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John Wells
Biography
Wells started in cabaret at Oxford and began his television career as a writer on That Was The Week That Was, the 1960s weekly satire show that launched the careers of David Frost and Millicent Martin, among others, and also appeared in the television programme Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life, as well as in The Secret Policeman's Other Ball. Besides making cameo appearances in films such as Casino Royale (1967) and Rentadick (1972), television dramas like Casanova (1987), an episode of Lovejoy (1991) and comedy shows like Yes Minister, he also wrote television scripts and screenplays, such as Princess Caraboo (1994).
In 1971, with John Fortune, he published the comedy classic A Melon for Ecstasy, about a man who consummates his love affair with a tree. Wells played the headmaster of Thursgood's Preparatory School in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979).
Wells was one of the original contributors to the satirical magazine Private Eye and contributed to Mrs Wilson's Diary, the long-running spoof journal of the wife of Prime Minister Harold Wilson.
From 1979 he repeated that success with Dear Bill, a series of letters (co-written with Richard Ingrams) supposedly sent by Denis Thatcher, husband of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, to Bill Deedes. Wells developed the feature into a stage farce, Anyone for Denis?, first performed in 1981, in which he played Denis Thatcher. Co-starring Angela Thorne as Mrs. Thatcher, the play was a major West End hit, toured the UK and was adapted for television.He co-wrote Alice in Wonderland, a musical adaptation of Lewis Carrol’s novel with Carl Davis, which debuted at The Lyric Theatre in the West End, London.[3]
Wells also played Denis Thatcher in the Bond movie For Your Eyes Only (1981). In 1991, he and Thorne again played the Thatchers in Dunrulin, a one-off TV sitcom-like satirical look at the couple in retirement.[4] He also voiced Arnold the Elephant, Edward the Monkey and Bert in the children's TV series Charlie Chalk.
In 1988, Leonard Bernstein started working on a new version of his much-revised operetta Candide. The author of the original book, Hugh Wheeler, had died, and John Wells was asked to help revise the text.[5] The first production of this "final version", by Scottish Opera, was followed by a "final revised version" in 1989, performances of which have been released on CD and DVD. An insert in the DVD ("Bernstein and Voltaire"), written by Wells, explained what Bernstein had wanted in this final revised version.
Wells authored Rude Words in 1991, a history of the London Library, for the institution's 150th anniversary.
In 1997, Wells appeared in the BBC situation comedy Chalk as ineffectual headmaster Richard Nixon.[6] His fellow cast members do not recall him being ill on set, but he was too unwell to participate in the second series.[7]
Wells' last book, House of Lords, was a best-seller and published a year before his death in 1998. The book is a historical and humorous study of the British peerage system.
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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 October 31, 2020, it was announced that Connery had died at the age of 90.
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Ysabel Ortega
Biography
Maria Ysabel Ortega Lapid (born on January 25, 1999 in Laoag City, Ilocos Norte), better known as Ysabel Ortega, is a Filipino actress, commercial model, singer, and dancer.
She made her first appearance in the 2015 series On the Wings of Love, while her breakthrough roles include Pusong Ligaw, Precious Hearts Romances Presents: Araw Gabi, and #JusticeForLove: End of the World.
In 2022, Ortega appeared as Cynthia Macaraeg in What We Could Be, in her first lead role. She is currently starring as Jamie Robinson in Voltes V: Legacy, a live-action Philippine adaptation of the Japanese anime series of the same name by Toei Animation.
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Rhys Nicholson
Biography
Rhys Nicholson is an Australian comedian and actor known for being a judge on RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under from 2021 onwards.
In 2011, Nicholson was featured in the ABC documentary GayCrashers alongside Joel Creasey, in which the duo travelled to the small town of Colac and performed a stand-up show. Creasey had been the subject of a homophobic attack on an earlier visit to the town.
Rhys Nicholson stars on the show The Weekly with Charlie Pickering.
In 2016, to highlight the importance of marriage equality in Australia, Nicholson publicly married lesbian and fellow comedian Zoe Coombs Marr at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. That year Nicholson and Coombs Marr were also both nominated for the Barry Award for Best Show, which Coombs Marr won.
In 2021, Nicholson served as a judge on RuPaul's Drag Race Down Under, alongside RuPaul and Michelle Visage. The same year they appeared on the panel show Patriot Brains. In 2022, they played Doctor Sarkov in Netflix's Science-Fiction series The Imperfects.
In February 2024, Nicholson will be a contestant on the second series of Taskmaster Australia.
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Aurora Rosselli
Biography
Aurora Rosselli is an Artist, Photographer, Designer, Influencer, and Entrepreneur. Born and raised in Italy, she began her education at the Liceo Artistico and became devoted to the world of Art. After that, she enrolled at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Catania, where she continued gathering the tools necessary to express her passions you see today throughout her original artwork. She quickly gained popularity in Italy and later on her artwork was displayed in exhibits across Europe and the US. The extensive, formal background she gained of fine arts is today incorporated into her entrepreneurial perspective and has enhanced rather than formed her artistic viewpoint capturing the beautiful Art of everyday scenery and culture in her work.
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Haruka Nagashima
Biography
Haruka Nagashima (長嶋 はるか, Nagashima Haruka, September 21, 1987 – May 30, 2021) was a Japanese voice actress and singer. In the early days, she was active under her real name, Haruka Nagashima (長嶋 陽香). She was born in a hospital in Yamagata Prefecture. She moved to Tokyo shortly after she was born.
After graduating from the training school Human Academy, she joined the agency Three Tree. She made her debut as a voice actress in 2009, and her debut as a singer in September of the same year with the single RAY!Flower. On June 11, 2021, her agency announced that she had passed away on May 30, 2021, while undergoing medical treatment. She died at the age of 33.
Her special skills included dancing and singing. Her hobbies were watching idols and appreciating the beauty of form. Her role model was voice actress Nana Mizuki.
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Daniel Laurie
Biography
Daniel Laurie is a supervising sound editor, based at Skywalker Sound. He began his career working in the cutting rooms at Soho and at Pinewood Studios in the UK, where he developed his focus on dialogue, ADR, and supervising sound editing. Over the course of his career, he has contributed to more than 50 films, spanning smaller, independent, dialogue-driven features to large-scale, effects-heavy blockbusters.
Among his most prominent credits are several films in the Marvel Studios franchise, where he served as supervising sound editor. These include Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Doctor Strange (2016), Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), and Avengers: Endgame (2019). He also began by working on earlier British films, including Die Another Day (2002) and The Dreamers (2003), early in his career.
His work has been formally recognised with major awards and nominations. He won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Miniseries, Movie or a Special for Hemingway & Gellhorn (2012), shared with colleagues Douglas Murray, Pete Horner, Kim Foscato, Steve Boeddeker, Casey Langfelder, Andrea Gard, Pat Jackson, Goro Koyama, Andy Malcolm, and Joanie Diener. He was also nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy or Drama Series (Half-Hour) for Agatha All Along (2024), shared with Kim Foscato, Paula Fairfield, Richard Gould, Jacob Riehle, Andre Zweers, Kim B. Christensen, Fernand Bos, Mary Parker, Jana Vance, and Ronni Brown.
In addition to his Emmy honours, he was on the nominations list for the Motion Picture Sound Editors (MPSE) Golden Reel Awards in several categories, including for films such as Avengers: Endgame.
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Maria Tucci
Biography
Tucci made her Broadway debut in 1963, in The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore. She has fourteen Broadway credits. Principal roles include Rose Delle Rose opposite Maureen Stapleton in the 1966 production of The Rose Tattoo by Tennessee Williams. In 1967, she starred as Alexandra Giddens in a revival of The Little Foxes by Lillian Hellman, with Anne Bancroft as her mother. In 1969, she was a replacement for Jane Alexander in The Great White Hope. In 1988, she starred in a revival of The Night of the Iguana as Hannah Jelkes. In 2009, she appeared in the production of Mary Stuart as Hanna.
Tucci began appearing in film in 1969. Her first credits were in Robert Frank's Me and My Brother and a CBS Playhouse production titled Shadow Game. She played Lisa in Sidney Lumet's 1983 film Daniel. In Gus Van Sant's 1995 film To Die For she portrayed Angela Maretto.
She was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play in 1967 for her performance in The Rose Tattoo. She played Koula in the 2015 mini-series The Slap. She also won an OBIE award for her performance as Phaedo in "Talk" by Carl Hancock Rux at the Joseph Papp Public Theater.
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Tony Bennett
Biography
Anthony Dominick Benedetto (August 3, 1926 - July 21, 2023), known professionally as Tony Bennett, was an American singer of popular music, standards, show tunes, and jazz.
Raised in New York City, Bennett began singing at an early age. He fought in the final stages of World War II as an infantryman with the U.S. Army in the European Theatre. Afterwards, he developed his singing technique, signed with Columbia Records, and had his first number one popular song with "Because of You" in 1951. Several top hits such as "Rags to Riches" followed in the early 1950s. Bennett then further refined his approach to encompass jazz singing. He reached an artistic peak in the late 1950s with albums such as The Beat of My Heart and Basie Swings, Bennett Sings. In 1962, Bennett recorded his signature song, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco". His career and his personal life then suffered an extended downturn during the height of the rock music era.
Bennett staged a remarkable comeback in the late 1980s and 1990s, putting out gold record albums again and expanding his audience to the MTV Generation while keeping his musical style intact. He remains a popular and critically praised recording artist and concert performer in the 2000s. Bennett has won fifteen Grammy Awards, two Emmy Awards, been named an NEA Jazz Master and a Kennedy Center Honoree. He has sold over 50 million records worldwide. Bennett is also a serious and accomplished painter, creating works under the name Benedetto that are on permanent public display in several institutions. He is also the founder of Frank Sinatra School of the Arts in Astoria, Queens.
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Nancy Reagan
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nancy Davis Reagan (born Anne Frances Robbins; July 6, 1921 – March 6, 2016) was an American film actress and the wife of Ronald Reagan, the 40th President of the United States. She served as the First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989. Davis' film career began with small supporting roles in two films that were released in 1949, The Doctor and the Girl with Glenn Ford and East Side, West Side starring Barbara Stanwyck. She played a child psychiatrist in the film noir Shadow on the Wall (1950) with Ann Sothern and Zachary Scott; her performance was called "beautiful and convincing" by New York Times critic A. H. Weiler. She co-starred in 1950's The Next Voice You Hear..., playing a pregnant housewife who hears the voice of God from her radio. Influential reviewer Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that "Nancy Davis [is] delightful as [a] gentle, plain, and understanding wife." In 1951, Davis appeared in Night into Morning, her favorite screen role, a study of bereavement starring Ray Milland. Crowther said that Davis "does nicely as the fiancée who is widowed herself and knows the loneliness of grief," while another noted critic, The Washington Post's Richard L. Coe, said Davis "is splendid as the understanding widow." MGM released Davis from her contract in 1952; she sought a broader range of parts, but also married Reagan, keeping her professional name as Davis, and had her first child that year. She soon starred in the science fiction film Donovan's Brain (1953); Crowther said that Davis, playing the role of a possessed scientist's "sadly baffled wife," "walked through it all in stark confusion" in an "utterly silly" film. In her next-to-last movie, Hellcats of the Navy (1957), she played nurse Lieutenant Helen Blair, and appeared in a film for the only time with her husband, playing what one critic called "a housewife who came along for the ride." Another reviewer, however, stated that Davis plays her part satisfactorily, and "does well with what she has to work with."
Author Garry Wills has said that Davis was generally underrated as an actress because her constrained part in Hellcats was her most widely seen performance. In addition, Davis downplayed her Hollywood goals: promotional material from MGM in 1949 said that her "greatest ambition" was to have a "successful happy marriage"; decades later, in 1975, she would say, "I was never really a career woman but [became one] only because I hadn't found the man I wanted to marry. I couldn't sit around and do nothing, so I became an actress." Ronald Reagan biographer Lou Cannon nevertheless characterized her as a "reliable" and "solid" performer who held her own in performances with better-known actors. After her final film, Crash Landing (1958), Davis appeared for a brief time as a guest star in television dramas, such as the Zane Grey Theatre episode "The Long Shadow" (1961), where she played opposite Ronald Reagan, as well as Wagon Train and The Tall Man, until she retired as an actress in 1962.
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