Paul Simon
Paul Frederic Simon is an American singer-songwriter and actor. Simon's musical career has spanned seven decades with his fame and commercial success beginning as half of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, formed in 1956 with Art Garfunkel. Simon was responsible for writing nearly all of the pair's songs including three that reached number one on the U. S. singles charts: "The Sound of Silence", "Mrs. Robinson", "Bridge over Troubled Water"; the duo split up in 1970 at the height of their popularity, Simon began a successful solo career, recording three acclaimed albums over the next five years. In 1986, he released Graceland, an album inspired by South African township music, which sold 14 million copies worldwide on its release and remains his most popular solo work. Simon wrote and starred in the film One-Trick Pony and co-wrote the Broadway musical The Capeman with the poet Derek Walcott. On June 3, 2016, Simon released his 13th solo album, Stranger to Stranger, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Album Chart and the UK charts.
Simon has earned sixteen Grammys for his solo and collaborative work, including three for Album of the Year, a Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2001, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and in 2006 was selected as one of the "100 People Who Shaped the World" by Time. In 2011, Rolling Stone named Simon one of the 100 greatest guitarists. In 2015, he was named one of the 100 Greatest Songwriters of All Time by Rolling Stone. Among many other honors, Simon was the first recipient of the Library of Congress's Gershwin Prize for Popular Song in 2007. In 1986, he was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Music degree from Berklee College of Music, where he serves on the Board of Trustees. Simon was born on October 1941, in Newark, New Jersey, to Hungarian Jewish parents, his father, was a college professor, double-bass player, dance bandleader who performed under the name "Lee Sims". His mother, was an elementary school teacher. In 1945, his family moved to the Kew Gardens Hills section of Queens, in New York City.
The musician Donald Fagen has described Simon's childhood as that of "a certain kind of New York Jew a stereotype to whom music and baseball are important. I think; the parents are either immigrants or first-generation Americans who felt like outsiders, assimilation was the key thought—they gravitated to black music and baseball looking for an alternative culture." Simon, upon hearing Fagen's description, said it "isn't far from the truth." Simon says about his childhood, "I was a ballplayer. I'd go on my bike, I'd hustle kids in stickball." He adds that his father was a New York Yankees fan: I used to listen to games with my father. He was a nice guy. Fun. Funny. Smart, he didn't play with me as much. He was at work until late at night.... Sometimes two in the morning. Simon's musical career began after meeting Art Garfunkel when they were both 11, they performed in a production of Alice in Wonderland for their sixth-grade graduation, began singing together when they were 13 performing at school dances.
Their idols were the Everly Brothers. Simon developed an interest in jazz and blues in the music of Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly. Simon's first song written for himself and Garfunkel, when Simon was 12 or 13, was called "The Girl for Me," and according to Simon became the "neighborhood hit." His father wrote the chords on paper for the boys to use. That paper became the first copyrighted Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel song, is now in the Library of Congress. In 1957, in their mid-teens, they recorded the song "Hey, Schoolgirl" under the name "Tom & Jerry", a name, given to them by their label Big Records; the single reached No. 49 on the pop charts. After graduating from Forest Hills High School, Simon majored in English at Queens College and graduated in 1963, while Garfunkel studied mathematics at Columbia University in Manhattan. Simon was a brother in the Alpha Epsilon Pi fraternity, earned a degree in English literature, attended Brooklyn Law School for one semester after graduation in 1963, but his real passion was rock and roll.
Between 1957 and 1964, Simon wrote and released more than 30 songs reuniting with Garfunkel as Tom & Jerry for some singles, including "Our Song" and "That's My Story". Most of the songs Simon recorded during that time were performed alone or with musicians other than Garfunkel, they were released on several minor record labels, such as Amy, Hunt, King and Madison. He used several pseudonyms for these recordings, most "Jerry Landis", but "Paul Kane" and "True Taylor". By 1962, working as Jerry Landis, he was a frequent writer/producer for several Amy Records artists, overseeing material released by Dotty Daniels, The Vels and Ritchie Cordell. Simon enjoyed some moderate success in recording a few singles as part of a group called Tico and the Triumphs, including a song called "Motorcycle" that reached No. 97 on the Billboard charts in 1962. Tico and the Triumphs released four 45s. Marty Cooper, known as Tico, sang lead on several of these releases, but not on "Motorcycle", which featured Simon's vocal.
That same year, Simon reached No. 99 on the pop charts as Jerry Landis with the novelty song "The Lone Teen Ranger." Both chart singles were released on Amy Records. In early 1964, Simon and Garfunkel got an audition with Columbia Records, whose executive Clive Davis was impressed enough to sign the du
World Traveler
World Traveler is a 2001 drama directed by Bart Freundlich. It stars Julianne Moore, it was screened at the 2001 Toronto International Film Festival. The plot centers around a restless New Yorker named Cal who one day drives off into the open road, leaving his wife and infant son behind and along the way, meets a number of unusual characters; the film uses numerous songs by Willie Nelson. Billy Crudup... Cal Julianne Moore... Dulcie Cleavant Derricks... Carl Liane Balaban... Meg David Keith... Richard Mary McCormack... Margaret Karen Allen... Delores James LeGros... Jack Francie Swift... Joanie Filming took place in Alabama and the Oregon towns of Pacific City and Enterprise; the film has a 35% rating at Rotten Tomatoes based on 66 reviews. World Traveler on IMDb
Blythe Danner
Blythe Katherine Danner is an American actress. She is the recipient of several accolades, including two Primetime Emmy Awards for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Izzy Huffstodt on Huff, a Tony Award for Best Actress for her performance in Butterflies Are Free on Broadway. Danner was twice nominated for the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for portraying Marilyn Truman on Will & Grace, the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or Movie for her roles in We Were the Mulvaneys and Back When We Were Grownups. For the latter, she received a Golden Globe Award nomination. Danner played its sequels Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers, she has collaborated on several occasions with Woody Allen, appearing in three of his films: Another Woman and Husbands and Wives. Her other notable film credits include 1776, Hearts of the West, The Great Santini, Mr. and Mrs. Bridge, The Prince of Tides, To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything!
Julie Newmar, The Myth of Fingerprints, The X-Files, Forces of Nature, The Last Kiss, Hello I Must Be Going, I'll See You in My Dreams, What They Had. Danner is the widow of Bruce Paltrow, she is the mother of director Jake Paltrow. Danner was born in Philadelphia, the daughter of Katharine and Harry Earl Danner, a bank executive, she has opera singer and actor Harry Danner. Danner has Pennsylvania Dutch, some English and Irish, ancestry. Danner graduated from George School, a Quaker high school located near Newtown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania in 1960. A graduate of Bard College, Danner's first roles included the 1967 musical Mata Hari, the 1968 Off-Broadway production of Summertree, her early Broadway appearances included Cyrano de Bergerac and her Theatre World Award-winning performance in The Miser. She won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for portraying a free-spirited divorcée in Butterflies Are Free. In 1972, Danner portrayed Martha Jefferson in the film version of 1776; that same year, she played a wife whose husband has been unfaithful, opposite Peter Falk and John Cassavetes, in the Columbo episode "Etude in Black".
Her earliest starring film role was opposite Alan Alda in To Kill a Clown. Danner appeared in the episode of M*A*S*H entitled "The More I See You", playing the love interest of Alda's character Hawkeye Pierce, she played lawyer Amanda Bonner in television's Adam's Rib opposite Ken Howard as Adam Bonner. She played Zelda Fitzgerald in F. Scott Fitzgerald and'The Last of the Belles', she was the eponymous heroine in the film Lovin' Molly. She appeared in Futureworld. In the 1982 TV movie Inside the Third Reich, she played the wife of Albert Speer. In the film version of Neil Simon's semi-autobiographical play Brighton Beach Memoirs, she portrayed a middle-aged Jewish mother, she has appeared in two films based on the novels of Pat Conroy, The Great Santini and The Prince of Tides, as well as two television movies adapted from books by Anne Tyler, Saint Maybe and Back When We Were Grownups, both for the Hallmark Hall of Fame. Danner appeared opposite Robert De Niro in the 2000 comedy hit Meet the Parents, its sequels, Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers.
From 2001 to 2006, she appeared on NBC's sitcom Will & Grace as Will Truman's mother Marilyn. From 2004 to 2006, she starred in the main cast of the comedy-drama series Huff. In 2005, she was nominated for three Primetime Emmy Awards for her work on Will & Grace and the television film Back When We Were Grownups, winning for her role in Huff; the following year, she won a second consecutive Emmy Award for Huff. For 25 years, she has been a regular performer at the Williamstown Summer Theater Festival, where she serves on the Board of Directors. In 2006, Danner was awarded an inaugural Katharine Hepburn Medal by Bryn Mawr College's Katharine Houghton Hepburn Center. In 2015, Danner was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. Danner has been involved in environmental issues such as recycling and conservation for over 30 years, she has been active with INFORM, Inc. is on the Board of Environmental Advocates of New York and the Board of Directors of the Environmental Media Association, won the 2002 EMA Board of Directors Ongoing Commitment Award.
In 2011, Danner joined Moms Clean Air Force, to help call on parents to join in the fight against toxic air pollution. After the death of her husband Bruce Paltrow from oral cancer, she became involved with the nonprofit Oral Cancer Foundation. In 2005, she filmed a public service announcement to raise public awareness of the disease and the need for early detection, she has since given interviews in such magazines as People. The Bruce Paltrow Oral Cancer Fund, administered by the Oral Cancer Foundation, raises funding for oral cancer research and treatment, with a particular focus on those communities in which healthcare disparities exist, she has appeared in commercials for Prolia, a brand of denosumab used in the treatment of osteoporosi
James LeGros
James LeGros is an American actor. LeGros was born in Minneapolis, his mother was a teacher and his father was a real estate broker. He was raised in Redlands and attended the Professional Conservatory at South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa, California, as well as the University of California, Irvine. LeGros is the son-in-law of late actor Robert Loggia. James LeGros appeared as Rick in Gus Van Sant's 1989 Drugstore Cowboy. One of his best-known roles was in Living in Oblivion. LeGros played Chad Palomino, a male acting diva with endless "a-list" star demands for a "b-movie" director and crew. LeGros appeared on Law & Order, he was a cast member on the television series Ally McBeal and guest-starred on Roseanne, Punky Brewster, The Outer Limits, Friends. He portrayed Dr. Dan Harris on the NBC series Mercy. LeGros portrayed Peter Gray in the Dark Sky thriller Bitter Feast, he is the first actor to appear on TV as Deputy United States Marshal Raylan Givens in the TV film Pronto, based on a book by Elmore Leonard.
LeGros appeared on the TV series Justified as antagonist Wade Messer. LeGros married to actress/photographer Kristina Loggia in 1992 and together they have two sons. Notes James LeGros on IMDb
Chris Bauer
Mark Christopher Bauer is an American film and theater actor. His film work includes roles in 8mm, The Devil's Advocate, Face/Off, The Conspirator, Snow White: A Tale of Terror, he has appeared on Broadway, in A Streetcar Named Desire, has originated roles in plays by David Mamet, John Patrick Shanley, Jez Butterworth. Bauer was born in Los Angeles, is of German and Irish descent, he attended Miramonte High School in Orinda and played on the Miramonte football team in his senior year, 1984, the year the team won the state championship. He attended the University of San Diego amd the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, graduated from the Yale School of Drama. Bauer has starred in numerous television series including The Wire, as port-union boss Frank Sobotka, he auditioned for the role of Jimmy McNulty. He starred in Billy Crystal's 2001 film 61*, as New York Yankees player Bob Cerv, his roles on network television include a regular role as Fred Yokas, husband of Officer Faith Yokas, on the NBC series Third Watch, lead FBI Agent Dodd on the short-lived CBS series Smith, a priest on ABC's Life on Mars, as Detective Lou Destefano in the original Sci-Fi channel miniseries The Lost Room.
In 2004, he played Lee Nickel on the ESPN series Tilt. He appeared in the episode "The No-Brainer" of the television series Fringe as Brian Dempsey, appeared in multiple episodes of Numb3rs as Dr. Raymond "Ray" Galuski and in Criminal Minds, in season one, as the antagonist. Chris Bauer played Det. Andy Bellefleur on the TV-series True Blood, he played Dennis Halsey, a guard on Unforgettable in the fourth episode of the first season, "Up In Flames", appeared as a rival salesman from the Syracuse branch of Dunder Mifflin in Season 8 of The Office. In 2014, Bauer guest starred in an episode of Recreation. In October 2014 Bauer started a recurring role on the Starz comedy Survivor's Remorse, he plays the owner of a fictitious Atlanta professional basketball team. The show is written by Mike O'Malley, an executive producer along with NBA star LeBron James, stars Jessie T. Usher. Survivor's Remorse started its second season on September 22, 2015. Bauer played Det. Tom Lange in the FX limited series American Crime Story.
Bauer appeared as Tim Rutten in the NBC mini-series Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Brothers, from 2017 co-stars as Bobby Dwyer in the HBO series The Deuce. Bauer's first film appearance was in Snow White: A Tale of Terror, with Sigourney Weaver, Sam Neill, Monica Keena. Soon after, Bauer played schoolteacher/pedophile Lloyd Gettys in the 1997 film The Devil's Advocate, he played prisoner NB9674932-65 Ivan Dubov in the 1997 action film Face/Off, where he met Nicolas Cage. He appeared as the masked character'Machine' in the 1999 film 8mm starring Cage, he starred as fetish photographer Irving Klaw in the 2005 Bettie Page biopic The Notorious Bettie Page, as famous author Ken Kesey in a 2007 Neal Cassady biopic. Bauer played a small role in Broken Flowers, he was featured in the movie The Conspirator, as a fellow officer following Abraham Lincoln's assassination, played a minor role in Flags of Our Fathers. In 2015, Bauer played the role of'Pa' in Disney's Tomorrowland, he appeared in Money Monster as Lt. Nelson, played Larry Rooney in Sully.
Chris Bauer on IMDb Chris Bauer at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
John Phillips (musician)
John Edmund Andrew Phillips was an American singer, guitarist and promoter, most notably of the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival. Phillips was a leader of the vocal group The Mamas & the Papas. Phillips was born August 1935 in Parris Island, South Carolina, his father, Claude Andrew Phillips, was a retired United States Marine Corps officer. Claude Phillips, while on his way home from France following World War I, managed, in a poker game, to win a tavern business located in Oklahoma from another Marine, his mother, Edna Gertrude, who had English ancestry, met his father in Oklahoma. According to his autobiography, Papa John, Phillips' father was a heavy drinker who suffered from poor health. Phillips grew up in Alexandria, where he was inspired by Marlon Brando to be "street tough." From 1942 to 1946, he attended Linton Hall Military School in Virginia. According to his autobiography, he "hated the place," citing "inspections," and "beatings," and recalls that "nuns used to watch us take showers." He formed a musical group of teenage boys.
He played basketball at George Washington High School, now George Washington Middle School in Alexandria, where he graduated in 1953, gained an appointment to the Naval Academy. However, he resigned during his first year. Phillips attended Hampden–Sydney College, a liberal arts college for men in Hampden Sydney, dropping out in 1959. Phillips longed to have success in the music industry and traveled to New York to gain a record contract in the early 1960s, his first band, The Journeymen, was a folk trio, with Dick Weissman. They were successful, putting out three albums and several appearances on the 1960s TV show Hootenanny. All three albums, as well as a compilation known as Best of the Journeymen, have since been reissued on CD, he developed his craft in Greenwich Village, during the American folk music revival, met future The Mamas & the Papas group vocalists Denny Doherty and Cass Elliot there around that time. Lyrics of the group's song "Creeque Alley" describe this period. Phillips was the primary songwriter and musical arranger of the Papas.
In a 1968 interview, Phillips described some of his arrangements as "well arranged two-part harmony moving in opposite directions". After being signed to Dunhill, they had several Billboard Top Ten hits, including "California Dreamin'", "Monday, Monday", "I Saw Her Again", "Creeque Alley", "12:30". John Phillips wrote "San Francisco" in 1967 for former Journeymen bandmate Scott McKenzie. "San Francisco" is regarded as emblematic of 1960s American counterculture music. Phillips wrote the oft-covered "Me and My Uncle", a favorite in the repertoire of the Grateful Dead. Phillips helped promote and performed with The Mamas & the Papas in the Monterey International Pop Music Festival held June 16 to 18, 1967 in Monterey, California; the festival was planned in just seven weeks and was developed as a way to validate rock music as an art form in the way jazz and folk were regarded. It was the first major pop-rock music event in history. John and Michelle Phillips became Hollywood celebrities, living in the Hollywood Hills and socializing with stars such as Jack Nicholson, Warren Beatty, Roman Polanski.
The Mamas & the Papas broke up in 1968 because Cass Elliot wanted to go solo and because of personal problems between Phillips, his wife Michelle, Denny Doherty, including Michelle's affair with Doherty. As Michelle Phillips recounted, "Cass confronted me and said'I don't get it. You could have any man. Why would you take mine?'" Michelle was fired in 1966 for having affairs with Gene Clark and Doherty, she was replaced for two months by Jill Gibson, their producer Lou Adler's girlfriend. Although Michelle Phillips was forgiven and asked to return to the group, the personal problems continued until the group split. Cass Elliot went on to have a successful solo career until her death from heart failure in 1974. Phillips released his first solo album John, the Wolf King of L. A. in 1970. The album was not commercially successful, although it did include the minor hit "Mississippi", Phillips began to withdraw from the limelight as his use of narcotics increased. Phillips produced his third wife, Geneviève Waïte's, Romance Is on the Rise and wrote music for films.
Between 1969 and 1974, Phillips and Waïte worked on a script and composed over 30 songs for a space-themed musical called Man on the Moon, produced by Andy Warhol but played for just two days in New York after receiving disastrous opening night reviews. Phillips moved to London in 1973, it was to be funded by RSR distributor Atlantic Records. Jagger and Keith Richards produced and played on the album, as well as former Stone Mick Taylor and future Stone Ronnie Wood; the project was derailed by Phillips' increasing use of cocaine and heroin, which he injected, by his own admission, "almost every fifteen minutes for two years". In 2001, the tracks of the Half Stoned or The Lost Album album were released as Pay Pack & Follow a few months after Phillips' death. In 1975 Phillips, still living in London, was commissioned to create the soundtrack to the Nicolas Roeg film The Man Who Fell to Earth, starring David Bowie. Phillips asked Mick Taylor to help out. In 1981, Phillips was convicted of drug trafficking.
Subsequently, he and his daughter Mackenzie Phillips made the rounds in the media in an anti-drug campaign, helping to reduce his prison time to only a mont
Thanksgiving
Thanksgiving Day is a national holiday celebrated on various dates in Canada, the United States, some of the Caribbean islands, Liberia. It began as a day of giving thanks and sacrifice for the blessing of the harvest and of the preceding year. Named festival holidays occur in Germany and Japan. Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday of October in Canada and on the fourth Thursday of November in the United States, around the same part of the year in other places. Although Thanksgiving has historical roots in religious and cultural traditions, it has long been celebrated as a secular holiday as well. Prayers of thanks and special thanksgiving ceremonies are common among all religions after harvests and at other times; the Thanksgiving holiday's history in North America is rooted in English traditions dating from the Protestant Reformation. It has aspects of a harvest festival though the harvest in New England occurs well before the late-November date on which the modern Thanksgiving holiday is celebrated.
In the English tradition, days of thanksgiving and special thanksgiving religious services became important during the English Reformation in the reign of Henry VIII and in reaction to the large number of religious holidays on the Catholic calendar. Before 1536 there were 95 Church holidays, plus 52 Sundays, when people were required to attend church and forego work and sometimes pay for expensive celebrations; the 1536 reforms reduced the number of Church holidays to 27, but some Puritans wished to eliminate all Church holidays, including Christmas and Easter. The holidays were to be replaced by specially called Days of Fasting or Days of Thanksgiving, in response to events that the Puritans viewed as acts of special providence. Unexpected disasters or threats of judgement from on high called for Days of Fasting. Special blessings, viewed as coming from God, called for Days of Thanksgiving. For example, Days of Fasting were called on account of drought in 1611, floods in 1613, plagues in 1604 and 1622.
Days of Thanksgiving were called following the victory over the Spanish Armada in 1588 and following the deliverance of Queen Anne in 1705. An unusual annual Day of Thanksgiving began in 1606 following the failure of the Gunpowder Plot in 1605 and developed into Guy Fawkes Day on November 5. According to some historians, the first celebration of Thanksgiving in North America occurred during the 1578 voyage of Martin Frobisher from England in search of the Northwest Passage. Other researchers, state that "there is no compelling narrative of the origins of the Canadian Thanksgiving day."The origins of Canadian Thanksgiving are sometimes traced to the French settlers who came to New France in the 17th century, who celebrated their successful harvests. The French settlers in the area had feasts at the end of the harvest season and continued throughout the winter season sharing food with the indigenous peoples of the area; as settlers arrived in Nova Scotia from New England after 1700, late autumn Thanksgiving celebrations became commonplace.
New immigrants into the country—such as the Irish and Germans—also added their own traditions to the harvest celebrations. Most of the US aspects of Thanksgiving were incorporated when United Empire Loyalists began to flee from the United States during the American Revolution and settled in Canada. Pilgrims and Puritans who emigrated from England in the 1620s and 1630s carried the tradition of Days of Fasting and Days of Thanksgiving with them to New England; the modern Thanksgiving holiday tradition is traced to a well-recorded 1619 event in Virginia and a sparsely documented 1621 celebration at Plymouth in present-day Massachusetts. The 1619 arrival of 38 English settlers at Berkeley Hundred in Charles City County, concluded with a religious celebration as dictated by the group's charter from the London Company, which required "that the day of our ships arrival at the place assigned... in the land of Virginia shall be yearly and perpetually kept holy as a day of thanksgiving to Almighty God."
The 1621 Plymouth feast and thanksgiving was prompted by a good harvest, which the Pilgrims celebrated with native Americans, who helped them pass the last winter by giving them food in the time of scarcity. Several days of Thanksgiving were held in early New England history that have been identified as the "First Thanksgiving", including Pilgrim holidays in Plymouth in 1621 and 1623, a Puritan holiday in Boston in 1631. According to historian Jeremy Bangs, director of the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum, the Pilgrims may have been influenced by watching the annual services of Thanksgiving for the relief of the siege of Leiden in 1574, while they were staying in Leiden. Now called Oktober Feest, Leiden's autumn thanksgiving celebration in 1617 was the occasion for sectarian disturbance that appears to have accelerated the pilgrims' plans to emigrate to America. In Massachusetts, religious thanksgiving services were declared by civil leaders such as Governor Bradford, who planned the colony's thanksgiving celebration and fast in 1623.
The practice of holding an annual harvest festival did not become a regular affair in New England until the late 1660s. Thanksgiving proclamations were made by church leaders in New England up until 1682, by both state and church leaders until after the American Revolution. During the revolutionary period, political influences affected the issuance of Thanksgiving proclamations. Various proclamations were made by royal governors, John Hancock, General George Washington, the Continental Congress, each giving thanks to God for events favorable to their causes; as President of the United States, George Washington proclaimed the first nationwide thanksgiving cel
