrest warrant since 2005. Polański continued to make films such as The Pianist (2002), a World War II-set adaptation of Jewish-Polish musician Władysław Szpilman's autobiography of the same name, which echoed some of Polański's earlier life experiences. Like Szpilman, Polański escaped the ghetto and the concentration camps while family members were killed. The film won three Academy Awards including Best Director, the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or, and seven French César Awards including Best Picture and Best Director. He then released the successful films Oliver Twist (2005), To Each His Own Cinema (2007), and The Ghost Writer (2010), completed while under house arrest. In September 2009, Polański was arrested by Swiss police, at the request of U.S. authorities, when he traveled to receive a lifetime achievement award at the Zurich Film Festival. In October 2009, the U.S. requested his extradition; however, on July 12, 2010, the Swiss rejected that request and instead declared him a "free man" after releasing him from custody.
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Mindy Kaling

Biography

Vera Mindy Chokalingam (born June 24, 1979), known professionally as Mindy Kaling, is an American actress, comedian, and writer. She rose to prominence in 2005 for her work on the NBC sitcom The Office, where she portrayed Kelly Kapoor and served as a writer, executive producer, and occasional director throughout most of the series' run. Kaling created, wrote, produced, and starred in the Fox/Hulu sitcom The Mindy Project, which ran for six seasons from 2012 to 2017. Kailing's film career includes voice work in the films Despicable Me (2010), Wreck It Ralph (2012), Inside Out (2015) and starring roles in the fantasy adventure A Wrinkle in Time and heist-comedy Ocean's 8, both 2018. Description above from the Wikipedia article Mindy Kaling, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Clarence Gilyard Jr.

Biography

Clarence Alfred Gilyard Jr. (December 24, 1955 – November 28, 2022) was an American university professor, actor, and author. As a performer, he appeared in film, television, and stage productions; some sources give his middle name as Alfred. Gilyard was known for his roles as second private investigator and right-hand man Conrad McMasters to Ben Matlock (played by Andy Griffith) on the legal drama series Matlock from 1989 to 1993; Pastor Bruce Barnes in the first two Left Behind movies; Cordell Walker's (played by Chuck Norris) Texas Ranger partner, James "Jimmy" Trivette, in the 1990s crime drama Walker, Texas Ranger; Theo, the terrorist computer expert in Die Hard; and Lieutenant (junior grade) Evan "Sundown" Gough in Top Gun.
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Alexandra Kamp

Biography

Alexandra Kamp-Groeneveld (born 29 December 1966) is a German model and actress. She was born in Karlsruhe to Peter Kamp and his wife and grew up in Baden-Baden. She visited drama schools in New York, Los Angeles and Paris before she started her career as an actress in 1994. She has had many star and supporting roles in German movies and TV series and some in Hollywood B-movies. In 1998, she acted together with Claudia Cardinale in Riches, belles, etc., in 2001 with Leslie Nielsen in 2001: A Space Travesty and in 2003 she played the star role in Sumuru together with Michael Shanks in an English-South African co-production. In 2007 she appeared as a covergirl on the German issue of the Playboy. Alexandra is the spokeswoman for the children's hospital "Kinderhospiz St. Nikolaus" in the Bavarian Alps, which gives a care home to terminally ill children and their parents. She frequently gives charity readings.
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