(Video:JDE Productions)

“I was born a poor black child….”

The Jerk was released in 1979.

It was Steve Martin’s first starring role in a film

In my opinion, it continues to be the funniest movie that Steve Martin has made.

Steve Martin was one of the most successful stand-up comedians during the 1970’s. He won acclaim by winning Grammy Awards for his Comedy Albums, for his frequent guest appearances on Saturday Night Live, and by frequently performing his comedy routine throughout the country.

With the release of “The Jerk“, Steve Martin quickly transitioned from Stand-up comedian to full-blown comedic film star.

I know the humor is silly, childish, idiotic, and goofy….but the film still draws a ton of laughs each time you watch it, even 30+ years later.

The film starred:

Steve Martin – Navin Johnson
Bernadette Peters – Marie Johnson
Bill Macy – Stan Fox
M. Emmett Walsh – The Madman
Jackie Mason – Harry Hartounian
Carl Reiner – Himself
Catlin Adams – Patty Bernstein
Unknown canine actor – Shithead

The movie is stuffed full of too many memorable quotes and lines that it would be impossible to list them all. It is best to remember Navin Johnson’s words of wisdom at taught to him by his black parents…

“Lord loves a workin’ man; don’t trust whitey; see a doctor and get rid of it.”

The Director of “The Jerk” was Carl Reiner. As part of my autograph collecting hobby, I have been able to get autographed photos from both Steve Martin and Carl Reiner.

Steve Martin co-wrote the screenplay for the film.

Steve Martin’s next film was “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid” which came out in 1982. It did not do nearly as well at the box office as “The Jerk”.

Carl Reiner’s next directoral effort was also “Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid“.

Steve Martin has starred in a lot of highly successful comedies over the years since “The Jerk”. The film will never win any artistic awards but it is usually always listed on any list of the Top-100 Comedy Films of All-Time. If you want to watch this great comedian in his comedic prime, rent this movie or watch some of the early Saturday Night Live shows that he did. The man was a comedy genius!

Breaking news: For all you wedding watchers out there, Tracie B has just posted on our wedding cake! Yes, WEDDING CAKE!

Above: While in Los Angeles in early December, I had lunch at Mozza with my friends Howard Rodman and Lou Amdur. Owner of my favorite natural wine bar, Lou has a wonderful food and wine blog (not so new), where he writes about his wine selection and whatever else makes him culinarily curious. Comrade Howard is my number 1 candidate for “someone who outta have a food and wine blog.”

The oughts are noughts and 2010 has arrived and at least a couple of friends of mine took time during the December wind-down to launch new food and wine blogs.

Above: For desert, Howard, Lou, and I shared olive oil ice cream. Penelope and Javier sat at the table next to us. I had no idea who they were (as I was hoping to run into Mel and Carl, who purportedly dine there and are a much more sexy couple!).

This month saw the launch of a food and wine (and music) blog by my friend Anthony Wilson (click on “blog” in the left-hand nav bar). You see, Anthony’s primary mission in life is not to be one of the greatest jazz guitar players of our time. His true calling is “to seek out — every day — fresh, delicious, typical food, prepared with love by like-minded obsessives, along with real, authentic, natural wine, served whenever possible in non-aristocratic, sometimes downright quirky, environments where it’s possible to roll up one’s sleeves and really get down to the business of eating and drinking.”

Above: While in LA, I also dined at Palate (in Glendale), which, despite the swagger, is my favorite restaurant in the U.S. right now. I really dig their vintage decanters (we decanted a bottle of Domaine de Montille 2006 Pommard Les Rugiens, thank you very much).

I’m also excited about a new blog, Gourmale, authored by my bandmate and air guitar superstar, Dan Crane (aka Jean-Luc Retard, aka Björn Türoque). Dan’s well-earned nickname on the road is “Snackboy Jr.” or “Snack,” and the Nous Non Plus tour bus has often been forced to stop abruptly for “snack attacks.” Enough said… (now, if we could just get Dan to add a blogroll!).

Above: At Palate, chef Octavio Becerra treated us to an amazing roast side of goat.

I’ve also been recently hipped to two very cool wine blogs by Los Angeles-based wine professionals, My Daily Wine by Amy Atwood, now at the top of my Google reader feed for news from the world of natural wine, and Brunellos Have More Fun, by Whitney Adams, whose mostly Italocentric blog I would read if only for the title! And lastly, but by no means least, my new guide to Bay Area restaurants is called Wine Book Girl, by my colleague UC Press publicist Amy Cleary.

In other news…

Above: A collaborative NYE meal, dill and chive roast potatoes (by Tracie B) and pan-roasted, boneless rib-eyes (by me). Langhe Nebbiolo 2008 by Produttori del Barbaresco and Beatles Anthology on DVD. Is this what heaven is like?

At the last minute, Tracie B and I decided to spend our New Year’s eve at home, alone, just the two of us. We’ll have a lifetime of NYE celebrations ahead of us and so we thought we’d spend this last one, before we get married later this month, by ourselves.

Our bubbly beverage? A champagne of Champagnes (ha!): a bottle of Pierre Gimmonet Cuis 1er Cru Sans Année. We opened it at the beginning of the evening for an apertif and re-corked it. By the end of the night, it had opened up into a wonderful toastiness complemented by fresh white fruit and bright acidity. The perfect wine to pair with my true love’s sweet first kiss of the new year…

Happy 2010, everyone! So far, so good!

Gene Kelly directs A Guide for the Married Man, a film that is truly a product of its time. The 1967 “bedroom farce” feels quite dated today and seems to rely on its guest stars a bit too much, but the root of it is a pretty funny little send-up of infidelity and how not to get caught screwing around on your wife. The premise is ludicrous from the outset, with a bunch of slovenly dopes paired with some truly glorious hotties, so right away you know Kelly’s up to something…

To take anything in A Guide for the Married Man seriously requires the bending of logic. We have to accept that Walter Matthau’s Paul Manning could be married to Inger Stevens’ Ruth Manning, for instance, and we have to imagine that he’d want to cheat on Inger Stevens. This takes some doing. We also have to accept, rationally, that Robert Morse’s Ed Stander is going to help Paul cheat on his wife and that his gap-toothed idiot grin is something women look for.

The puzzle is whether all of this stuff is meant as parody or meant to be taken as a sort of “lesson movie” in which Paul eventually discovers how happy his marriage really is. The premise involves Ed telling Paul all sorts of tips of the trade to help him avoid getting caught. This means that Ed and Paul have to go on a trial run that includes renting a car and getting a seedy motel room to make sure that Paul doesn’t get caught when he decides to cheat.

Of course, Paul doesn’t really have anyone specific in mind and his decision to cheat simply seems to come out of general boredom with his marital existence with Ruth. Why he’d be bored with Ruth’s generous breasts and hips is a giant mystery, of course, but that might be all a part of the comedy. How good a movie A Guide for the Married Man actually is depends largely on how much of the premise is meant as parody and how much is meant as comedy.

If, for instance, the clearly chauvinistic rantings of the characters are meant as send-ups of how men acted in the 50s and 60s, this is truly funny stuff. And if this is all meant as a send-up of how magazines like Playboy treat women in general (how these rags still treat women), this is good stuff indeed. But if it’s all a part of the general lexicon and simply a lame product of its time, there’s little good about A Guide for the Married Man.

I suppose the greatest failing here is that Kelly isn’t an adequate enough director to make his intentions clear. Sure, he wraps the thing up in a nice “family values” bow and tells us how happy it is to make a home. But there’s tinges of blatant, strong sexism throughout and the women in the film only exist as eye candy and nothing more. There aren’t any female characters worth relating to beyond a butt shot or a peek at the generous cleavage.

Kelly’s direction simply leaves too many questions about the film’s intent and, while there are some funny bits and some truly over-the-top moments, it’s hard to decide if the chauvinism and backwards attitudes is intentional or meant to be sent up for laughs. Even so, a lot of A Guide for the Married Man feels dated and awkward and there really isn’t much to this picture beyond a pile of sexy women and a lot of mucking about with Walter Matthau. If that’s your cup of tea, this movie might be for you.

3.9/10

Trailer:

Nature's Winter etch-a-sketch displayed on a pane of glass.

A lot of people like snow. I find it to be an unnecessary freezing of water.
-Carl Reiner-

Ice crystals form on window screen.

“Merry Madagascar”
a review by Darby O’Gill

DreamWorks Animation released their second holiday special this year, the only problem is they may have jumped the shark a little this time. Now, I’m not a big fan of the Madagascar movies. Truth be told, I only saw the first one and hated it. But, I did try to watch this special with an open mind. My biggest problem with Merry Madagascar is that they aired it a week before Thanksgiving, and not a week before Christmas! I know that everyone is always saying Christmas is starting earlier and earlier each year, but come on! Look, I don’t want see a story about Santa before I even get to eat some turkey. NBC really dropped the ball on this one. I guess I spoke too soon when I praised the first special, Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space. Merry Madagascar reunites the original voice talent from the films, and has the gang filling in for Santa after he gets a case of amnesia. It’s a fun holiday special, but I wouldn’t call it a classic by any means. I’m glad DreamWorks Animation is keeping the holiday special tradition alive, but I just wish they would have aired this one a little closer to Christmas. With that and my dislike for the film series, I’m afraid I have to give this one a lower rating. But, overall it works for what it is. I’m just hoping for a Kung Fu Panda New Year special.

Rating:

Terry, I can’t predict the future. I pay professionals to do that, and even they get it wrong sometimes.

– Reuben

After the massive success of the first movie, Soderburgh and company came back together for Ocean’s Twelve. This setting and story are dramatically different from the glitz and glamour from the first incarnation. Instead of the bright lights of the Las Vegas, the Eleven are focused their attention on Europe. I think that this was a mistake, because it hurt the caper aspect of the story.

When the Eleven successful pilfered Terry Benedict out of his $150 million dollars at the ending of the first movie, (spoiler alert) the beginning show how the gang was doing during the three and a half since the heist. Most of them spent some or all of their $13 million dollars cut.

They get a rude awakening when Benedict tracks them all down wherever they were hiding. He offers them a chance to correct their mistakes by stealing his money. Benedict gives them two weeks to return the money with interest, which is roughly $200 million dollars, or he will kill them.

The gang has a pow-wow to discuss how they could get the money is that short amount of time. They decide to go to Amsterdam to meet up with Matsui (Robbie Coltrane), who gives them an assignment to steal the world’s oldest stock certificate from 1602 worth $2.5 million Euros.

When they do, they realize that a famous cat burglar named “The Night Fox” (Vincent Cassel) got the stock first. Not only that, but the team realizes that The Night Fox made the call to Benedict that ratted them out.

The Night Fox issues a challenge to the Ocean’s Eleven to steal a Coronation Faberge Egg from exhibit in Paris. They want to beat The Night Fox at their own game. Eleven becomes Twelve when they enlist the help of Roman (Eddie Izzard) to help pull off the switch-a-roo.

This movie as a whole is not well executed. The dialogue was not up to par. The scenes dragged on way too long. I was bored to tears. The movie looks grainy. The interaction with the members felt clunky and stagy. There wasn’t the synergy from the first outing. I was disappointed with this movie, especially the last thirty that fell off the tracks.

Judgment: This is one of the instances that the sequel is not better than the original.

Rating: **1/2

You guys are pros. The best. I’m sure you can make it out of the casino. Of course, lest we forget, once you’re out the front door, you’re still in the middle of the fucking desert!

– Reuben

Breaking away from his trademark quirky sensibility, Steven Soderbergh remade the 1960s Rat Pack classic heist film, Ocean’s Eleven. Instead of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammie Davis, Jr., the main leads are George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Matt Damon. Quite a departure. Soderbergh has some success with mainstream movies; I think that his subsequent Ocean’s trilogy exposed himself more to the mainstream consciousness.

Re-channeling his Out of Sight persona, George Clooney plays the titular Danny Ocean that is recently paroled after four years. When he is released, he goes to old stomping grounds to reconnect with his former crewmembers, travel across the country to reconnect with the poker teacher to the stars, Rusty (Pitt).

Ocean’s plan is to steal “x” amount dollars from three casinos, the Bellagio, the Mirage and the MGM Grand all of them owned Las Vegas casino owner, Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia). He would need a large crew at least a dozen to pull off the multiple cons needed to pull off the heist.

Seeing that they need a way inside the way, Danny and Rusty pay a visit to a former casino owner that was wronged by Benedict and knows the ins and outs of the security system, Reuben (Elliott Gould). After he is in, the rest of the crew is assembled like Frank (Bernie Mac), two drivers the twins, Virgil and Turk (Casey Affleck, Scott Caan), electronic expert Livingston (Eddie Jemison), explosives Basher Tarr (Don Cheadle), a “grease man” Yen (Shaobo Qin), Saul (Carl Reiner) and last but not least, master of disguise, Linus (Damon).

They have pow-wow to lay out the foundation of this impossible feat. If they succeed, they stand to get 150 million dollars when the casinos are distracted from an upcoming fight between Lennox Lewis and Wladimir Klitschko that same day. In order to let the heist run slowly, they have to lay the groundwork like plant a device on the casino’s closed circuit camera, recreating the vault to practice, the daily routine of their mark.

While relaying the routine of Benedict, Linus thought it would be a good idea to enlist the help of Benedict’s main squeeze, Tess (Julia Roberts) who was also Danny’s ex-wife. Danny’s ulterior motive becomes clear that steals the money is not his only motivation. He wants to get Tess back.

The movie is slick and a little too polished. I had the same problem with this movie as I did with Spike Lee’s Inside Man. I don’t like it when a filmmaker talks down the audience. We don’t need to know every single detail that needed to be explained. When the heist was taking place, I didn’t believe that these people would be able to pull that off. The only person that I liked was Andy Garcia. He has a permanent stoic look on his face that works well with his dickish Terry Benedict.

Judgment: Have a good time with Ocean and the gang in this solid remake.

Rating: ****

When I think of what God looks like, I know I don’t think about George Burns.

Buttonholing venerable comedian George Burns for the title role was certainly a divine inspiration! God, in the guise of a wisecracking old gent, decides to makes his presence known to a harried grocery clerk (John Denver) so he can get the message out that “everything on earth can still work if we want it to.”

Going into this film I was expecting to hear a bunch of little rants about religion and how God isn’t real and how he is. Well I didn’t get that, and instead what I got was a very true, if not careful look at the world of religion.

There are plenty of one-liners that make this film very funny. By the end you have this feeling that God isn’t just a funny guy, but probably a really chill guy that you wouldn’t mind hanging out with. The film is directed by Carl Reiner, who instead of making this film very silly and dumb, he brings up this smart and quietly funny story, that all of us can connect to.

But what i really found interesting and it is still so true today, even more so, that even when we do see miracles in our lives right in front of us we still tend to ignore then and credit it to something else. This movie does carry a timeless message that WE are creating our life, that we all have a choice to live a certain way and that everything that is happening in our world is created by us and actually is a reflection by us. But again, it is all our choice to believe it or not. And the only things that we complain about, is truly and simply about ourselves and nothing else.

However, although the humor was there at points it really wasn’t in the film all the way through. For some of these parts I was bored and uninterested until God came back on the screen and made everything funny. Also, this film really doesn’t get strong and effective until the very last 20 minutes. I feel like with a strong message that I basically just stated above, this film could have benefited from that throughout the whole film, but instead choose to use it at the end of the film.

I really did like George Burns as God however. He doesn’t play this stereotypical image we have of God instead he just plays himself, and makes the film a whole lot more funnier with this representation. Surprisingly, John Denver does a better job than I expected. He doesn’t seem too cheesy and more believable as an actor than a country artist. If only he didn’t die too young, or else he could have been in better films. Some guys just don’t have all the luck.

Consensus: Oh God! is good but not terrific. It features a heart-felt message, with good acting, and a smart script, its just that its message wasn’t as effective until the very end of the film.

8/10=Matineee!!!!

NO PEOPLE LIKE SHOW PEOPLE: Good news for Mel Brooks fans — his Grammy-winning comedy collaborations with Carl Reiner, The 2000 Year Old

MIRREN: seeing Red

Man, have been remastered and repackaged for a 50th anniversary four-disc reissue (three CDs and one DVD), The 2000 Year Old Man: The Complete History, due in stores this week. Not only that, Toronto audiences well finally get to see Mel’s Broadway musical version of Young Frankenstein, now slated to play March 16 – April 18 at the Princess Of Wales … Helen Mirren is set to co-star with Bruce Willis and Morgan Freeman in a new thriller, Red, after she brings the National Theatre production of Phedre to Broadway with Dominic Cooper, the Mamma Mia boy toy currently on view with new scene-stealer Carey Mulligan in the hit TIFF star-maker An

MERCER: Rodeo daze

Education … 40-year CHUM radio veteran Roger Ashby will be inducted into the Canadian Music and Broadcast Industry Hall of Fame at a Canadian Music Week dinner March 11 at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel … and talk about yer urbane cowboy! Rick Mercer goes a-ridin’ and a-ropin’ at the Edmonton Rodeo tonight, and actually lives to tell the tale, on CBC’s Rick Mercer Report at 8 pm.

FANGS FOR THE MEMORIES: He became David Frost in Frost/Nixon, shone as Tony Blair in The Queen, and plays legendary maverick U.K. rugby coach Brian Clough in The Damned United. So what does Michael Sheen have to do with that mess of a man pictured beside him? Yup – that’s

SHEEN: he sucks, but only in THIS movie

him. Sheen plays the vampire leader Aro in last weekend’s top boxoffice sizzler, The Twilight Saga: New Moon. And he makes no bones about why he took the role. “I knew it would make my 10-year-old daughter, Lily, very happy,” he confesses. And it has. “She’s got pictures from Twilight and New Moon everywhere in her bedroom,” he notes. “And now, she’s put her dad up there as well.” Just wait ‘til she sees him as The White Rabbit in Tim Burton’s bound-to-be-peculiar re-telling of Alice In Wonderland.

MAY IN NOVEMBER: Toronto Western Hospital’s Fracture Clinic and Medical Imaging Waiting Room is a happier place this morning after renowned

KARP: a gift to last

Toronto photo artist May Karp gifted 22 pieces to TWH. Karp’s uplifting photography is already on view in a number of Canada’s larger hospitals. In 2004 she donated 27 framed images for Toronto General’s new Surgical Centre waiting room, adding warmth and a new visual focus for the families of surgery patients. After seeing the impact of her photography in the Surgical Centre, Tennys Hanson, President and CEO of Toronto General & Western Hospital Foundation, asked her to consider a similar project for Toronto Western Hospital. “Hospital waiting rooms are for patients, sometimes for their relatives or friends,” Karp notes. “Most visitors are frightened and anxious. Time passes very slowly as they wait for results or treatment. One can almost ‘taste’ the emotions. Over 20 years ago I spent a lot of time in rooms like this. I experienced all the emotions many times since then.” Which is why her colourful, eye-catching and blissfully distracting works are brightening TWH this morning.

TOMORROW:

Glee & Nine go on the record.

-/-

Tell Me Another Scary Story…But Not TOO Scary!

By Carl Reiner, Illustrated by James Bennett

Published September 1, 2009 (Hardcover) Dove

When I was a kid, I watched Carl Reiner on The Dick Van Dyke Show, wishing that Dick was my father, and that I would grow up to be like Mary Tyler Moore.  Now that I’ve grown up, some have said I do look like Mary Tyler Moore, and here I am,  reading a kids’ book by Carl Reiner.  There’s an odd symmetry to this, but it makes sense to me.

The book — thank you for asking — is Tell Me Another Scary Story…But Not TOO Scary! A CD accompanies the book, and  Carl Reiner himself reads the story about something that happened to him as a kid.  His kind old neighbor — whose last name spells Halloween backwards — calls young Carl on the phone, and invites him over for hamburgers to see a scary costume Mr Neewollah was creating just for Carl.  But when Carl arrives at his neighbor’s house, something more frightening than he can ever imagine happens.  Ketchup is involved.  And blood.  Real blood.

I love Halloween, even though I only wear one type of costume.  Witch.  It’s a black costume, although I imagine myself to have good powers.   I can wear Lycra, I’m happy.

When I was a kid, my stepfather – who was very creative — made our Halloween costumes.  We did boxes a lot.  We were cereal boxes a few times.  Not particularly easy to see out of, although we were protected somewhat from the typical Halloween weather, which, in Jersey, was either very cold or rainy.  I was Minnie Mouse one year, with an amazing head he had crafted out of chicken-coop wire.    I guess my brother would have been Mickey, but I don’t remember.  I just recall that I loved wearing a short skirt, black tights, and little white gloves.  I haven’t changed a lot over the years.

I had a friend, Luanne, whose parents hired people to create her costumes every year, expensive, lavish costumes, like a coffee pot that looked completely real.   She won the contest at the high school one year, when we were all in grade school.  My stepfather flipped out.  He was furious that the money beat him.  It was a bloody night, when we got home.

That kind of thing is scary.  Carl Reiner is just sweet, and a bit cranky, but not scary.  So go ahead and read the book to your kids, or pop the CD in and listen and turn the pages.  Sound effects are really cool.

But not too scary!

Instead of the Germans its the Russians, so hilarious!

A Russian submarine runs aground near a small New England town, and it’s up to Lt. Rozanov (Alan Arkin) as the Russians’ second-in-command to covertly secure a towboat to avoid an international confrontation. When he hooks up with residents such as Walt Whittaker (Carl Reiner) and the police chief (Brian Keith), all hell breaks loose.

I will say one thing about this film is that although it is an old film, it still does hold up some comedy that you can still laugh at till this day. The film is a very gentle comedy towards the Russians. I was expecting a film that was going to be bashing the Russians and basically making them look like fools, however this is not the case. Much of the film shows the culture clash but shows how the Russians are just as gentle as us, and we shouldn’t be afraid of them.

I just didn’t think that this film was all that funny as I was to believe. Many of the jokes are catchy but most of them can be very flat, and really stiff. Now this is a good film don’t get me wrong, but I just think that there are better ones out there, that would be a lot more funnier than some of the jokes they had in this film.

I will say that despite the over 2 hour time limit the film was very sharp. The direction of the film was quick and went from one place to another so I wouldn’t get bored too easily of these jokes.

The performances are OK but would be nothing without Alan Arkin. Arkin does the best job as he still does the great Russian accent and it doesn’t slip one bit. He was funny but also very vicious, and you could tell that’s what he was having coming out through this performance.

Consensus: Though not amazingly funny, Russians Are Coming boasts a great performance from Arkin, memorable quotes, and a timeless message of “why can’t we all just get along?”.

8/10=Matinee!!

Just Desserts

By Carl Reiner

Buy on Amazon

Published September 1, 2009 (Hardcover) Phoenix Books

I’ve never been one for slapstick, but maybe Carl Reiner is convincing me.   His heart is in the right place.  Mostly.

In Just Desserts, Reiner magically creates a world where sinners and other cruel people are instantly punished.  In this world, is a novelist, influenced by an author whose name is unnervingly similar to Carl Reiner’s — try Rhyne Karlner.  And that novelist, Nat Noland, is a plagiarist.  Yeah, that part I don’t like.  I wouldn’t even open a Cliff’s Notes in school, so opposed was I to unoriginality and what I thought was cheating.

Nat — an avowed atheist — begins this adventure by writing to God in an email.  He was goofing.  But, he is stunned when he gets an immediate reply.  He is further stunned when the GodGod emails, as he calls them, begin answering questions Nat has posed in his mind.

At the point when the romance author Nat Noland shows up — with a New York Times press pass — at the UN, I finally throw in the towel of my resistance.   And I roll with Reiner’s Novellelah.  Good timing, because this is about the point when the noses of world leaders at the UN grow, Pinocchio-like, with their lies.  Including George W.

Just Desserts is a deliciously funny book — with lessons and depth if you enjoy its profoundness. And its slapstick, if you don’t.

We have lost several notables so far this month, one of whom, was directly involved with writing some well-remembered old time radio shows.

09-11-2009
Larry Gelbart, 81, American comedy writer (M*A*S*H)
died of cancer

This is the first of an 8 part interview.
Click here to see the remaining videos on Youtube.

Although Larry Gelbart will be most remembered for M*A*S*H, during the 1940s, Gelbart began working as a writer for Fanny Brice’s radio show, and as a gag writer for Danny Thomas.  After a brief stint in the army, where he wrote for Armed Forces Radio, Gelbart joined the writing staff of Duffy’s Tavern, a popular radio program.  He also wrote for Bob Hope, whom he followed to television. . . . . In the early 1950s, Gelbart became part of the extraordinarily talented crew of writers on Sid Caesar’s Your Show of Shows. This group, which included Carl Reiner, Howard Morris, Mel Brooks and Woody Allen, in addition to Gelbart, helped define the medium in its earlier days. Shortly after becoming head writer for The Pat Boone Show, Gelbart became disgusted by broadcasting’s communist witch-hunts and moved to England.  While in London, he continued to work in British film and television.  Read more

 
09-12-2009
George Eckstein, 81, American television writer
and producer (The Fugitive)
died of lung cancer

09-14-2009
Patrick Swayze, 57, American actor (Dirty Dancing, Ghost)
died of pancreatic cancer

09-16-2009*
Henry Gibson, 73, American actor (Laugh-In, Boston Legal)
died of cancer

09-16-2009
Mary Travers, 72, American singer
(Peter, Paul and Mary If I Had A Hammer; Puff, The Magic Dragon)
died of leukemia

*At the time of this posting, Wikipedia is stating that henry Gibson died on 09-14-2009.  All other Google hits are claiming 09-16-2009.