Tag: In Memoriam (61-70 of 546)

Jul 17 2012 09:08 AM ET

Bill Asher, director of 'I Love Lucy and 'Bewitched,' dies at 90

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Image Credit: Everett Collection

The director and producer behind the television classics I Love Lucy and Bewitched has died. Bill Asher was 90. His wife, Meredith, says he died Monday at a facility in Palm Desert, Calif., of complications from Alzheimer’s disease.

Asher was best known for his work on I Love Lucy, where he directed Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz for 100 of the show’s 181 episodes between 1952 and 1957. He also produced and directed The Patty Duke Show and Bewitched, which starred his then-wife Elizabeth Montgomery. Montgomery and Asher had three children together.

Asher brought Sally Field to TV screens in Gidget, and took the same sensibility to movies as director of the teen romps Beach Blanket Bingo and Beach Party, starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello.

Jul 16 2012 01:15 PM ET

'Seven Habits of Highly Effective People' author dies

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Stephen R. Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People as well as three other books that have all sold more than a million copies, has died. He was 79. In a statement sent to employees of a Utah consulting firm Covey co-founded, his family said the writer and motivational speaker died at a hospital in Idaho Falls, Idaho, early Monday due to complications from a bicycle accident in April. “In his final hours, he was surrounded by his loving wife and each one of his children and their spouses, just as he always wanted,” the family said.

Covey was hospitalized after being knocked unconscious in the bicycle accident on a steep road in the foothills of Provo, Utah, about 45 miles south of Salt Lake City. At the time, his publicist, Debra Lund, said doctors had not found any signs of long-term damage to his head. “He just lost control on his bike and crashed,” Lund said. “He was wearing a helmet, which is good news.”

Covey is the author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People and co-founder of Utah-based professional services company FranklinCovey. Catherine Sagers, Covey’s daughter, told The Salt Lake Tribune in April that her father had suffered some bleeding on his brain after the bicycle accident. A telephone message left for Sagers on Monday wasn’t returned.

Jul 16 2012 12:59 PM ET

Sylvester Stallone on son's death: 'There is no greater pain'

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Sylvester Stallone spoke to TMZ about the death of his son, Sage Stallone, saying he wants the “speculation and questionable reporting” to end.

Stallone said, “When a parent loses a child there is no greater pain. Therefore I am imploring people to respect my talented son’s memory and feel compassion for his loving mother Sasha. This agonizing loss will be felt for the rest of our lives. Sage was our first child and the center of our universe and I am humbly begging for all to have my son’s memory and soul left in peace.”

Sage passed away over the weekend at age 36. The cause of death has not been determined.

Read more:
Sylvester Stallone’s son found dead
Coroner: Sage Stallone’s cause of death unknown
Arnold Schwarzenegger remembers Sage Stallone

Jul 8 2012 05:27 PM ET

Ernest Borgnine dies at 95

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Image Credit: Jason Merritt/Getty Images

Ernest Borgnine, the beefy screen star known for blustery, often villainous roles, but who won the best-actor Oscar for playing against type as a lovesick butcher in Marty in 1955, died Sunday. He was 95.

His longtime spokesman, Harry Flynn, told The Associated Press that Borgnine died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center with his family by his side.

Television fans loved Borgnine as the scheming Navy officer in the sitcom McHale’s Navy. Borgnine was also known as the heavy who beats up Frank Sinatra in From Here to Eternity and one of the thugs who menaces Spencer Tracy in Bad Day at Block Rock.

More on Ernest Borgnine’s life and career from EW:
Ernest Borgnine honored by SAG: It’s about time! (August 2010)

Jun 28 2012 02:56 PM ET

'I Love Lucy' actress Doris Singleton dies at 92

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Photo credit: ABC Photo Archives/ABC via Getty Images

Actress Doris Singleton died Tuesday in Los Angeles, reports Variety. She was 92.

Singleton is best known for her recurring role as Carolyn Appleby — Lucy and Ricky Ricardo’s over-zealous neighbor — on I Love Lucy. She appeared on the sitcom 10 times between 1953 and 1957.

”A day of saying hasta luego to two great ladies, Nora Ephron and Doris Singleton,” Lucie Arnaz, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz’s daughter, wrote on her Facebook page. “May they both fly swiftly heavenward and enjoy a blissful rest for jobs well done down here. They were loved and appreciated and will be missed.”

The comedienne also appeared on Ball’s later TV shows, as well as All in the Family, Hogan’s Heroes, My Three Sons, The Munsters, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Days of Our Lives, and Dynasty, among others.

Before she hit the small screen, Singleton danced with the American Ballet Theater and sang with bandleader Art Jarrett. She later lent her voice to radio, appearing with George Burns and Gracie Allen, Bob Hope, and Jack Benny.

Singleton’s husband of 61 years, Charles Isaacs, a comedy writer, director and producer, died in 2002.

Jun 28 2012 09:03 AM ET

Don Grady of 'My Three Sons' dies

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Don Grady, who was one of television’s most beloved big brothers as Robbie Douglas on the long-running 1960s hit My Three Sons, died Wednesday. He was 68. His My Three Sons co-star Barry Livingston, who played youngest brother Ernie, confirmed Grady’s death to The Associated Press. Livingston said Grady had been suffering from cancer and receiving hospice care at his home in Thousand Oaks, Calif. But the exact cause and place of death were not immediately clear. “It’s the oldest cliche in the world when TV brothers start referring to each other like biological brothers, but he was the oldest, and somebody I looked up to and learned from a great deal about life,” Livingston said. READ FULL STORY »

Jun 21 2012 08:59 AM ET

Sports artist LeRoy Neiman dead at 91

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LeRoy-Neiman

Image Credit: Bebeto Matthews/AP

Painter and sketch artist LeRoy Neiman, best known for evoking the kinetic energy of the world’s biggest sporting and leisure events with bright quick strokes, died Wednesday at age 91. Neiman was the official painter of five Olympiads and was a contributing artist at Playboy magazine for many years. His longtime publicist, Gail Parenteau, confirmed his death at a Manhattan hospital on Wednesday but didn’t disclose the cause.

Neiman was a media-savvy artist who knew how to enthrall audiences with his instant renditions of what he observed. In 1972, he sketched the world chess tournament between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer in Reykjavik, Iceland, for a live television audience. He also produced live drawings of the Olympics for TV and was the official computer artist of the Super Bowl for CBS. Neiman’s “reportage of history and the passing scene … revived an almost lost and time-honored art form,” according to a 1972 exhibit catalog of his Olympics sketches at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

“It’s been fun. I’ve had a lucky life,” Neiman said in a June 2008 interview with The Associated Press. READ FULL STORY »

Jun 20 2012 09:46 PM ET

Horror and sci-fi movie actor Richard Lynch dies

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An actor who employed his scarred face to play villainous characters in such films as Bad Dreams and The Sword and the Sorcerer has died. Richard Lynch was 76.

His representative, Mike Baronas, says Lynch was found dead Tuesday at his home in Palm Springs, Calif. No other details were provided.

The actor appeared in several horror and sci-fi films in a career spanning four decades. He recently played serial killer Michael Myers’ principal in director Rob Zombie’s Halloween remake in 2007. His most recent role is in Zombie’s upcoming film The Lords of Salem. Other movies included Scarecrow and Little Nikita. He appeared in such TV series as Battlestar Galactica, The A-Team and Six Feet Under.

Lynch reportedly suffered scarring in 1967 after accidentally setting himself on fire.

Jun 19 2012 09:51 AM ET

'A Hard Day's Night' and 'Help!' actor Victor Spinetti dies

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Comic actor Victor Spinetti has died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 82, according to The Independent.

Spinetti was a well-known British stage actor who won a Tony award in 1965 for his role in the Broadway show Oh! What a Lovely War. He is best remembered as a supporting character in the Beatles’ movies A Hard Day’s Night, Help!, and Magical Mystery Tour. Spinetti also worked with John Lennon to turn Lennon’s book In His Own Write into a play. He appeared in more than 30 films, including Under Milk Wood and The Taming of the Shrew, both of which starred Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. In his later years, he performed on the British stage.

Read more:
Paul McCartney is 70 today: What’s your favorite Fab Macca song?
Paul McCartney will close Olympic opening ceremony
Jimmy Fallon’s ‘Blow Your Pants Off’: He tells EW about the stories — and the stars — behind the songs

Jun 18 2012 07:49 PM ET

Oscar-nominated actress Susan Tyrrell dies at age 67

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Image Credit: Mary DiBiase/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Image

Actress Susan Tyrrell has died at the age of 67. Tyrrell was best known for her Oscar-nominated supporting performance as a barfly in director John Huston’s 1972 boxing drama Fat City. Her eclectic filmography also included Andy Warhol’s Bad, Paul Verhoeven’s Flesh + Blood, and John Waters’ Cry-Baby.

In 2000, the actress was diagnosed with thrombocythemia, a rare disease of the bone marrow, and had both her legs amputated. Tyrell continued to act, appearing in such projects as Masked and Anonymous and, most recently, Kid Thing.

Although never a household name, Tyrrell’s fondness for leftfield projects and her at times outre behavior helped her acquire a devoted following amongst cult film fans. “The last thing my mother said to me was, ‘SuSu, your life is a celebration of everything that is cheap and tawdry,’” the actress recalled to writer Paul Cullum, who penned a 2000 profile of Tyrrell for the LA Weekly. “I’ve always liked that, and I’ve always tried to live up to it.”

Her death was confirmed by Cullum who said he was told by Tyrrell’s niece that she passed away in her sleep on Saturday at the actress’ home in Austin, Texas.

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