Category: people

Johnson choreographed the film adaptation of The Wiz and won a Tony for his choreography for Purlie. He performed in both stage and screen versions of Damn Yankees, created works for the Alvin Ailey and for the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and inspired Jerome Robbins’ “Afternoon of a Faun.” He began the dance department at Howard University. Carmen de Lavallade, his costar from the 1954 musical House of Flowers, said “You know those hard rubber balls that bounce? He reminded me of that because he had such elevation, and he was quick and tough. He was low to the ground, but he could get off the floor, and he could jump high. My goodness, he was strong. … And there was always a sense of humor in his movement — the jauntiness that he had.” – The New York Times

Baillie “personified the Bay Area experimental cinema of the 1960s as an independent filmmaker and consummate 16-millimeter craftsman whose most extraordinary movie is a single panning shot.” – The New York Times

Rodriguez, a writer, actor, and former associate artistic director at Center Theatre Group, died of cancer on Friday. “‘Diane was an incredibly disciplined artist, with equal talent as a writer, director and actor,’ said CTG Artistic Director Michael Ritchie. ‘But she was never more animated than when she was advocating for the work of other artists. The arts community mourns the loss of a leader and advocate for accessibility, inclusion and community.'” – Los Angeles Times

“For many decades, he has been trying to delight Alfred Yankovic, the bright, painfully shy kid who grew up alone in his tiny bedroom. For the benefit of that lonely boy, he reshaped the whole world of pop culture. His ridiculous music sent out a pulse, a signal, and these were the people it drew: the odd, the left out. A crowd of friends for that lonely kid.” – The New York Times Magazine

The Bloomsbury Group revered him. But today he is pretty much forgotten. So why do some who achieve fame endure but others – some of the biggest – fade from history? – Prospect

Says critic David Apatoff, “The parallel is very exact. Just like [Norman] Rockwell was the centerpiece of the Saturday Evening Post, Drucker did the same thing for Mad magazine with his parodies. They were kind of looking at each other through a mirror.” – The Washington Post

The first wife of Fort Worth oil billionaire Sid Bass, she ultimately “became one of New York’s most respected philanthropists, supporting, in large but unflashy ways, the New York Botanical Garden, the Museum of Modern Art and … the New York Public Library and its Jerome Robbins Dance Division.” She was best known for her long support of New York City Ballet and its school, though she left its board in 2005 after giving warnings, then unheeded, about the behavior of the company’s and school’s leader at the time, Peter Martins. – The New York Times

“A onetime Army mechanic and mail carrier who wrote songs rooted in the experiences of lower-middle-class life, Mr. Prine rose to prominence almost by accident. He was at a Chicago folk club called the Fifth Peg one night in 1969, complaining about the performers, when someone challenged him to get onstage, saying, ‘You get up and try.’ … Within a year, he released his first album and was hailed as one of the foremost lyricists of his time, even as a musical heir to Bob Dylan. He went on to record more than 20 albums, win three competitive Grammy Awards and help define a genre of music that came to be called Americana.” – The Washington Post

He first attracted notice for shooting supermodels in famous ad campaigns for the likes of Estée Lauder; his fame grew with a photo series of famous actors, each in an enormous black turtleneck first worn by Orson Welles. His cool factor skyrocketed with the series of elegantly provocative semi- and nude portraits he did as posters for the Chicago International Film Festival. – Chicago Sun-Times

“He played the laconic rancher with no name on the revolutionary NBC series. Among Westerns, only Gunsmoke and Bonanza lasted longer.” – The Hollywood Reporter