TODAY IS:
- National Spinach Day
- National Black Forrest Cake is the 28th but so important to me and Ron Segal that it must be mentioned.
- Saturday night is the first night of Passover.
- The 28th is weed appreciation day dedicated to all the weeds that spring up in yards, gardens and cracks in the sidewalk.
- Weeds after all are plants and many are very beneficial and for those stranded in the wilderness can be a life saver and not a nascence; providing food, shelter and oxygen.
Famous People’s Birthdays:
- Leonard Nimoy 1931-2015
- American actor, film director, singer and author born in Boston to immigrants from Ukraine.
- His father owned a barber shop.
- He took miscellaneous jobs while growing up to supplement the family’s income such as selling newspapers and shining shoes. When he got older he sold vacuum cleaners.
- Can you imagine Spoke at your door with an electric gizmo?
- He also began acting at the age of 8 in a neighborhood theater, and began singing at 13 in his Synagogue’s choir.
- He took drama classes at Boston College and moved to Los Angeles and used $600 of vacuum cleaner earnings to enroll in Pasadena Playhouse.
- Marlin Brando was his role model and tried to dress like him. Not like Wally Cox.
- While studying, he took a job at an ice cream shop on the Sunset Strip.
- After being discharged from the army he became a cap driver while playing in several B movies and television series such as Perry Mayson, Dragnet, and serials like “Zombies of the Stratosphere”. Even small parts in “Them” and “The Brain Eaters”.
- Best known for his role in the Star Trek television series and the films that followed.
- The series lasted from 1966 to 1969, but it’s offshoots continue to this day.
- Spoke’s skin was supposed to be reddish, but turned out to be greenish.
- The Vulcan salute is actually a Hebrew Blessing for a specific tribe.
- The Wrath of Kahn featured the first entirely computer generated sequence for the demonstration of the Genesis Device. Really a great film made especially so by the acting of Ricardo Montalban who revived his role from the television episode.
- Nimoy directed the most financially successful film in the franchise: Star Trek 4; The Voyage Home. He also directed Star Trek 3; The Search for Spock, not to mention the 1987 film “Three Men and a Baby” with Tom Selleck and Ted Danson.
- In 1970, after Star Trek was cancelled; Nimoy opened a pet shop dealing in exotic animals that he no doubt picked up on the many planets he visited.
- He released 5 albums of recordings and here are a couple of them. William Shatner also released albums as a singer. He and Shatner became close friends that lasted until Nimoy passed away.
- In 1978, Nimoy starred in Philip Kaufman’s remake of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” with Donald Southerland, Jeff Goldblum and Brooke Adams and Veronica Cartwright who was also featured in “The Birds”.
- He rebuilt a camera at age 13 and in the 70s he studied photography at UCLA. He has had a few exhibitions including one at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary arts.
- American actor, film director, singer and author born in Boston to immigrants from Ukraine.
- James Caan – 1940
- My wife cornered him near Columbus Circle to get his autograph.
- Born in the Bronx of Jewish immigrants from Germany and his father was a butcher and meat dealer.
- He attended Hofstra University in New York and one of his classmates was Frances Ford Coppola. He also studied acting at Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theater. Then began appearing on off-Broadway productions and started to show up in some television series such as Naked City, Route 66, The Untouchables, Dr. Kildare, (50cent tip) Wagon Train and Death Valley Days.
- His first film role was uncreated in Billy Wilder’s “Irma La Duce” with Jack Lemon and Shirley McClain.
- Movies:
- Rollerball
- Godfather
- With his classmate Francis Ford Coppola
- Misery
- Thief
- Tangerine Dream
- Funny Lady
- Dick Tracey
- Bottle Rocket
- First Wes Anderson feature film.
- Sterling Hayden 1916-1986
- A leading man who specialized in westerns and film noir.
- Born in New Jersey he dropped out of high school at 16 to take a job on a schooner from New London CT to Newport Beach CA.
- Later a fisherman in Newfoundland, ran a charter yacht, and served as a fireman on 11 trips to Cuba on a steamer. He also worked on large vessels and sailed around the world several time.
- He was awarded his first command at 22 to skipper a square rigger from Mass to Tahiti in 1938.
- His photo was seen on the cover a sailing magazine and Paramount called him for a screen test and signed him for a seven year contract.
- After leaving the service he starred in John Huston’s “The Assault Jungle” then onto more westerns and Noir with Gloria Graham and Frank Sentara.
- His relationship with Stanly Kubrick started with “The Killing” in 1956 then his fantastic port rail of General Jack de Ripper in the classic “Dr. Strangelove”.
- I think that both he and George C. Scott should have shared the academy award for best actor for those roles. Another such rule that was a huge winner was Robert Shaw’s portrayal of Quint in Jaws. This was a role that was first offered to Sterling Hayden but turned it down.
This Day in History:
- Who returned payed by Christopher Ecclestone with his companion Rose.
- The Birds were released on March 28th
- Bud Cardos
- Associated with Sam Peckinpah and director of “The Day Time Ended”
- Bud Cardos