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Jael Strauss
Biography
Jael Strauss (3 July 1984 - 4 December 2018) was an American model. She was best known as a contestant on Cycle 8 of America's Next Top Model. She was the eighth girl eliminated and placed sixth. After the show she was signed by Hitch Couture, with who she was going to create a clothing line.
In 2012, Strauss was reported to be battling methamphetamine addiction. She appeared on the Dr. Phil show on September 13, 2012, to discuss her struggle with addiction. She notably ran out into the parking lot during filming of the episode. Jael stated that she felt exploited while she was on the show.
On October 4, 2018 Strauss announced on her Facebook that she had incurable stage IV metastatic inflammatory breast cancer. She died on December 4, 2018, at the age of 34.
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Deena Kastor
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Deena Michelle Kastor (born Deena Michelle Drossin on February 14, 1973) is an American long-distance runner. She holds American records in the marathon, half-marathon, and numerous road distances. She won the bronze medal in the women's marathon at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece. She is also an eight-time national champion in cross country.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Deena Kastor, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Y. V. Rao
Biography
Yaragudipati Varada Rao (30 May 1903 – 13 February 1973), also known as Y. V. Rao was an Indian film producer, director, thespian, screenwriter, editor and actor known for his works predominantly in Telugu, Kannada and Tamil cinema. One of the pioneers of Telugu cinema, Rao plunged into drama and did a few stage plays before moving to Kolhapur and Bombay to act in silent films.
R. S. Prakash Rao, son of Raghupathi Venkaiah Naidu, cast him as lead actor in many silent films such as Garuda Garva Bhangam, Gajendra Moksham and Rose of Rajasthan. Rao moved into film direction and made silent films such as Pandava Nirvan (1930), Pandava Agnathavaas (1930) and Hari Maya (1932). In 1940, he directed the Telugu magnum opus Viswa Mohini. Rao and, R. S. Prakash have established a long-lasting precedent of producing films exclusively on religious themes; Nandanar, Gajendra Moksham and Matsyavatar, three of their Telugu productions, centred on religious figures, parables and morals.
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Slimane Hachi
Biography
Slimane Hachi, born in 1954 in Beni Yenni in Algeria is a professor of anthropology, Director of the Regional Center for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Africa (CRESPIAF) and member of the scientific council of the Center for Research in Social and Cultural Anthropology "CRASC" .
He will publish the books: "The Industries of Afalou Bou-Rhummel, The Upper Layers" and "Prehistoric Atlas Of Ahaggar. He also has numerous scientific publications including: "The Lower Paleolithic of the Ajjer (Algeria), state of the question, Libyca", 1983. "A structure for cooking grasshoppers by thermal diffusion in the Tin-Hanakaten deposit", (Tassili n Ajjer), (with G. Aumassip and M. Bétrouni), Libyca, 1983. "The deposit Lower Paleolithic of Erg Touareg (Ouargla)", (with G. Aumassip), Libyca, 1985. "Chronostratigraphy of the Neolithic Deposit of Tin-Hanakaten, International Colloquium, Paleoecology of arid zones" (Beni-Abbas), 1984. 3Discovery of terracotta figurines in the Iberomaurusian site of Afalou Bou-Rhummel3. Works of LAPMO, 1985. "Afalou, Artistic Manifestations", Berber Encyclopedia, 1985. L'Anthropologie, 1996. "Principal Results of the Excavations of Afalou, Acts of the 8th colloquium of the International Union of Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences", Banyoles (Spain), May 1995 (1996)...
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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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Stéphane Bergeron
Biography
Stéphane Bergeron MP (born January 28, 1965, in Montreal, Quebec) is a Canadian politician. He currently serves as a Bloc Québécois member of the House of Commons of Canada since 2019, he had previously served in that aspect from 1993 to 2005, and a Parti Québécois member of the National Assembly of Quebec from 2005 to 2018.
Bergeron has a bachelor's degree in political science from the Université du Québec à Montréal and a master's degree in the same domain from the Université Laval. Bergeron has been a political adviser and a teaching assistant at Laval in the department of political science. Bergeron also served in the Canadian Forces as a naval Cadet Instructor Cadre officer from 1984 to 1993.
Bergeron was a member of the Bloc Québécois in the House of Commons, representing the riding of Verchères—Les Patriotes from 2000 to November 9, 2005, and Verchères from 1993 to 2000. Bergeron held many positions as a Member of Parliament including whip of the Bloc and critic of Parliamentary Affairs, Intergovernmental Affairs, Privy Council, Foreign Affairs, Industry, Science, Research, and Development, International Trade and Asia-Pacific.
He resigned his federal seat and won a provincial by-election on December 12, 2005, under the Parti Québécois (PQ) banner. He became the member for Verchères of the Quebec National Assembly succeeding former Quebec Premier Bernard Landry in that riding. He was re-elected in the 2007 provincial election. He was named the PQ's critic in parks and environment but was later promoted to the portfolios of families and seniors.
Since 2021 he has served as the critic of foreign affairs and international development, international cooperation, Canada-China relations in the Bloc Québécois Shadow Cabinet.
Source: Article "Stéphane Bergeron" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Vittorio Taviani
Biography
Paolo Taviani (born 8 November 1931) and Vittorio Taviani (20 September 1929 – 15 April 2018), collectively referred to as the Taviani brothers, were Italian film directors and screenwriters who collaborated on film productions.
At the Cannes Film Festival, the Taviani brothers won the Palme d'Or and the FIPRESCI prize for Padre Padrone in 1977 and the Grand Prix du Jury for La notte di San Lorenzo (The Night of the Shooting Stars, 1982). In 2012 they won the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival with Caesar Must Die.
Vittorio Taviani died on 15 April 2018 at the age of 88. Both born in San Miniato, Tuscany, Italy, the Taviani brothers began their careers as journalists. In 1960 they came to the world of cinema, directing with Joris Ivens the documentary L'Italia non è un paese povero (Italy is not a poor country). They went on to direct two films with Valentino Orsini, Un uomo da bruciare (A Man to Burn) (1962) and I fuorilegge del matrimonio (Outlaws of Marriage) (1963).
Their first autonomous film was I sovversivi (The Subversives, 1967), with which they anticipated the events of 1968. With actor Gian Maria Volonté they gained attention with Sotto il segno dello scorpione (Under the Sign of Scorpio, (1969) where one can see the echoes of Brecht, Pasolini, and Godard.
In 1971, they co-signed the media campaign against Milan's police commissioner Luigi Calabresi, published in the magazine L'espresso.
The revolutionary theme is present both in San Michele aveva un gallo (1971), an adaptation of Tolstoy's novel The Divine and the Human, a film greatly appreciated by critics, and in the film Allonsanfan (1974), in which Marcello Mastroianni has a role as an ex-revolutionary who has served a long term in prison and now views his idealistic youth in a much more realistic light, and nevertheless gets entangled in a new attempt in which he no longer believes.
Their next film Padre Padrone (1977) (Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival), taken from a novel by Gavino Ledda, speaks of the struggle of a Sardinian shepherd against the cruel rules of his patriarchal society. In Il prato (1979) there are nonrealistic echoes, while La notte di San Lorenzo (The Night of the Shooting Stars, 1982) narrates, in a fairy-tale tone, a marginal event in the days before the end of World War II, in Tuscany, as seen through the eyes of some village people. The film was awarded the Special Jury Award in Cannes.
Kaos (1984)—another literary adaptation—is a poignantly beautiful and poetical film in episodes, taken from Luigi Pirandello's Short Stories for a year. In Il sole anche di notte (1990) the Taviani brothers transposed in 18th century Naples the story from Tolstoy's Father Sergius.
From then onwards, the Tavianis' inspiration proved faltering. Successes like Le affinità elettive, (1996, from Goethe) and an attempt to woo the international audiences like Good morning Babilonia, (1987), on the pioneers of cinema history, alternate with lesser films like Fiorile (1993) and Tu ridi (1996), inspired by the characters and short stories of Pirandello. ...
Source: Article "Paolo and Vittorio Taviani" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Jon-Erik Hexum
Biography
In the early 1980s, this ruggedly handsome young man of Norwegian parentage was seen as the "next big thing" - then suddenly he was dead from an accident via a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Hexum was born and raised in Englewood, New Jersey, where he was a musically gifted student at school playing both the horn and the violin in the school orchestra, and even the piano at home. He then attended Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, before transferring across to Michigan State University studying bio-medical engineering and then switching over to philosophy.
While at MSU, Hexum played football, and DJ'd at several local radio stations under the name of "Yukon Jack", before being discovered by John Travolta's manager, Bob LeMond. Hexum allegedly turned down plenty of opportunities to appear in shows such as The Dukes of Hazzard (1979), CHiPs (1977) and many daytime soap operas before finally making his debut in the television series Voyagers! (1982) as time traveler Phineas Bogg. He was then cast as hunk Tyler Burnett alongside Joan Collins in Making of a Male Model (1983), and then as ex-Green Beret Mac Harper in the television series Cover Up: Pilot (1984).
However, on October 12, 1984, after a long and draining day's shooting on the set of Cover Up: Pilot (1984), Hexum became bored with the extensive delays and jokingly put a prop .44 magnum revolver to his temple and pulled the trigger. The gun fired, and the wadding from the blank cartridge shattered his skull, whereupon the mortally injured Hexum was rushed via ambulance to hospital to undergo extensive surgery. Despite five hours of work, the chief surgeon, Dr. David Ditsworth, described the damage to Hexum's brain as life-ending.
One week later, on October 18, he was taken off life support and pronounced dead. However, Hexum's commitment to organ donation meant five other lives were assisted or saved with organs harvested from him. The youthful and charming Hexum was dead at only 26 years of age.
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Judd Hirsch
Biography
Judd Seymore Hirsch (born March 15, 1935) is an American actor. He is known for playing Alex Rieger on the television comedy series Taxi (1978–1983), John Lacey on the NBC series Dear John (1988–1992), and Alan Eppes on the CBS series Numb3rs (2005–2010). He is also well known for his career in theatre and for his roles in films such as Ordinary People (1980), Running on Empty (1988), Independence Day (1996), A Beautiful Mind (2001), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Uncut Gems (2019) and The Fabelmans (2022).
He has twice won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series, twice won the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play, won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy, and was nominated twice for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performances in Ordinary People (1980) and The Fabelmans (2022), the longest gap between Academy Award nominations in history.
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Luis Brandoni
Biography
Brandoni was born in Dock Sud, a port community east of Avellaneda. He debuted on the stage in 1962, television in 1963, and on film in 1966. He joined the National Comedy Theater in 1964 under the direction of Luisa Vehil. Politically active in the centrist Radical Civic Union (UCR), he served as cultural policy adviser for President Raúl Alfonsín (1983-89), and was elected to the Argentine Chamber of Deputies in 1993, where he served until 2001.
He was an unsuccessful Argentine Senate candidate for the UCR in 2005, and for Vice Governor of Buenos Aires Province, with nominee Ricardo Alfonsín, in 2007. He was married to actress Marta Bianchi, and in 2007 married Monica Lopez. An actor with extensive film, television and theatre credits, he portrayed leading roles in acclaimed pictures such as La tregua (1974), Juan que reía (1976), Darse cuenta (1984), Esperando la carroza (1985), Made in Argentina (1986), Cien veces no debo (1990), Convivencia (1993), Una sombra ya pronto serás (1994), De mi barrio con amor (1995), and Los pasos perdidos (2001). His career remained strong during 2011: among his notable theatre credits was his portrayal of former President Arturo Illia; and his notable television credits included a starring role in the Telefé; sitcom, El Hombre de tu vida.
He earned three Martín Fierro Awards (1970, 1990, and 1993); and an Argentine Film Critics Association Silver Condor awards for Best Actor for his roles in Made in Argentina and Convivencia. Brandoni also served in numerous actors' guilds, including the International Federation of Actors (IFA) as its Vice President between 1974 and 2004.
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