In Norman Taurog's 1963 film "It Happened at the World's Fair," Elvis Presley plays a crop-duster pilot named Mike whose crop-dusting plane was just repossessed by the local sheriff. While hitchhiking home, wondering how he'll get the money to buy back his plane, Mike comes upon the Seattle World's Fair. There, he instantly becomes smitten with a local nurse named Diane Warren (not to be confused with songwriter Diane Warren) played by Joan O'Brien.
To manufacture a reason to see the Fair's nurse, Mike pulls an 11-year-old boy out of the crowd and offers to pay the kid a quarter in exchange for a really, really hard kick to the shin. The kid is thrilled to have the money and dutifully thwacks the stranger. As Mike limps away, the kid mutters to himself "Adults. They're all nuts." The unnamed character was played by an uncredited Kurt Russell making his feature film debut.
To manufacture a reason to see the Fair's nurse, Mike pulls an 11-year-old boy out of the crowd and offers to pay the kid a quarter in exchange for a really, really hard kick to the shin. The kid is thrilled to have the money and dutifully thwacks the stranger. As Mike limps away, the kid mutters to himself "Adults. They're all nuts." The unnamed character was played by an uncredited Kurt Russell making his feature film debut.
- 4/21/2024
- by Witney Seibold
- Slash Film
At 5’2, Mickey Rooney may have been small in stature, but he had a huge personality and was one of the biggest stars in the heyday of the Golden Era of Hollywood. He had one of the longest careers of any entertainer, with a body of work that spans nine decades in the industry, including vaudeville, films, television, radio and the stage.
Rooney was born Joe Yule, Jr. on September 23, 1920, in Brooklyn, New York. At 17 months old, he made his stage debut in his parent’s vaudeville act, and made his motion picture debut in 1926. In 1927, he starred in the first of several short films in the “Mickey Maguire” series, and adopted the stage name “Mickey Rooney.” He made 78 of these comedies, and also received great notices in films such as “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (1935). Then in 1937, he made the film that would establish his star status. “A Family Affair” was...
Rooney was born Joe Yule, Jr. on September 23, 1920, in Brooklyn, New York. At 17 months old, he made his stage debut in his parent’s vaudeville act, and made his motion picture debut in 1926. In 1927, he starred in the first of several short films in the “Mickey Maguire” series, and adopted the stage name “Mickey Rooney.” He made 78 of these comedies, and also received great notices in films such as “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (1935). Then in 1937, he made the film that would establish his star status. “A Family Affair” was...
- 9/14/2023
- by Susan Pennington, Chris Beachum and Misty Holland
- Gold Derby
In the fall of 2021, Olivia Colman scored her first career Emmy for “The Crown” despite not having succeeded on her Oscar bid for “The Father” that spring. This made her the 16th performer to prevail at the Emmys directly after going home empty-handed at the Oscars and the fourth to do so during the 21st century. Now that the 2023 Emmy nominations ballots have been released, eight of the 16 actors who lost Oscars at the most recent ceremony officially have shots at joining Colman on this list.
Gold Derby’s Emmy odds currently indicate that the man and woman with the best hopes of following in Colman’s footsteps are Brian Tyree Henry and Hong Chau, who just received their first career Academy Award nominations for their respective supporting turns in “Causeway” and “The Whale.” Henry is seeking his second comedy supporting Emmy notice for “Atlanta,” while Chau could pull double...
Gold Derby’s Emmy odds currently indicate that the man and woman with the best hopes of following in Colman’s footsteps are Brian Tyree Henry and Hong Chau, who just received their first career Academy Award nominations for their respective supporting turns in “Causeway” and “The Whale.” Henry is seeking his second comedy supporting Emmy notice for “Atlanta,” while Chau could pull double...
- 7/5/2023
- by Matthew Stewart
- Gold Derby
Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe has been played by some of Hollywood’s biggest stars. To many, Humphrey Bogart remains the definitive Marlowe, based on his performance in Howard Hawks’ The Big Sleep, but film noir afficianados will often cite Murder My Sweet’s Dick Powell, or later iterations, like Robert Mitchum in Farewell My Lovely or Elliot Gould in The Long Goodbye as the best. Indeed, Liam Neeson is stepping into some mighty big shoes with his new movie, Marlowe, but if anyone can go toe-to-toe with Mitchum or Bogart, it’s Neeson, right?
To help bring Marlowe to the big screen, Neeson recruited one of his most frequent directors, Neil Jordan. The two famously worked together on Michael Collins, as well as the earlier High Spirits and the more recent (underrated) Breakfast on Pluto, and are set to reteam again on a new prison break thriller filming this year.
To help bring Marlowe to the big screen, Neeson recruited one of his most frequent directors, Neil Jordan. The two famously worked together on Michael Collins, as well as the earlier High Spirits and the more recent (underrated) Breakfast on Pluto, and are set to reteam again on a new prison break thriller filming this year.
- 2/19/2023
- by Chris Bumbray
- JoBlo.com
Mickey Rooney was earliest surviving Best Actor Oscar nominee (photo: Mickey Rooney and Spencer Tracy in ‘Boys Town’) (See previous post: “Mickey Rooney Dead at 93: MGM’s Andy Hardy Series’ Hero and Judy Garland Frequent Co-Star Had Longest Film Career Ever?”) Mickey Rooney was the earliest surviving Best Actor Academy Award nominee — Babes in Arms, 1939; The Human Comedy, 1943 — and the last surviving male acting Oscar nominee of the 1930s. Rooney lost the Best Actor Oscar to two considerably more “prestigious” — albeit less popular — stars: Robert Donat for Sam Wood’s Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939) and Paul Lukas for Herman Shumlin’s Watch on the Rhine (1943). Following Mickey Rooney’s death, there are only two acting Academy Award nominees from the ’30s still alive: two-time Best Actress winner Luise Rainer, 104 (for Robert Z. Leonard’s The Great Ziegfeld, 1936, and Sidney Franklin’s The Good Earth, 1937), and Best Supporting Actress nominee Olivia de Havilland,...
- 4/9/2014
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Legendary actor Mickey Rooney died Sunday in Los Angeles, Calif. He was 93.
Mickey Rooney Dies
The Brooklyn-born Rooney, who got his first acting gig at just 17 months old, is best known for the series of Andy Hardy films that came out in the 1930s. Starring alongside Judy Garland, Rooney became the most bankable actor throughout the Depression-era. Among the Andy Hardy films were, Love Finds Andy Hardy, Andy Hardy Gets Spring Fever, Andy Hardy Meets Debutante and Love Laughs at Andy Hardy.
Following his incredible success at such a young age, Rooney struggled to remain a major player in Hollywood as an adult. In the 50s, there was the short-lived TV series, The Mickey Rooney Show that lasted just two years in which he played Mickey Mulligan. He had another TV vehicle in the 60s titled simply Mickey that lasted for 16 episodes.
Rooney went on to get minor parts in films,...
Mickey Rooney Dies
The Brooklyn-born Rooney, who got his first acting gig at just 17 months old, is best known for the series of Andy Hardy films that came out in the 1930s. Starring alongside Judy Garland, Rooney became the most bankable actor throughout the Depression-era. Among the Andy Hardy films were, Love Finds Andy Hardy, Andy Hardy Gets Spring Fever, Andy Hardy Meets Debutante and Love Laughs at Andy Hardy.
Following his incredible success at such a young age, Rooney struggled to remain a major player in Hollywood as an adult. In the 50s, there was the short-lived TV series, The Mickey Rooney Show that lasted just two years in which he played Mickey Mulligan. He had another TV vehicle in the 60s titled simply Mickey that lasted for 16 episodes.
Rooney went on to get minor parts in films,...
- 4/7/2014
- Uinterview
Television writer Stephen Lord has died. The Writers Guild announced today that Lord died May 5 in his home in Sherman Oaks, CA surrounded by his family. The writer, whose real name was Stephen Loyacano, was 85. In a career that went from the 1950’s to the early 1990’s, Lord worked on a wide variety of shows. His credits include CHiPs, Fantasy Island, Bonanza, Kung Fu, The Loretta Young Show, The Dick Powell Show, Matlock, Death Valley Days, Johnny Ringo, Zane Grey Theatre, Ironside, the original Outer Limits and T.J. Hooker. Lord also wrote several features including an adaptation of the Edgar Allen Poe short story classic The Fall of the House of Usher.
- 5/11/2012
- by THE DEADLINE TEAM
- Deadline TV
Actress Joan Taylor, best remembered for two sci-fi / horror B movies of the late 1950s, died March 4 in Santa Monica, in Los Angeles County. Taylor was 82. According to various sources, Taylor was born Rose Marie Emma in Geneva, Illinois, on August 18, 1929. She was the daughter of Austrian vaudeville player Amelia Berky and an Italian-born immigrant who later became a Hollywood prop man. Curiously, last Friday night I watched for the first time the 1957 Columbia release 20 Million Miles to Earth. Though wasted in a non-role in this King Kong rip-off with stop-motion animation by Ray Harryhausen, Taylor looked quite pretty (as an Italian) whether angry at leading man William Hopper (son of gossip columnist Hedda Hopper) or screaming at the ballooning Martian creature. I guess it says something about her screen presence that I was rooting for the Martian Monster to gobble up the film's director (Nathan Juran), writers (Robert Creighton Williams...
- 3/7/2012
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Peter Falk Peter Falk, the two-time Oscar nominee best known for playing television police detective Columbo, died Thursday, June 23, at his Beverly Hills home. Falk, who had been suffering from dementia (apparently a consequence of Alzheimer's disease), was 83. Falk's two Oscar nods, both in the Best Supporting Actor category, came back-to-back in the early '60s: as a cold-blooded hitman in Burt Balaban and Stuart Rosenberg's 1960 crime drama Murder, Inc., and as a typical Damon Runyon underworld character — named Joy Boy — in Frank Capra's dismal 1961 remake of his own Lady for a Day, Pocketful of Miracles. Among Falk's other notable film roles are those in two John Cassavetes movies: the very, very, very long 1970 drama Husbands, co-starring Ben Gazzara and Cassavetes himself, and the director' biggest box-office hit, the 1974 release A Woman Under the Influence, co-starring Gena Rowlands as the mentally unbalanced title character. In the film, which many consider Cassavetes' best work,...
- 6/25/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
Peter Falk, who created one of the all-time great TV detectives on "Columbo" and was twice nominated for an Oscar, has died.
A family spokesperson says Falk, 83, died Thursday night (June 23) at his home in Beverly Hills. He had been suffering from dementia and Alzheimer's disease in recent years.
Falk is best known for his iconic role as Lt. Columbo, the disheveled, trench coat-wearing, constantly underestimated Lapd detective in the classic 1970s series. He won four Emmys for the role (and a fifth for an earlier role in an episode of "The Dick Powell Theatre"), most recently in 1990 after ABC revived the character.
His career stretched back to the late 1950s, and he was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar in two consecutive years, first for 1960's "Murder Inc." and then for 1961's "Pocketful of Miracles." He also worked with director John Cassavetes on several films, including "Husbands" and "A Woman Under the Influence.
A family spokesperson says Falk, 83, died Thursday night (June 23) at his home in Beverly Hills. He had been suffering from dementia and Alzheimer's disease in recent years.
Falk is best known for his iconic role as Lt. Columbo, the disheveled, trench coat-wearing, constantly underestimated Lapd detective in the classic 1970s series. He won four Emmys for the role (and a fifth for an earlier role in an episode of "The Dick Powell Theatre"), most recently in 1990 after ABC revived the character.
His career stretched back to the late 1950s, and he was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar in two consecutive years, first for 1960's "Murder Inc." and then for 1961's "Pocketful of Miracles." He also worked with director John Cassavetes on several films, including "Husbands" and "A Woman Under the Influence.
- 6/24/2011
- by editorial@zap2it.com
- Pop2it
Peter Falk, the Oscar-nominated and Emmy Award-winning actor best known for his portrayal of the raincoat-wearing, cigar smoking TV detective Columbo, died Thursday evening at his home in Beverly Hills, CA; he was 83. Though an exact cause of death was not released by his family, it had been known that Falk was suffering from Alzheimer's disease.
Though he received two Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor in 1960 and 1961 for Murder, Inc. and Pocketful of Miracles, and was an acclaimed stage actor, winning a Tony Award for 1972's The Prisoner of Second Avenue, he was known to millions as the irascible Lieutenant Columbo, one of television most beloved detectives, whose apparent absent-mindedness belied his cunning deductive skills and ease at outwitting even the most clever and devious of criminals. In all, he received four Emmy Awards and 10 nominations for the role, which he played from 1968 (in the TV film Prescription: Murder) to a special 2003 episode of the series.
Born in New York City in 1927, Falk underwent surgery at only the age of three to have his right eye removed because of a malignant tumor; for the rest of his life he would wear a glass eye, which became one of his most notable traits. Rejected by the armed forces because of his eyesight, he enlisted in the Merchant Marines during World War II, returning home to finish his college education, obtaining a master's degree in public administration and taking a job as an efficiency expert in Hartford, Connecticut in the early 1950s. It was there that he began his acting career, studying with the acclaimed actress and teacher Eva Le Gallienne. After moving to New York to pursue acting full time, he co-starred in the 1956 revival of The Iceman Cometh alongside Jason Robards, and was on Broadway within the same year, and started appearing on television as well. In the late '50s he took a number of small film roles, and was hailed by critics for his turn as a murderer in the 1960 gangster film Murder Inc., which proved to be his breakthrough role. An Oscar nomination followed, as did a role in Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles the next year, which was the acclaimed director's last film and for which Falk received a second Oscar nod.
With back-to-back Academy Award nominations and his first Emmy Award (for a 1961 episode of The Dick Powell Theater), Falk worked steadily throughout the 1960s in both television and film, with small roles in It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World and Robin and the 7 Hoods, and a starring role in the short-lived legal TV series The Trials of O'Brien. He first played the role of Lieutenant Columbo in the 1968 TV movie Prescription: Murder, which was originally written as a Broadway play and then reworked for television. The film set up a number of tropes for the upcoming TV series: the seeming ineptitude of detective Columbo and the intricate cat-and-mouse mysteries in which the killer, known to viewers, seemed to dance around the detective's bumbling investigations. Columbo became a TV series in 1971, with a young 25-year-old Steven Spielberg helming the very first episode. The series was an unqualified hit for NBC, and ran through 1977 in 90 or 120 minute movie-length segments that appeared every third week as part of the network's "Sunday Mystery Movie" series, with a wide variety of acclaimed guest stars. Even after it went off the air, it spawned the short-lived Mrs. Columbo (based on the detective's unseen wife), starring a young Kate Mulgrew.
While becoming one of the signature television stars of the 1970s, Falk also appeared on the big screen in two of close friend John Cassavetes' films, Husbands (1970) and the Oscar-nominated A Woman Under the Influence (1971). Falk also played a Sam Spade-style detective in the comedy Murder By Death, and also starred in The Brink's Job (1978), The Cheap Detective (also 1978), and The In-Laws (1979). After the Columbo series came to a close in 1977, Falk continued acting in film, appearing in two highly notable roles in 1987: the storybook-reading Grandfather in Rob Reiner's The Princess Bride, and an acclaimed turn as a slightly modified version of himself as a man who converses with angels in Wim Wender's Wings of Desire. He returned to the role of Columbo in 1989 when ABC began commission TV movies centered on the character that would appear twice a year. After his last Columbo turn in 2003, Falk appeared sporadically in film and TV, his last role in the 2009 indie comedy American Cowslip.
In December 2008, his daughter Catherine Falk had filed court documents stating her father suffered from Alzheimer's Disease and petitioned to be his guardian; he is survived by his two daughters and wife, Shera.
Though he received two Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor in 1960 and 1961 for Murder, Inc. and Pocketful of Miracles, and was an acclaimed stage actor, winning a Tony Award for 1972's The Prisoner of Second Avenue, he was known to millions as the irascible Lieutenant Columbo, one of television most beloved detectives, whose apparent absent-mindedness belied his cunning deductive skills and ease at outwitting even the most clever and devious of criminals. In all, he received four Emmy Awards and 10 nominations for the role, which he played from 1968 (in the TV film Prescription: Murder) to a special 2003 episode of the series.
Born in New York City in 1927, Falk underwent surgery at only the age of three to have his right eye removed because of a malignant tumor; for the rest of his life he would wear a glass eye, which became one of his most notable traits. Rejected by the armed forces because of his eyesight, he enlisted in the Merchant Marines during World War II, returning home to finish his college education, obtaining a master's degree in public administration and taking a job as an efficiency expert in Hartford, Connecticut in the early 1950s. It was there that he began his acting career, studying with the acclaimed actress and teacher Eva Le Gallienne. After moving to New York to pursue acting full time, he co-starred in the 1956 revival of The Iceman Cometh alongside Jason Robards, and was on Broadway within the same year, and started appearing on television as well. In the late '50s he took a number of small film roles, and was hailed by critics for his turn as a murderer in the 1960 gangster film Murder Inc., which proved to be his breakthrough role. An Oscar nomination followed, as did a role in Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles the next year, which was the acclaimed director's last film and for which Falk received a second Oscar nod.
With back-to-back Academy Award nominations and his first Emmy Award (for a 1961 episode of The Dick Powell Theater), Falk worked steadily throughout the 1960s in both television and film, with small roles in It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World and Robin and the 7 Hoods, and a starring role in the short-lived legal TV series The Trials of O'Brien. He first played the role of Lieutenant Columbo in the 1968 TV movie Prescription: Murder, which was originally written as a Broadway play and then reworked for television. The film set up a number of tropes for the upcoming TV series: the seeming ineptitude of detective Columbo and the intricate cat-and-mouse mysteries in which the killer, known to viewers, seemed to dance around the detective's bumbling investigations. Columbo became a TV series in 1971, with a young 25-year-old Steven Spielberg helming the very first episode. The series was an unqualified hit for NBC, and ran through 1977 in 90 or 120 minute movie-length segments that appeared every third week as part of the network's "Sunday Mystery Movie" series, with a wide variety of acclaimed guest stars. Even after it went off the air, it spawned the short-lived Mrs. Columbo (based on the detective's unseen wife), starring a young Kate Mulgrew.
While becoming one of the signature television stars of the 1970s, Falk also appeared on the big screen in two of close friend John Cassavetes' films, Husbands (1970) and the Oscar-nominated A Woman Under the Influence (1971). Falk also played a Sam Spade-style detective in the comedy Murder By Death, and also starred in The Brink's Job (1978), The Cheap Detective (also 1978), and The In-Laws (1979). After the Columbo series came to a close in 1977, Falk continued acting in film, appearing in two highly notable roles in 1987: the storybook-reading Grandfather in Rob Reiner's The Princess Bride, and an acclaimed turn as a slightly modified version of himself as a man who converses with angels in Wim Wender's Wings of Desire. He returned to the role of Columbo in 1989 when ABC began commission TV movies centered on the character that would appear twice a year. After his last Columbo turn in 2003, Falk appeared sporadically in film and TV, his last role in the 2009 indie comedy American Cowslip.
In December 2008, his daughter Catherine Falk had filed court documents stating her father suffered from Alzheimer's Disease and petitioned to be his guardian; he is survived by his two daughters and wife, Shera.
- 6/24/2011
- IMDb News
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