Today's Birthdays 5/17
Today's Birthdays 5/17
#0Today's Birthdays 5/17
Posted: 5/16/06 at 11:51pm
Erik Satie 5/17/1866 - 7/1/1925 famously eccentric French composer & 1 of my favs; altho perhaps most famous for his "Trois Gymnopédies", his songs are fresh & unique & deserve to be given a listen. I find the titles of some of his music very entertaining as well: "Genuine Flabby Preludes (for a dog)", or "Old Sequins and Old Breastplates"; he is also known for having started his own church (with himself as the only member). Considered to be the center of the Groupe des Six, a group of six French composers (Auric, Durey, Honegger, Germaine Tailleferre, Milhaud and Poulenc. The group advocated clear musical language, and opposed impressionism (for example Debussy and Ravel), slavism (Stravinsky) and post-Wagnerism (Schönberg) in music.
Jean Gabin 5/17/1904 - 11/15/1976 French film actor, prod. - film's Pépé le Moko; Les Misérables; Du rififi à Paname
Maureen O'Sullivan 05/17/1911 - 6/22/1998 prod, perf; Mother of Mia Farrow, wife of John N.B. Villiers-Farrow (1936 - 1963) his death, James Cushing (1983 - 199 her death - Never Too Late; The Subject Was Roses; Keep It In the Family (Patrick Magee, Karen Black); No Sex Please, We're British; 1980 Morning's at Seven (Nancy Marchand, Teresa Wright, Gary Merrill); 1990 Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Falsettos; film's Tarzan films: Jane; Hannah and Her Sisters, Peggy Sue Got Married, The River Pirates
Birgit Nilsson May 17, 1918 - 12/25/05 truly a prima donna assoluta del mondo, in a day & age when the term prima donna is tossed about like a wilted salad. This lady is the REAL thing! 1 of the greatest regrets of my life is that I couldn't have been in the audience to hear her TOURANDOT with Franco Corelli. When asked if she had any dependents, she replied, "Yes, Rudolph Bing." [the then dir. of the Met]. I remember as a student when I 1st came to NYC, I was strolling down Columbus Ave. when out came Ms. Nilsson from a small grocery store carrying a brown paper bag. I mentioned this to a fellow student, who said, that it was legendary that Ms. Nilsson always drank beer before her performances. I can only guess that that's what might have been in the brown bag.
Bob Merrill 05/17/1921 - Feb 17, 1998 suicide; composer, lyricist, Paul Stryker [Pseudonym] - The Red Shoes; New Girl in Town; Carnival!; Breakfast at Tiffany's; Henry, Sweet Henry; Sugar; Funny Girl
Dennis Hopper 05/17/1936 dir., perf; husband of Michelle Phillips (1970 - 1970) divorced; marriage lasted only a few days, Daria Halprin (1972 - 1976), Katherine La Nasa (1989 - 1992) divorced, Victoria Duffy (1995 - present), Brooke Hayward (1961 - 1969) divorced - Mandingo (Brooke Hayward, Franchot Tone, Georgia Burke); film's Easy Rider, Apocalypse Now, Rebel Without a Cause, Giant, Hoosiers, Flashback, Blue Velvet, Super Mario Brothers, True Romance, Speed, Waterworld, Space Truckers; director: Easy Rider, Colors, Chasers
Peter Gerety 05/17/1940 performer - The Hothouse; Conversations With My Father (Tony Shalhoub, Judd Hirsch, Marilyn Sokol, David Margulies); 2000 Macbeth; Never Gonna Dance (Noah Lacey, Nancy Lemenager, Karen Ziemba); The Lieutenant of Inishmore; tv's & film's Return to Lonesome Dove; Central Park West; Homicide: Life on the Street; Law & Order; The Wire; 2005 War of the Worlds; Syriana
Jerry Lanning 05/17/1943 - origs Mame; Sextet (Dixie Carter, Mary Small); Anna Karenina; Timon of Athens; tv's 1967 tv Damn Yankees; The Cosby Mysteries; Guiding Light; Another World; Law & Order; Texas
Michael Mastro 05/17/1962 performer - Barrymore; Side Man; Judgment at Nuremberg; 2003 Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Twelve Angry Men; tv's & film's Kissing Jessica Stein; Law & Order;
David Eigenberg May 17, 1963 performer - Six Degrees of Separation; Take Me Out; tv's & film's Homicide: Life on the Street; The Practice; Ed; Sex and the City; Around the Bend;
SHOWS THAT OPENED ON THIS DATE:
1890 Beau Brummell
1971 - The musical, Godspell, opened this night at the Cherry Lane Theatre in New York City. Godspell featured the song Day by Day (a top-15 hit in 1972). The rock musical that featured Robin Lamont played for 2,651 performances and was the third longest-running off-Broadway production at the time.
1973 Nash at Nine - E. G. Marshall, Steve Elmore, Virginia Vestoff, dir. Martin Charnin
1979 Murder at the Howard Johnson's - Bob Dishy, Tony Roberts, Joyce Van Patten
ON THIS DAY IN:
On May 17, 1954, the Supreme Court issued its landmark Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka ruling, which declared that racially segregated public schools were inherently unequal.
2000 Two former Ku Klux Klansmen were arrested on murder charges in the 1963 church bombing in Birmingham, Ala., that killed four black girls.
(sources: IBDB, IMDB, NYT's ON THIS DAY, 440.com’s Those Were The Days, Playbill.com)
Milla
#3re: Today's Birthdays 5/17
Posted: 5/17/06 at 4:00pmI love reading these every day, thanks for posting.
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