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Olivia Newton-John
Biography
Dame Olivia Newton-John AC, DBE (September 26, 1948 – August 8, 2022) was an English-born, Australian-raised singer and actress. She is a four-time Grammy award winner who amassed five No. 1 and ten other Top Ten Billboard Hot 100 singles and two No. 1 Billboard 200 solo albums. Eleven of her singles (including two platinum) and 14 of her albums (including two platinum and four double platinum) have been certified gold by the RIAA. She has sold an estimated over 100 million albums worldwide.
In 1978, she co-starred with John Travolta in the film adaptation of the Broadway musical, Grease, which became one of the most successful films and movie soundtracks in Hollywood history. It features two major hit duets with co-star John Travolta: "You're the One That I Want"—which is one of the best-selling singles of all time—and "Summer Nights".
She became the second woman (after Linda Ronstadt in 1977) to have two singles – "Hopelessly Devoted to You" and "Summer Nights" – in the Billboard top 5 simultaneously. Her performance earned her a People's Choice Award for Favorite Film Actress. She was nominated for a Golden Globe as Best Actress in a Musical and performed the Oscar-nominated "Hopelessly Devoted to You" at the 1979 Academy Awards.
In 1980, she starred with Gene Kelly and Michael Beck in the musical fantasy film Xanadu. Although it was a critical failure, its soundtrack was certified double platinum and scored five top 20 singles on the Billboard Hot 100. She charted with "Magic", "Suddenly" with Cliff Richard, and the title song "Xanadu" with the Electric Light Orchestra.
"Magic" was Newton-John's biggest pop hit to that point and still ranks as the biggest AC hit of her career. The film has since become a cult classic and the basis for a Broadway show that ran for more than 500 performances beginning in 2007 and was nominated for four Tony Awards including Best Musical.
She helped pioneer the music video industry by recording a video album for Physical, featuring videos of all the album's tracks and three of her older hits. The video album earned her a fourth Grammy and was aired as an ABC prime-time special, Let's Get Physical, becoming a top-10 Nielsen hit.
She teamed up with Travolta again in 1983 for the critically and commercially unsuccessful movie Two of a Kind, redeemed by its platinum soundtrack featuring "Twist of Fate", and a new duet with Travolta, "Take a Chance"Iowa.
In 2002, she was inducted into Australia's ARIA Hall of Fame and, in 2015, she was inducted into the Music Victoria Hall of Fame. In recognition for "her work as an entertainer and philanthropist", she was bestowed Australia's highest honor, the Companion of the Order of Australia, in June 2019.
In 2008, she raised funds to help build the Olivia Newton-John Cancer and Wellness Centre in Melbourne, Australia. She led a three-week, 228 km walk along the Great Wall of China, joined by various celebrities and cancer survivors throughout her trek. The walk symbolised the steps cancer patients must take on their road to recovery.
She was a a long-time activist for environmental and animal rights issues. She battled breast cancer three times and was an advocate for breast cancer research and health awareness. Her business ventures included launching several product lines for Koala Blue and co-owning the Gaia Retreat & Spa in Australia.
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Ian Ritchie
Biography
Ian Ritchie is an English composer, record producer, arranger and saxophonist. He was the producer of Roger Waters' album Radio K.A.O.S., along with other recordings with Laurie Anderson (Strange Angels), Pete Wylie (Sinful), Hugh Cornwell (Wolf) and the Big Dish (Swimmer). During the 1980s, he collaborated with English singer/songwriter Gary Numan.
Ritchie is also the composer of "The Globe Trekker Theme" (previously known as "The Lonely Planet Theme"), the theme music of the travel show Globe Trekker. He is a member of the Liverpool-based theatre rock group Deaf School, and has released a number of singles in the 1980s under the name Miro Miroe. His saxophone playing can be heard on "See the Day" by Dee C Lee, "Club Tropicana" by Wham!, "C'est La Vie" by Robbie Nevil and on his debut jazz album Ian Ritchie's SOHO Project. In 2006–2008, Ritchie toured as saxophonist with Roger Waters as part of the backing band on the Dark Side of the Moon Live tour. In 2010, he toured Europe with Australian progressive rock band Unitopia. In 2013, Ritchie released South of Houston, a second jazz album under his own name. He has produced an album for the dance group URUBU and performs with them. Other groups Ritchie plays with include the Blue Jays ('50s rock & roll), the Cricklewood Cats (jazz/cabaret, together with Holly Penfield), Tina T's Smooth Soul (soul/R&B/house) and the Crown Moran Allstars (jazz), who also have an eponymous album written and produced by Ritchie. In 2016, he took part in the historic Desert Trip concerts at Coachella. From 2017 to 2018, he again toured with Roger Waters' new lineup playing tenor saxophone. The Us + Them show was performed in 157 venues across the world.
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Charles C. Stevenson Jr.
Biography
Charles C Stevenson Jr. was an actor who lit up the silver screen many times with his sidesplitting comedic genius. Stevenson's acting career began mostly with his roles in various films, such as "The Cheat" (1923), the Harold Lloyd comedy "Safety Last" (1923) and "The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu" (1929) with Warner Oland. He also appeared in the western "The Cisco Kid" (1931) with Warner Baxter. He worked in series television while getting his start in acting, including a part on "Our Gang" (TBS, 1987-88). Stevenson was also credited in "Ed Wood" (1994), "Sgt. Bilko" (1996) starring Steve Martin and "Up Close and Personal" (1996) starring Robert Redford. He also was recognized in the Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith box office smash "Men in Black" (1997). Stevenson was most recently credited in "Bad Judge" (NBC, 2014-15).
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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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Regan Byrd
Biography
Regan Byrd is an award-winning anti-oppression activist, speaker, and trainer who has trained dozens of organizations on anti-oppression and allyship, including the Sierra Club, the Colorado Democratic Party, Google, McKinsey and Company, and Denver Public Schools.
Regan has served as the morning keynote speaker for the DU Women’s Conference in 2017, the afternoon keynote for the 2018 League of Women Voters annual conference, and morning MC for the Womxn’s March Denver 2019 march. She was also a trainer at the 2018 White Privilege Symposium in Denver. She has participated in various expert panels on topics ranging from transformative justice, to the history of police, to housing justice. Regan is also a seasoned nonprofit professional with over 15 years of experience in grassroots and social justice non-profit organizations, formerly working for the Arc of Jefferson County, 9to5 Colorado: National Association of Working Women, Hunger Free Colorado, and the Bell Policy Center. She previously served as office manager for the Colorado Nonprofit Development Center, and the Data and Systems Manager for the Bell Policy Center.
Regan currently serves as treasurer of the board for Colorado Women Uprising and was formerly the co-chair of the board for 9to5 Colorado for 10 years, and a legacy board member with Womxn’s March Denver. Regan is a former commissioner on the Aurora Humans Rights Commission, and former board member for the youth mentorship non-profit “YESS Institute”. She is a graduate of the Transit Alliance’s Citizen Academy and Emerge Colorado, a training program for women running for office. She is a recent graduate of the Denver Metro Chamber’s “Impact Denver” leadership class of Spring 2018 and is a recent participant in the Chinook Fund’s 2020 Spring Giving Project.
Regan has a deep commitment to social justice, institutional systems change, and collective liberation. She believes this is best done through self-reflexivity, strong allyship, knowledge cultivation, intentional inclusivity, coalition building, and dismantling systems of oppression. Regan Byrd is an alumni of the University of Denver’s undergraduate program, with dual B.A. degrees in Public Policy and Sociology, and minors in Gender and Women’s Studies, and English. Regan has been named a “Woman to Watch” by the Denver League of Women Voters, is the winner of the 2015 Lilly Ledbetter award from 9to5 Colorado and was named 2019’s “Woman of the Year” by the Business and Professional Women of Denver. In her free time, she enjoys making fun of bad movies, exploring the Denver dining scene, competitive video gaming, and fawning over new technology.
Regan is known for her empathy, humor, and surgical precision in discussing typically difficult topics. She creates an environment of curiosity and mutual respect so that people are engaged and eager to grow. She trains people from all backgrounds and knowledge levels, focusing on the concept of oppression and how we can identify and resist it, together.
Regan is based in Aurora, Colorado.
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Pardis Pourabedini
Biography
Pardis Pourabedini is an Iranian actress known for her impactful performances in film and television. Born on April 10, 2000, in Tehran, Iran, she began her acting career in theater before gaining widespread recognition for her role as Razieh in the popular TV series Aghazadeh (2020–2021). Her performance earned her a nomination at the Hafez Awards, establishing her as a rising star. She further showcased her talent in the acclaimed series Fereshteh's Sin (2023–2024). In cinema, Pourabedini has appeared in notable films like Killing a Traitor (2022) and Motherless (2022). Her portrayal of Kazhal in the war drama Unknown (2023) won her the prestigious Crystal Simorgh for Best Actress at the 41st Fajr International Film Festival.
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Elisabeth Roudinesco
Biography
Élisabeth Roudinesco (born 10 September 1944) is a French scholar, historian and psychoanalyst. She conducts a seminar on the history of psychoanalysis at the École Normale Supérieure.
Roudinesco's work focuses mainly on psychiatry, psychology and psychoanalysis in France, but also worldwide. She has written biographies of Jacques Lacan and Sigmund Freud. Her biography of Freud, Freud, In his Time and Ours, was awarded the "Prix Décembre" 2014 and The "Prix des Prix" 2014. With Michel Plon, she published a huge Dictionary of Psychoanalysis (7th édition in 2023), which was translated into many languages, though not yet into English. Her book Généalogies (also unpublished in English) was awarded The Best Book Prize by The Société française d'histoire de la médecine. Her work has been translated into thirty languages.
Roudinesco was born to half-Jewish parents in newly liberated Paris in September 1944, and grew up there. Her mother was Jenny Aubry, née Weiss, a daughter of the Judeo-Protestant bourgeoise, a renowned psychoanalyst and hospital neuro-paediatrician who spent her whole life looking after suffering children: abandoned, ill and in difficulty. She was an anglophile who, in the 1950s, introduced to France John Bowlby's theories on the importance of maternal care, and she worked in collaboration with the Tavistock Clinic in London. She was a friend of Jacques Lacan - and whose sister was the feminist Louise Weiss, of the Javal family. Her father was physician Alexandre Roudinesco, of Romanian origin, who had "a passion for history and a phenomenal library". He was born in Bucharest in a Jewish and francophile milieu, and his father had been an editor.
She received her secondary education in Paris at the Collège Sévigné. She studied Literature at the Sorbonne, with a minor in Linguistics; her master's degree was supervised by Tzvetan Todorov, and her doctoral thesis, entitled Inscription du désir et roman du sujet [Inscription of the desire and novel of the subject], by Jean Levaillant at the Université Paris VIII-Vincennes in 1975.
She also took classes with Michel de Certeau, Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault at the time of her master's degree. She next defended her "habilitation à diriger des recherches" (H.D.R – the French accreditation needed to supervise doctoral dissertations) in 1991 with Michelle Perrot as supervisor and Alain Corbin, Dominique Lecourt, Jean-Claude Passeron, Robert Castel, and Serge Leclaire as members of the examining committee. This work was published under the title Généalogies.
From 1969 to 1981, she was a member of the École Freudienne de Paris, founded by psychoanalyst and philosopher Jacques Lacan. She was also a member of the editorial board of Action Poétique (1969–1979). She has written for French national newspapers, Libération (1986–1996), and then Le Monde since 1996.
For the past 30 years, she has been married to Olivier Bétourné, CEO of Éditions du Seuil. ...
Source: Article "Élisabeth Roudinesco" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
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Damon Carney
Biography
Damon Carney is an American actor with roles in television ranging from "Walker Texas Ranger" to "Friday Night Lights"; most recently playing Don Wheeler in the critically acclaimed series "American Crime", opposite Felicity Huffman and Timothy Hutton.
Film credits include: Ranger Blaine in Disney's blockbuster "The Lone Ranger" alongside Johnny Depp and Armie Hammer; Mr. Heatherton in the upcoming film "Waiting For The Miracle To Come" alongside Willie Nelson; and Phil in "My All American" starring Aaron Eckhart. Damon will make his leading man debut as Detective Sean Carter in Dimension's film "Hellraiser: Judgment" set for release in 2017.
Born and raised in Tyler, Texas Damon is one of 11 children. An extraordinarily diverse actor, Damon has played a multitude of roles ranging from a drug dealing but, lovable womanizer in the 70's drama "Swingtown" to a hit man in the upcoming feature film "Kreep", starring Judd Nelson.
In addition to acting, Damon, an entrepreneur, opened up a restaurant with his wife of 25 years. He and his wife, Bradi, have owned and operated The Tin Cup deli in Arlington, Texas for 13 successful years while raising their two children.
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Sarah Queralt
Biography
Raised in a small suburb outside of Los Angeles, Sarah has grown into a passionate and versatile actor dedicated to bringing stories to life through the art of performance. With a background spanning theatre, film, and television, she thrives on embodying diverse characters that resonate with audiences. As the daughter of a strong Cuban nurse and a diligent American scholar, she holds immense value on hard work and continuous education. Her training includes a BFA in Acting for the Stage and Screen, a BA in Screenwriting, and ongoing courses at The Berg Studios.
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Miles Teller
Biography
Miles Teller (born February 20, 1987) is an American actor. He debuted his feature film with the independent drama Rabbit Hole (2010). He gained wider recognition for his roles in the coming-of-age film The Spectacular Now (2013) and the Divergent film trilogy (2014–2016). His breakthrough role came in the drama Whiplash (2014), which earned him critical acclaim.
Teller starred in the superhero film Fantastic Four (2015) and the biographical film War Dogs (2016). He garnered a mainstream resurgence for his starring role in the action film Top Gun: Maverick (2022). In television, he has starred in the Amazon Prime Video crime drama Too Old to Die Young (2019) and the Paramount+miniseries The Offer (2022).
Description above from the Wikipedia article Miles Teller, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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