Some famous & not-so-famous who quit the party....
It’s that time of year again when we spare a thought for some of the famous, infamous and not-so-famous whom we’ve grown up with and won’t be with us in 2008.
2007 was unusually kind to rock stars, it was a year not too many burned out and shuffled this mortal coil. There was a heavy heavy toll however from the art and literary worlds with the departures of Stockhausen, Menotti, Rostropovich and Pavarotti, writers Norman Mailer and Kurt Vonnegut, film directors Antonioni and Bergman, jazz greats Max Roach and Oscar Peterson, the ever-graceful actress Deborah Kerr, not to mention the irrepressible and inimitable George Melly. Just a few political heavyweights, most notably Boris Yeltsin and, most recent and most shockingly, Benazir (Pinky) Bhutto also quit the scene.
This year my own arbitrary list commemorates those I grew up with as a boy in that period of gestation 1950 to 1965, when the 60’s blossomed into the brief glorious scene that was 1966-69, truly the best of times to be covering the London scene. So here’s my list, a pastiche of the themes and folks who figured at the time.
Robert Anton Wilson (75): b.1932 d. Jan, prolific and engaging American novelist, essayist, philosopher, psychologist, futurologist, libertarian, and conspiracy theory researcher, who loved taking a big black needle to new agey pseuds. Wilson wrote 35 books. The best-known, the cult classic “The Illuminatus Trilogy” (1975), described as “a fairy tale for paranoids”. His writing was an “attempt to get people into a state of generalized agnosticism, not agnosticism about God alone, but agnosticism about everything”, he said.
Barbara Kelly (83): b.1924 d. Jan, Canadian-born actress best remembered for her TV roles in the anodyne mid 50’s and early 60’s in UK with husband Bernard Braden, most frequently on What’s My Line? (1951-63). In 1972 the BBC terminated Braden’s late night show, replacing it with a similar programme introduced by the assiduously toothsome and upwardly mobile Esther Rantzen, who’d worked for Braden on the show. Not uncoincidentally, Rantzen married Braden’s producer Desmond Wilcox. Their ouster long rankled with both Braden’s but their day was done.
Charles Forte (99): b.1908 d. Feb, British hotelier Lord Forte emigrated from Italy to Scotland aged four, founded chain of milk bars in 1935, which post-war became Forte Holdings, buying the Café Royal in 1954. Famous for all that was tacky in the 60’s he opened UK’s first full motorway service station for cars at Newport Pagnell in 1959. Trust Houses Group Ltd and Forte Holdings were merged in 1970 to become Trust House Forte or THF. Through mergers and expansion, Forte expanded the Forte Group into a multibillion £ business, including the Savoy Hotel.
Arthur Schlesinger (90): b.1917 d. Feb, US Pulitzer Prizewinner and historian who explored liberalism of American leaders Roosevelt, John Kennedy, and Robert Kennedy. Wrote a detailed account of the Kennedy administration in “A Thousand Days”. Schlesinger was a prolific contributor to liberal theory and articulate voice for Kennedy-style liberalism. He popularized the term “imperial presidency” during the Nixon administration.
Neville Duke (85), DSO, OBE, DFC, b.1922 d. April, British WW2 fighter pilot. The last true “Boy’s Own” hero, he was the top Allied flying ace in the Mediterranean theatre, having shot down 27 enemy aircraft, and acknowledged as one of the world’s foremost post-war test pilots. In 1953, he became holder of the world air speed record flying a Hawker Hunter F Mk3 at 727.63 mph. The movie “Sound Barrier” was loosely based on him.
George Sewell (83) b.1924 d. April, English character actor, son of a Tottenham florist, specialising in tough guys, cops and villains. Auditioned by Joan Littlewood for her Theatre Workshop production of “Fings Ain’t Wot They Used T’Be” he made his debut at age of 35. Went on to star in Littlewood’s productions, “Sparrers Can’t Sing” (1962) and “Oh! What a Lovely War” (1963). For years Sewell was the gritty face of crime and law enforcement in numerous TV series. He appeared in films, notably Poor Cow (1967) and Get Carter (1971).
Jean-Pierre Cassel (75) b.1932 d. April, French actor, son of a Paris opera singer Cassel was discovered by Gene Kelly as a tap dancer. He worked with Claude Chabrol , Luis Buñuel in “The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie” and Hollywood in Ken Annakin’s “Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines”.For English-speaking audiences he became the French equivalent of Italy’s Marcello Mastroianni, as the urbane charming Continental male. He was father of actor Vincent Cassel.
David Halberstam (73): b.1934 d. April, American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author known for his early work on the Vietnam War and politics. In the mid-1960s, Halberstam covered the Civil Rights Movement for The New York Times. He next covered President John F. Kennedy’s foreign policy decisions and the Vietnam War in his most famous work “The Best and the Brightest”.
Jerry Falwell (74): b.1933 d.May, American fundamentalist Christian televangelist. He founded the Moral Majority in 1979, which became the largest political lobby groups for evangelical Christians in the US during the 1980s. and is credited with getting Ronald Reagan elected. In 1987 he was fined for financial improprieties and in 1999 announced the Antichrist would arrive within a decade, adding “of course he’ll be Jewish.” After the September 11, 2001 attacks, he told viewers “pagans, abortionists, and feminists, gays and lesbians helped this happen.’” Fellow evangelist Pat Robertson agreed.
Nigel Dempster (66): b.1941 d. July, British journalist, best known for his celebrity and high life gossip columns. His work appeared in the Daily Express (Paul Hickey) and Daily Mail. Calcutta-born son of an Australian mining engineer and English mother, he was educated at Sherborne School, Dorset from whence he was expelled for bad behaviour. Dempster also wrote an inspired “Grovel” column in Private Eye. Eye’s editor, Richard Ingrams, prone to style Dempster as the “greatest living Englishman”, changed this ‘Nigel Pratt-Dumpster’ following Dempster’s remarks about his wife. .
Tammy Faye Bakker (65): b.1942 d. July, American Christian singer, evangelist and TV personality. Wife of televangelist, and convicted felon, Jim Bakker she was known for her heavy makeup, mascara, false eyelashes and tattooed eyebrows. Unlike other televangelists, she urged tolerance toward homosexuals and people with AIDS. The Bakkers’ TV empire collapsed in 1987 in sexual and financial scandal, with media revelations of opulent lifestyle, including air-conditioned dog house and gold-plated bathroom fixtures.
Leona Helmsley (87): b.1920 d.Aug, billionaire New York City hotel operator and real estate investor, a flamboyant personality with a reputation for tyrannical behaviour earning her the nickname “Queen of Mean.” The image of Helmsley was sealed when a former housekeeper testified she heard Helmsley say: “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.” She was convicted tax evasion in 1989 serving 19 months in prison.
Mark Birley (77): b.1930 d. Aug, English entrepreneur. In 1962 Birley founded Annabel’s in Berkeley Square. The nightclub, named for his wife, was the place to go through the 60’s and 70’s, just a step down the stairs from pal John Aspinall’s Clermont gaming club. Birley was the son of Sir Oswald Birley, the portrait painter. His sister, Maxime de la Falaise, was a noted 1950’s fashion model and muse to designer Yves Saint Laurent. Annabel Birley became the mistress of Birley’s former friend Sir James Goldsmith, giving birth to two children, Jemima and Zac by Goldsmith. The Birleys divorced in 1975. In 1986 Birley’s son Rupert disappeared in Togo and was never found. His other son Robin was mauled as a child by a tiger in John Aspinall’s private zoo and badly scarred for life. It all went to hell with Lucan’s vanishing act.
Ned Sherrin (76): b.1931 d. Oct, English broadcaster and stage director. Sherrin joined British TV with the founding of ITV (1956), and BBC in 1957. In 1962 produced the satirical series “That Was The Week That Was” starring David Frost and successors “Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life” . Films included “Up Pompeii!”, and “The Virgin Soldiers”. Sherrin produced and directed numerous theatre productions in London’s West End, including “Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell”. Openly gay, Sherrin was a patron of London’s Gay Symphony Orchestra.
“Colonel” Bob Denard (78): b.1929 d. Oct, born Gilbert Bourgeaud, one of the most infamous mercenaries since World War II. Fought in Algeria and took part in the Katanga secession in the 1960s, also fighting in Congo, Angola and Zimbabwe. His mercenaries becoming notorious as Les Affreux. Between 1975 and 1995, he participated in four coups in the Comoro Islands where he converted to Islam, married 7 times and had 8 children.He died in his bed.
Ike Turner (1931- Dec, 2007): American musician, bandleader and talent scout, best known for his work with wife Tina Turner as one half of the Ike & Tina Turner duo. Spanning a career that lasted half a century, Ike’s repertoire included blues, soul, rock, and funk. Hugely talented, he did not take to being outshone by Tina, whom he physically abused. RIP Ike, Tina rocks on...
