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Luis Fernando Midence
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Luis Fernando Midence is an independent writer, director, and producer from Guatemala. He is the founder of the production company GuatGuy Media, a platform dedicated to exploring identity, visual storytelling, and Central American LGBTQ+ cinema. Midence is known for directing the landmark short film "Sin ruta" (2012), recognized as the first Guatemalan film to feature an openly queer character. His expanding filmography focuses deeply on queer narratives, featuring acclaimed works such as "Primero-Verdadero-Último" (2017), "Las cosas que no decimos" (2019), and "Un año sin sombra" (2025). Through his work with GuatGuy Media, Midence continues to pioneer authentic LGBTQ+ representation in regional independent cinema.
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Sean Connery
Biography
Sir Thomas Sean Connery (August 25, 1930 – October 31, 2020) was a Scottish actor and producer. He 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, Connery died at the age of 90.
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Raïna Raï
Biography
Raïna Raï (Arabic: راينا راي) is an Algerian raï music group. Originally from Sidi Bel-Abbès, their style of music mixes raï, rock and diwane. It merges traditional rhythms and instruments with rock instruments. His most popular hits include: "Zina", "Hagda" and "Til Taila"...
The Raïna Raï group was created in December 1980 in Paris by four musicians from Sidi Bel Abbès in Algeria. This group was launched by former singers of the groups Les Aigles Noirs and Les Basiles under the leadership of Tarik Chikhi. He made his appearance during a support concert on Radio Soleil radio station. Its founding members are Tarik Naïmi Chikhi, Kaddour Bouchentouf, Lotfi Attar and Hachemi Djellouli. A few months later, Raïna Raï joined Djilali Rezkallah as a singer, replacing Kada.
They cover old songs from the group Les Aigles Noirs and others like the hit “Zina” by singer Kadri Dziri and “Hmama” by Blaoui Houari. Raïna Raï released her first album in 1982, "Ya Zina Diri Latay", then the following year a second, "Hagda". In 1985, he released his third album, "Rana Hna". In 1985, the legendary Algerian group Raïna Raï disbanded. Lotfi Attar, guitarist and founder of Raïna Raï created with his wife Hamida, the group Amarna, for which he composes the music, she will be the lyricist. The texts created by Hamida Attar for Amarna were inspired by lyric poetry and Djilali Amarna will be the singer of the group. Amarna will publish four albums: "Chouli" (1986) "Saf" (1986), "Waïle" (1987) and "El Ghaba" (1989). Hachemi Djellouli, returned from France, joins Amarna. For a while, they composed under the name of Lotfi and Hachemi. Amarna recorded a lot of success and during the dark decade in Algeria, Lotfi and his group took risks by going on stage all over Algeria. Raïna Raï group reformed in 2001, and released the premonitory album entitled "Bye Bye" which concluded a long break in the history of the group. The same year, Lotfi Attar formed the “New Amarnas” troupe. The group was made up of young artists, but was unable to establish itself on the front of the stage. The group reformed in 2011 with new sounds. The group has never stopped recomposing itself since its creation, through numerous separations and reformations. The group's notoriety then goes beyond the borders of Algeria, the group is listened to all around the world. The group's historic singer, Djilali Rezkellah (aka Djilali Amarna) died in 2010. Tarik Chikhi, one of the group's founders, died in 2019. Raïna Raï is today considered a pioneer of modern raï sometimes called "electric raï".
Throughout her existence Raïna Raï will publish 6 studio albums: "Raïna Raï" 1982, Production Sadi Disques, "Hagda" 1983, self-production (HTK Productions), "Rana Hna" 1985, Édition Rachid & Fethi, "Mama" 1988, Edition Rachid & Fethi, "Zaama" 1993, Musidisc, "Bye Bye" 2001, Lazer Production.
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Rena Vlahopoulou
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Irene "Rena" Vlahopoulou (Greek: Ειρήνη (Ρένα) Βλαχοπούλου; 28 July 1923 – 29 July 2004) was a Greek actress and singer. She starred in theatre, musical and Greek cinema productions, including The Gambler and The Countess of Corfu. Vlahopoulou was born on 28 July 1923 on the island of Corfu, the fifth of nine children. She first began playing the piano, taught by her father, Giannis Vlahopoulos. When she turned ten, she began singing at a local bakery; she was a talented dancer and actress and a qualified mezzo-soprano. Over the course of her fifty-five-year career she appeared in 105 theatrical plays between 1939 and 1994, and twenty-six films between 1951 and 1985. In 1939, Vlahopoulou and AEK Athens footballer, Kostas Vasiliou eloped to Athens and were married. She began singing at the Oasis varieté show in the Zappeion gardens, where Mimis Traiforos presented his new work. In the winter of 1930–40, she sang at the World Theatre of Kostas Makedos on Panepistimiou Street. The marriage with Vasiliou ended. In 1942 she married her second husband, a banker, Giannis Kostopoulos; the couple divorced in 1946. She married her third and final husband, entrepreneur Giorgos Lafazanis, on 18 September 1967. They remained wed until her death in 2004. Vlahopoulou had no children by any of her marriages. She left Finos Film in 1966 and moved to Karagiannis-Karatzopoulos. From 1972, she continued to star in films for the next seven years. In 1992–93, she starred in the musical comedy Gia Tin Ellada Re Gamo To (Για την Ελλάδα ρε γαμώ το), after which she retired. Vlahopoulou died at 7 pm on 29 July 2004, after being hospitalized in the intensive care unit of the Athens Medical Center, aged 81. On 30 July 2004, her body was exposed in a popular pilgrimage in the chapel of Saint Lazarus in the First Cemetery of Athens. She was buried at a public expense on 31 July 2004, accompanied by the band of the Philharmonic Society "Mantzaros" that came from Corfu, in the presence of many of her colleagues and ordinary people. On the day of her funeral all shops in Corfu remained closed, as a sign of mourning. Her hometown honored her by naming the old theatre "Mon Repo", to the "Rena Vlahopoulou" theatre.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Frank da Vinci
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Frank James "Buddy" da Vinci (14 February 1933 – 4 June 2013; age 80) was a Chicago-born actor and stuntman who worked as Leonard Nimoy's stand-in and background and stunt performer on Star Trek: The Original Series. His nickname, according to William Blackburn, was "Buddy." The Star Trek Concordance and derivative works occasionally list him as "Bud da Vinci".
Da Vinci was a stand-in and double for Anthony Perkins in Alfred Hitchcock's classic Psycho, which was written by Joseph Stefano, based on a novel by Robert Bloch, and featured John Anderson in the cast. Da Vinci's silhouette can be seen in the famous shower murder scene. (citation needed • edit)
Da Vinci appeared (uncredited) in the 1964 The Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode "The Project Strigas Affair", which featured both William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy, and was directed by Joseph Sargent. A year later, he appeared in the episode "The Secret Sceptre Affair", which also featured Jack Donner and William Boyett, was directed by Marc Daniels, co-produced by Sam Rolfe, and had a musical score by Jerry Goldsmith. [1](X)
After Star Trek was cancelled, da Vinci continued to be Nimoy's stand-in for two seasons of Mission: Impossible. He appeared on screen in the first two parts of the three-part episode "The Falcon", as the uncredited character named Sebastian. For most of the two episodes Sebastian was disguised as Nimoy's character Paris (Nimoy actually applied the mask disguise on to da Vinci's face). The episodes also featured Lee Meriwether, Logan Ramsey, Jack Donner, Dick Dial, and Charles Picerni, and the voice of Robert C. Johnson.
Da Vinci left acting in the 1970's. Along with Ellsworth, he owned and operated two gay night clubs in Los Angeles. He passed away due to renal failure on 4 June 2013. The same year, the Pepperdine University of Malibu founded the "Frank James 'Buddy' da Vinci and George B. Ellsworth Scholarship", awarded to applicants who empathize service and volunteerism dedicated to improving the mental and physical health of the LGBT community.
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Dino De Laurentiis
Biography
Agostino "Dino" De Laurentiis (Italian: [ˈdiːno de lauˈrɛnti.is]; 8 August 1919 – 10 November 2010) was an Italian film producer and businessman who held both Italian and American citizenship. Following a brief acting career in the late 1930s and early 1940s, he moved into film production; alongside Carlo Ponti, he brought Italian cinema to the international scene in the post-World War II period. He produced or co-produced over 500 films, with 38 of his Hollywood films receiving Academy Award nominations. He was also the creator and operator of DDL Foodshow, a chain of Italian specialty foods stores.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Dino De Laurentiis, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Mario Alejandro Arias
Biography
Mario Alejandro Arias is an Ecuadorian writer and director based in Madrid. After receiving a scholarship from the ECAM film school, he migrated to Spain in 2019. At the school, he specialized in non-fiction filmmaking, slowly crafting a style that blurs the lines between fiction and documentary. His second-year project, “It’s just a burning memory...” was selected for over a dozen international festivals. His third and final film school project, a feature-length film called “Tener Tiempo” was the first feature from his school to premiere at the Festival de Málaga. Shot with less than $3,000 on two handy-cams, the film enjoyed a very successful festival circuit in Spain.
After graduating first in his class, he wrote and directed “Qué calor hará sin vos en verano,” a story of two foreigners who meet in Madrid, fall in love, but have little time to enjoy it. The short film premiered in June 2024. His next short film, “Ya están viniendo” is about four friends who escape the city and the troubles of early adulthood to camp in the mountains for a weekend and try psychedelic mushrooms. This short is set to premiere in autumn 2024.
Arias navigates between fiction and non-fiction filmmaking, writing for friends, family members, and non-professional actors. His films explore themes such as the passage of time, migration, love, existentialism, and the struggle to find oneself in the modern world.
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Martina Arroyo
Biography
Martina Arroyo (born February 2, 1937) is an American operatic soprano who had a major international opera career from the 1960s through the 1980s. She was part of the first generation of black opera singers to achieve wide success.
Arroyo first rose to prominence at the Zurich Opera between 1963 and 1965, and then was one of the Metropolitan Opera's leading sopranos between 1965 and 1978. During those years at the Metropolitan Opera, she was also a regular presence at the world's opera houses, performing on the stages of La Scala, Covent Garden, the Opéra National de Paris, the Teatro Colón, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Vienna State Opera, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and the San Francisco Opera. She is best known for her performances of the Italian spinto repertoire, and in particular, her portrayals of Verdi and Puccini heroines. Her last opera performance was in 1991, after which she has devoted her time to teaching singing on the faculties of various universities in the United States and Europe. On December 8, 2013, Arroyo received a Kennedy Center Honor.
Arroyo was born in New York City, the younger of two children of Demetrio Arroyo, originally from Puerto Rico, and Lucille Washington, a native of Charleston, South Carolina. Her older brother grew up to become a Baptist minister. The family lived in Harlem near St. Nicholas Avenue and 111th Street. Her father was a mechanical engineer at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and earned a good salary which enabled Arroyo's mother to stay at home with their children. His job also allowed the family to experience New York's cultural offerings and the family frequented museums, concerts, and the theatre. It was attending several performances of Broadway shows during the 1940s that first inspired Arroyo's interest in becoming a performer. Her mother humored her dreams and allowed Arroyo to take ballet classes. Her mother was also a talented amateur classical pianist and taught her daughter to play the instrument. Arroyo's other musical experiences as a child were largely through singing in the choirs at her Baptist church and as a student at Hunter College High School.
After finishing high school in 1953, Arroyo attended Hunter College where she earned a B.A. in Romance languages in 1956 at the age of nineteen. While there she studied voice as a hobby in an opera workshop with Joseph Turnau. Turnau recognized that Arroyo was a major talent who just needed proper training. After the workshop ended, he introduced her to voice instructor Marinka Gurewich, who immediately accepted her as a student. When Arroyo did not take her training as seriously as her teacher wanted, Gurewich eventually threatened to end their lessons. Arroyo said of the incident, "It was a real wake-up call. Up to then, I must have been, in my mind, treating singing as a hobby, a lark—something I loved that I was dabbling in". ...
Source: Article "Martina Arroyo" from Wikipedia in english, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Antonio Margheriti
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Antonio Margheriti (19 September 1930 – 4 November 2002), also known under the pseudonym Anthony M. Dawson, was a prolific Italian filmmaker. He was born in Rome and died in 2002 from a heart attack in Monterosi, Viterbo, near Rome at the age of 72.
Margheriti started out in the Italian film industry in 1956 as a screenwriter. He started directing in 1960, his first film being "Spacemen" (aka "Assignment Outer Space"). Margheriti is known for his science fiction, horror, spaghetti western and action movies. He was the director of such cult movies as Cannibal Apocalypse, Castle of Blood, The Virgin of Nuremberg, Assignment Outer Space, Wild Wild Planet, Naked You Die, Mr. Super Invisible, The Last Hunter, Battle of the Worlds and numerous others. Most of his films were directed under the pseudonym of Anthony M. Dawson. He stopped using his real name in the USA early in his career, when he realized the English translation of the name "Antonio Margheriti" was "Anthony Daisies", and he thought it sounded too effeminate.
He was the only Italian director who worked directly for American production companies like MGM, United Artists, 20th Century Fox, Columbia Pictures, etc. with films like: Yor, the Hunter from the Future, Take a Hard Ride, Killer Fish, etc. Margheriti said his action/adventure films were his favorites, and his least favorite movies were the sword-and-sandal peplum films he made in the early 1960s (such as "Devil of the Desert" and "Giants of Rome").
For years, director Richard Morrissey disputed Margheriti's claim that he had directed "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein" in the early 1970s, saying that Margheriti was mostly just a technical advisor on that film. Morrissey said Margheriti did however direct a very, very brief segment of the movie (mostly the scenes involving the two children roaming around in the lab).
Margheriti worked with many well-known genre actors such as Lee Van Cleef, John Saxon, Claude Rains, John Morghen, Klaus Kinski, Barbara Steele, Reb Brown, Donald Pleasence, Yul Brynner, David Warbeck, Luciano Pigozzi, Marvin Hagler, Terence Hill, Fred Williamson, Christopher Lee and many others. Most of his later films were shot in the Philippines (especially his war films). Margheriti also collaborated on the special effects in two Italian cult films which he did not direct, Sergio Leone's "Fistful of Dynamite" (1971) and Aldo Lado's "The Humanoid" (1979).
Margheriti retired from filmmaking in 1996 at age 66. He died in 2002 of natural causes. Margheriti's son Edoardo and his daughter Antonella are both also involved in filmmaking. Eli Roth's character in the 2009 Quentin Tarantino film Inglourious Bastards took Margheriti as his namesake.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Antonio Margheriti, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Chuck Seitsinger
Biography
Like many others on the show, Chuck started street racing as soon as he was old enough to legally drive. Chuck is one of the racing veterans out of the group. He has a habit for racing, whether it’s professional or street. Professionally, Chuck was crowned Rookie of the Year by the NOPI Drag Racing Association and won the 2004 Nitrous Express P/4 XBOX Cup Championship in the 4 Cylinder division. On the street Chuck has proven time and time again that he drives the fastest small tire car in the 405 with his 89’ Ford Fox Body Mustang, Death Trap. He runs a successful repair shop, Advanced Motorsports and is married with 2 girls. He boasts a very supportive family that stands behind the excess time needed to put into racing. Watch Chuck haul-ass on the street and beat the odds against all of the big-tire cars in OKC.
Chuck has also earned a name for himself as the racemaster of the No Prep Kings series.
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