1.
Les Liaisons dangereuses
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Les Liaisons dangereuses is a French epistolary novel by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, first published in four volumes by Durand Neveu from March 23,1782. It has been claimed to depict the decadence of the French aristocracy shortly before the French Revolution, however, it has also been described as an amoral story. As an epistolary novel, the book is composed entirely of letters written by the characters to each other. In particular, the letters between Valmont and the Marquise drive the plot, with those of their victims and other characters serving as contrasting figures to give the story its depth. It is often claimed to be the source of the saying Revenge is a dish best served cold, however, the expression does not actually occur in the original novel in any form. The Vicomte de Valmont is determined to seduce the virtuous, married, and therefore inaccessible Madame de Tourvel, who is staying with Valmonts aunt while her husband is away on a court case. Cécile falls in love with the Chevalier Danceny, and Merteuil and Valmont pretend to help the lovers in order to gain their trust. Merteuil suggests that the Vicomte seduce Cécile in order to enact her revenge on Céciles future husband, Valmont refuses, finding the challenge too easy, and preferring to devote himself to seducing Madame de Tourvel. Merteuil promises Valmont that if he seduces Madame de Tourvel and provides her with written proof and he expects rapid success, but does not find it as easy as his many other conquests. During the course of his pursuit, he discovers that Céciles mother has written to Madame de Tourvel about his bad reputation and he avenges himself in seducing Cécile as Merteuil had suggested. In the meantime, Merteuil takes Danceny as a lover, by the time Valmont has succeeded in seducing Madame de Tourvel, he seems to have fallen in love with her. Jealous, Merteuil tricks him into deserting Madame de Tourvel —, in retaliation Valmont reveals that he prompted Danceny to reunite with Cécile, leaving Merteuil abandoned yet again. Merteuil declares war on Valmont and reveals to Danceny that Valmont has seduced Cécile, Danceny and Valmont duel, and Valmont is fatally wounded. Before he dies, he gives Danceny the letters proving Merteuils own involvement and these letters are sufficient to ruin her reputation so she flees to the countryside, where she contracts smallpox. Her face is permanently scarred and she is rendered blind in one eye, so she loses her greatest asset. But the innocent also suffer from the schemes, desperate with guilt and grief, Madame de Tourvel succumbs to a fever and dies. Les Liaisons dangereuses is celebrated for its exploration of seduction, revenge and human malice, the book was viewed as scandalous at the time of its initial publication, though the real intentions of the author remain unknown. It has been suggested that Lacloss intention was the same as that of his fictional author in the novel, to write a morality tale about the corrupt, however, this theory has been questioned on several grounds
2.
Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
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Pierre Ambroise François Choderlos de Laclos was a French novelist, official, freemason and army general, best known for writing the epistolary novel Les Liaisons dangereuses. A unique case in French literature, he was for a time considered to be as scandalous a writer as the Marquis de Sade or Nicolas-Edme Rétif. It is one of the masterpieces of literature of the 18th century. It has inspired a number of critical and analytic commentaries, plays. Born in Amiens into a family, in 1760 Laclos began studies at the École royale dartillerie de La Fère. As a young lieutenant he served in a garrison at La Rochelle until the end of the Seven Years War. Postings to Strasbourg, Grenoble and Besançon followed, in 1763 Laclos became a freemason in LUnion military lodge in Toul. Despite a promotion to the rank of captain, Laclos grew increasingly bored with his garrison duties and with the company of soldiers. His first works, several poems, appeared in the Almanach des Muses. Later he wrote an opéra comique, Ernestine, inspired by a novel by Marie Jeanne Riccoboni and its premiere on 19 July 1777, in the presence of Queen Marie Antoinette, proved a failure. In the same year he established a new school in Valence. On his return to Besançon in 1778 Laclos was promoted captain of the Engineers. In this period he wrote works which showed his great admiration of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In 1776 Laclos requested and received affiliation with the Henri IV lodge in Paris, there he helped Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans leading the Grand Orient of France. In 1777, in front of the Grand Orients dignitaries, he delivered what is considered as the first feminist speech by a man, in 1779 he was sent to Île-dAix to assist Marc René, marquis de Montalembert in the construction of fortifications there against the British. However, he spent most of his writing his new epistolary novel, Les Liaisons dangereuses. When he asked for and received six months of vacation, he spent the time in Paris, durand Neveu published Les Liaisons Dangereuses in four volumes on 23 March 1782, it became a widespread success. Laclos was immediately ordered to return to his garrison in Brittany, here he met Marie-Soulange Duperré, whom he would marry on May 3,1786, and remain with for the rest of his life
3.
Colin Firth
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Colin Andrew Firth, CBE is an English actor. His films have grossed more than $3 billion from 42 releases worldwide, Firth has received an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, two BAFTA Awards, and three Screen Actors Guild Awards, as well as the Volpi Cup. Firths most notable and acclaimed role to date has been his 2010 portrayal of King George VI in The Kings Speech and this led to roles in films such as The English Patient, Bridget Joness Diary, Shakespeare in Love, and Love Actually. In 2009, Firth received widespread acclaim for his leading role in A Single Man, for which Firth gained his first Academy Award nomination. Firth starred in the spy movie Kingsman, The Secret Service in 2014. In 2011, Firth received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and he was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Winchester in 2007, and was made a Freeman of the City of London in 2012. He has campaigned for the rights of tribal peoples, and is a member of Survival International. Firth has also campaigned on issues of asylum seekers, refugees rights, and he commissioned and is credited as a co-author on a scientific paper on a study into the differences in brain structure between people of differing political orientations. Firth was born in the village of Grayshott, Hampshire, to parents who were both academics and teachers, Firth is the eldest of three children, he has a sister, Kate, an actress and voice coach, and a brother, Jonathan, an actor. Both of his parents were raised in India, because his grandparents, Congregationalist ministers, and his paternal grandfather. As a child, Firth travelled a lot due to his parents work and he also lived in St. Louis, Missouri when he was 11, which he has described as a difficult time. On returning to England, he attended the Montgomery of Alamein Secondary School and he was still an outsider and was the target of bullying. To counter this, he adopted the working class Hampshire accent. By the time he was 14, Firth had already decided to be a professional actor, until further education, he was not academically inclined, later saying in an interview, I didnt like school. I just thought it was boring and mediocre and nothing they taught me seemed to be of any interest at all, after his sixth form years, Firth moved to London and joined the National Youth Theatre. There, he made contacts in the acting world, from which he got a job in the wardrobe department at the National Theatre. From there, he went on to study at Drama Centre London, in 1984, Firth made his film debut in the role of Tommy Judd, Guy Bennetts straight, Marxist school friend in the screen adaptation of the play. This was the start of longstanding public feud between Firth and Everett, which was later resolved and he starred with Sir Laurence Olivier in Lost Empires, a TV adaptation of J. B
4.
Annette Bening
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Annette Carol Bening is an American actress. She began her career on stage with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival company in 1980 and she was nominated for the 1987 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her Broadway debut in Coastal Disturbances. She is a four-time Academy Award nominee, for the films The Grifters, American Beauty, Being Julia, in 2006, she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. After her film debut in the 1988 film The Great Outdoors, she starred in Valmont, Bugsy, The American President, The Siege, Open Range, Bening was born in Topeka, Kansas, the daughter of Shirley Katherine and Arnett Grant Bening. Her mother was a singer and soloist, and her father was a sales training consultant. Her parents, natives of Iowa, were practicing Episcopalians and conservative Republicans and she is of mostly German and English descent. Bening has one sister, Jane, and two brothers, Bradley and Byron, the family moved to Wichita, Kansas in 1959, where she spent her early childhood. In 1965, her father took a job with a company in San Diego, California and she began acting in junior high school, playing the lead in The Sound of Music. She graduated in 1975 from Patrick Henry High School, where she studied drama and she then spent a year working as a cook on a charter boat taking fishing parties out on the Pacific Ocean, and scuba diving for recreation. Bening attended San Diego Mesa College, then completed a degree in theatre arts at San Francisco State University. Bening began her career on stage with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival company in 1980 and she was a member of the acting company at the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco while studying acting as part of the Advanced Theatre Training Program. There, she starred in productions as Shakespeares Macbeth as Lady Macbeth. Bening also starred in productions of Pygmalion and The Cherry Orchard at the Denver Center Theatre Company during the 1985–86 season and she made her Broadway debut in 1987, garnering a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her performance in Coastal Disturbances. Bening made her debut in The Great Outdoors. Her second film appearance was as the Marquise de Merteuil in Valmont and her breakthrough role was in The Grifters, which starred John Cusack and Anjelica Huston, and earned Bening a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. In 1991, she portrayed Virginia Hill in Barry Levinsons biopic Bugsy, later, she appeared in Regarding Henry with Harrison Ford. In 1994, Bening and Beatty starred in Love Affair, which also featured Katharine Hepburn, in 1995, Bening appeared in The American President, followed by Tim Burtons sci-fi spoof Mars Attacks. In 1998, she co-starred with Denzel Washington and Bruce Willis in The Siege, the biggest critical and commercial success of her career thus far was the 1999 film American Beauty, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture and was directed by Sam Mendes
5.
Meg Tilly
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Meg Tilly is a Canadian-American actress and novelist. For her role in the 1985 film Agnes of God, she won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and her other film roles include Psycho II, The Big Chill, Masquerade, and Valmont. For her role in the television series Bomb Girls, she won the 2013 Canadian Screen Award for Best Lead Actress in a Drama Series, Tilly has also written six novels, including Porcupine, which was a finalist for the Sheila A. Egoff Childrens Literature Prize. She is the sister of actress Jennifer Tilly. Tilly was born in Long Beach, California, the daughter of Patricia Ann, a Canadian teacher and her father was Cantonese American, and her mother was of Irish, Finnish descent. Following her parents divorce when she was three, Tilly was raised by her mother and stepfather, John Ward, on rural Texada Island in British Columbia and she later claimed that Ward was a violent pedophile. At the age of 12, Tilly started taking lessons, in part to avoid her stepfather. After graduating from Esquimalt High School in Esquimalt, British Columbia, Tilly left home, in New York City she studied with Madame Darvash and Melissa Hayden on full scholarship. She joined the Connecticut Ballet Company and she made her screen debut as a dancer in Alan Parkers 1980 musical drama Fame. Tillys dance career came to a halt when, in 1979. Forced to give up dancing because of complications stemming from her injury, Tilly moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as an actress. She made her debut in the 1981 half-hour drama The Trouble with Grandpa, co-starring Elisha Cook. After playing a prostitute in a episode of Hill Street Blues. Tillys appearance in The Big Chill, which was nominated for three Academy Awards, including Best Picture, helped her career significantly, in 1985, Tilly landed the acclaimed, title role in Norman Jewisons Agnes of God, appearing with Jane Fonda and Anne Bancroft. Playing the role of a nun who confesses her involvement in a virgin conception. Tillys critically praised performance earned her an Academy Award nomination and a Golden Globe Award, however, she sustained a leg injury playing soccer and had to abandon the project. The role later went to Elizabeth Berridge, Tilly later appeared in Valmont, The Two Jakes with Jack Nicholson and Leaving Normal with Christine Lahti, as well as the 1993 horror film, Body Snatchers. After this, she stopped acting for the next 15 years, Tilly returned to acting in 2010, portraying the Blessed Mother, a Pope-like figure in the Caprica episode Unvanquished
6.
Fairuza Balk
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Fairuza Balk is an American film actress. She made her film debut as Dorothy Gale in Disneys 1985 film Return to Oz. Balk also made appearances in Valmont, The Craft, The Island of Dr. Moreau, American History X, The Waterboy, Almost Famous, Balk was born as Fairuza Alejandra Feldthouse in Point Reyes, California. Until age two, Balk lived in Cloverdale, California with her mother and they then moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, where she began acting at age six. They moved from London to Paris for another role and they remained there for six months before returning to Vancouver. Balk moved to Los Angeles as a woman upon signing to act in The Craft. Fairuzas mother, Cathryn Balk, has studied, performed, and taught the ethnic and traditional forms of many countries such as Egypt, Turkey, Morocco. Her father, Solomon Feldthouse, was one of the members of the 1960s psychedelic rock group Kaleidoscope. He was born in Pingree, Idaho and between the ages of 6 and 10, he lived in Turkey where he learned Greek, Turkish, Balk has stated that her father is of Romani and Cherokee ancestry, and that her mother is of Irish and French descent. Balks debut role was in a film titled The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. While in London, Balk was cast by Walt Disney Productions to star as Dorothy Gale in Return to Oz, the unofficial sequel to MGMs 1939 musical The Wizard of Oz. This role led to other, minor roles, including that of Mildred Hubble in The Worst Witch, by 1989 she was back in Vancouver, where she attended high school. However, she decided to take correspondence courses instead and went back to Hollywood. In 1992 she was awarded an Independent Spirit Award as best actress for her performance in the Allison Anders film Gas Food Lodging. In 1996, she appeared in a role in The Craft, in which her character formed a teenage coven with characters portrayed by Neve Campbell, Rachel True. Since The Craft, Balk has continued to find roles, primarily dark ones, in 1996 she co-starred in The Island of Dr Moreau with Marlon Brando, Val Kilmer and David Thewlis. Since 2000, she has appeared in over a dozen films and she has also done voice work for animated films, TV shows and video games, including Justice League, Family Guy, Grand Theft Auto, Vice City and Lords of EverQuest. The 2007 documentary Return To Oz, The Joy That Got Away was dedicated to her, in 2010, Balk released the single Stormwinds under the artist title Armed Love Militia
7.
Jeffrey Jones
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Jeffrey Jones is an American actor best known for his roles as Joseph II in Amadeus, Edward R. Rooney in Ferris Buellers Day Off, and Charles Deetz in Beetlejuice. In 2002, Jones was arrested and charged with possession of child pornography and he pleaded no contest to a felony charge, and was ordered to register as a sex offender. He then went to London in 1969 to study at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, followed by a stint with the Stratford Theatre in Stratford. Productions included, Cloud 9, A Flea in Her Ear, Romeo and Juliet and his transition from stage to film began in 1970. Jones began acting in small parts in film and television in the 1970s, in his best-known roles as Emperor Joseph II in Amadeus, Charles Deetz in Beetlejuice, and Edward R. However, the actor is also widely respected and considered a boon wherever he appears. Jones portrays the Emperor as a superficial and self-absorbed ruler who cant tell the difference between a great opera and a one, according to one reviewer. He received a nomination for a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture for his performance, Joness performance as Edward R. Rooney in the 1986 film, Ferris Buellers Day Off, made him a cultural icon. Rooney, self-important and obsessed with catching the chronically truant Ferris Bueller, became a symbol of pomposity, the review likened Jones role as akin to that of Wile E. Coyote as a character who is fated to be unable to catch The Road Runner. Jones expressed concern about being remembered more for this role than his Emperor Joseph II in 1984s Amadeus, in the movie Beetlejuice, Jones played a supporting role, along with Catherine OHara, as co-owners of a haunted house. Jones went on to act in films by director Tim Burton, including Ed Wood in the role of The Amazing Criswell. Jones also appeared in The Hanoi Hilton, The Hunt for Red October, Howard the Duck, Houseguest, The Crucible, The Devil’s Advocate, and Stuart Little. In 1999 he co-starred with Guy Pearce, Robert Carlyle, and David Arquette in the cannibal western Ravenous, Jones appeared in the comedy film The Pest, as the evil German trying to hunt Pestario Pest Vargas. Other key roles include Mr. Spike in Stay Tuned and Dick Nelson in the 1992 comedy Mom, one of Joness earlier television roles was in an episode of the 1976 CBS series Sara. In 1986, he showcased his villain persona in the role of the sinister Mister Acme, in the satirical comedy miniseries Fresno, with Carol Burnett, Charles Grodin and Dabney Coleman. In 1995, Jones co-starred with Tyra Banks, Kathy Najimy and he also hosted Disneys D-TV Monster Hits musical special, as The Magic Mirror. He has had guest roles on a number of series, including Amazing Stories, Tales from the Crypt. In 1989, he starred in the short-lived CBS sitcom The People Next Door and he also appeared as newspaper publisher A. W. Merrick on the highly acclaimed HBO series Deadwood. Jones was born in Buffalo, New York, the son of Ruth and his mother was an art historian, who urged him towards a career in acting
8.
Orion Pictures
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It was formed in 1978 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and three former top-level executives of United Artists. Although it was never a large motion picture producer, Orion achieved a high reputation for Hollywood quality. Woody Allen, James Cameron, Jonathan Demme, Oliver Stone, of the films distributed by Orion, four won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Amadeus, Platoon, Dances with Wolves, and The Silence of the Lambs. Two other Orion films, Hannah and Her Sisters and Mississippi Burning, were nominated for same category. In 2013, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer revived the Orion name for television, a year later Orion Pictures was quietly relaunched by the studio, in January 1978, three executives of Transamerica -owned studio United Artists – Arthur B. Krim, Eric Pleskow, and Robert S. Benjamin - quit their jobs, Krim and Benjamin had headed UA since 1951, and subsequently turned around the then-flailing studio with a number of critical and commercial successes. Change had begun once Transamerica purchased UA in 1967, and within a decade a rift formed between Krim and TA chairman Jack Beckett regarding the studios operations, Krim suggested spinning off United Artists into a separate company, which was rejected by Beckett. The last straw came for Pleskow when he refused to collect, Krim, Benjamin, and Pleskow quit United Artists on January 13,1978, followed by the exits of senior vice presidents William Bernstein and Mike Medavoy three days later. In February 1978, the five men forged a deal with Warner Bros, the executives formed Orion Pictures Company, named after the constellation, which they claimed had five main stars. The new company intended only to projects, giving the filmmakers complete creative autonomy. Orion held a $100 million line of credit, and its films would be distributed by the Warner Bros. studio, Orion, however, was contractually given free rein over distribution and advertising, as well as the number and type of films the executives chose to invest in. In late March 1978, Orion signed its first contract, a deal with John Travoltas production company. Orion also developed a co-financing and distribution deal with EMI Films, Orions first film, A Little Romance, was released in April that year. That year, Orion released Blake Edwards 10, which became a big critical and commercial success, other films released in that period included Caddyshack, The Great Santini, a critically praised but underpromoted adaptation of a Pat Conroy novel, and Promises in the Dark. Out of the 23 films Orion released between April 1979 and December 1981, only a third of them made a profit, Orion executives were conflicted over financing big-budgeted films and passed on Raiders of the Lost Ark for that reason. By early 1982, Orion had severed its ties with Warner. As part of the deal, the rights to Orions films made up to that point were sold to Warner, Orion was now looking to have its own distribution network by acquiring another company with such capabilities. The four partners looked into Allied Artists and Embassy Pictures before settling on Filmways, Orion subsequently purchased Filmways and reorganized the flailing company
9.
Fabia Drake
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Fabia Drake OBE was a British actress whose professional career spanned almost 73 years during the 20th century. Drake was born in Herne Bay, Kent and her first professional role, in a film, was in Fred Pauls Masks and Faces, and her last role was as the inimitable, irresistible Madame de Rosemonde in Miloš Formans Valmont. Drake was a friend of Laurence Olivier. Born not Drake, but Ethel McGlinchy, the actresss Irish father, a caterer, was an actor manqué, whose love was the theatre. She was small, was called the Shrimp, and played a wide range of parts - Richard II, Macbeth, Cardinal Richelieu in Bulwer Lyttons play. Her first paid work came when she was cast in a production of The Happy Family, also in the cast was a young man who had rather stick-out ears, and his name was Noël Coward. It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. In the same year,1916, she met a heroine, Ellen Terry, one of the preachers at this church, Geoffrey Heald, produced each year the All Saints choirboys in scenes by Shakespeare, in the clergy house. At the age of sixteen she was sent to a school in France. It had been a lodge of Louis XIV and the sunken marble bath of Madame de Maintenon was still in place. Back in London in 1921 and unemployed she spent time with Meggie Albanesi and she did then sign with Vedrenne for 18 months, playing small parts, and understudying and was then sent to Basil Dean who was about to produce James Elroy Fleckers Hassan. Drake, an understudy, would play both of the two parts in the play, Yasmin and Pervaneh - Isabel Jeans and Laura Cowrie. The play ran for six months, directed by Gerald du Maurier, shortly after this Drake worked with Marie Tempest in a play by John Hastings Turner called The Scarlet Lady. In Marie Tempest she found artistic understanding, comradeship and succour, the play was a success when it opened and brought Drake some critical attention. Charles Langbridge Morgan, then critic of The Times, Fabia Drake. she has not been long on the professional stage and she has judgment and poise and a mind that lifts a trivial part out of its triviality. And James Agate in The Sunday Times, Miss Fabia Drake is probably the best ingénue on the present-day stage and she suggests health, physical, mental and moral. In the London theatre between the First and Second World Wars, Sunday play-producing societies flourished and these societies acted as shop windows for rising players and try-out theatres for new dramatists. RADA ex-students decided to have their own Sunday society, The RADA Players, in a play of Allan Monkhouses called Sons and Fathers, Drake played opposite John Gielgud
10.
T. P. McKenna
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Thomas Patrick McKenna was an Irish actor, born in Mullagh, County Cavan. After leaving school he joined the Ulster Bank in Grannard, Co. Longford and his employers were not impressed by his extra curricular activities and in 1953 he was posted to the remote town of Killeshandra in County Cavan. McKenna refused to go and resigned his position, McKenna made his stage debut at the tiny Pike Theatre in Dublin in 1953 as John Buchanan in Tennessee Williams Summer and Smoke. He played a season at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin, with Anew McMasters Shakespearean company and was a member of The Gas Theatre Company directed by Godfrey Quigley, through family contacts he sought an interview with the managing director of the Abbey Theatre, Ernest Blythe. Despite Blythes concerns that his nose was too long and he would grow fat and he eventually become a permanent member of the company in 1954 and would remain there for the next eight years performing over seventy roles. McKenna stayed on when the London run ended, never returning to the Abbey company, then he went to the Royal Court Theatre in Lindsay Andersons revival of Julius Caesar, the next year he took over as the Burglar in Shaws Too Good to be True. He joined Stuart Burges company at the Nottingham Playhouse in 1968 playing Trigorin in The Seagull and Sir Joseph Surface in Sheridans School For Scandal, in 1969 he created the role of Fitzpatrick in David Storeys The Contractor directed by Lindsay Anderson at the Royal Court Theatre, London. The production later transferred to the Fortune Theatre and ran for over a year, in 1973 he took on the role of Andrew Wyke opposite his friend Donally Donnelly in the Irish premiere of Peter Shaffers Sleuth. The production played to acclaim at the Opera House, Cork, later that year he joined the Royal Shakespeare Company and took over the role of Robert Hand in James Joyces only play, Exiles directed by Harold Pinter. In the same season he appeared in a rare staging of Jean Genets The Balcony directed by Terry Hands. He returned to the RSC in 1976 for Shaws The Devils Disciple, directed by Jack Gold in a production to mark the American bicentennial celebrations, as the revolutionary pastor Revd. It was there he created the role of Dr. Rice in Brian Friels drama, Molly Sweeney, other Friel productions he appeared in were The Communication Cord and Aristocrats at the RNT in his final stage appearance. During the 1960s and 1970s, McKenna appeared regularly in television dramas, including The Avengers, Danger Man, The Saint. Jason King, The Sweeney, Blakes 7, Minder and in the Doctor Who serial The Greatest Show in the Galaxy and he had prominent film roles in Ulysses, and A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man. He narrated the Emmy-winning documentary on the life of James Joyce Is There One Who Understands Me and his performance as Henry VIII in the film Monarch, with Jean Marsh, written and directed by John Walsh was re-released in cinemas in 2014. McKennas voice featured in over thirty original drama productions for the BBC and he took the role of Phonsie Doherty in Christopher FitzSimons Radio 4 comedy series, Ballylennon, and later appeared opposite David Threlfall in the radio drama Baldi. On CD he has recorded the poetry of W. B Yeats, Joyces short story collection Dubliners, McKenna died on 13 February 2011 at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, London, at the age of 81 following a long period of illness. He was buried alongside his wife at Teampall Cheallaigh Cemetery in his native County Cavan, in County Cavan, he is commemorated by the T. P. McKenna Drama Scholarships and the T. P. McKenna Perpetual Trophy presented as part of the Millrace Annual Drama Festival
11.
Ian McNeice
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Ian McNeice is an English actor and voice actor. He plays Bert Large in the drama series Doc Martin. McNeice was born in Basingstoke, Hampshire and his acting training started at the Taunton School in Somerset, followed by the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and two years at the Salisbury Playhouse. The next few years were spent in theatre, including a career with the Royal Shakespeare Company. McNeices television breakthrough was as Harcourt in the award-winning series Edge of Darkness and his television appearances have included all seven series of Doc Martin, in which he plays Bert Large, as well as the third episode of the second series of Lewis. He appears as the Newsreader in the HBO/BBC production Rome, McNeice has also appeared in a number of films, including 84 Charing Cross Road, Day of the Dead, No Escape, From Hell and The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill But Came Down a Mountain. His breakthrough into American films occurred when he played Fulton Greenwall in Ace Ventura and he played the Nazi Gerhard Klopfer in the 2001 BBC/HBO television film Conspiracy. Since then, he has been in Around the World in 80 Days and he also appeared as Potiphar in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. In 2007, he made his Doctor Who debut when he guest-starred as villain Zeus in the Big Finish BBC Digital Radio 7 drama Immortal Beloved. He had a role as Joachim von Kortzfleisch, a German general who refused to put his troops under the command of officers plotting to depose Hitlers government. McNeice was initially cast in the role of Illyrio Mopatis in the HBO pilot of Game of Thrones, McNeice also stars as The Architect in the independent feature film The House of Screaming Death, set to release in 2017 Ian McNeice at the Internet Movie Database
12.
Vincent Schiavelli
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Vincent Andrew Vince Schiavelli was an American character actor, journalist and food writer noted for his work on stage, screen, and television, often described as the man with the sad eyes. He was notable for his numerous supporting roles, Schiavelli was also well known for his height, standing 6 ft 6 in. He often attributed his unique appearance and great height to Marfan syndrome. Schiavelli was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a Sicilian-American family and he attended Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School as a teen. He studied acting through the programme at New York University. He began performing on stage in the 1960s, larry Flynt, Valmont, and the 1999 biopic Man on the Moon. He played Mr. Vargas, the teacher, in the 1982 comedy Fast Times at Ridgemont High. He was cast in a role in Better Off Dead in which he played Mr. Kerber. In 1987, he starred alongside Tim Conway in the film comedy Dorf on Golf, and then Dorf. In 1990, he played the Subway Ghost in Ghost and in 1992, he played in Tim Burtons Batman Returns as the Organ Grinder, one of the Penguins henchmen. In 1994 he appeared in the video for ZZ Tops song Breakaway, alongside Fairuza Balk and in 1997. He also made several appearances in the animated television show Hey Arnold. In 2002, he played a television show host turned heroin addict named Buggy Ding Dong in Death to Smoochy. His first television role came in 1972 as Peter Panama in The Corner Bar and his other television credits include The Moneychangers, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Taxi as the priest who marries Latka and Simka. In 1987 he appeared as Lyle, a gangster, in the MacGyver season 2 episode Soft Touch, in Highlander, The Series, he played Leo Atkins, a homeless Vietnam War veteran accused of murder in the Season 1 episode Innocent Man. In The X-Files, he played Lanny, man with a conjoined twin in the Season 2 episode Humbug. He wrote a number of cookbooks and food articles for various magazines, in 1999, Schiavelli starred in a 26-episode Italian cooking show called Chefs of Cucina Amore that aired on PBS periodically for the next couple of years. He received a James Beard Foundation Journalism Award in 2001 and was nominated on other occasions
13.
DVD region code
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This is achieved by way of region-locked DVD players, which will play back only DVDs encoded to their region. The American DVD Copy Control Association also requires that DVD player manufacturers incorporate the regional-playback control system, however, region-free DVD players, which ignore region coding, are also commercially available, and many DVD players can be modified to be region-free, allowing playback of all discs. DVDs may use one code, a combination of codes, every code or no codes, DVDs in Hispanophone Latin America and Mexico use both the region 1 and region 4 codes. DVDs sold in the Baltic states use both region 2 and 5 codes, Region 0 is widely used by China and the Philippines. Most DVDs in India combine the region 2, region 4, European region 2 DVDs may be sub-coded D1 to D4. D1 are the United Kingdom–only releases, D2 and D3 are not sold in the UK and Ireland, any combination of regions can be applied to a single disc. For example, a DVD designated Region 2/4 is suitable for playback in Western Europe, Oceania, so-called Region 0 and ALL discs are meant to be playable worldwide. The term Region 0 also describes the DVD players designed or modified to incorporate Regions 1–6, thereby providing compatibility with most discs, regardless of region. This apparent solution was popular in the days of the DVD format. This system is known as Regional Coding Enhancement, the scheme was deployed on only a handful of discs. The disc contained the program material region coded as region 1. But it also contained a video loop of a map of the world showing the regions, which was coded as region 2,3,4,5. The intention was that when the disc was played in a non-region 1 player and this played the aforementioned video loop of a map, which was impossible to escape from, as the user controls were disabled. However, the scheme was fundamentally flawed, as a player tries to play a disc using the last region that worked with the previously inserted disc. If it cannot play the disc, then it tries another region until one is found that works, RCE could thus be defeated by briefly playing a normal region 1 disc, and then inserting the RCE protected region 1 disc, which would now play. RCE caused a few problems with genuine region 1 players, some manufacturers of DVD players now freely supply information on how to disable regional lockout, and on some recent models, it appears to be disabled by default. Computer programs such as DVD Shrink, Digiarty WinX DVD Ripper Platinum can make copies of region-coded DVDs without RCE restriction, One purpose of region coding is controlling release dates. A practice of movie marketing threatened by the advent of home video is to release a movie to cinemas
14.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
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Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of feature films and television programs. Its headquarters are in Beverly Hills, California and it is one of the worlds oldest film studios. In 1971, it was announced that MGM would merge with 20th Century Fox, over the next thirty-nine years, the studio was bought and sold at various points in its history until, on November 3,2010, MGM filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. MGM Resorts International, a Las Vegas-based hotel and casino company listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol MGM, is not currently affiliated with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In 1966, MGM was sold to Canadian investor Edgar Bronfman Sr. whose son Edgar Jr. would later buy Universal Studios, the studio continued to produce five to six films a year that were released through other studios, mostly United Artists. Kerkorian did, however, commit to increased production and a film library when he bought United Artists in 1981. MGM ramped up production, as well as keeping production going at UA. It also incurred significant amounts of debt to increase production, the studio took on additional debt as a series of owners took charge in the 1980s and early 1990s. In 1986, Ted Turner bought MGM, but a few later, sold the company back to Kerkorian to recoup massive debt. The series of deals left MGM even more heavily in debt, MGM was bought by Pathé Communications in 1990, but Parretti lost control of Pathé and defaulted on the loans used to purchase the studio. The French banking conglomerate Crédit Lyonnais, the major creditor. Even more deeply in debt, MGM was purchased by a joint venture between Kerkorian, producer Frank Mancuso, and Australias Seven Network in 1996, the debt load from these and subsequent business deals negatively affected MGMs ability to survive as an independent motion picture studio. In 1924, movie theater magnate Marcus Loew had a problem and he had bought Metro Pictures Corporation in 1919 for a steady supply of films for his large Loews Theatres chain. With Loews lackluster assortment of Metro films, Loew purchased Goldwyn Pictures in 1924 to improve the quality, however, these purchases created a need for someone to oversee his new Hollywood operations, since longtime assistant Nicholas Schenck was needed in New York headquarters to oversee the 150 theaters. Mayer, Loew addressed the situation by buying Louis B. Mayer Pictures on April 17,1924, Mayer became head of the renamed Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, with Irving Thalberg as head of production. MGM produced more than 100 feature films in its first two years, in 1925, MGM released the extravagant and successful Ben-Hur, taking a $4.7 million profit that year, its first full year. Marcus Loew died in 1927, and control of Loews passed to Nicholas Schenck, in 1929, William Fox of Fox Film Corporation bought the Loew familys holdings with Schencks assent. Mayer and Thalberg disagreed with the decision, Mayer was active in the California Republican Party and used his political connections to persuade the Justice Department to delay final approval of the deal on antitrust grounds
15.
MGM HD
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MGM HD is an all high-definition television cable network. It features movies from MGMs library of approximately 1,200 movies mastered in a high-definition-compatible format and it is available via AT&T U-verse, Comcast, DirecTV, Dish Network, Time Warner Cable, Verizon FiOS, Mediacom, and Frontier FiOS in the United States. The N satellite service in Poland carries the service and it was launched on December 7,2006 in Poland. In the United Kingdom and Ireland, MGM HD launched on 14 December 2009 on the Sky satellite service, the channel is run in joint partnership with British Sky Broadcasting. On 27 April 2011, the channel was added to UPC Irelands line-up, on 16 January 2014, MGM HD ceased broadcasting in UK & Ireland. MGM continues to be available on the UPC service in Ireland on channel 326, MGM has also announced plans to bring MGM HD to Israel via the Tel-Ad service on Israels DTH satellite platform. In Latin America MGM HD was replaced by AMC, MGM HD offers programming similar to the MGM Channel which is available in 110 countries
16.
Rotten Tomatoes
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Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by Senh Duong and since January 2010 has been owned by Flixster, in February 2016, Rotten Tomatoes and its parent site Flixster were sold to Comcasts Fandango. Warner Bros. retained a minority stake in the merged entities, since 2007, the websites editor-in-chief has been Matt Atchity. The name, Rotten Tomatoes, derives from the practice of audiences throwing rotten tomatoes when disapproving of a stage performance. From early 2008 to September 2010, Current Television aired the weekly The Rotten Tomatoes Show, featuring hosts, a shorter segment was incorporated into the weekly show, InfoMania, which ended in 2011. In September 2013, the website introduced TV Zone, a section for reviewing scripted TV shows, Rotten Tomatoes was launched on August 12,1998, as a spare-time project by Senh Duong. His goal in creating Rotten Tomatoes was to create a site where people can get access to reviews from a variety of critics in the U. S. As a fan of Jackie Chans, Duong was inspired to create the website after collecting all the reviews of Chans movies as they were being published in the United States, the first movie whose reviews were featured on Rotten Tomatoes was Your Friends & Neighbors. The website was an success, receiving mentions by Netscape, Yahoo. and USA Today within the first week of its launch. They officially launched it on April 1,2000, in June 2004, IGN Entertainment acquired rottentomatoes. com for an undisclosed sum. In September 2005, IGN was bought by News Corps Fox Interactive Media, in January 2010, IGN sold the website to Flixster. The combined reach of both companies is 30 million unique visitors a month across all different platforms, according to the companies, in May 2011, Flixster was acquired by Warner Bros. In early 2009, Current Television launched the version of the web review site. It was hosted by Brett Erlich and Ellen Fox and written by Mark Ganek, the show aired every Thursday at 10,30 EST on the Current TV network. The last episode aired on September 16,2010 and it returned as a much shorter segment of InfoMania, a satirical news show that ended in 2011. By late 2009, the website was designed to enable Rotten Tomatoes users to create, one group, The Golden Oyster Awards, accepted votes of members for different awards, as if in parallel to the better-known Oscars or Golden Globes. When Flixster bought the company, they disbanded the groups, announcing, in the meantime, please use the Forums to continue your conversations about your favorite movie topics. As of February 2011, new community features have been added, for example, users can no longer sort films by fresh ratings from rotten ratings, and vice versa
17.
Metacritic
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Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of media products, music albums, games, movies, TV shows, DVDs, and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged, Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc Doyle, and Julie Doyle Roberts. The site provides an excerpt from each review and hyperlinks to its source, a color of Green, Yellow or Red summarizes the critics recommendations and therefore the general appeal of the product to reviewers and, to a lesser extent, the public. It is regarded as the game industrys foremost review aggregator. Metacritics scoring converts each review into a percentage, either mathematically from the mark given, before being averaged, the scores are weighted according to the critics fame, stature, and volume of reviews. Metacritic was launched in July 1999 by Marc Doyle, his sister Julie Doyle Roberts, rotten Tomatoes was already compiling movie reviews, but Doyle, Roberts, and Dietz saw an opportunity to cover a broader range of media. They sold Metacritic to CNET in 2005, CNET and Metacritic are now owned by the CBS Corporation. Nick Wingfield of The Wall Street Journal wrote in September 2004, Mr. Doyle,36, is now a product manager at CNET. Speaking of video games, Doyle said, A site like ours helps people cut through. unobjective promotional language and he added that the review process was not taken as seriously when unconnected magazines and websites provided reviews in isolation. In August 2010, the appearance was revamped, reaction from users was overwhelmingly negative. Certain publications are given more significance because of their stature, games Editor Marc Doyle was interviewed by Keith Stuart of The Guardian to get a look behind the metascoring process. Stuart wrote, the phenomenon, namely Metacritic and GameRankings, have become an enormously important element of online games journalism over the past few years. The ranging of metascores is, Metacritic is regarded as the foremost online review site for the video game industry. Nick Wingfield of The Wall Street Journal has written that Metacritic influence the sales of games and he explains its influence as coming from the higher cost of buying video games than music or movie tickets. Many executives say that low scores can hurt the sales potential. He claimed that a number of businesses and financial analysts use Metacritic as an early indicator of a games potential sales and, by extension. In 2004, Jason Hall of Warner Bros. began including quality metrics in contracts with partners licensing its movies for games, if a product does not at least achieve a specific score, some deals require the publisher to pay higher royalties. In 2008, Microsoft began using Metacritic averages to de-list underperforming Xbox Live Arcade games and these are the top 10 individual games with the highest scores on the site as of 2 April 2017
18.
Dangerous Liaisons
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The film was directed by Stephen Frears. Swoosie Kurtz, Mildred Natwick and Peter Capaldi appeared in supporting roles, as did the young, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, it won those for Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Costume Design, and Best Art Direction. In 1781 pre-Revolution Paris, the Marquise de Merteuil plots revenge against her ex-lover, the Comte de Gercourt, Merteuil calls on the similarly unprincipled Vicomte de Valmont to do the deed, offering him her own sexual favors as a reward. Merteuil is amused and incredulous, how can Valmont ever hope to bed the virtuous Madame Tourvel, never one to refuse a challenge, Valmont modifies the proposal, If he succeeds in sleeping with Tourvel, Merteuil must sleep with him as well. Merteuil accepts, on the condition that he furnish written proof of the liaison, Tourvel rebuffs all of Valmonts advances. Searching for leverage, he instructs his page Azolan to seduce Tourvels maid Julie to gain access to Tourvels private correspondence, one of the letters he intercepts is from Madame de Volanges, Céciles mother and Merteuils cousin, warning Tourvel that Valmont is a nefarious and untrustworthy individual. On reading this, Valmont resolves to seduce Cécile after all, meanwhile in Paris, Cécile meets the charming Chevalier Raphael Danceny. Danceny becomes Céciles music teacher and slowly, with a little coaxing from Merteuil, after gaining access to Céciles bedchamber on a false pretense, Valmont forces himself upon her as she pleads with him to leave. On the pretext of illness Cécile remains locked in her chambers, a concerned Madame de Volanges calls upon Merteuil to speak to her. Cécile, naively assuming that Merteuil has her best interests at heart, Merteuil advises Cécile to welcome Valmonts advances, young women should take advantage of all the lovers they can acquire, she says, in a society so repressive and contemptuous of women. The result is a perverse relationship, by day, Cécile is courted by Danceny. In the meantime, Merteuil begins an affair with Danceny, meanwhile, Valmont somehow manages to win Tourvels heart — but at a cost, the lifelong bachelor playboy falls in love. In a fit of jealousy, Merteuil mocks Valmont and threatens to trash his reputation as a carefree gigolo and she also refuses to honor her end of their agreement, since Valmont has no written proof that the relationship has been consummated. Valmont abruptly dismisses Tourvel with an excuse, It is beyond my control. Cécile, meanwhile, after a rough night in Valmonts bed. Tourvel, overwhelmed with grief and shame, retreats to a monastery where her health deteriorates rapidly, Valmont warns Danceny of Merteuil’s ulterior motives in seducing him, Merteuil retaliates by informing Danceny that Valmont has been sleeping with Cécile. Danceny challenges Valmont to a duel with swords, and mortally wounds him, with his dying breath, Valmont asks Danceny to communicate to Tourvel—by now at deaths door—his genuine love for her. He then gives Danceny his collection of letters from Merteuil, all of Paris learns the entire, grisly range of her schemes
19.
Chicago Sun-Times
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The Chicago Sun-Times is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois. It is the paper of the Sun-Times Media Group. The Chicago Sun-Times is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the city and it began in 1844 as the Chicago Daily Journal, which was the first newspaper to publish the rumor, now believed false, that a cow owned by Catherine OLeary was responsible for the Chicago fire. The Evening Journal, whose West Side building at 17-19 S. Canal was undamaged, in 1929, the newspaper was relaunched as the Chicago Daily Illustrated Times. The modern paper grew out of the 1948 merger of the Chicago Sun, founded December 4,1941 by Marshall Field III, and the Chicago Daily Times. The newspaper was owned by Field Enterprises, controlled by the Marshall Field family, when the Daily News ended its run in 1978, much of its staff, including Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Mike Royko, were moved to the Sun-Times. During the Field period, the newspaper had a populist, progressive character that leaned Democratic but was independent of the citys Democratic establishment, although the graphic style was urban tabloid, the paper was well regarded for journalistic quality and did not rely on sensational front-page stories. It typically ran articles from the Washington Post/Los Angeles Times wire service, the advice column Ask Ann Landers debuted in 1943. Ann Landers was the pseudonym of staff writer Ruth Crowley, who answered readers letters until 1955, eppie Lederer, sister of Dear Abby columnist Abigail van Buren, assumed the role thereafter as Ann Landers. Kups Column, written by Irv Kupcinet, also made its first appearance in 1943, Jack Olsen joined the Sun-Times as editor-in-chief in 1954, before moving on to Time and Sports Illustrated magazines and authoring true-crime books. Hired as literary editor in 1955 was Hoke Norris, who covered the civil-rights movement for the Sun-Times. Jerome Holtzman became a member of the Chicago Sun sports department after first being a boy for the Daily News in the 1940s. He and Edgar Munzel, another longtime sportswriter for the paper, famed for his World War II exploits, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Bill Mauldin made the Sun-Times his home base in 1962. The following year, Mauldin drew one of his most renowned illustrations, two years out of college, Roger Ebert became a staff writer in 1966, and a year later was named Sun-Times film critic. He continued in this role for the remainder of his life, after the friend wrote a story about it, Grizzard fired Banks. With that, the employees union intervened, a federal arbitrator ruled for Banks and 13 months later. The articles received considerable publicity and acclaim, but a nomination for the Pulitzer Prize met resistance from some who believed the Mirage series represented a form of entrapment. In March 1978, the afternoon publication the Chicago Daily News, sister paper of the Sun-Times
20.
Roger Ebert
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Roger Joseph Ebert was an American film critic and historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a critic for the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert became the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, the two verbally sparred and traded humorous barbs while discussing films. They created and trademarked the phrase Two Thumbs Up, used when both hosts gave the film a positive review. After Siskel died in 1999, Ebert continued hosting the show with various co-hosts and then, starting in 2000, Ebert lived with cancer of the thyroid and salivary glands from 2002. This required treatments necessitating the removal of his jaw, which cost him the ability to speak or eat normally. His ability to write remained unimpaired, however, and he continued to publish frequently both online and in print until his death on April 4,2013. Roger Joseph Ebert was born in Urbana, Illinois, the child of Annabel, a bookkeeper, and Walter Harry Ebert. He was raised Roman Catholic, attending St. Marys elementary school and his paternal grandparents were German immigrants and his maternal ancestry was Irish and Dutch. In his senior year, he was president and editor-in-chief of his high school newspaper. In 1958, he won the Illinois High School Association state speech championship in radio speaking, regarding his early influences in film criticism, Ebert wrote in the 1998 parody collection Mad About the Movies, I learned to be a movie critic by reading Mad magazine. Mads parodies made me aware of the machine inside the skin – of the way a movie might look original on the outside, I did not read the magazine, I plundered it for clues to the universe. Pauline Kael lost it at the movies, I lost it at Mad magazine, Ebert began taking classes at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as an early-entrance student, completing his high-school courses while also taking his first university class. After graduating from Urbana High School in 1960, Ebert then attended and received his degree in 1964. As an undergraduate, he was a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity, One of the first movie reviews he ever wrote was a review of La Dolce Vita, published in The Daily Illini in October 1961. Ebert spent a semester as a student in the department of English there before attending the University of Cape Town on a Rotary fellowship for a year. He returned from Cape Town to his studies at Illinois for two more semesters and then, after being accepted as a PhD candidate at the University of Chicago. Instead Kogan referred Ebert to the city editor at the Chicago Sun-Times, Jim Hoge and he attended doctoral classes at the University of Chicago while working as a general reporter at the Sun-Times for a year
21.
Rolling Stone
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Rolling Stone is an American biweekly magazine that focuses on popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner, who is still the publisher. It was first known for its coverage and for political reporting by Hunter S. Thompson. In the 1990s, the magazine shifted focus to a readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors. In recent years, it has resumed its traditional mix of content, Rolling Stone magazine was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and Ralph Gleason. To get it off the ground, Wenner borrowed $7,500 from his own family and from the parents of his soon-to-be wife, Jane Schindelheim. The first issue carried a date of November 9,1967. Some authors have attributed the name solely to Dylans hit single, At Gleasons suggestion, Rolling Stone initially identified with and reported the hippie counterculture of the era. In the very first edition, Wenner wrote that Rolling Stone is not just about the music, in the 1970s, Rolling Stone began to make a mark with its political coverage, with the likes of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson writing for the magazines political section. Thompson first published his most famous work Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas within the pages of Rolling Stone, where he remained a contributing editor until his death in 2005. In the 1970s, the magazine also helped launch the careers of prominent authors, including Cameron Crowe, Lester Bangs, Joe Klein, Joe Eszterhas, Patti Smith. It was at point that the magazine ran some of its most famous stories. One interviewer, speaking for a number of his peers, said that he bought his first copy of the magazine upon initial arrival on his college campus. In 1977, the magazine moved its headquarters from San Francisco to New York City, editor Jann Wenner said San Francisco had become a cultural backwater. During the 1980s, the magazine began to shift towards being an entertainment magazine. Music was still a dominant topic, but there was increasing coverage of celebrities in television, films, the magazine also initiated its annual Hot Issue during this time. Rolling Stone was initially known for its coverage and for Thompsons political reporting. In the 1990s, the changed its format to appeal to a younger readership interested in youth-oriented television shows, film actors
22.
Peter Travers
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Peter Travers is an American film critic and journalist, who has written for, in turn, People and Rolling Stone. Travers also hosts a celebrity interview show called Popcorn on ABC News Now, Travers joined Rolling Stone in 1989 after a four-year stint with People. According to eFilmCritic. com, Travers is the nations most blurbed film critic and he has also shown a great deal of disdain for certain directors, most notably Michael Bay and his films. Peter Travers at Rolling Stone Movie Reviews at Rolling Stone Peter Travers at Rotten Tomatoes Popcorn with Peter Travers on ABC News
23.
The New York Times
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The New York Times is an American daily newspaper, founded and continuously published in New York City since September 18,1851, by The New York Times Company. The New York Times has won 119 Pulitzer Prizes, more than any other newspaper, the papers print version in 2013 had the second-largest circulation, behind The Wall Street Journal, and the largest circulation among the metropolitan newspapers in the US. The New York Times is ranked 18th in the world by circulation, following industry trends, its weekday circulation had fallen in 2009 to fewer than one million. Nicknamed The Gray Lady, The New York Times has long been regarded within the industry as a newspaper of record. The New York Times international version, formerly the International Herald Tribune, is now called the New York Times International Edition, the papers motto, All the News Thats Fit to Print, appears in the upper left-hand corner of the front page. On Sunday, The New York Times is supplemented by the Sunday Review, The New York Times Book Review, The New York Times Magazine and T, some other early investors of the company were Edwin B. Morgan and Edward B. We do not believe that everything in Society is either right or exactly wrong, —what is good we desire to preserve and improve, —what is evil, to exterminate. In 1852, the started a western division, The Times of California that arrived whenever a mail boat got to California. However, when local California newspapers came into prominence, the effort failed, the newspaper shortened its name to The New-York Times in 1857. It dropped the hyphen in the city name in the 1890s, One of the earliest public controversies it was involved with was the Mortara Affair, the subject of twenty editorials it published alone. At Newspaper Row, across from City Hall, Henry Raymond, owner and editor of The New York Times, averted the rioters with Gatling guns, in 1869, Raymond died, and George Jones took over as publisher. Tweed offered The New York Times five million dollars to not publish the story, in the 1880s, The New York Times transitioned gradually from editorially supporting Republican Party candidates to becoming more politically independent and analytical. In 1884, the paper supported Democrat Grover Cleveland in his first presidential campaign, while this move cost The New York Times readership among its more progressive and Republican readers, the paper eventually regained most of its lost ground within a few years. However, the newspaper was financially crippled by the Panic of 1893, the paper slowly acquired a reputation for even-handedness and accurate modern reporting, especially by the 1890s under the guidance of Ochs. Under Ochs guidance, continuing and expanding upon the Henry Raymond tradition, The New York Times achieved international scope, circulation, in 1910, the first air delivery of The New York Times to Philadelphia began. The New York Times first trans-Atlantic delivery by air to London occurred in 1919 by dirigible, airplane Edition was sent by plane to Chicago so it could be in the hands of Republican convention delegates by evening. In the 1940s, the extended its breadth and reach. The crossword began appearing regularly in 1942, and the section in 1946
24.
The Washington Post
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The Washington Post is an American daily newspaper. It is the most widely circulated newspaper published in Washington, D. C. and was founded on December 6,1877 and its current slogan is Democracy Dies in Darkness. Located in the city of the United States, the newspaper has a particular emphasis on national politics. Daily editions are printed for the District of Columbia, Maryland, the newspaper is published as a broadsheet, with photographs printed both in color and in black and white. The newspaper has won 47 Pulitzer Prizes and this includes six separate Pulitzers awarded in 2008, the second-highest number ever awarded to a single newspaper in one year, second only to The New York Times seven awards in 2002. Post journalists have also received 18 Nieman Fellowships and 368 White House News Photographers Association awards, in years since, its investigations have led to increased review of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. In 2013, its owners, the Graham family, sold the newspaper to billionaire entrepreneur. The newspaper is owned by Nash Holdings LLC, a holding company Bezos created for the acquisition, the Washington Post is generally regarded as one of the leading daily American newspapers, along with The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. The Post has distinguished itself through its reporting on the workings of the White House, Congress. It is one of the two daily broadsheets published in Washington D. C. the other being its smaller rival The Washington Times, unlike The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post does not print an edition for distribution away from the East Coast. In 2009, the newspaper ceased publication of its National Weekly Edition, the majority of its newsprint readership is in District of Columbia and its suburbs in Maryland and Northern Virginia. The Sunday Style section differs slightly from the weekday Style section, it is in a tabloid format, and it houses the reader-written humor contest The Style Invitational. Additional weekly sections appear on weekdays, Health & Science on Tuesday, Food on Wednesday, Local Living on Thursday, the latter two are in a tabloid format. In November 2009, it announced the closure of its U. S. regional bureaus—Chicago, Los Angeles and New York—as part of a focus on. political stories. The newspaper has bureaus in Maryland and Virginia. While its circulation has been slipping, it has one of the highest market-penetration rates of any metropolitan news daily, for many decades, the Post had its main office at 1150 15th Street NW. This real estate remained with Graham Holdings when the newspaper was sold to Jeff Bezos Nash Holdings in 2013, Graham Holdings sold 1150 15th Street for US$159 million in November 2013. The Washington Post continued to lease space at 1150 L Street NW, in May 2014, The Washington Post leased the west tower of One Franklin Square, a high-rise building at 1301 K Street NW in Washington, D. C
25.
Cruel Intentions
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Cruel Intentions is a 1999 American romantic teen drama film starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, Ryan Phillippe, Reese Witherspoon, and Selma Blair. The film started as an independent film with a small budget and it was released on March 5,1999 to mixed critical reviews, but was a box office success, earning $75 million worldwide. It was followed by two films, a prequel, Cruel Intentions 2, and a sequel, Cruel Intentions 3. In early 2016, it was announced Cruel Intentions could receive a television series spin-off with Gellar set to reprise her role as Kathryn, as NBC ordered a pilot to a follow-up TV series. In an upscale New York City mansion, wealthy and popular teenager Kathryn Merteuil is discussing her prep school with Mrs. Caldwell and Mrs. Caldwells daughter, Kathryn promises Mrs. Caldwell that she will look out for the sheltered and naïve Cecile. Kathryns step-brother, Sebastian, enters the room, whereupon Mrs. Caldwell reacts to him coldly, Kathryn reveals to him that her real intention is to use Cecile to take revenge on her ex-lover Court Reynolds, who has dumped her for Cecile. Kathryn asks Sebastian to seduce Cecile, he refuses as he is planning to seduce Annette Hargrove, Annette is a paradigm of chastity and virtue who recently wrote a published essay about saving herself for marriage and has been temporarily staying with Sebastians aunt. The two make a wager, if Sebastian fails to bed Annette, Kathryn gets Sebastians vintage Jaguar XK140, if he succeeds and it is mentioned that Sebastian keeps a journal detailing his conquests. Sebastians first attempt to seduce Annette fails, as she had already been told of his reputation as a womanizer. He vents to his friend, Blaine Tuttle, who suggests that the informant might be Annettes ex-boyfriend and closeted jock, Greg McConnell and he uses that to seduce Greg while being secretly filmed by Sebastian. Sebastian confronts Greg with the photographs, but he denies warning Annette, Greg is pressured into investigating who did, and Sebastian also orders him to present him in a good light to Annette. Later, while gushing about Sebastian to Annette, Greg discovers that the culprit is Ceciles mother, wanting revenge on the Caldwells, Sebastian agrees to seduce Cecile. Meanwhile, Ceciles music teacher, Ronald Clifford, is in love with her, Kathryn tells Mrs. Caldwell about Ronald and Ceciles romance and Mrs. Caldwell orders Cecile to end it. Sebastian, in turn, calls Cecile to his house, ostensibly to give her a letter from Ronald, there he blackmails Cecile in order to perform oral sex on her. The next day, Cecile confides in Kathryn, who advises her to learn from Sebastian so that she can make Ronald happy in bed, Sebastian begins to fall in love with Annette, who returns his feelings but still resists him. Sebastian calls her a hypocrite because she claims to be waiting for her one true love and she relents, but Sebastian refuses her, confused about his feelings colliding with his stolid sexuality. Annette flees to the estate of her friends parents, Sebastian tracks her down, professes his love, and makes love to her. As he has won the bet, Kathryn offers herself to Sebastian the next day, Kathryn tries kissing him, but he rejects her again saying that its only a stupid bet
26.
YouTube
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YouTube is an American video-sharing website headquartered in San Bruno, California. The service was created by three former PayPal employees—Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim—in February 2005, Google bought the site in November 2006 for US$1.65 billion, YouTube now operates as one of Googles subsidiaries. Unregistered users can watch videos on the site, while registered users are permitted to upload an unlimited number of videos. Videos deemed potentially offensive are available only to registered users affirming themselves to be at least 18 years old, YouTube earns advertising revenue from Google AdSense, a program which targets ads according to site content and audience. YouTube was founded by Chad Hurley, Steve Chen, and Jawed Karim, Hurley had studied design at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and Chen and Karim studied computer science together at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Karim could not easily find video clips of either event online, Hurley and Chen said that the original idea for YouTube was a video version of an online dating service, and had been influenced by the website Hot or Not. YouTube began as a venture capital-funded technology startup, primarily from an $11.5 million investment by Sequoia Capital between November 2005 and April 2006, YouTubes early headquarters were situated above a pizzeria and Japanese restaurant in San Mateo, California. The domain name www. youtube. com was activated on February 14,2005, the first YouTube video, titled Me at the zoo, shows co-founder Jawed Karim at the San Diego Zoo. The video was uploaded on April 23,2005, and can still be viewed on the site, YouTube offered the public a beta test of the site in May 2005. The first video to reach one million views was a Nike advertisement featuring Ronaldinho in November 2005. Following a $3.5 million investment from Sequoia Capital in November, the site grew rapidly, and in July 2006 the company announced that more than 65,000 new videos were being uploaded every day, and that the site was receiving 100 million video views per day. The site has 800 million unique users a month and it is estimated that in 2007 YouTube consumed as much bandwidth as the entire Internet in 2000. The choice of the name www. youtube. com led to problems for a similarly named website, the sites owner, Universal Tube & Rollform Equipment, filed a lawsuit against YouTube in November 2006 after being regularly overloaded by people looking for YouTube. Universal Tube has since changed the name of its website to www. utubeonline. com, in October 2006, Google Inc. announced that it had acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion in Google stock, and the deal was finalized on November 13,2006. In March 2010, YouTube began free streaming of certain content, according to YouTube, this was the first worldwide free online broadcast of a major sporting event. On March 31,2010, the YouTube website launched a new design, with the aim of simplifying the interface, Google product manager Shiva Rajaraman commented, We really felt like we needed to step back and remove the clutter. In May 2010, YouTube videos were watched more than two times per day. This increased to three billion in May 2011, and four billion in January 2012, in February 2017, one billion hours of YouTube was watched every day
27.
IMDb
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In 1998 it became a subsidiary of Amazon Inc, who were then able to use it as an advertising resource for selling DVDs and videotapes. As of January 2017, IMDb has approximately 4.1 million titles and 7.7 million personalities in its database, the site enables registered users to submit new material and edits to existing entries. Although all data is checked before going live, the system has open to abuse. The site also featured message boards which stimulate regular debates and dialogue among authenticated users, IMDb shutdown the message boards permanently on February 20,2017. Anyone with a connection can read the movie and talent pages of IMDb. A registration process is however, to contribute info to the site. A registered user chooses a name for themselves, and is given a profile page. These badges range from total contributions made, to independent categories such as photos, trivia, bios, if a registered user or visitor happens to be in the entertainment industry, and has an IMDb page, that user/visitor can add photos to that page by enrolling in IMDbPRO. Actors, crew, and industry executives can post their own resume and this fee enrolls them in a membership called IMDbPro. PRO can be accessed by anyone willing to pay the fee, which is $19.99 USD per month, or if paid annually, $149.99, which comes to approximately $12.50 per month USD. Membership enables a user to access the rank order of each industry personality, as well as agent contact information for any actor, producer, director etc. that has an IMDb page. Enrolling in PRO for industry personnel, enables those members the ability to upload a head shot to open their page, as well as the ability to upload hundreds of photos to accompany their page. Anyone can register as a user, and contribute to the site as well as enjoy its content, however those users enrolled in PRO have greater access and privileges. IMDb originated with a Usenet posting by British film fan and computer programmer Col Needham entitled Those Eyes, others with similar interests soon responded with additions or different lists of their own. Needham subsequently started an Actors List, while Dave Knight began a Directors List, and Andy Krieg took over THE LIST from Hank Driskill, which would later be renamed the Actress List. Both lists had been restricted to people who were alive and working, the goal of the participants now was to make the lists as inclusive as possible. By late 1990, the lists included almost 10,000 movies and television series correlated with actors and actresses appearing therein. On October 17,1990, Needham developed and posted a collection of Unix shell scripts which could be used to search the four lists, at the time, it was known as the rec. arts. movies movie database
28.
AllMovie
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AllMovie is an online guide service website with information about films, television programs, and screen actors. As of 2013, AllMovie. com and the AllMovie consumer brand are owned by All Media Network, AllMovie was founded by popular-culture archivist Michael Erlewine, who also founded AllMusic and AllGame. The AllMovie database was licensed to tens of thousands of distributors and retailers for point-of-sale systems, websites, the AllMovie database is comprehensive, including basic product information, cast and production credits, plot synopsis, professional reviews, biographies, relational links and more. AllMovie data was accessed on the web at the AllMovie. com website and it was also available via the AMG LASSO media recognition service, which can automatically recognize DVDs. In late 2007, Macrovision acquired AMG for a reported $72 million, the AMG consumer facing web properties AllMusic. com, AllMovie. com and AllGame. com were sold by Rovi in August 2013 to All Media Network, LLC. The buyers also include the founders of SideReel and Ackrell Capital investor Mike Ackrell. All Media Network offices are located in San Francisco, California, AllMusic AllGame SideReel All Media Network Official website
29.
Loves of a Blonde
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Loves of a Blonde is a 1965 Czechoslovakian feature film directed by Miloš Forman. It is also known under the title of A Blonde in Love. The fiction film tells the story of a woman who has a routine job in a shoe factory in provincial Czechoslovakia. When the army holds maneuvers near her home town, the factory supervisor organizes a mixer for the female workforce. The films protagonist, though, does meet a young man who plays in the dance band and has a one-night fling with him. When she travels to the city where he lives in order to resume their romance, she meets his parents. Upon its release, Loves of a Blonde was a success in its home country and was shown at some major film festivals. Critical response was positive, although some reviewers were less enthusiastic than others. It was nominated in 1966 for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Andula is a working-class young woman living in a fading Czech factory town, where, due to an oversight in central state planning, women outnumber men 16–1. They need what we needed when we were young, he explains to a sympathetic officer, Andula strikes up a flirtation with Milda, the big-city pianist of the band providing the music. He reads her palm and instructs her in how to rebuff unwanted advances with a kick in the shins. After the party she goes to bed with Milda, although the comic frustrations continue, with Milda fighting a battle with a shade that wont close. Afterward, as they lie in bed together, Andula asks what Milda meant when he said she was angular and he replies that a woman is shaped like a guitar, And you, you look like a guitar too, he tells her, but one painted by Picasso. Before they part, he invites her to come to Prague. After listening to a speech by the housemother on the virtues of fidelity and commitment, she packs up her suitcase and arrives on MIldas doorstep in the big city, ready to resume their romance. Milda is not home, and she meets his parents, who have never heard of her, Forman has described this famous scene, It’s a tight fit. The old man wants to sleep, the son would like to get out so he can join the girl on the couch. She tells her friends about her trip to the capital and how nice Mildas parents were to her, especially his father
30.
The Firemen's Ball
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The Firemans Ball is a 1967 comedy film directed by Miloš Forman. It is set at the ball of a small towns volunteer fire department. The film uses few professional actors – the firemen portrayed are primarily played by the firemen of the town where it was filmed. The Firemans Ball was the last film Forman made in his native Czechoslovakia before going into exile and it is also the first film he shot in color, and a milestone of the Czechoslovak New Wave. The volunteer fire department in a small Czechoslovak town decides to organize a ball in a townhall with raffle, the firefighters also plan to present a small ceremonial fire axe as the birthday gift to their retired chairman who has cancer. During the ball, three of the members of the committee look for eight candidates for the beauty contest. A man continues to buy drinks for the members to persuade them to include his overweight daughter among the candidates. During the ball the raffle prizes start to disappear from the table, josef, one of the firefighters, knows the prizes have been stolen, but is unable to recover them, and even finds out that his wife is involved in the theft. After much trouble, enough candidates for the beauty contest are found, however, when the contest begins, the girls decide not to participate and lock themselves in the bathroom. Consequently, the crowd uses force to draw the replacement candidates to the stage, soon afterwards, the siren sounds because a house of an old man is on fire. All people immediately begin to leave the townhall without paying for the drinks they consumed, with the fire engine stuck in the snow, the firefighters manage to save some furniture from the house, but are unable to extinguish the fire. To help the old man who lost almost everything in a fire, however, it is soon discovered almost all of the prizes had been stolen during the ball. The firefighters order the unknown thieves to return the stolen prizes once they turn off the lights, realizing this, the firefighters committee moves backstage to discuss what they can do to save the reputation of the department. Deciding to do nothing, they return to the now empty hall, the committee presents him the gift box, but when the box is opened, it turns out that the axe itself has also been stolen. One evening, to ourselves, we went to a real firemens ball. What we saw was such a nightmare that we couldnt stop talking about it, so we abandoned what we were writing on to start this script. The movie was shot in a typical local Palace of Culture Na střelnici in Vrchlabí, most of the actors were not professional actors. To shoot the sound of their voices it was necessary to keep silence so during their dialogues the band just pretended to play
31.
Taking Off (film)
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Taking Off is a 1971 American comedy film. It was Czech director Miloš Formans first American film and it tells the story of a group of parents whose children have run away from home. The parents take the opportunity to rediscover their youth and it was written by Forman in collaboration with John Guare, along with Jean-Claude Carriere and John Klein. Part of the movie takes place at a Tina Turner concert. Taking Off Taking Off at the Internet Movie Database Taking Off at Rotten Tomatoes Taking Off at AllMovie
32.
Visions of Eight
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Visions of Eight is a 1973 American documentary film, produced by David L. Wolper and Stan Margulies, offering a stylized look at the 1972 Summer Olympics, directed by eight different directors. It was screened at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival, but wasnt entered into the main competition and it was later shown as part of the Cannes Classics section of the 2013 Cannes Film Festival. Some visuals of the Munich stadium from the documentary were used in Without Limits, Wolper asked eight directors to select their own crews and create a segment which would capture some aspect of the Munich Games. Arthur Wooster shot The Longest for director John Schlesinger, and Walter Lassally directed the photography for Arthur Penns segment The Highest, Visions of Eight won the best documentary award at the Golden Globe Awards, held in 1974 for films which were released in 1973. Peter Rainer of Bloomberg News Service noted that only Schlesinger bothered to be aware of the terrorist tragedy at the Munich Games. Schlesinger’s is the segment that fully acknowledges the Black September terrorist attacks, in which 11 Israeli athletes and coaches. Rainer continues, Penn’s entry begins daringly, not only is the imagery a slo-mo crawl, it’s also out of focus and the soundtrack is silent. Gradually the visuals sharpen, the sounds come up, but, for the most part. Rainer sees French director Claude Lelouchs segment as a welcome contrast to the other directors worshipful heroic depictions, list of American films of 1973 Visions of Eight at the Internet Movie Database
