This is a continuation of last week’s feature dedicated to actors, directors and others connected with the cinema, who died in 2010 and were not the subject of a specific feature in The Sunday Times following their death.
Singer and dancer Lena Horne was born in Brooklyn, New York, on June 30, 1917. She broke into the movies in several musicals of the 1930s and 1940s, such as Cabin in the Sky and Stormy Weather (both 1943). Her only dramatic role was in Death of a Gunfighter (1969). Horne died of heart failure on May 9 in New York City.
Bekim Fehmiu was born in Bosnia on June 1, 1936, and became an international film actor. His English-speaking films include The Adventurers (1970), The Deserter (1971) and Permission to Kill (1975). Fehmiu committed suicide on June 15 in Belgrade, Serbia.
Film producer Elliott Kastner was born in New York City on January 7, 1930, and brought to the screen such films as Where Eagles Dare (1968), The Nightcomers (1972) and The Long Goodbye (1973). Kastner succumbed to cancer on June 30 in London.
British director Clive Donner was born in London on January 21, 1926, and made his mark in many youth-oriented films such as Some People (1962) and Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (1967). But after Vampira (1974) was a failure he continued his career on television. Donner died in London on September 7 from Alzheimer’s disease.
The distinguished French film director Claude Chabrol was, like Eric Rohmer, a member of the French New Wave cinema. He was born in Paris on June 24, 1930, and after military service during World War II, he abandoned his medical studies and then turned his attention to filmmaking. His films include Le Beau Serge (1958), Que la bệte meure (1969) and Le Boucher (1970). Chabrol died of natural causes on September 12 in Paris.
Handsome and chiselled-jawed Kevin McCarthy was born on February 15, 1915, in Seattle, Washington. He won an Oscar nomination for his second film, Death of a Salesman (1951), but is better known for his part in the cult horror film Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956). He kept working till the end and we still have to see him in The Ghastly Love of Johnny X (2011). McCarthy died in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, on September 11 from pneumonia.
Harold Gould was born in Schenectady, New York, on December 10, 1923, and developed into a reliable character actor mainly on television. His feature films include The Sting (1973), The Front Page (1974), and Silent Movie (1976). Gould died of prostate cancer on September 11 in Woodland Hills, California.
Born on August 10, 1928, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Eddie Fisher was more famous as a singer and is notoriously known to have broken his ‘perfect’ marriage to Debbie Reynolds to marry a grieving Elizabeth Taylor. He only made two feature films of note – Bundle of Joy (1956) with Reynolds and Butterfield 8 (1960) with Taylor. Fisher died in Berkeley, California, on September 22 after complications from hip surgery.
Gloria Stuart was born on July 4, 1910, and died a hundred years later on September 26. Her brief tribute was included in my article ‘They Should be 100’ (The Sunday Times, December 2, 2010).
Simon MacCorkindale was born in Cambridge, England, on February 12, 1952, and was an important actor on the stage and television. Among his few films are Death on the Nile (1978), The Sword and the Sorcerer (1982) and Jaws 3-D (1983). He died from bowel and lung cancer on October 14 in London.
Johnny Sheffield, who was born in Pasadena, California, on April 11, 1931, is popularly known as Tarzan’s son and for portraying a similar role in the Bomba series of films. His films include Tarzan Finds a Son, the musical Babes in Arms (both 1939) and Bomba the Jungle Boy (1949). Sheffield died of a heart attack on October 15 in Chula Vista, California.
Lamont Johnson was born on September 30, 1922 in Stockton, California, and began his career as an actor and then as a director of television films. He then began directing feature films, such as The Last American Hero (1973), Lipstick (1976) and Somebody Killed Her Husband (1978). Johnson died on October 24 in Monterey, California, from congestive heart failure.
As a young actor, James MacArthur was a prominent fixture in several Walt Disney films such as The Light in the Forest (1958), Kidnapped and the acclaimed Swiss Family Robinson (both 1960). As he grew up he found fame in the TV series Hawaii Five-0 (1968-1979). MacArthur was born in Los Angeles on December 8, 1937, and died of natural causes on October 28 in Florida.
Ingrid Pitt was born in Poland on November 21, 1937, and began her career on the stage and in Spanish-made Westerns. Her breakthrough was in Where Eagles Dare (1969) opposite Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood before she became Hammer Films’ resident horror queen in films such as Countess Dracula and The House That Dripped Blood (both 1971). Pitt died of natural causes on November 23, in London.
(Concluded)