“If you missed Elvis or James Dean or the Beatles, if you were immune to what they did to other people’s hormones, maybe George Michael’s ‘Faith’ registered strongly on your superstar Richter scale. Maybe he triggered your gaydar, too.” An appreciation by Wesley Morris.
Category: people
NPR Mainstay Diane Rehm Signs Off The Radio For Good
The host, whose style was to hold guests – especially politicians – to account in a polite and steady way, has to get Botox injections into her vocal chords several times a year.
Jens Risom, Who Brought Scandinavian Design To The U.S., Dead At 100
“His most famous design emerged out of material restrictions imposed during World War II: The 1943 Risom Lounge Chair originally had a curved frame made from wood scraps and a seat and back woven out of a parachute producer’s rejected nylon straps.”
Actress Michèle Morgan, 96, Legend Of French Cinema
She gave her star-making performance in Le Quai des Brumes at age 18, went to Hollywood at 22 (where “RKO didn’t know what to do with me”), returned to France after World War II and became the first-ever best actress winner at Cannes.
The Campaign That Made Marshall McLuhan Famous (A Study In Fame)
“Understanding Media garnered a few mainstream print reviews upon publication, but McLuhan’s break came in early 1965, when a pair of San Francisco prospectors — one, Gerald Feigen, a physician, the other, Howard Gossage, an ad-agency executive — “discovered” McLuhan and promptly arranged to visit the Canadian in Toronto. Feigen and Gossage were self-fashioned avant-gardists, using profits from their business consulting firm for “genius scouting”; the doctor read Understanding Media and alerted his partner. Together they plotted a full-fledged publicity rollout, starting with cocktail parties in New York City with media and publishing figures.”
Lin-Manuel Miranda Named AP Entertainer Of The Year
The “Hamilton” writer-composer had a great year, winning a Pulitzer and several Tonys, a Golden Globe nomination, won the Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired by American History, wrote music for a top movie, and inspired a best-selling book, a best-selling album of “Hamilton” covers and a popular PBS documentary.
Charles Busch Recalls The First Time He Performed In Drag
“I had always tried onstage to eliminate any effeminate mannerisms, and consequently, came across as lively as the animatronic Abe Lincoln at Disneyland. Playing a female role gave me a freedom of expression I had never known.”
Dick Latessa, 87, Broadway Veteran Who Won His First Tony At 74
“The Ohio native made his Broadway debut in the 1968 musical The Education of HYMAN KAPLA*N and enjoyed a 50-year acting career, appearing most recently on Broadway in the 2012 comedy The Lyons, playing an elderly man who refuses to die. … [He] won the 2003 Tony Award as Best Featured Actor in a Musical for playing Harvey Fierstein’s onstage husband in the original cast of Hairspray.”
Bocelli Out For Inaugural
A source said that, by Monday, “Andrea Bocelli said there was no way he’d take the gig . . . he was ‘getting too much heat’ and he said no.” But another source told us, “Trump suggested to Bocelli he not participate because of the backlash. It’s sad people on the left kept him from performing on a historic day.”
Composer Karel Husa Dead At 95
“[He] won the Pulitzer Prize in Music in 1969 for his String Quartet No. 3, and the 1993 Grawemeyer Award for his Concerto for Cello and Orchestra, and many other composition prizes over his career.”