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John Drainie
Biography
John Drainie was a renowned Canadian actor and broadcaster, recognized for his exceptional contributions to both radio and television. He gained prominence for his captivating performances in various radio dramas and programs, showcasing his versatility and talent in storytelling. Drainie was highly regarded for his voice-acting skills and his ability to bring characters to life. His notable contributions in the entertainment industry solidified his status as a respected figure in Canadian broadcasting.
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Roger Ebert
Biography
Roger Ebert was a Pulitzer Prize winning film critic, journalist, and screenwriter. Described by Forbes magazine as the "most powerful pundit in America", Ebert was the first film critic to be awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame as well as a Pulitzer Prize.
Ebert's began his criticizing career in 1967 as a critic for the Chicago Sun-Times and later gained national recognition co-hosting a number of shows with Gene Siskel in which they coined the 'thumbs up- thumbs down' style of reviewing.
Following Siskel's 1999 death Ebert continued to host "And The Movies" with Richard Roeper until 2006 when he stopped appearing due to developing Thyroid cancer. Complications from the cancer ended up taking much of his tongue and jaw, forcing Ebert to undergo massive reconstruction surgery and speak with the help of a computer program (which was configured with his own voice due to the volume of recorded spoken language from Ebert's TV show).
He continued to write reviews for his website later in life. On April 3rd, 2013 announced his cancer had returned and he would be taking a "leave of presence", lowering the amount he would be writing and only reviewing films he wanted to review.
Ebert succumbed to his cancer the next day, April 4th, 2013.
The balcony is closed.
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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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Peter Arne
Biography
Born in Kuala Lumpur, British Malaya, to a Swiss-French mother and an American father, Peter Arne was an actor and an antique dealer who was murdered in 1983. In the late 1940s, Arne and his partner Jack Corke befriended acclaimed novelist Mary Renault and her partner, Julie Mullard, on the SS Cairo, a steamer bound from Britain to South Africa and convinced them to go into business building homes for immigrants to the country. Renault financed using her £25,000 MGM award, employing labourers and craftsmen to begin construction of several houses, but Arne and Corke squandered the money, racking up debts before stealing Renault's car and returning to the UK to avoid charges of embezzlement. On 1st August 1983, Arne attended a costume fitting for a role in Doctor Who. On his return home, neighbours reported sounds of an argument to the police who subsequently found Arne's body inside his Knightsbridge flat. He had been bludgeoned to death with a stool and log from his fireplace. The prime suspect in Arne's murder was Giuseppe Perusi, a schoolteacher from Italy who had been living rough in a local park, and for whom Arne had been providing food. Four days later, a body matching Perusi's description was found in the River Thames at Wandsworth, having drowned in an apparent suicide. At the subsequent inquest in October 1983, Police concluded that Perusi had beaten the actor to death then killed himself.
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James Earl Jones
Biography
James Earl Jones (born January 17, 1931) is a multi-award-winning American actor of theater and film, well known for his distinctive bass voice and for his portrayal of characters of substance, gravitas and leadership. He is known for providing the voice of Darth Vader in the Star Wars franchise and the tagline for CNN. James Earl Jones was born in Arkabutla, Mississippi, the son of Ruth (née Connolly) and Robert Earl Jones. At the age of five, he moved to Jackson, Michigan, to be raised by his maternal grandparents, but the adoption was traumatic and he developed a stutter so severe he refused to speak aloud. When he moved to Brethren, Michigan in later years a teacher at the Brethren schools started to help him with his stutter. He remained functionally mute for eight years until he reached high school. He credits his high school teacher, Donald Crouch, who discovered he had a gift for writing poetry, with helping him out of his silence. Jones attended the University of Michigan where he was a pre-med major. While there, he joined the Reserve Officer Training Corps, and excelled. During the course of his studies, Jones discovered he was not cut out to be a doctor. Instead he focused himself on drama, with the thought of doing something he enjoyed, before, he assumed, he would have to go off to fight in the Korean War. After four years of college, Jones left without his degree. In 1953 he found a part-time stage crew job at the Ramsdell Theatre in Manistee, Michigan, which marked the beginning of his acting career. During the 1955–1957 seasons he was an actor and stage manager. He performed his first portrayal of Shakespeare’s Othello in this theater in 1955. After his discharge from the Military, Jones moved to New York, where he attended the American Theatre Wing to further his training and worked as a janitor to earn a living. His first film role was as a young and trim Lt. Lothar Zogg, the B-52 bombardier in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb in 1964. His first big role came with his portrayal of boxer Jack Jefferson in the film version of the Broadway play The Great White Hope, which was based on the life of boxer Jack Johnson. For his role, Jones was nominated Best Actor by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, making him the second African-American male performer (following Sidney Poitier) to receive a nomination. In 1969, Jones participated in making test films for a proposed children's television series; these shorts, combined with animated segments were the beginnings of the Sesame Street format. The next year, in the early 1970s, James appeared with Diahann Carroll in the film called Claudine. While he has appeared in many roles, he is well known as the voice of Darth Vader in the original Star Wars trilogy. Darth Vader was portrayed in costume by David Prowse in the original trilogy, with Jones dubbing Vader's dialogue in postproduction due to Prowse's strong West Country accent being unsuitable for the role. At his own request, he was originally uncredited for the release of the first two films (he would later be credited for the two in the 1997 re-release). His other voice roles include Mufasa in the 1994 film Disney animated blockbuster The Lion King, and its direct-to-video sequel, The Lion King II: Simba's Pride. He also has done the CNN tagline, "This is CNN", as well as "This is CNN International", and the Bell Atlantic tagline, "Bell Atlantic: The heart of communication". When Bell Atlantic became Verizon, Jones used the tagline greeting of "Welcome to Verizon" or "Verizon 411" right before a phone call would go through. The opening for NBC's coverage of the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics; "the Big PI in the Sky" (God) in the computer game Under a Killing Moon; a Claymation film about The Creation; and several guest spots on The Simpsons. In addition to his film and voice over work, Jones is an accomplished stage actor as well; he has won Tony awards in 1969 for The Great White Hope and in 1987 for Fences. Othello, King Lear, Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Abhorson in Measure for Measure, and Claudius in Hamlet are Shakespearean roles he has played. He received Kennedy Center Honors in 2002. Jones has been married to actress Cecilia Hart since 1982. They have one child, Flynn Earl Jones. He was previously married to American actress/singer Julienne Marie (born March 21, 1933, Toledo, Ohio); they had no children. Jones is a registered Republican.
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Reon Kadena
Biography
Reon Kadena, also known as Leon Kadena or Minamo Kusano, is a Japanese glamour model and actress
Kadena was born in Osaka Prefecture on February 19, 1986. The former gravure idol had her first collection of nude photos published at age eighteen by Asahi Press in the photobook Naked Reon (はだかのれおん) in June 2004. Kadena also appeared in a number of glamour videos including the September 2005 Reon Style (レオンスタイル) released by Geneon Entertainment.
In July 2005, Kadena made her theatrical debut in the erotic drama Piikan Fūfu. Three years later in June 2008, she co-starred with fellow gravure idol Yuuri Morishita in the Toei comedy Secret Undercover Agent: Wild Cats in Strip Royale as secret agents Honey and Bunny who investigate strange incidents beyond the abilities of the regular police.
Kadena also appeared in a number of television dramas including being part of the regular cast for the TV Asahi action-mystery series Maid Deka (メイド刑事) which was broadcast in 11 episodes from June to September 2009. In 2010 she played the role of Eren Komori (小森絵漣) in Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider OOO & W Featuring Skull: Movie War Core, an installment in the long-running Kamen Rider Series of tokusatsu films.
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Yuri Morishita
Biography
Hachiooji, Tokyo is known mostly for its hiking trails and views of the city, but some know it as where Morishita Yuuri was born. She has two older brothers. She was raised there and in Saitama Prefecture to the north from where her father hailed. She then spent six years at a protestant Christian school in Hiroshima until graduation. She attended Atomi University in Tokyo and gravitated towards a life as an entertainer becoming a model, gravure idol and race queen in 2003. She used the Akagi Maiko at this time. She had initially imagined herself as a stewardess. She joined Nasa Entertainment and worked as a club hostess in Tokyo. She is later represented by Asche. Yuri has half a dozen photo books to her name, done stage work and appeared in numerous magazines. She married Murakami Naoya in June 2017 and ceased her gravure work. She gave birth to a girl in 2018. Yuri's favourite food is Chinese.
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Maneerat Kam-Uan
Biography
Maneerat Kam-Uan, nicknamed Ae, is a Thai actress of Bangladeshi descent who was born and raised in Sakon Nakhon province, Thailand. Ae graduated from Khon Kaen Wittayayon School and bachelor's degree in humanities in journalism, Ramkhamhaeng University.
She is daughter of Mohammed Hussain a Bangladeshi father and Payomsri Hussain, Thai mother. During childhood, Maneerat and her sister helped their mother make and sell roti. Her father made a provincial contractor career, but everything changed when his father died. Her mother must become pillars of the family instead. She returned to help her mother sell roti again.
Later, when her mother had health problems, Maneerat went out to find a job. Initially, she worked as a home sales clerk, cashier, and illustrator until being an actor, giving her to learn and experience about acting, which she later was cast in the film 'Dear Dakanda' (2005) and played the role of Nui. She began to be known at this point.
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Johnny Eck
Biography
John Eckhardt Jr, (August 27, 1911 – January 5, 1991), professionally billed as Johnny Eck, was an American freak show performer in sideshows and a film actor. Born with sacral agenesis, Eck is best known today for his role in Tod Browning's 1932 cult classic film Freaks and his appearances as a bird creature in several Tarzan films. He was often billed as "The Amazing Half-Boy", "King of the Freaks" and "The Most Remarkable Man Alive".
Besides being a sideshow performer and actor, the multi-talented Eck was also a folk artist (specifically a screen painter), musician, photographer, illusionist, penny arcade owner, Punch and Judy operator, and expert model-maker. Description above from the Wikipedia article Johnny Eck, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Anu Lamp
Biography
Anu Lamp (born March 29, 1958) is an Estonian stage, film, television and voice actress, stage director, translator and instructor.'
Anu Lamp was born in Tallinn. She graduated from secondary school in 1976 at the Tallinn 7th Secondary School (now, the Tallinn English College). From 1976 until 1978, she studied philology at University of Tartu before studying acting under instruction of Aarne Üksküla at the Tallinn State Conservatory (now, the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre), graduating in 1982. Among her graduating classmates were Margus Oopkaup, Jaan Rekkor, Laine Mägi, Sulev Teppart, Andrus Vaarik, and Viire Valdma.
In June 2016, she graduated from the Institute of Theology of the Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church with a master's degree in theology.
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