In Memory Of ...

[Lando Griffin]

Tony Lewis, singer for the Outfield, dies at 62.

http://rollingstone.com/music/music-news/tony-lewis-the-outfield-dead-obituary-1078460/

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[Dunderklumpen]

Sean Connery, Oscar Winner and James Bond Star, Dies at 90

Sean Connery, the Scottish-born actor who rocketed to fame as James Bond and became one of the movies’ most popular and enduring international stars, has died. He was 90.

Connery, long regarded as one of the best actors to have portrayed the iconic spy, was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2000 and marked his 90th birthday only in August. His death was confirmed by his family, according to the BBC, which notes that the actor died in his sleep while in the Bahamas. He had been unwell for some time.

Connery was an audience favorite for more than 40 years and one of the screen’s most reliable and distinctive leading men. Once pigeonholed as Ian Fleming’s sexy Agent 007, he went on to distinguish himself with a long and mature career in such films as “The Wind and the Lion,” “The Man Who Would Be King” and “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.”



His turn as a tough Irish cop in Depression-era Chicago in Brian De Palma’s “The Untouchables” (1987) brought him a supporting actor Oscar.

Even as he entered his seventh decade, Connery’s star power remained so strong that he was constantly in demand and handsomely remunerated. In 1999 he was selected People magazine’s Sexiest Man of the Century, and from his 007 days to “Entrapment” (1999), opposite the much-younger Catherine Zeta-Jones, his screen roles more than justified the choice. Age seemed only to intensify his sex appeal and virility.

In his early career, his physique was his main asset as he modeled and picked up acting jobs where he could. In 1956, he landed the role of a battered prizefighter in the BBC production of “Requiem for a Heavyweight.” Good notices brought him to the attention of the entertainment community, and his first film was “No Road Back,” a B crime movie in 1956. He seemed doomed to play the hunk to ageing leading ladies, as he did opposite Lana Turner in “Another Time, Another Place,” or roles that stressed his looks such as “Tarzan’s Great Adventure” in 1959.

It was easy to dismiss him in films like “Darby O’Gill and the Little People,” but his Count Vronsky to Claire Bloom’s Anna Karenina on the BBC brought him some respect and the kind of attention needed to raise him to the top of the Daily Express’ poll of readers asked to suggest the ideal James Bond.

After an interview with producers Albert Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, he landed the role without a screen test, according to Saltzman. It was a controversial choice at the time, as Connery was an unknown outside Britain. But 1962’s “Dr. No,” the first of the Bond films, made him an international star.

His stature grew with the ever more popular sequels “From Russia With Love,” “Goldfinger” and “Thunderball,” which arrived over the next four years. Bond gave Connery a license to earn; he was paid only $30,000 for “Dr. No” but $400,000 for Alfred Hitchcock’s “Marnie” and was soon getting $750,000 a film.

His initial efforts to break out of the Bond mold, however, proved fruitless. Films like “A Fine Madness,” “Shalako” and “The Molly Maguires” were well-intentioned attempts that did nothing to shake Connery as Bond from the public consciousness. After 1967’s “You Only Live Twice,” he left the Bond franchise, but he was coaxed back for 1971’s “Diamonds Are Forever.” He looked old for the role, and the series seemed tired, so with that, he left Bond behind — though money would tempt him back once last time in 1983 for “Never Say Never Again.”

He took a major misstep with sci-fi film “Zardoz,” and his career seemed to be foundering.

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Sean Connery and Luciana Paoluzzi filming “Thunderball” at Pinewood Studios in the U.K. (AP)
But he bounced back in 1974 with a supporting role in “Murder on the Orient Express” and the following year with “The Wind and the Lion” and “The Man Who Would Be King,” two bold adventures featuring a mature, salt-and-pepper-bearded Connery. “Robin and Marian” (1976) opposite Audrey Hepburn was not a popular success, but critics embraced it, and the film cemented Connery’s reputation as a versatile, serious screen actor.

In the late 1970s, there were more missteps such as “Meteor,” “A Bridge Too Far” and “Cuba.” But he scored in Terry Gilliam’s “Time Bandits.” It wasn’t until after his last Bond film that his standing as a box office star caught up to his critical reputation, thanks mostly to two huge worldwide hits: “Highlander,” which was not a big hit in the U.S., and “The Name of the Rose,” which was also much more popular abroad.

BAFTA gave him a best actor award for “Name of the Rose,” and he received his Oscar for “The Untouchables.” After that, he was an instant greenlight any time he agreed to take a role even if some of them, such as “The Presidio,” and “Family Business,” were not so hot.

Pairing Connery and Harrison Ford as father and son in the third “Indiana Jones” film was an inspired move, and the film grossed almost half a billion dollars worldwide.

Meanwhile, “The Hunt for Red October,” in which Connery played a defecting Soviet sub captain, was also a major hit in 1990.

By the 1990s, he was so popular that his uncredited cameo as King Richard in “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves” became one of the film’s highlights.

He was still a force to contend with in the foreign market, as “Highlander 2,” “Medicine Man,” “Rising Sun,” “Just Cause” and “First Knight” proved over the next several years. His salary was regularly $5 million and above.

One setback was a bout with throat cancer in the early 1990s, but Connery rebounded with a burst of activity. He starred with Nicolas Cage in 1996 actioner “The Rock,” playing a character that drew more than a little on his history as James Bond. In 2000, he essayed a very different role and received positive reviews for “Finding Forrester,” playing a reclusive writer who bonds with a young black basketball player who’s an aspiring scribe himself.

Nevertheless, he continued with action roles well after his 70th birthday, playing the legendary adventurer Allan Quatermain in 2003’s “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.” He announced his retirement in 2005. He voiced a James Bond videogame the same year, and he subsequently did some other voice acting, playing the title character in the animated short “Sir Billi the Vet” and reprising the role in 2010 for “Sir Billi,” which he also exec produced.

Thomas Sean Connery was born of Irish ancestry in the slums of Edinburgh. Poverty robbed him of an education, and by his teens he’d left school and was working as an unskilled laborer.

At 17, he was drafted into the Royal Navy, but he was discharged three years later due to a serious case of ulcers.

He returned to Edinburgh and worked a variety of jobs, including as a lifeguard. He took up bodybuilding and placed third in the 1950 Mr. Universe competition.

After moving to London, he learned of an opening in the chorus of “South Pacific.” He took a crash dancing and singing course and, surprisingly, landed the role, in which he stayed for 18 months. He was “hooked,” he said, but spent several years paying his dues in small repertory companies in and around London before anyone else became hooked on him.

Connery was devoted to his native Scotland and used his stature to press for the re-establishment of a Scottish parliament. When the body reconvened in 1999, 296 years after its last meeting, Connery was invited to address the first session, where he was greeted with a thunderous ovation. The next year, when he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II — an honor he called “one of the proudest days of my life” — he asked that the investiture be performed in Edinburgh.

Connery published his autobiography, “Being a Scot,” co-written with Murray Grigor, in 2008. Besides his knighthood and his Academy Award, he received many kudos over his long career, including the Kennedy Center Honors in 1999 and the American Film Institute’s lifetime achievement award in 2006.

Connery was married to actress Diane Cilento from 1962-73. The couple divorced in 1973 and Cilento died in 2011. Connery is survived by his second wife, painter Micheline Roquebrune, whom he married in 1975; his son by Cilento, actor Jason Connery; and a grandson from Jason’s marriage to actress Mia Sara.

[Dunderklumpen]

90 years is a ripe old age.

It certainly looks like they had time to prepare the obituary.

Sean Connery will always be the only "real" James Bond to me. The charachter doesn't make much sense to me outside of the 60s.

“Name of the Rose” is probably my favorite non-bond film of his. Either that or “The Man Who Would Be King”. He made a lot of good stuf after bond.



"Zardoz" is probably the weirdest. Haha!

[SynchroDub]

RIP, Sir Sean.
You will certainly be missed a lot in this world.

He certainly made the best Bond ever. He had charisma, he was witty, funny and definitely very smart as Bond.
Only Pierce Brosnan managed to keep and bring the same Bond magic and formula as that of Sean in the late '90s, somehow
Daniel Craig, on the other hand, has made Bond look a lot like an old and tired Jason Bourne than anything else.
They should've just stopped the saga right after Pierce Brosnan left. As after Die Another Day, everything became just a boring drag.

[allworkboy]

RIP the only James Bond and Indiana Jones Father

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[allworkboy]

Dad will always know better, no matter how old you are.

Cool even when looking at death in the eyes!

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[pelham456]

Originally Posted by Dunderklumpen

Thomas Sean Connery was born of Irish ancestry in the slums of Edinburgh.

what the hell? we been hearing for 50 years that he was scottish!

to a yank like moi, ethnicity and nationality are one and the same (i'd have no problem calling pat morita, say, the quintessential american), but i didn't think brits and europeans thought this way. while sir sean may have been a scottish national -- and scotland-born -- would most ppl there really call an irishman the quintessential "scot"?!

[allworkboy]

http://dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/sir-sean-connery/index.html

[RedBeer]

Sean Connery was such a mainstay for me. If I was surfing and there was a Bond movie on, I dropped the remote. If you have not seen the Mike Myers tribute to Sir Sean you need to treat yourself:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=KQYp8xJ4kpo

[Gemini37]

Ken Hensley, co-funding former keyboardist with Uriah Heep, died at the age of 75 at home in Spain on Nov. 4, his brother confirmed.

Hensley wrote many of the band’s songs during his tenure from 1970 to 1980, performing guitar and lead vocals on a number of occasions. He later worked with W.A.S.P., Cinderella, Blackfoot and others following his departure and led his own band, Live Fire.

“I am writing this with a heavy heart to let you know that my brother Ken Hensley passed away peacefully on Wednesday evening,” Trevor Hensley wrote on Facebook. “His beautiful wife Monica was at his side and comforted Ken in his last few minutes with us. We are all devastated by this tragic and incredibly unexpected loss and ask that you please give us some space and time to come to terms with it.”

He noted that “Ken will be cremated in a private ceremony in Spain, so please don’t ask for information about a funeral. Ken has gone but he will never be forgotten and will always be in our hearts.”

In a statement, Uriah Heep said Hensley's death took place after a “very short illness," adding that he "was one of the most important musicians of the past half-century. His work with Uriah Heep in the 1970s helped to make the band hugely influential. … A very spiritual person, Hensley became an inspiration to many and known for encouraging talented artists.”

Band leader Mick Box said: “I am in deep shock at the news Ken Hensley has passed away, and my sincere condolences go to his family and wife Monica. Ken wrote some amazing songs in his tenure with the band, and they will remain a musical legacy that will be in people’s hearts forever.”

In an interview with Eonmusic last month, Hensley explained why he had no writing credits on Uriah Heep’s debut album, Very ‘Easy, Very ‘Umble. "When I joined the band, I had a publishing contract with another publisher, which meant they had to hide my name," he explained. "I did, in fact, write songs for the first album, but we just weren't allowed to publicize it, and so it was disguised under Paul Newton's name.”

He noted that the "reason I became the dominant writer was because I always wrote a lot of songs. In the days of vinyl, you could only put eight or nine tracks on an album, and I would go in with 10, 12, 15 songs, and the other guys would bring maybe one or two, so naturally, that's the way it came out.”

Hensley left Uriah Heep after becoming disillusioned with lineup changes, and said, despite a reunion show in Russia in 2015, he had no desire to return. “But to think about what we achieved together and the things that we did and everything else, it still puts a smile on my face,” he said.

The cause of Hensley's death was not revealed. He had recently finished writing a memoir titled My Book of Answers, which is set for publication in February.

http://ultimateclassicrock.com/uriah-heep-ken-hensley-dead/