On This Day

RichardTheBruce

April 14th

1912: Joie Chitwood is born--Denison, Texas.
(He dies 3 January 1988 at age 75--Tampa, Florida.)

Joie Chitwood

See the complete article here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joie_Chitwood

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Joie Chitwood

Born April 14, 1912 | Denison, Texas
Died January 3, 1988 (aged 75) | Tampa Bay, Florida
Formula One World Championship career

Nationality United States American
Active years 1950
Teams Kurtis Kraft
Entries 1
Championships 0
Wins 0
Podiums 0
Career points 1
Pole positions 0
Fastest laps 0
First entry 1950 Indianapolis 500
Last entry 1950 Indianapolis 500

George Rice Chitwood (April 14, 1912 – January 3, 1988), nicknamed "Joie", was an American racecar driver and businessman. He is best known as a daredevil in the Joie Chitwood Thrill Show.

Born in Denison, Texas of Cherokee Indian ancestry, he was dubbed "Joie" by a track promoter and the name stuck.

Racing career
Chitwood started his racecar driving career in 1934 at a dirt track in Winfield, Kansas. From there, he began racing sprint cars. In 1939 and 1940 he won the AAA East Coast Sprint car championship.[1] He switched to the CSRA and won its title in 1942.[1] Between 1940 and 1950 he competed at the Indianapolis 500 seven times, finishing fifth on three different occasions.[1] He was the first man ever to wear a safety belt at the Indy 500.[1]

Joie Chitwood Thrill Show
Chitwood also operated the "Joie Chitwood Thrill Show", an exhibition of auto stunt driving that became so successful he gave up racing. Often called "Hell Drivers," he had five units that for more than forty years toured across North America thrilling audiences in large and small towns alike with their death-defying automobile stunts.

His show was so popular, that in January 1967, the performance at the Islip Speedway, New York was broadcast on ABC television's Wide World of Sports.

On May 13, 1978, Joie Chitwood Jr.(b. Aug. 31, 1943) set a world record when he drove a Chevrolet Chevette for 5.6 miles (9.0 km) on just 2 wheels. His sons, Joie Jr. and Tim both joined the auto thrill show and continued to run the "Joie Chitwood Chevy Thunder Show" after their father's retirement. The Chitwood show toured the US from 1945-98. His grandson, Joie Chitwood III, is the President of Daytona International Speedway and a former president of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

The show was featured during season 3 of CHiPs in an episode entitled "Thrill Show". Joie Jr. did stunts for Miami Vice on several occasions. Joie Jr. (b. 1943) also appeared as a guest challenger on the TV game show To Tell The Truth. Joie Jr. worked in over 60 feature films and national commercials.

Chitwood's show was credited by Evel Knievel as being his inspiration to become a daredevil when his show appeared in his home town of Butte, Montana.

Stuntman
Chitwood was frequently hired by Hollywood film studios to either do stunt driving for films or to act as auto-stunt coordinator. On a few occasions he appeared in a minor role, notably with Clark Gable and Barbara Stanwyck in the 1950 film about auto racing, To Please a Lady.

In 1973, Joie Chitwood Jr. is credited as a Stunt Coordinator for the hugely successful James Bond film Live and Let Die, where he was also the stunt driver and acted in a minor part.

Safety Consultant
Joie Chitwood Jr. also acted as a car safety consultant, intentionally crashing vehicles for subsequent investigation. He had intentionally crashed more than 3000 vehicles by the time he appeared on the game show I've Got A Secret in 1965. Joie Jr. and Joie Sr. test-crashed guardrails and breakaway Interstate signs for US Steel and aluminum light poles for ALCOA. The highways are safer today because of these tests.

Retirement
When Chitwood retired, his sons took over the business. Joie Chitwood died in 1988,[1] aged 75, in Tampa Bay, Florida.

He was inducted in the National Sprint Car Hall of Fame in 1993. He was inducted in the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 2010 in the Historic category.[1] Among his contributions to the sport was the supervision of the construction of Pennsylvania's Selinsgrove Speedway in 1945.

Joie Chitwood (I) (1912–1988)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0158374/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

1917: Richard Wasey Chopping is born--Colchester, Essex, England.
(He dies 17 April 2008 at age 91--Colchester, Essex, England.)

Richard Chopping: Versatile
illustrator best known for his
distinctive Bond book jackets

See the complete article here:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/richard-chopping-versatile-illustrator-best-known-for-his-distinctive-bond-book-jackets-813974.html

Wednesday 23 April 2008 00:00

Richard Chopping is probably best known today as the creator of dust-jackets for the publisher Jonathan Cape's Ian Fleming James Bond novels. From Russia with Love (1957), with its pistol and flower design, the skull and rose for Goldfinger (1959), and the slightly eerie spyhole and Ian Fleming's name-plate artwork for For Yours Eyes Only [sic] (1960) are distinctively Chopping's work.

The creator of these confections, with their meticulous attention to detail and delicacy of colour, was, however, much more than a book-jacket designer. By the time they appeared, Chopping had established a reputation as a versatile illustrator who was noted for his depictions of natural objects such as butterflies, flowers, insects and fruit, based on close observation, as well as being a sympathetic teacher, busy exhibitor and author.

Richard Wasey Chopping was born in 1917 in Colchester, Essex – Wasey was an old family name. His father was an entrepreneurial businessman from a milling family, was himself a miller and store owner and eventually became mayor of Colchester. Chopping's twin brother died when young. He also had an older brother, a pilot killed on a Pathfinder mission over Europe in the Second World War.

- - -

A 1956 three-man exhibition at the Hanover Gallery, with Francis Bacon as the main attraction and separate rooms given over to pictures by a French aristocrat and Chopping, led to the Bond dust-jacket commissions. Chopping's flower paintings and trompe-l'oeil works were upstairs, as he remembered, "in a little gallery at the back, that was like a kind of long lavatory".

Bacon took Ann, Ian Fleming's wife, in to see his own work, Chopping recalled. "Then he took her upstairs to see mine, which was very good of him, and Ann went back to Ian and said, 'Well, you ought to get this chap to do your next book jacket.'" They met at one of the Flemings' artistic salons, where Fleming granted Chopping the commission for From Russia with Love.

Although the first edition jacket announced that it had been designed by the author, Chopping later said:

He in no way designed it. He did tell me the things he wanted on it. It had to be a rose with a drop of dew on it. There had to be a sawn-off Smith & Wesson. We never discussed the type of revolver we would use. It had to be that one.

- - -

1961: Ian Fleming is inspired to pursue republishing favorite books gone out of print.

Ian Fleming, Andrew Lycett, 1995.

A glance through The Times Literary
Supplement while he was still at the London Clinic suggested another idea.
In the issue of 14 April he read a leading article which put the case for
republishing books long out of print. This encouraged him to remind his
own publisher that he had several times pushed for a reprint of one of his
favourite novels, All Night at Mr Stanyhurst's by Hugh Edwards, with an
introduction he would write himself. In putting forward such ideas, Ian
was thinking about his future. As he told William Plomer, he had again
almost killed off Bond in The Spy Who Loved Me. He had decided not to,
but the appropriate time had now certainly come.

1961: Robert Carlyle is born--Glasgow, Scotland.
1967: Casino Royale general release in the UK.

1980: Moonraker receives an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects.

1996: English Heritage establishes a ceramic plaque at 22 Ebury Street, Belgravia, London:

IAN FLEMING 1908-1964 Creator of James Bond lived here.

1999: BBC News reports on a "minor planet" named after James Bond. Maybe asteroid.

Sci/Tech
The name's Bond, James
Bond

See the complete article here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/319237.stm

Wednesday, April 14, 1999 Published at 17:25 GMT 18:25 UK

Asteroid 9007 captured on film

By BBC News Online Science Editor Dr David Whitehouse

Czech astronomers have named a minor planet they discovered in 1983 after Her Majesty's Secret Agent 007 - James Bond.

Giving a minor planet a name is one of the privileges given to those astronomers who find them. Mostly, these objects are a few miles across and orbit the Sun in-between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.

When a newly-discovered minor planet has been observed several times, and an orbit for it has been well established, it is given a number.

At present, there are 10,448 numbered minor planets of which 7,000 have been officially named.

According to Brian Marsden of the Minor Planet Center at Harvard there are rules about choosing names.

Naming rules
No military or political names are allowed until at least 100 years after the event or death of the person concerned.

No unpronounceable names or those that are obscene or in bad taste. None must be too similar to existing names and none must be longer than 16 characters.

Following these guidelines, 223 minor planets have just received names - a record.

They include asteroid 9007 which according to its discoverers at the Klet observatory in the Czech republic, could only be called James Bond.

Minor planets have also just been named after the writers Iris Murdoch and Arthur Ransome, as well as painters Constable, Holbein and Gainsboroug.

Star gazing
There is also Minor Planet DENI which stands for the Department for Education in Northern Ireland.

But perhaps the most touching name given to a minor planet is 1992 QJ Lewispearce.

Lewis Percival Pearce was born at Nedlands, Western Australia on 23 January this year.

He suffered oxygen deprivation during birth and never regained consciousness.

Twelve days later, he died but not without sharing some experiences with his parents. One of them was observing the stars with his dad, Andrew Pearce.

1999: Anthony Newley dies at age 67--Jensen Beach, Florida.
(Born 24 September 1931--Hackney, London, England.)

Obituary: Anthony Newley

See full article here:

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/obituary-anthony-newley-1087464.html

Tom Vallance | Friday 16 April 1999 00:02

ONE OF Britain's most distinctive talents, Anthony Newley was an actor, singer, composer and writer who had his first starring role in films at the age of 16, composed hit musicals and songs, topped the hit parade himself as a pop star, played everything from romantic leads to quirky character roles in movies, starred on both the West End and Broadway stages, and became a favourite of cabaret audiences from New York to Las Vegas.

His elongated Cockney vowel sounds made his voice an unmistakable one which people either loved or hated. It served him well on novelty songs such as "Pop Goes the Weasel", but he was also a fine ballad singer. "What Kind of Fool Am I", "Who Can I Turn To" and "Candy Man" were just three of the hit songs he co-wrote. "I'm not a trained musician or singer," he once said, "but I can turn out a song."

- - -

With Bricusse, Newley wrote the book and score of Stop the World I Want To Get Off, in which Newley starred as Littlechap, an Everyman figure whose whole life is depicted in the show. Newley said, "The role of Littlechap, surrounded by the type of chorus once used in Greek drama, has presented us with a challenge which any cast would surely enjoy tackling." Directed by Newley, the show opened at the Queen's Theatre in July 1961 and was a smash hit, its songs including "What Kind of Fool Am I", "Gonna Build a Mountain" (a hit record for Matt Monro) and "Once in a Lifetime". Sammy Davis was one of many who recorded the songs - he became a close friend of Newley and a great champion of the Newley-Bricusse catalogue.

When Newley was asked why most of his songs became hit records for other singers, he replied, "Sammy Davis, Andy Williams, Tony Bennett . . . their records sell in the millions; when I do it, it just trickles. But for the composer and lyricist there's a tidy bit to be made that way too, so I don't really mind." "What Kind of Fool Am I" won the 1962 Grammy Award as song of the year and has been recorded by over 70 vocalists, though Newley's own recording ran into trouble because he sang the word "damn" - he later made another recording which could be played on sensitive radio stations.

In 1962 Stop the World moved to Broadway where, produced by David Merrick who had bought the American rights while it had been trying out in Nottingham ("I felt no need to wait and see if it would be a hit in London - I had been thoroughly entertained and absorbed by the freshness of conception shown by its authors"), it ran for over 500 performances. Both the London and New York productions were directed by Newley, of whom Merrick was to write, "I have no doubts at all that Mr Newley is going to enjoy widespread and durable success in America. The man does everything - he acts well; he sings with individuality and verve; and most importantly, he is an exceptionally attractive performer. His personality is dynamic and he projects a brilliance of spirit."

During the show's run in 1963 Newley, who had previously been wed to Tiller Girl-turned-actress Ann Lynn, married Joan Collins. "Like most men of my generation," he said, "I had drooled over pictures of Joan. And there she was, backstage at Stop the World and I could not believe it. Did I ask her for a date? Yes I did." Collins described Newley at the time as "a half- Jewish Cockney git" and herself as "a half-Jewish princess from Bayswater via Sunset Boulevard".

The following year the Bricusse-Newley team had a big hit with their lyrics to John Barry's music for Goldfinger, sung over the titles of the James Bond film by Shirley Bassey. The next Newley-Bricusse musical, The Roar of the Greasepaint - the Smell of the Crowd, "a comic allegory about the class system in contemporary Britain", had a better score than its predecessor but its 1964 tryout in Nottingham, starring Norman Wisdom and directed by Newley, did not prove satisfactory and it failed to reach London. David Merrick was again impressed, and offered to take it to Broadway if Newley would assume the leading role.

Anthony Newley (1931–1999)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0627969/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

2021: Rowman & Littlefield Publisher release an updated version of Jeremy Black's
World Of James Bond: The Lives & Times Of 007.

2048: The first Ian Fleming Bond novel Casino Royale is timed to enter the public domain in the United States.
(And each of the following 13 years another book will do that.)

RichardTheBruce

April 15th

1947: Lois Chiles is born--Houston, Texas.
1948: Michael Arnold Kamen is born--New York City, New York.
(He dies 18 November 2003 at age 55--London, England.)

Michael Kamen

See the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2003/nov/21/guardianobituaries.artsobituaries

Driven classical and pop composer
Friday 21 November 2003 01:00

Michael Kamen, composer: born New York 15 April 1948; married Sandra Keenan (two daughters); died London 18 November 2003.

The extraordinary musical career of Michael Kamen was a testament not only to his talent and driven ambition, but also to a ceaseless passion and energy for his chosen course in life: following the twin paths of classical and pop music, he seemingly effortlessly balanced work as a composer, collaborator, performer, orchestrator and producer.

On one hand, he was the driving force behind such fantastically ambitious projects as the 1994 Great Music Experience at Todaiji Temple in Nara, Japan, in aid of Unesco, to which Kamen not only brought Bob Dylan together with an orchestra for the first time, but also composed and conducted an overture for 350 performers including a symphony orchestra, 200 Buddhist monks, 35 Kodo Japanese drummers, an ancient Chinese orchestra, the Irish folk group the Chieftains and an all-star rock band. Yet, he was also the co-composer of Bryan Adams' 1991 hit "(Everything I Do) I Do It For You", a No 1 single in the UK for four months and for seven weeks in the United States. It was the biggest selling single in the history of A & M Records, and won Kamen one of several Grammy awards.

The Adams' hit song, which many loved to hate, was taken from the soundtrack of Robin Hood: prince of thieves. The film world readily came to appreciate Kamen's abilities: he could write under pressure and he was fast - it took him just three weeks to come up with the soundtrack for The Three Musketeers in 1993 ("He thought visually," said the film producer Eric Fellner) and he wrote over 30 musical soundtracks, including those for all the Die Hard and Lethal Weapon series, for Terry Gilliam's Brazil (1985) and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1988), Neil Jordan's Mona Lisa (1986), The Krays (1990), the James Bond film Licence To Kill (1989) and X-Men (2000); several of these soundtracks were Oscar-nominated.

"He was a man of many parts, using a very wide brush," said his close friend David Gilmour of Pink Floyd. "He was about the most successful film writer in recent years. He had such a gift for a memorable tune, and a great gift for melody. He also had huge enthusiasm, and a compulsion to keep at it." Gilmour had considerable experience of Kamen's work method. At the instigation of the producer Bob Ezrin, Kamen was brought in to orchestrate the string sections of Pink Floyd's 1979 album The Wall and subsequently moved to London from his native New York. In 1983 he co-produced Pink Floyd's The Final Cut album with the group. Kamen was an ebullient, bouncing bear of a man, with a gregarious personality.

- - -

Chris Salewicz

Michael Kamen (1948–2003)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004383/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

Pink Floyd - The Final Cut

1960: Ian Fleming short story "Risico" (as "The Double Take") ends its serial run in The Daily Express.
(Started 11 April 1960.)
1965: Goldfinger released in the Netherlands.
1969: On Her Majesty's Secret Service films Moneypenny and a new Bond.

1978: 007 나를 사랑한 스파이 (007 Love Me Spy) released in the Republic of Korea.

http://blog.naver.com/PostView.nhn?blogId=cine212722&logNo=221767682162&parentCategoryNo=&categoryNo=28&viewDate=&isShowPopularPosts=false&from=postView

1988: The Los Angeles Times reports Timothy Dalton will return.

MOVIES

See the complete article here:

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1988-04-15-ca-1309-story.html

By DEBORAH CAULFIELD
April 15, 1988 12 AM PT

Timothy Dalton apparently passed muster as Agent 007--he’ll return as James Bond in “License Revoked,” set to start filming in Mexico City in mid-July, United Artists announced this week. No word yet on whether the Welsh-born Shakespearean-trained actor will again do many of his own stunts, as he did in “The Living Daylights.”

2017: Clifton James dies at age 96--Gladstone, Oregon.
(Born 29 May 1920--Spokane, Washington.)

Gladstone hometown hero Clifton James
fondly remembered

See original article here:

http://pamplinmediagroup.com/pt/9-news/357972-237884-gladstone-hometown-hero-clifton-james-fondly-remembered

Raymond Rendleman - Monday, May 08, 2017

James, awarded the Silver Star for his bravery in combat in 1945, went on international fame as Louisiana Sheriff JW Pepper in two James Bond films

Clifton James, Gladstone's hometown hero for his World War II bravery and extensive acting career spanning nearly six decades, died last month at the age of 96.

SUBMITTED PHOTO - In the photo circa 1980, Clifton James enjoys
the Clackamas River with his family near High Rocks in Gladstone.

James grew up in Gladstone, a town that he always loved. After studying drama at the University of Oregon, he lived in New York and Los Angeles for most of his life, but his sisters lived in Gladstone, so he would often visit them along with his nieces and nephews. He moved in with his daughter, Gladstone resident Mary James, for the final years of his life before succumbing to diabetes on April 15.

SUBMITTED PHOTO - Clifton James as Sheriff JW Pepper plays opposite
Roger Moore as James Bond in 1974's The Man with the Golden Gun.

James' memorial service with full military honors is scheduled for 3 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 25, at Willamette National Cemetery, 11800 S.E. Mt Scott Blvd., Portland.

"He almost always played that tough, Southern sheriff type," said James' sister Bev Anslow of his successful acting career that included more than 50 film credits.

James made his Broadway stage debut as a construction foreman in "The Cave Dwellers" (1958). He was involved in a lot of off-Broadway shows, where he played various roles, including starring with Al Pacino in "American Buffalo" from 1980-81, which was turned into a 1997 film production starring Dustin Hoffman.

James played a floor walker in the classic film "Cool Hand Luke" (1967). His most famous role was fast-talking Louisiana Sheriff JW Pepper in two James Bond films opposite Roger Moore: 1973's Live and Let Die and 1974's The Man with the Golden Gun. Anslow said an elephant was supposed to knock James' stunt double, not James himself as JW Pepper, into a Southeast Asian river during a memorable scene in The Man with the Golden Gun.

Moore paid tribute to James on Twitter: "Terribly sad to hear Clifton James has left us. As JW Pepper he gave my first two Bond films a great, fun character."

As a character actor, James was called upon to reprise variations on JW Pepper many times. Did he mind being type-cast?

"It didn't bother him, and he rather liked it," Anslow said. "He was an actor's actor, and he would act whatever part was given to him and genuinely enjoy the work."

James loved putting on a show throughout his long life. He was a well-known character around Gladstone, often seen with an unlit cigar in his mouth or taking out his false teeth to scare children.

James' mother taught grade school in Woodland, Washington, and would organize local drama productions, including at the old Gladstone Grade School, which which was K-8 at that time. James went to school in Gladstone through the eighth grade and graduated from Milwaukie High School.

SUBMITTED PHOTO - Staff Sgt. Clifton James of Gladstone
served in the U.S. Army for 42 months during World War II.

James was one of the last survivors of WWII's 41st Division, composed of National Guard units from Idaho, Montana, Oregon, North Dakota and Washington state. Serving in the U.S. Army for 42 months in the South Pacific during WWII, he was awarded the Silver Star for his bravery in combat on April 21, 1945.

During the spring of '45, James served as a staff sergeant leading a combat patrol to determine the strength of enemy entrenchments on several ridges on the Philippines' Jolo Island, where previous U.S. attacks had been repulsed. Rather than endanger the whole patrol on April 21, he asked them to stay under cover and watch him try to crawl undetected toward an enemy's trench system. James came under "heavy automatic fire" once he crawled within 20 yards of the trench.

"Then, with complete disregard for his life, [James] charged the position, killing its occupants," a now-declassified military document says. "Continuing on his mission, he crawled to a vantage point, where he could observe the activity of the enemy on the next ridge. With this valuable information gained, the forthcoming attack was a success."

More information about James' military service and letters he sent home to family is available in copies of "Gladstone, Oregon: A History" by Gladstone historian Herbert K. Beals available at City Hall. James suffered various injuries during WWII, including the loss of his front teeth. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a drama degree in 1950.

In 1951, James married Laurie Harper, who died in 2015. He is survived by six children, 14 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Clifton James (I) (1920–2017)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0416378/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Clifton James The Dukes of Hazzard


Superman II : Zod Gang vs. Police Officer

2021: Paper Idol release their single "James Bond."

Electronic indie-pop band
Paper Idol premieres single “James Bond”

See the complete article here:

https://www.rockatnight.com/2021/04/electronic-indie-pop-band-paper-idol-premieres-single-james-bond/

April 15, 2021 Rock At Night Contributor New Releases

Paper Idol

Rock At Night says: “James Bond is one song that makes you want to get off your seat and dance across the floor. With its retro 70s disco sound, it’s exactly what we need at this time!

Paper Idol is the genre-bending pop project of LA-based artist and auteur Matan KG. The music weaves dance music and alternative into “something unique and utterly disarming” (Beats per Minute), with storytelling that blurs the line between reality and fantasy, optimism and delusion.

After graduating university with a Neuroscience degree, Matan left medical-school ambitions behind to pursue music in LA. In under two years, he has released a string of singles and a four-track EP, multiple collaborations with forward-thinking dance artists (Yung Bae, Wankelmut, NASAYA), and has been lauded by BBC Radio 1, Billboard, Under the Radar, and Dancing Astronaut.

Paper Idol’s live act, featuring former classmate Adam Rochelle (keys), has played alongside Louis Futon and Sam Gellaitry at legendary venues the Fonda Theatre and the Echoplex. With another single in late October and a sophomore EP due early 2021, Paper Idol continues to rally a generation bombarded by reality and desperate for an escape.

Paper Idol - James Bond (Official Music Video)

RichardTheBruce

April 16th

1917: Barry Nelson (Haakon Robert Nielsen) is born--San Francisco, California.
(He dies 7 April 2007 at age 89--Bucks County, Pennsylvania.)

Barry Nelson, Broadway and Film Actor, Dies at 86

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/14/obituaries/14nelson.html[/center[

By STUART LAVIETES | APRIL 14, 2007

Barry Nelson, an actor who had a long career in film and television, starred in some of the more durable Broadway comedies of the 1950s and ’60s, and achieved a permanent place in the minds of trivia buffs as the first actor to portray James Bond, died last Saturday, his wife said yesterday. He was 86.

The cause was not immediately known. His wife, Nansi Nelson, said he died while traveling in Bucks County, Pa., The Associated Press reported.
- - -

Barry Nelson (I) (1917–2007)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0625167/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

1918: Syd Cain is born--Grantham, Lincolnshire, England.
(He dies 21 November 2011 at age 93--England.)

Syd Cain obituary
Production designer behind the deadly gadgets used by James Bond – and his foes

See the full article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2011/dec/01/syd-cain

Kim Newman - Thu 1 Dec 2011 13.29 EST

Syd Cain at Pinewood Studios with the model used in the explosive climax to
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969). Photograph: 007magazine.com

The production designer Syd Cain, who has died aged 93, was one of many behind-the-scenes professionals elevated to something like prominence by the worldwide interest in the James Bond films. An industry veteran who began work in British cinema as a draughtsman in 1947, contributing to the look of the gothic melodrama Uncle Silas, Cain is credited on a range of film and television projects, but remains best known for his work in various design capacities on the 007 series, from Dr No in 1962 to GoldenEye in 1995.

Born in Grantham, Lincolnshire, Cain served in the armed forces in the second world war, surviving a plane crash and recovering from a broken back. Working at Denham Studios in Buckinghamshire in the 1940s and 50s, he moved up from uncredited draughtsman (on Adam and Evelyne, The Interrupted Journey, You Know What Sailors Are and Up to His Neck) to assistant art director (for The Gamma People, Fire Down Below, Interpol, How to Murder a Rich Uncle and The World of Suzie Wong). During this time, he developed a habit of slipping his name on to the screen among documents provided as props. In Carol Reed's Our Man in Havana (1959), where the blueprints for a vacuum cleaner are mistaken for rocket secrets, he is listed on the papers as the designer of the device. His first credit as art director was on The Road to Hong Kong (1962), the British-produced last gasp of the series of Bob Hope/Bing Crosby comedies. Cain also worked on the Hope vehicle Call Me Bwana (1963), best remembered because of an in-joke reference to it in From Russia With Love, where a sniper is concealed behind a billboard advertising the film.

Having worked as a draughtsman on Hell Below Zero (1954) and assistant art director on The Cockleshell Heroes (1956), both produced by Albert R Broccoli, he was chosen by Broccoli to work on the Bond films. Though uncredited, he worked with the production designer Ken Adam – in whose shadow he modestly remained for much of his career – on Dr No, taking over as art director when Adam was not available for the immediate follow-up, From Russia With Love (1963). This was the film that introduced the character of Q (Desmond Llewelyn). Cain was responsible for the design of the gadgets issued to Sean Connery's Bond, notably the briefcase with concealed sniper rifle and tear-gas talcum tin. For the villains, Cain also provided Rosa Klebb's shoes, with poison-tipped blade, and the chess-themed decor of Blofeld's lair.

Later, he was production designer for On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969). With a new Bond (George Lazenby) and a move away from the gadgets and vast sets of Connery and Adam's later work, Thunderball and Goldfinger, this tried to seem less fantastical – the only contraption issued to Bond is a photocopier. Cain was the supervising art director on Roger Moore's first Bond film, Live and Let Die (1973), then left the series, eventually returning as a storyboard artist for Pierce Brosnan's 007 debut, GoldenEye.

Arguably more impressive than his Bond associations, Cain worked with a number of notable film-makers throughout the 1960s and 70s, as assistant art director for Stanley Kubrick (Lolita, 1962), art director for Ronald Neame (Mister Moses, 1965) and François Truffaut (Fahrenheit 451, 1966), executive art director for Richard Lester (A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, 1966) and production designer for Ken Russell (Billion Dollar Brain, 1967), Alfred Hitchcock (Frenzy, 1972) and Jack Gold (Aces High, 1976).

Contributing to lasting British pop-culture artefacts, he was also art director on the Cliff Richard vehicle Summer Holiday (1963) and production designer of the revival series The New Avengers (1976). After the popular, action-oriented Alistair Maclean adventure Fear Is the Key (1973), Cain became associated with a brand of high adventure that grew out of the Bond films, working with Peter R Hunt (director of On Her Majesty's Secret Service) on the Moore movies Gold (1974) and Shout at the Devil (1976), both set in Africa, and with the producer Euan Lloyd on a series of boozy, British macho epics – The Wild Geese (1978), The Sea Wolves (1980) and Who Dares Wins (1982).

Cain retired as a production designer after Tusks (1988), but contributed storyboards to a select run of high-profile films, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). His final credit was on the Michael Caine boxing movie Shiner (2000). In retirement, he illustrated children's books, wrote an autobiography (Not Forgetting James Bond: The Autobiography of James Bond Production Designer Syd Cain, 2002) and was a well-liked guest at Bond-themed fan events.

Cain was married twice. His five sons and three daughters survive him.

• Sidney Cain, production designer, art director and illustrator, born 16 April 1918; died 21 November 2011

Syd Cain (1918–2011)

Filmography

Production designer (17 credits)

1988 Tusks
1985 Wild Geese II
1982 The Final Option
1981 Loophole
1980 Lion of the Desert
1980 The Sea Wolves

1978 The Wild Geese
1976 The New Avengers (TV Series) (13 episodes)
- Dirtier by the Dozen (1976)
- Gnaws (1976)
- Sleeper (1976)
- Faces (1976)
- Three Handed Game (1976)
- The Tale of the Big Why (1976)
- Target! (1976)
- Cat Amongst the Pigeons (1976)
- To Catch a Rat (1976)
- The Last of the Cybernauts...? (1976)
- House of Cards (1976)
- The Midas Touch (1976)
- The Eagle's Nest (1976)
1976 Aces High
1976 Shout at the Devil
1974 Gold
1972 Fear Is the Key (as Sidney Cain)
1972 Frenzy
1969 On Her Majesty's Secret Service
1967 Billion Dollar Brain
1966 Fahrenheit 451
1965 The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders

Art department (27 credits)

2001 The Fourth Angel (storyboard artist)
2000 Shiner (storyboard artist)

1998 Tarzan and the Lost City (storyboard artist)
1995 GoldenEye (storyboard artist)
1994 The NeverEnding Story III (storyboard artist)
1991 Robin Hood (storyboard artist - as Sydney Cain)

1988 Who Framed Roger Rabbit (storyboard artist: UK)
1984 Supergirl (research art director)

1966 A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (executive art director)
1962 Lolita (associate art director - as Sidney Cain)
1960 The World of Suzie Wong (assistant art director - as Sydney Cain)
1959 Our Man in Havana (assistant art director)
1958 Tank Force (assistant art director)
1957 High Flight (assistant art director)
1957 How to Murder a Rich Uncle (assistant art director)
1957 Fire Down Below (assistant art director)
1957 Pickup Alley (assistant art director)
1956 Zarak (assistant art director - uncredited)
1956 The Gamma People (assistant art director)
1955 The Cockleshell Heroes (assistant art director)
1954 Up to His Neck (draughtsman - uncredited)
1954 You Know What Sailors Are (draughtsman - uncredited)
1954 Hell Below Zero (draughtsman - uncredited)

1949 The Interrupted Journey (draughtsman - uncredited)
1949 Madness of the Heart (draughtsman - uncredited)
1949 Adam and Evalyn (draughtsman - uncredited)
1947 The Inheritance (draughtsman - uncredited)

Art director (10 credits)

1973 Live and Let Die (supervising art director)
1966 Fahrenheit 451
1965 Mister Moses
1965 McGuire, Go Home!
1964 Agent 8 3/4
1963 From Russia with Love
1963 Call Me Bwana
1963 Summer Holiday
1962 Dr. No (uncredited)
1962 The Road to Hong Kong

1922: Sir Kingsley William Amis, CBE is born--Clapham, London, England.
(He dies 22 October 1995 at age 73--London, England.)

Obituary: Sir Kingsley Amis

See the complete article here:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/obituary-sir-kingsley-amis-1579017.html

David Lodge | Monday 23 October 1995 01:02

Kingsley Amis was the most gifted of the British novelists who began publishing in the 1950s and were grouped together - by the media rather than by their own volition - as "Angry Young Men". He also proved himself to be the one with the most stamina and capacity for development.

Amis was a key figure in the history of British post-war fiction, but his originality was not always fully appreciated because it did not manifest itself in any obvious novelty of form. Indeed the literary new wave of the Fifties, in which Amis played a leading role (its poetic wing, to which he also contributed, was known as "The Movement"), was an aesthetically conservative force, consciously setting itself against modernist experimentation. A passage in a review Amis contributed to the Spectator in 1958 is representative in both its sentiments and the down-to-earth blokeishness of its manner:

The idea about experiment being the life-blood of the English novel is one that dies hard. "Experiment" in this context boils down pretty regularly to "obtruded oddity", whether in construction - multiple viewpoints and such - or in style. It is not felt that adventurousness in subject matter or attitude or tone really count.

This is a thinly disguised manifesto for Amis's own early fiction, but it is as obscuring as it is revealing. It is true that Lucky Jim (1954) and its successors dealt with what was then new or neglected social territory (for example, the provincial university) from unhackneyed perspectives (for example, the upwardly mobile young professional who is unimpressed by the values and lifestyle of the bourgeoisie). This is presumably what Amis meant by adventurousness of subject matter, attitude and tone. And it is also true that these novels were very traditional in form - the specific tradition to which they belonged being that of the English comic novel, in which satirical comedy of manners and robust farce are combined in an entertaining and easily assimilable story. Fielding, Dickens, Wodehouse and Waugh are some of Amis's obvious precursors. But it is also true that Amis's novels are triumphs of "style" - a way of using language that, if not obtrusively "odd", is highly original, and wonderfully expressive.

- - -

In the late Sixties and Seventies he experimented a good deal with "genre" fiction: science fiction (The Anti-Death League, 1966, and The Alteration, 1976), the James Bond thriller (Colonel Sun, 1968), the classic detective story (The Riverside Villas Murder, l973) and the ghost story (The Green Man, 1969). These forms perhaps attracted him as ways of escaping the constraints of the realistic novel and the expectations of an audience who kept hoping he would repeat Lucky Jim. In some of them he addressed himself to weighty philosophic and religious themes, such as the nature of evil.

- - -

This year, Eric Jacobs published a biography, with Amis's collaboration. It revealed (as literary biographies tend to do) a closer correspondence between the life and the fiction than one might have supposed, especially as regards difficulties with women. It also revealed a surprisingly vulnerable person behind the bluff, blimpish public mask, and the poised, sardonic prose stylist: a rather timid man, fearful of flying, unable to drive a car or perform the simplest domestic tasks, needing a regular and repetitive daily routine to keep the black dog of depression at bay: work, club, pub, telly. Work was the most important of these resources. In spite of increasing physical debility, Amis kept writing up till the end of his life. You Can't Do Both (1994) was generally well received and is perhaps the most openly autobiographical of his novels. If The Biographer's Moustache, published earlier this year, was not the biographee's revenge that many reviewers had hoped for, it still had more than a touch of past mastery.

In That Uncertain Feeling the hero is accosted one evening in the street of a small Welsh town by two lascars, one of whom seems to ask him:

"Where is pain and bitter laugh?" This was just the question for me, but before I could smite my breast and cry, "In here, friend", the other little man had said: "My cousin say, we are new in these town and we wish to know where is piano and bit of life, please?"

That is one of my favourite quotations from Amis because it seems to epitomise his art. He did not dodge the pain of existence and his laughter was sometimes bitter, but he always retained the liberating, life- enhancing gift of comic surprise.

Kingsley Amis, writer: born London 16 April 1922; CBE 1981; Kt 1990; books include A Frame of Mind 1953, Lucky Jim 1954, That Uncertain Feeling 1955, A Case of Samples 1956, I Like it Here 1958, Take a Girl Like You 1960, New Maps of Hell 1960, My Enemy's Enemy 1962, One Fat Englishman 1963, The Egyptologists 1965, (with Robert Conquest) The James Bond Dossier 1965, The Anti-Death League 1966, The Book of Bond, or Every Man His Own 007 1966, A Look Round the Estate 1967, Colonel Sun 1968, I Want it Now 1968, The Green Man 1969, What Became of Jane Austen? 1970, Girl, 20 1971, On Drink 1972, The Riverside Villas Murder 1973, Ending Up 1974, Rudyard Kipling and His World 1975, The Alteration 1976, Jake's Thing 1978, Collected Poems 1944-79 1979, Russian Hide-and-Seek 1980, Collected Short Stories 1980, Every Day Drinking 1983, How's Your Glass? 1984, Stanley and the Women 1984, The Old Devils 1986, (with J. Cochrane) Great British Songbook 1986, The Crime of the Century 1987, Difficulties with Girls 1988, The Folks that Live on the Hill 1990, We are All Guilty 1991, Memoirs 1991[/i], The Russian Girl 1992, Mr Barrett's Secret and Other Stories 1993, You Can't Do Both 1994, The Biographer's Moustache 1995; married 1948 Hilary Bardwell (two sons, one daughter; marriage dissolved 1965), 1965 Elizabeth Jane Howard (marriage dissolved 1983); died London 22 October 1995.

1939: Dusty Springfield is born--Hampstead, London, England.
(She dies 2 March 1999 at age 59--Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, England,.)

Dusty Springfield

See the complete article here:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/5900498/Dusty-Springfield.html
04 Mar 1999

Dusty Springfield, who has died aged 59, was one of Britain's most successful female pop singers; she had nine Top 10 hits in the 1960s, and with her upswept hair and panda-shadowed eyes was among the emerging pop scene's most readily identifiable stars.

Photo: GETTY IMAGES

She was distinguished from her contemporaries both by her choice of material and by the quality of her voice. Dusty Springfield was a fine judge of a lyric, and favoured emotional songs written by the American teams of Burt Bacharach and Hal David and Jerry Goffin and Carole King. Their songs, rooted in the Broadway tradition, were perfectly suited to a voice often described as soulful but whose ideal setting would perhaps have been cabaret.

Usually backed by lush string arrangements, she sang with a voice that was low and sensual and made her songs sound like confessions of sins she took increasing pleasure in committing. Her voice sounded mature and smooth too, and the assurance of her performances gave her records longer life than the fizzier offerings of such rivals as Lulu and Cilla Black.

Dusty Springfield was among the first British singers to champion the sound of black America, Motown. She was much influenced by that label's girl groups, and in turn her rich voice surprised them. The singer Mary Wells believed Dusty Springfield must be black before seeing her on television, while Cliff Richard dubbed her "The White Negress".

When Motown's stars came to London to host an edition of the pop programme Ready, Steady, Go, they invited only one British guest - Dusty Springfield.

She was born Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O'Brien in Hampstead, north London, on April 16 1939. Her father was a tax inspector and she was educated at a convent school in Ealing.

- - -

But her star was declining. Although she had had some success with a song from the soundtrack of the Bond film Casino Royale - "The Look of Love", perhaps her definitive vocal performance - her two most recent albums had flopped. She seemed out of step with the mood of popular music as it edged towards rock, psychedelia and more overt rebellion.

In 1968 she fled London for Memphis. She had long been fascinated by America - she was a considerable expert on the Civil War - and in Tennessee recorded her finest album, Dusty in Memphis (1968). It was supervised by Jerry Wexler - Ray Charles's and Aretha Franklin's producer - who gave her voice more room to breathe, unlike the British producers who had tended to bury it beneath over-elaborate arrangements.

- - -

A new generation discovered her music when Son of a Preacher Man featured in the film Pulp Fiction (1994). Then shortly afterwards she began her fight against breast cancer.

Published March 4 1999

Dusty Springfield (1939–1999)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0819778/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

"I Only Want To Be With You"

"The Windmills of Your Mind"

"The Look of Love"

"Six Million Dollar Man"

1962: Jonathan Cape publishes Ian Fleming's ninth James Bond novel The Spy Who Loved Me.

VIVIENNE MICHEL writes:

'The spy who loved me was called
James Bond and the night on which he
loved me was a night of screaming
terror in The Dreamy Pines Motor
Court, which is in the Adirondacks in the
north of New York State.

'This is the story of who I am and how
I came through a nightmare of torture
and the threat of rape and death to a
dawn of ecstacy. It's all true--absolutely.
Otherwise Mr. Fleming certainly would
not have risked his professional reputa-
tion in acting as my co-author and per-
suading his publisherss, Jonathan Cape,
to publish my story. Ian Fleming has
also kindly obtained clearnace for
certain minor breaches of The Official
Secrets Act that were necessary to my
story.'

FLEMING
The Adventures of James Bond

Casino Royale
Live and Let Die
Moonraker
Diamonds Are Forever
From Russia, With Love
Dr No
Goldfinger
For Your Eyes Only
Thunderball
The Spy Who Loved Me

Non-Fiction:
Thrilling Cities
The Diamond Smugglers

Introduces
his choice among 'lost' books
All Night at Mr Stanyhurst's
by Hugh Edwards

Jacket design by Richard Chopping
Dagger by Wilkinson Swords Ltd;
Ian Fleming 1962

Watermarked promotional letter in early editions.

Richard Chopping at work.

1964: From Russia With Love released in Australia.

Daybills

2021: Helen Elizabeth McCrory OBE dies at age 52--London, England.
(Born 17 August 1968--Paddington, London, England.)

Helen McCrory, British ‘Skyfall’ and
‘Harry Potter’ Actress, Dies at Age 52

‘GO NOW, LITTLE ONE’

See the complete article here:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/helen-mccrory-british-skyfall-and-harry-potter-actress-dies-at-age-52

Cheyenne Roundtree | Entertainment Reporter
Published Apr. 16, 2021 12:18PM ET

Photo: Stuart C. Wilson

British actress Helen McCrory has died of cancer at age 52 surrounded by family, her husband, actor Damian Lewis, announced Friday. “I’m heartbroken to announce that after a heroic battle with cancer, the beautiful and mighty woman that is Helen McCrory has died peacefully at home, surrounded by a wave of love from friends and family,” he wrote on Twitter. “She died as she lived. Fearlessly. God we love her and know how lucky we are to have had her in our lives. She blazed so brightly. Go now, Little One, into the air, and thank you.” Lewis and McCrory had been married for 14 years, with 14-year-old daughter Manon and 13-year-old son Gulliver.

With more than 72 acting credits to her name, McCrory was best known for her roles in Peaky Blinders, the Harry Potter franchise, and the James Bond movie Skyfall.

Helen McCrory (1968–2021)

Actress
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0567031/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0