R.i.p 2010

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Little Feat co-founder Richie Hayward dies at the age of 64


NEW YORK (AP) — Richie Hayward, co-founder of the Little Feat, an eclectic jamband that maintained a strong cult following throughout the decades, has died.

He was 64.

The drummer had been suffering from liver cancer and died Thursday at a hospital near Vancouver, Canada, after complications of pneumonia, his publicist, Bridget Nolan, confirmed Friday.

"He was waiting for a liver transplant," Nolan said. Over the past year, benefits had been staged on Hayward's behalf; he had no health insurance.

In a letter to fans last August, Hayward wrote about his predicament, but sounded hopeful: "My intent is to come back to the band, as soon as I am physically able. Your love and support will mean a lot to me, more than I can say. I love and will miss you all, and I will see you again on the proud highway."

He last performed with the band on July 11.

Hayward helped form Little Feat in 1969, along with frontman Lowell George, Bill Payne and Roy Estrada. The jamband mixed a variety of genres including rock, country, jazz and blues, and were known for songs like "Willin." The group fell apart in 1979 after George died, but reformed in 1987, and had been a fixture on the touring circuit.

Besides his work with Little Feat, Hayward also performed with acts including Eric Clapton, Robert Plant, Buddy Guy and Barbra Streisand.

He is survived by his wife, Shauna Drayson-Heyward, and eight children.

[newb]

Originally Posted by _____V_____

Little Feat co-founder Richie Hayward dies at the age of 64


NEW YORK (AP) — Richie Hayward, co-founder of the Little Feat, an eclectic jamband that maintained a strong cult following throughout the decades, has died.

He was 64.

The drummer had been suffering from liver cancer and died Thursday at a hospital near Vancouver, Canada, after complications of pneumonia, his publicist, Bridget Nolan, confirmed Friday.

"He was waiting for a liver transplant," Nolan said. Over the past year, benefits had been staged on Hayward's behalf; he had no health insurance.

In a letter to fans last August, Hayward wrote about his predicament, but sounded hopeful: "My intent is to come back to the band, as soon as I am physically able. Your love and support will mean a lot to me, more than I can say. I love and will miss you all, and I will see you again on the proud highway."

He last performed with the band on July 11.

Hayward helped form Little Feat in 1969, along with frontman Lowell George, Bill Payne and Roy Estrada. The jamband mixed a variety of genres including rock, country, jazz and blues, and were known for songs like "Willin." The group fell apart in 1979 after George died, but reformed in 1987, and had been a fixture on the touring circuit.

Besides his work with Little Feat, Hayward also performed with acts including Eric Clapton, Robert Plant, Buddy Guy and Barbra Streisand.

He is survived by his wife, Shauna Drayson-Heyward, and eight children.

bummer....one of my favs

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George Alan Hume, cinematographer, born 16 October 1924; died 13 July 2010


Despite, or because of, the ancient, dirty jokes, schoolboy humour, double entendres, and a string of hammy actors tele- graphing each jest with pursed lips, rolling eyes or a snigger, the Carry On films have an army of devotees.

Among the most regular actors were Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Sid James, Joan Sims and Kenneth Connor, and behind the camera, on almost all of the 30 Carry On movies, was the cinematographer Alan Hume, who has died aged 85.

Hume started as camera operator on the very first, Carry On Sergeant (1958), soon becoming director of photography (DP) on Carry On Regardless (1961), and continuing as DP until Carry On Columbus (1992) ended the franchise. Though few would make any artistic claims for the films, they were competently shot, rapidly, on a shoestring. Because of the rapport Hume built up over a long period with the producer Peter Rogers and the director Gerald Thomas – he worked with them for years without a contract – he knew exactly what was required.

In the foreword to Hume's autobiography, A Life Through the Lens: Memoirs of a Film Cameraman (2004), Rogers explained: "I have known Alan Hume almost as long as I know myself. I've known him as a giggling camera operator and as one of the film industry's foremost lighting cameramen. I say giggling operator because when we were working on the early Carry On films, he giggled so much … that he had to leave the stage to recover. I've also known him as a non-giggling operator as, for instance, when he was shooting a scene … hanging out of a doorless helicopter and holding a handheld camera."

The latter referred to Hume's second-unit filming of the spectacular pre-credit sequence of The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), in which James Bond (the stuntman Rick Sylvester standing in for Roger Moore), chased by baddies on skis, leaps off a cliff and opens up a Union Jack parachute. It was shot high on a mountain on Baffin Island, north Canada, after weeks of waiting for the weather to clear, so it had to be done in one take. "After so many weeks of preparing and anticipating this jump, I suddenly felt the blood rush from my face," Hume wrote. "This was it, and it was a far cry from my working diet of comedy and modest-budget dramas back in London."

Hume went on to be the daring cinematographer on three more Bonds, all starring Moore and directed by John Glen: For Your Eyes Only (1981), Octopussy (1983) and A View to a Kill (1985), each offering the well-tried formula of gals, guns, villains and glossy locations.

Hume, who was born in London, started in films as a clapper boy at Denham Studios, his first job being on Leslie Howard's The First of the Few (1942). A few films later, he was promoted to first assistant camera operator before being called up to serve in the Royal Navy during the second world war. "I was in the photographic unit. I learned more about photography in the navy than anywhere else."

Hume returned to Denham, then Pinewood, where he was assistant to the cinematographer Guy Green on David Lean's Great Expectations (1946) and Oliver Twist (1948). From 1953 to 1960, he was chief camera operator on dozens of British films, then DP mostly on the Carry Ons, with a couple of grisly horror films – Dr Terror's House of Horrors (1965) and From Beyond the Grave (1973) – thrown in.

In 1983, Hume was given the job of DP on the Star Wars film Return of the Jedi, although he fell out with the producers when he protested about what he felt was their mistreatment of the director Richard Marquand and was replaced by his assistant Alec Mills. It was one of his very few Hollywood movies.

Among Hume's best work was Andrei Konchalovsky's Runaway Train (1985), shot in freezing conditions in Canada and Iceland, on a real train. Also to be commended was his camerawork for two veteran directors of British cinema, Lewis Gilbert (Shirley Valentine, 1989; Stepping Out, 1991), and Charles Crichton (A Fish Called Wanda, 1988).

Hume was elected to the British Society of Cinematographers in 1964, serving as president for three years.

He is survived by his wife, Sheila, and three children. His eldest son, Lindsey, a film editor, died in 1967. His other sons, Martin and Simon, and a grandson, Lewis, are camera operators, while his daughter Pauline is a titles designer.

[crabapple]

Here's to Alan Hume, one of the great, great cinematographers. His work always impressed me. RIP Alan Hume.

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Satoshi Kon, the Japanese director of animated films such as Tokyo Godfathers, Millennium Actress and the Inception-influencing Paprika, has died at the young age of 47.

The director reportedly lost a battle with cancer.

This marks the untimely death of the filmmaker second only to Hayao Miyazaki in making inroads for anime films both internationally and as weighty works of cinema worthy of serious critical consideration.

News of the director’s passing originally came via a tweet from Takeda Yasuhiro, then confirmed by other sources, such as the UK Anime Network.

From the 1998 Hitchcockian tale of a menaced pop idol "Perfect Blue" to 2001's look into the life of a aging performer "Millennium Actress" to 2006's saga of shared dreams (out-"Inception"ing "Inception") "Paprika," Kon was fond of exploring and blurring the lines between reality, memory and dreams. These are themes animation is particularly suited to, and ones that can be seen early in his career, in the "Magnetic Rose" segment of omnibus film "Memories," for which he wrote the screenplay, and later in "Paranoia Agent," the series he created.

2003's "Tokyo Godfathers" was his lone linear narrative, though it too was a complicated story of three homeless people with loaded pasts who discover a baby in the trash on Christmas Eve. These are grown-up features all, ones that use the visual freedom of their medium to inventive, sometimes astonishing (particularly in "Paprika") effect.

Kon was working on his fifth feature, "The Dream Machine," which he described to an interviewer as a "like a 'road movie' for robots."

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Sad to report that Ahna Capri was killed in a car accident over the weekend in LA. The Hungarian actress, born Anna Marie Nanasi, lost consciousness following a traffic accident in Los Angeles on 9 August in which a five-ton truck collided with her car.

The 64 year old spent 11 days in a coma in hospital before doctors turned off her life support machine on 20 August.

She began as a child actress in the 50s and morphed into a sexy 60s starlet who resembled a cross between Sandra Dee and Joey Heatherton. Using the name Anna Capri, she appeared in such films as Kisses for My President and The Girls on the Beach (co-star Gail Gerber remembers Anna as "such a lovely girl. I remember when first meeting her I couldn't believe how beautiful she was.")

She popped up all over TV in such series as The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Wild Wild West, The Invaders, Run for Your Life, and It Takes a Thief. In the 70s, a la Mariana Hill, she changed her name also to Ahna Capri (she remarked, "Too many people pronounce 'Anna' with a flat 'a' and it comes out as ugly 'Aaana.'") and began to show the world she had more talent than previously being given credit especially in the underrated Payday (1972) opposite Rip Torn as one bastard of a country-western singer.

She reached cult status with her appearance in Enter the Dragon (1973) with Bruce Lee and as The Specialist (1975) a sexy assassin for hire.

Ahna Capri retired from acting in 1979.

[zwoti]

Clive Donner

[cheebacheeba]

R.I.P to the founder of the Donner Kebab.

[TheWickerFan]

R.I.P. Kevin McCarthy

[crabapple]

Yes. Hats off, to the great, Kevin McCarthy.