#The Beast of Broadway Affair | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

rose-of-pollux · 7 years

Text

The Beast of Broadway Affair (MFU fic), part 3/5

Title: The Beast of Broadway Affair Rating: PG13 (for action/danger) Chapter summary: Napoleon and Illya go Midtown to find out more about what Napoleon has been up to during his transformations, but a surprise attack from THRUSH causes Napoleon to change once again. Notes: This version of the fic (cross-posted to AO3) is slash; if you prefer reading gen, there is a gen version on ff.net, but I can’t link to it with tumblr’s new linking restrictions

Act III: Neither One Prepared

Illya was still attempting to keep Napoleon calm, and Napoleon, for his part, was trying to stay calm, wondering with concern as to why the sedative from Dr. Fisk wasn’t working. He would have to see him again—somehow, without letting Illya know what he had done, for he knew he wouldn’t hear the end of it.

At any rate, Illya was helping him; he would focus on that now.

“Are you feeling calmer?” the Russian asked him.

Napoleon gave a shaky nod.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m ready to read those reports about me—well, the Beast, that is.” He gave a wry chuckle. “Interesting, isn’t it?”

“What is?” Illya asked.

“I’ve sort of pulled a twist on the old fairy tale,” Napoleon said, looking at his partner with a wan smile. “This time, the Beauty is the Beast.”

“You needn’t attempt to cover up your fears with levity,” Illya said, softly. “I know you are concerned and afraid—and you have every reason to be. But also know that I am here for you.”

“I never had any doubt about that,” Napoleon promised.

Satisfied, Illya began to go over the sightings reports with him.

“These aren’t really that comprehensive,” Illya said. “They are mainly tracking your movements. It is odd that you do not seem to wander outside Midtown Manhattan. I wonder why…”

Napoleon bit his lip.

“During that flash of memory I had, I seemed to be looking for something; I guess that was why I was on top of the Majestic’s marquee—I was trying to get a better look at what I was searching for. I must have seen it near Sardi’s.”

Illya paused.

“I was near Sardi’s about ten days ago,” he recalled. “I was meeting with a contact who I’d been hoping would have some information on where to find you. I remember there being a large crowd, which, of course, I detested, so I contacted the contact and asked for us to meet elsewhere…” He facepalmed. “The crowd must have been the same one looking at you! How did I not notice you on the marquee down the street!?”

“I don’t know, but I must’ve noticed you; that must’ve been why I bounded off like that down the street—trying to catch up to you,” Napoleon said. He drew an arm around Illya. “You were worried about me, so you probably weren’t paying attention. I mean, you had no way of knowing that there was a lumbering Beast following you—or that the Beast was the one you were looking for.”

“But why did you not catch up with me?”

“I don’t remember that—not yet,” Napoleon said. “I guess you must’ve gotten into a cab, or I lost you in the crowd.”

“So…” Illya mused. “You saw me on 44th Street, and that must have been why you kept coming back to the Theatre District when you transformed—that was where you remembered seeing me last. But that doesn’t explain what happened last night—when you transformed, it would have been here—in the flat. I was here—why would you go looking for me in the Theatre District if I was right here in front of you?”

Napoleon pondered this.

“…I don’t know,” he said, at last. “Something must have persuaded me to go back Midtown, but what…?”

“Until your memory returns, there’s no way of knowing,” Illya said. “But, if you are up to it, we can go Midtown now. Perhaps walking around there will bring your memory back—but you must stay calm. We will go if you can manage that.”

Napoleon nodded.

“Yeah, now that I know what’s causing this, I’ll just keep doing the deep breathing…” he sighed. “But, ah, while we’re there, I would like to look at the police reports—just to make sure that I didn’t hurt anyone.”

“I am certain you didn’t,” Illya said again. “Our reports would have mentioned it if you had. But if it will satisfy you, we can go to the Midtown precincts and see their reports—again, only if you will remain calm. …Not that I think we will find something for you to fret and worry about, of course.”

Napoleon nodded, grabbing his suitjacket, and he and Illya headed Midtown. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary; they even swung by Sardi’s and the Majestic, and even the marquee seemed undamaged.

“You are a very mindful Beast—much as you always are when human,” Illya noted. “Is anything else coming back to you?”

Napoleon sniffed the air, trying to depend on scent-induced memory recall.

“Gasoline…” he murmured. “It wasn’t in this spot, but I remember the smell of gasoline elsewhere—a few streets down… And I remember seeing car’s headlights… …Sorry, I know that doesn’t narrow it down.”

“Keep thinking,” Illya instructed.

They moved on to the nearest police precinct, presenting their badges and requesting information on the Beast of Broadway sightings on the pretext of being on assignment.

“Not really much to these reports,” the desk sergeant said. “Mainly just sightings of where the Beast has been seen. A couple of our officers have seen it; some gave chase, but that thing is fast.”

“And you saw no need to send a task force after it?” Napoleon asked.

“Well, no,” the sergeant said, shrugging. “If you’ll look through those reports, you’ll see why.”

“I take it that means that the Beast never does anything?” Illya asked, smugly.

“No, that’s not it at all,” the sergeant replied. “A couple of those reports are worth reading, actually… That one—right there. A young lady filed a report against a mugger in an alley near here—and then added her report to the Beast sightings.”

“The Beast was the one who mugged her!?” Napoleon exclaimed, trying not to panic.

“No, Napoleon!” Illya exclaimed. “Look! She claims the Beast showed up and scared the mugger off—even handed back her purse before bounding off!”

“…Huh?” Napoleon asked.

“We’re all baffled,” the sergeant said, not noticing that Napoleon was so emotionally invested in this. “But yeah, those few ‘interesting’ reports are reports of the Beast stopping crimes all around Midtown Manhattan. On the one hand, it’s nice to have any help we can get, but, on the other hand, of course, it is a little embarrassing for us.”

“And so the decision was made not to capture the Beast because of the help?” Illya asked.

“No; at first we still wanted to—to discourage vigilante behavior,” the sergeant sighed. “But then something happened that made us realize that there were some things this Beast could do that we couldn’t.”

“…What happened?” Napoleon asked.

“That report there,” the sergeant said, indicating one. “Taxi cab had a brake failure—nearly ran a kid over, but the Beast jumped into the middle of the street, grabbed the kid in the nick of time and jumped again—landed first on the hood of the cab, which knocked out the engine, stopping it, and then the Beast jumped to the sidewalk and let the kid down. Then, it ran off before we could grasp what had just happened—took ten seconds for the whole thing to take place.”

Napoleon and Illya both blinked, and then exchanged glances.

“That explains the gasoline and headlights…” Illya said, and Napoleon responded with a shaky nod.

“And the cab driver,” Napoleon added. “Is he okay?”

“Oh, he’s fine—he’s just relieved the kid didn’t get hurt,” the sergeant said. “The kid had the time of his life—said he couldn’t wait to tell his friends at school that he was rescued by the Beast. But, anyway, you see why it was impossible for us to try to hunt the beast down like a zoo escapee after that? The public would never have gone for that, so we had to let this thing keep on doing whatever it was doing.”

“Well, this certainly was an eye-opening experience,” Illya commented. “Wouldn’t you say so, Napoleon.”

“Ah… Yes, I guess so,” he said.

They both thanked the sergeant and left the precinct, going through the network of alleys to search for any signs of THRUSH activity.

“Well,” Illya said, smugly. “Are you satisfied, Napoleon?”

“Actually… I think I am,” Napoleon mused, actually smiling. “It worked out amazingly—not only did I not go on a monstrous rampage like THRUSH was hoping for, it’s let me do my job of helping innocent people even better than before.”

Illya’s nodded.

“But while that is true, we do want to stop your transformations from occurring ever again. While you have superhuman strength as the Beast, you were meant to be human, and I prefer you that way.”

“Oh, believe me, I prefer me that way, too,” Napoleon assured him. “I like having this face when I work; people tend to trust it more than the Beast’s. …And besides, when I’m human, it means I can cuddle up with you at night--”

“Your adrenaline,” Illya reminded him, and Napoleon reigned himself in before his mind went any further down that path. “Oh, Napoleon, do you realize that until this is resolved, we cannot…?”

“…You’re right; we’ve got to figure out a way to stop these transformations,” Napoleon sighed, dreading the thought of having to sleep in another room until it was resolved. “I can’t live like this!”

“Nor can I; I suffer, too, living like this,” Illya added. “But at least we have removed this load off of your mind. Now, I need to focus on making an antidote. I do not have enough of a sample to make one, so we need to find this Professor Gaston and get a sample so I can--”

“Look out!” Napoleon yelled.

Illya saw the red laser appear on his black turtleneck just as Napoleon called out to him; his partner tackled him to the alley floor, and the shot missed him by inches. Napoleon swore, drew his Special, and fired back at their assailants.

“Napoleon, you must stay calm!” Illya instructed.

“Considering we’re under fire, I’m staying exceptionally calm!” he countered.

Illya drew his Special now, also firing back at the THRUSHies.

“If we can take one of them, he might be able to tell us where Professor Gaston is!” he said. “I think we…” He trailed off, seeing Napoleon shaking involuntarily as he tried to fire back. “Napoleon!” he frantically exclaimed.

But it was already too late; he knew that the shootout would have been the trigger to spike Napoleon’s adrenaline—exactly as THRUSH had intended. As Illya continued to look back at Napoleon, whose eyes were glazing over as perspiration poured down his face, right before Illya’s eyes, the metamorphosis took place.

Napoleon’s body grew as his musculature increased; the suit he was wearing tore to reveal the skin beneath covered with black fur. The fur covered his face soon, his features changing to slightly vulpine ones as he sniffed the air and growled, glaring at the direction of the THRUSH snipers.

“Oh, Napoleon…” Illya said, despairing.

He could only hope that the transformation would not last too long. But soon, a new worry appeared in the form of a THRUSH helicopter—bearing a large net.

“Napoleon, run!” Illya ordered. “They’ve come for you—look!”

Napoleon turned his face to the helicopter and roared at it. And then, without waiting for them to make a move, gently picked up Illya and placed him across his shoulder, and leaped up, using the walls of the two adjacent buildings near them in the alley to gain more height with each jump, finally landing on the roof of one, and then took off across the rooftops, still carrying Illya over his shoulder.

The Russian took a moment to come to grips with the situation; after realizing that, as the Beast, Napoleon was very sure-footed with these jumps, Illya proceeded to fire at the pursuing THRUSH agents. After one of the helicopter crew was tranquilized, the helicopter pulled away from them, and the snipers that had been firing on them before had gone back into hiding, not willing to show themselves.

But Napoleon didn’t slow down; Illya suspected that he wouldn’t be able to while the adrenaline rush was still going on in his body, and so it would be up to Illya to try to calm him.

He gently rubbed Napoleon’s back before realizing that this would probably have the opposite effect, and instead just spoke to him calmly. It didn’t seem to be having much of an effect, though, and they continued down past Midtown and into Lower Manhattan. Civilians stared, pointing at the building tops as Napoleon continued to leap from roof to roof.

Finally, they reached the top of their apartment building; Napoleon seemed to recognize it as home, as he gently placed Illya down and then went to look over the edge of the building to make sure that they had not been followed. He seemed satisfied and then returned to Illya’s side, making soft, almost inquisitive sounds.

Illya blinked, but soon realized what he was doing.

“Da, Napoleon; I am fine,” he assured him. “Now, breathe with me again. Please.”

It took a bit of time, but Napoleon was soon able to match Illya’s breaths again. And, slowly, his musculature reduced again, the fur disappeared, and the vulpine features of his face reverted back to human as he fell over, exhausted.

“Napoleon?” Illya asked, helping him cover up as he helped him up. “Are you alright, Dorogoy?”

“I… Yeah,” Napoleon said, still tired. “But… Illya, I just… I just King Konged you!”

“You did it to protect me from THRUSH,” Illya reminded him. He blinked. “You mean you remember that?”

“Yeah… I remember everything this time. I didn’t even know I could move like that…”

“Well, I am glad that you are able to remember and that you did move like that; you got us out of that THRUSH trap,” Illya said, sighing as he glanced at his partner. “But now… We have to find a way to stop this before it happens again.”

#Napoleon Solo #Illya Kuryakin #napollya #the man from uncle #mfu fic #The Beast of Broadway Affair

4 notes · View notes

youllallriseintheink · 3 years

Text

Angel of the Ink Machine, Chapter 1: An Unlikely Encounter.

Alright, this was a long time coming. And by a long time, I mean I have literally had it in mind since Fall. As a result, I’m going to ignore new information from TIOL so that I can do it as I originally planned.

The premise of this AU is simple: Sammy leaves the studio instead of Henry, and as a result, Joey needs a new partner in crime. He finds one in Allison. Power struggles, sacrifices, passion, ecstasy and tragedy ensues.

---

Sammy never even bothered to formally quit the studio, and it fell on Henry to explain to Joey what had probably transpired.

“He told me a few days ago that he wanted to get Mr. Arch’s attention and maybe a job from him. Sorry to say, Joey, but I think he got what he wanted.”

Joey’s face twisted with disbelief and anger and then back to serenity. “No, Sammy loved it here! I’m sure he’ll be back soon- he’s probably just sick. And even if he isn’t, well, we don’t need him anyhow, do we, Henry? So long as we have each other.”

“Hm? Yeah.” Henry didn’t tell Joey that Nathan had made him an offer as well, and that he was beginning to regret not taking it.

After a few days, Joey accepted that Sammy was gone and promoted Jack to the head of the music department. It was better that way, anyhow- Jack wasn’t so demanding, and let Joey have more run of the music room when he wanted it.

For the next decade, things went along as usual. The studio grew, Henry remained Joey’s finest and most hardworking artist, and Joey even began to look into some dark magic that could help him make his vision for the studio a reality. Joey was, however, beginning to feel increasingly alone in his vision. Henry had grown bitter and distant to him over the years, and then quit. It was disappointing, but not a surprise. It left Joey feeling rather empty in the realization of how little he’d lost. The loyal, invaluable partner he’d once had had turned into just another artist years ago.

Joey needed another person who truly understood his vision. Sadly, he didn’t know anyone that could have fit the bill.

And then he found her.

The place he’d found her had been a speakeasy during the prohibition- a hub of all sorts of illegal affairs. Joey had come here for booze and the occasional round of cocaine during the prohibition and had discovered magic that way. Now, the prohibition was over, but criminals still came to peddle their wares, and Joey, a frequent user of magic now, still came to supply himself with books and reagents that couldn’t be found anywhere else. It was a sleazy place- dirty, greasy, full of prostitutes and men who looked like they could rob you. So it didn’t surprise Joey when a woman- mid-twenties, curvaceous, and on the tall side- approached him while he was buying potions. He figured it was just a prostitute trying to find a customer.

“I need three of the generic restorative ones.. And a vial of clean animal blood, and a liter of chloroform, please.”

The woman next to him chuckled. “You know that restorative potions are horrendously marked up, right? And you could get the animal blood... from an animal.”

Looking at the woman for the first time, Joey realized two things. First, the nearly knee-length pink dress and grey leather jacket she was wearing looked far too new and expensive and a bit too modest to be a prostitute’s, and she looked awfully healthy and clean for one. Secondly, he recognized her from somewhere. Still, he wouldn’t let the woman embarrass him. “Well, yes. But I haven’t practiced making my own yet, and I don’t want to test the first few on myself! And I just so happen to have plenty of money for them.”

The woman finally made eye contact with him. Light grey eyes, Joey noted. “Really? So, you been into magic long, Mr…”

“Drew. Joey Drew. And not too long. My specialty is in the demonic, but I’m experimenting with a bit of everything. Trying to figure out what will work with my vision. Yourself? Actually, why don’t we have this conversation somewhere more pleasant.” Joey paid the man for the potions, and the two walked out of the dark alleyway and into the city lights.

“My specialty is potions. I brew my own. I also really like charms.”

Joey’s eyes went wide. “Charms? You criticize me for buying potions, and you buy charms? There’s no way of even knowing if they work!”

“Well, unlike you, I’m not working towards any grand vision. I think charms work. I think they make my life better. And that’s good enough for me. Honestly, some magic users forget that magic is meant to enhance life, not fill some kind of void in it. Heck, I could say the same of some artists.”

“Funny you should mention art. I’m an artist. And my life’s goal is to reflect life in art. It seems we have a similar view on life, don’t we? It’s just that I want to be the one to show it to other people. Say- would you like to see a bit of my vision tonight?”

“Sure!” Allison said with a smile.

Joey took her to his car and held the door open for her.

“Oh. A gentleman. And a rich one, it looks like!”

“Yes. I own one of the greatest animation studios in the world: Joey Drew Studios.”

Allison giggled. “I’m no cartoon expert, but if it’s one of the greatest in the world, then why haven’t I heard of it?”

“Well, it might not be the very best yet, but it will be! Especially once the project I’m about to show you takes off.”

“Great!” Joey could see the excitement in her eyes, and he loved it.

“And what do you do, Ms. Pendle? I feel like we’ve met.”

Allison’s face darkened a little. “Well... I used to be a Broadway performer. I quit. You see, I have an ugly history with cocaine, and some of my coworkers were getting me back into it. I knew I couldn’t stay without it ruining my health... so I didn’t. I’m still trying to figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life, though.”

Joey could remember her now- a backup dancer in one of the plays he’d seen. He committed everything she’d said to memory, knowing it could be useful later on.

Before long, they were at the studio, and Joey showed her to the pedestal room.

“Wow. You got your entire staff to participate in your rituals? That’s amazing.”

“Just a few of them, actually. But yeah, a little power goes a long way when you’re dealing with magic. And this isn’t even half of it. Come. I assume you aren’t a vegetarian witch?”

“Well, I’ve never slaughtered an animal for magic, but I’m up for it so long as it’s not too often. It’s no different than meat, really.”

“Fair enough,” Joey said. Maybe it was stupid to trust this woman that he’d met this same night, but he got a good feeling about her. He just had to share everything with her. The elevator wasn’t romantic enough, so he took her to the ink machine, suspended with chains, and watched the amazement on her face as it lowered until its top was at floor level. Joey stepped onto the machine and pulled Allison along with him. He held her waist as the machine lowered until it hit the floor of the very basement.

“Wait a moment,” he said, before climbing down the machine and running to turn on the lights.

Allison’s heart was beating a million miles a minute looking at all the pentagrams on the floor, the supplies on the shelves, and the strange machinery. A small part of her was glad she’d packed a knife in her jacket pocket, especially given the human-sized iron cages. Mostly, though, she felt like she’d died and gone to magic-user heaven. Joey had thought she wouldn’t be scared off by this, and was more than happy to be proven correct.

“This is amazing!” Allison beamed. “What do you use it for?”

“Well… nothing good, yet. I’m trying to create life, but there’s only been failed attempts. Let you show you my best one.” Joey led her to a supply closet that only he had the keys for. The door opened to reveal a metal cage and little else. When Joey clicked on the lights, a mound of black sludge, maybe a foot and a half tall, made itself visible. A cartoonish mouth floated down about where an ear should be, and two black mounds that vaguely looked like pie-cut eyes rested at its base. “I don’t know what to do to improve results,” Joey admitted. “Ultimately, I want to bring my cartoons into the real world. But can you imagine me presenting this old thing on a stage?” Joey laughed. “Wouldn’t exactly have them cheering, now would it?”

“Hmm... well, it’s a long shot, but a while ago while I was traveling, I stayed with a witch for a while and learned the recipe for a special potion. I kind of... stole the recipe from her, so I don’t know all about how it works, but it’s had all kinds of effects on the substances I’ve used it in in the past. I once burned all my hair off by mixing it with shampoo! So, you wanna to see what happens when you mix it with ink?

“Why not?” Joey said. He was sure to hear an earfull from Thomas the next day about some mechanical nonsense, but at that moment, Joey didn’t care.

“Alright,” Allison said, digging out a small vial of clear liquid from her bag. “Where do I put this?”

Joey directed her to the insertion nozzle. Allison put in the substance. Joey gathered some film of Bendy and added it in as well. And then, Joey started up the machine. What came out was an abomination- a strange, humanoid creature made of ink, its spine and joints jutting out at sharp angles from its body. It had Bendy’s horns, his smile, and one of its gloves, but the similarities ended there. It looked around at its surroundings before beginning to wander off.

Allison yelped. “What do we do? I’m sorry!”

“Don’t be,” Joey said in an extremely calm voice. “Just be calm. Find an iron cage big enough and open it for me.”

Allison did as she was told, and Joey calmly approached the beast as it took in its surroundings. “Hey, there, buddy. Come with me. It’s okay.” He offered the beast his hand and led him towards the cage. He and Allison wrestled the creature into the cage and locked it. Joey sighed in relief. “That could have been ugly.”

“Yeah. That was amazing. But I’m sorry for causing it!”

They made eye contact. “Don’t be! That’s the closest I’ve ever come to making a functional toon! I mean, it still needs something... but thank you.” Joey ran his hand over her arm. “Allison. You can sing, right? You sang on Broadway?”

“Yes.”

“I’ve been looking for a person who understood me- this side, the artistic side, the lust-for-life side- for years. Would you like to join my studio as a voice actress and help me with this grand project? Help me to do what no magician has done and create sentient life with me?”

“Yes! I’ve been looking for the next adventure since I quit Broadway!”

She hadn’t hesitated. This could only end well.

“Okay. Now, I’ll want you as a partner in crime and voice actress either way, but would you like to go out to dinner on Friday?”

Allison rolled her eyes. “Oh, well, pentagrams and demonic machines were one thing, but dinner? Now you’ve gone too far.” A pause. “I’m joking, Joey. Of course I will.” Dangerous just so happened to be Allison’s type, and she knew she could handle this little adventure if it turned sour.

#Bendy and the Ink Machine #my fanfiction #Angel of the Ink Machine AU #allison pendle #joey drew #joey x allison

18 notes · View notes

doubleattitude · 3 years

Text

NUVO Dance Convention, Minneapolis, MN: RESULTs

High Scores by Age:

NUbie Solo

1st: Aria Telander-’Diamonds’

1st: Mila Simunic-’Never Enough’

2nd: Neala Murphy-’Go Gently’

3rd: Zoey Brooks-’Boyfriend’s Back’

3rd: Violet Cruz-Blanco-’Eyes of A Child’

4th: Savannah Jackson-’His Eye is on The Sparrow’

4th: Ruby Kramer-’Transcience’

5th: Brooke Krawska-’Fawn’

6th: Maylin Munos-’Twilight’

7th: Clara McArdle-’Music Box’

8th: Mollie Darling-’Miracles’

9th: Lexie Shelton-’Hallelujiah’

10th: Evie Umbreit-’Bop’

Mini Solo

1st: Lilly Anderson-’Faun’

1st: Kelsie Jacobson-’I Dreamed A Dream’

2nd: Skylar Wong-’Elephants’

2nd: Carrigan Paylor-’It Is Time’

2nd: Finley Ashfield-’My Girl’

3rd: Harper Anderson-’Things Left Behind’

4th: Leighton Curry-’La Petit Fleur’

4th: Ingrid Wirtz-’Shining’

5th: Olivia Chiu-’Acceptance’

5th: Brittany Johnson-’Bird Land’

5th: Daphnie Braun-’Solace’

5th: Isabella Charnstrom-’The Brink’

6th: Annabel Schoolmeesters-’Lost Orbit’

6th: Lucy Mae Dunn-’Time For Mercy’

7th: Kate Baldwin-’Zimmer’

8th: Eden Hardy-’Cool Waves’

8th: Stella Kate Ziemke-’Edge’

8th: Natalie Cerepak-’Smoldering’

9th: Ava McCraine-’Femme Fatale’

9th: Ana Santos-’Je Suis Vivant’

9th: Ava Otto-’Light Sorrounds Me’

9th: Lauren Chiu-’Only Hope’

9th: Lainey Christeson-’You Are The Reason’

10th: Tova Thompson-’Arctic’

10th: Brooklyn Mohs-’La Vie En Rose’

Junior Solo

1st: Gracyn French-’A Character of Quiet’

2nd: Aaliyah Dixon-’Vintage Laser’

3rd: Carley Jensen-’April In Paris’

4th: Angelina Elliot-’The Mind’

5th: Sophia Anderson-’Emerald Mist’

5th: Josie Lutz-’It Is Time’

5th: Phoenix Jonat-’The Last Rose’

6th: Brynn Kostka-’Answer’

6th: Amelia Cherepanov-’Burgundy’

6th: Preslie Lopez-’Listen’

7th: Kylie Carter-’A Conscious Dispute’

7th: Olivia Shelton-’Ahead’

7th: Audrey Proulx-’Exist for Love’

7th: Klaire Simek-’Spine’

8th: Kylie Freeman-’Encompassed’

8th: MaKenna Allison-’Hate Me’

8th: Kira Reissner-’Shadow Journal’

9th: Siena Paradeau-’Cradle’

9th: Teagan Murphy-’Devoted’

9th: Brooklyn Alstead-’He’s A Dream’

9th: Claire Monge-’Inertia

9th: Ava Munos-’The Final Goodbye’

10th: Skylar Okerlund-’Echo’

10th: Braylin Uselding-’Light Leak’

10th: Zoe Zielinski-’Z’

Teen Solo

1st: Ava Wagner-’Change Is Everything’

1st: Isabella Jarvis-’Moonlight Serenade’

2nd: Cami Redpath-’Confined’

2nd: Harlow Ganz-’End of Love’

2nd: Payton Riss-’Twisting and Untangling’

2nd: Sydney Ishaug-’Wave’

3rd: Lydia Werschay-’A Deal With Chaos’

3rd: Mini Preston-’Rosas’

3rd: Keira Redpath-’Send in the Clowns’

3rd: Lynlie Ferrin-’Visnaga’

4th: Ayla Pilrain-’Commit’

4th: Caleb Abea-’Slide’

4th: Livia Wambach-’Wild is the Wind’

5th: Faith Cichocki-’Analysis’

5th: Kylie Vandeest-’Recognition’

5th: Mercedes Lorentz-’Reminiscence’

6th: Peyton Anderson-’Anata’

6th: Ema Cable-’Come Back To Us’

6th: Ivan Beetoe-’Giving Up’

6th: Alexa Leonard-’Hit & Run’

6th: Madeline Raverty-’Reveal’

7th: Reese Noha-’Another Love’

7th: Bella Saferstein-’I Am The Earth’

7th: Noelle Bjork-’Underground’

7th: Audrey Healy-’Waves’

7th: Vanessa Barnes-’Yesterday’

7th: Grace Kimmel-’Your Day Will Come’

8th: Hannah Olstad-’Lonely’

8th: Grace Wolk-’Under Your Breath’

9th: Madden Zook-’After Rain’

9th: Caleigh Proulx-’Hold On’

9th: Julissa Ortiz-’Never Knock’

9th: Mallorie Byard-’The Chain’

9th: Lexi Cairney-’Voyage’

10th: Brooklyn Bengtson-’All I Want’

10th: Falyn Jones-’Darkness Before the Dawn’

10th: Peyton Kratochwill-’Lotus Bud’

10th: Katelyn Franta-’Turning Tables’

Senior Solo

1st: Bennet EspindaBanick-’In Vessel’

2nd: Elisabeth Pabich-’The Art of Dealing With Pain’

3rd: Sara Gutz-’2,3,4′

3rd: Kate Happe-’Ne Me Quitte Pas’

3rd: Adam Truesdell-’Vanishing Act’

4th: Haley Klemesrud-’10,000 Miles’

4th: Evelina Galimova-’Belly of the Beast’

4th: Halie Hauer-’Grieving’

5th: Minda Li-’Efforts to Reignite’

5th: Amanda Fitzgerald-’Millions of Eels’

5th: Miranda Shaugnessy-’Shift’

6th: Kelly Blahauvietz-’Blackbird’

6th: Lauren Sklar-’Night and Day’

7th: Olivia Johnson-’Days Gone Quiet’

7th: Lexi Heath-’Visions of Gideon’

8th: Sophie Cowgill-’Bird Gherl’

8th: Joshua Ukura-’Serendipity March’

9th: Joy Lyn Erlandson-’Quiver’

9th: Ally Nelson-’Snowing’

9th: Emma Sranske-’While We Are Young’

10th: Bella Cundiff-’I Will Love You’

Open Solo

1st: Thomas Nguyen-’Falling’

NUbie Duo/Trio

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Horizon’

2nd: Dance Vision-’Timber’

3rd: Ballaraena Dance Studio-’Dark Side’

Mini Duo/Trio

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Something’s Gotta Change’

2nd: The Dance Complex-’Crumbling’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Peel’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Birthday’

Junior Duo/Trio

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Dark’

2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Soldier’

3rd: Madill Performing Arts Center-’Vanishing’

Teen Duo/Trio

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Touch’

2nd: The Dance Complex-’Desired Constellations’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’She Moves’

Senior Duo/Trio

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Impermanence’

2nd: Dance, etc!-’Particles’

3rd: Dance, etc!-’New Skin’

Open Duo/Trio

1st: Acting in Motion-’End of Love’

NUbie Group

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’These Boots’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’The Waiting Room’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’As Long As You Love Me’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’I Will Wait’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Lullaby’

Mini Group

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’What Have You Done For Me Lately’

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’This Bitter Earth’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Jailhouse Rock’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Hallelujah’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Soon You’ll Get Better’

Junior Group

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Between These Hands’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Nails, Hair, Hips, Heels’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Wolves’

Teen Group

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Paranoia’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Case of You’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’The Wolves’

Senior Group

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Fragment’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’What Is The Noise’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Dreams’

Mini Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Short Skirt, Long Jacket’

2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’This Way’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Imagine’

Junior Line

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Whole Lotta Woman’

2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’It Wasn’t Always Like This’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Naive to the Bone’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Bathers’

Teen Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’You’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Rewind’

3rd: Dance, etc!-’Thistle and Weeds’

Senior Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Rapid City’

2nd: Dance, etc!-’Begin the Beguine’

NUbie Extended Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Glamorous’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Barbie and Ken’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Broadway Banana’

Mini Extended Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Of What Is’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Feeling Gorgeous’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Yankee Doodle Dandee’

3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Trouble’

Teen Extended Line

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Do You?’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Everybody Loves You’

2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Well Played’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’So Much Betta’

Senior Extended Line

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Yes & No’

2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Adrenaline’

3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Affair of Honor’

Junior Production

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Tiger Rag’

Teen Production

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Red Handed’

2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Digital Motion’

High Scores by Performance Division:

NUbie Jazz

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’These Boots’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Glamorous’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Barbie and Ken’

NUbie Tap

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Broadway Banana’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Funky Y2C’

NUbie Contemporary

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’The Waiting Room’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’I Will Wait’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’As Long As You Love Me’

NUbie Lyrical

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Lullaby’ 2nd: Dance Vision-’Tightrope’ 3rd: Balleraena Dance Studio-’Battlefield’

NUbie Musical Theatre

Balleraena Dance Studio-’Unwritten Rules’

Mini Jazz

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Short Skirt, Long Jacket’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’What Have You Done For Me Lately’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Feeling Gorgeous’

Mini Ballet

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’This Way’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Rosamunde’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Cats’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Whistle a Happy Tune’

Mini Hip-Hop

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Don’t Slack’ 2nd: Dance, etc!-’The Girls’

Mini Tap

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Yankee Doodle Dandee’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Choo Choo’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Swing In The Mood’

Mini Contemporary

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Of What Is’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’This Bitter Earth’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Imagine’

Mini Lyrical

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Dream In Color’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Soon You’ll Get Better’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Hallelujah’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’The Lord’s Prayer’

Mini Musical Theatre

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’I’ve Got Rhythm’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’All That Jazz’ 3rd: Balleraena Dance Studio-’Someone In The Crowd’

Junior Jazz

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Whole Lotta Woman’ 1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Nails, Hair, Hips, Heels’ 2nd: Dance, etc!-’Bassline’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Time’

Junior Ballet

1st: Woodbury Dance Center-’Combust’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Bathers’

Junior Hip-Hop

Dance, etc!-’Comin In’

Junior Tap

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Tiger Rag’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Valerie’

Junior Contemporary

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Between These Hands’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Naive to the Bone’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’It Wasn’t Always Like This’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Wolves’

Junior Lyrical

1st: Dance, etc!-’Half Light’ 2nd: Misty’s Dance Unlimited-’Head and Heart’

Teen Jazz

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’So Much Betta’ 2nd: Dance Express-’Bassline’ 3rd: Madill Performing Arts Center-’Move’

Teen Hip-Hop

Dance, etc!-’When I Move’

Teen Tap

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’25 Miles’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Things I Regret’ 3rd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Work Me Down’

Teen Contemporary

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Red Handed’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’You’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Paranoia’

Teen Lyrical

1st: Dance, etc!-’People Help the People’ 2nd: Madill Performing Arts Center-’Found’

Teen Specialty

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Digital Motion’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Do You?’ 3rd: Madill Performing Arts Center-’Nine Two Five’

Senior Jazz

1st: Northland School of Dance-’London Bridge’ 2nd: Dance, etc!-’Begin the Beguine’ 3rd: Misty’s Dance Unlimited-’Another One Bites The Dust’

Senior Hip-Hop

1st: Dance, etc!-’Ani’ 2nd: Dynamic Dance Company-’Welcome To The Party’

Senior Contemporary

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Rapid City’ 2nd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Fragment’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’Affair of Honor’

Senior Lyrical

1st: Summit Dance Shoppe-’A Beautiful Reminder’ 2nd: Dynamic Dance Company-’Leave A Light On’ 3rd: Misty’s Dance Unlimited-’Conformed’

Senior Specialty

1st: Larkin Dance Studio-’Yes & No’ 2nd: Summit Dance Shoppe-’Adrenaline’ 3rd: Larkin Dance Studio-’What Is The Noise’

Best NU Groups:

NUbie

Larkin Dance Studio-’These Boots’

Summit Dance Shoppe-’Lullaby’

Dance Vision-’Barbie Girl’

Mini

Larkin Dance Studio-’Short Skirt, Long Jacket’

Dance, etc!-’Le Freak’

Dance Vision-’Slip Away’

Summit Dance Shoppe-’What Have You Done For Me Lately’

Junior

Larkin Dance Studio-’Between These Hands’

Summit Dance Shoppe-’Whole Lotta Woman’

Woodbury Dance Center-’Combust’

Teen

Dance Vision-’Modern Loneliness’

Madill Performing Arts Center-’Nine Two Five’

Summit Dance Shoppe-’Do You?’

Larkin Dance Studio-’Red Handed’

Senior

Summit Dance Shoppe-’Adrenaline’

Larkin Dance Studio-’Rapid City’

Northland School of Dance-’London Bridge’

Studio Pick:

Summit Dance Shoppe-’Adrenaline’

Dance Vision-’Modern Loneliness’

Larkin Dance Studio-’Rapid City’

Dance, etc!-’Thistle and Weeds’

Balleraena Dance Studio-’Unworthy’

#nuvo #dance #2021 #minneapolis #minnesota

20 notes · View notes

d-criss-news · 4 years

Text

When it was announced that The Rosie O'Donnell Show would be back for one night only with a guest list of about 15 million Broadway talents, many of us wondered, would it be a return to the glory days of her multiple Emmy-winning daytime talk show or more like her ill-fated attempt to resuscitate the primetime variety format on NBC in 2008. It turned out to borrow from both those predecessors while evolving into something completely different — a low-tech lovefest that felt like eavesdropping on a group chat among friends looking out for one another in a time of need.

It was spontaneous, messy and blighted by some of the worst audio glitches imaginable. Yet it was often affectingly intimate, and even over an endurance-testing three-and-a-half commercial-free hours, also strangely addictive. The lack of slickness seemed to carry through to the relaxed manner of the guests, and their refreshing unpretentiousness.

Conceived by actor-producer (and occasional tech-support helpmate) Erich Bergen and live-streamed on Broadway.com and the website's YouTube channel, the show was a benefit for The Actors Fund, the charitable organization founded in 1882 that supports performers and behind-the-scenes theater workers. It raised more than half-a-million dollars, O'Donnell announced at the end of the marathon, sitting in a Hamilton hoodie and offering a champagne toast in a glass emblazoned with the face of Barbra Streisand.

She conducted the entire show from behind a laptop in her New Jersey garage, its floor spattered with the paint spillage of countless craft projects. "I'm a little bit of a Broadway nerd, I admit it," said O'Donnell, establishing her dual role as host and superfan.

Part of the show's unique pleasure was seeing favorite Broadway performers chilling in their own homes, almost all of them dressed down, with little visible attention to makeup or hair, and zero concern about unflattering angles. It was a great equalizer, proving that even artists who can hold packed theaters in the palm of their hands with a song are housebound and trying to make the best of a bad situation just like the rest of us — staying close to their families, killing time, learning to cook, wondering how long this unnerving isolation will last. Or how much longer we can put off that shower.

It was kind of comforting to see Idina Menzel sitting by her microwave and confessing, "I guess I'm going a little bonkers," while lamenting a failed lasagna attempt and sharing the challenges of homeschooling her son when she's no math genius. Likewise, hearing Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker talk about watching Columbo reruns or catching up on The Crown, while SJP begged for no spoilers on the final episode of The Sopranos, which she may now get to at last. Seeing Annette Bening on her Los Angeles balcony wearing a "Make America Kind Again" baseball cap was as much a tonic as watching Neil Patrick Harris do a card trick with his adorable twins. And who doesn't want to meet Gloria and Emilio Estefan's cute rescue dogs or hear about Lin-Manuel Miranda's kids' reaction to their first exposure to Singin' in the Rain?

Then there were the musical interludes.

Where else could you catch Patti LuPone, in magnificent voice, singing the urgently upbeat 1930s standard "A Hundred Years From Today," unaccompanied while sitting by the jukebox in her basement? Or Kelli O'Hara nestled into an armchair honoring Stephen Sondheim's 90th birthday by wrapping her crystalline soprano around "Take Me to the World," a hymn to unity from Evening Primrose? Or husband and wife Audra McDonald and Will Swenson duetting on the Charlie Chaplin evergreen, "Smile," from their Westchester living room? Or Darren Criss pouring his heart into another Sondheim classic about the desire for connection, "Being Alive," from Company, accompanying himself in a lovely pop arrangement on acoustic guitar from the sofa of his Los Angeles home? And while sound problems plagued Barry Manilow's selection of hits, ending with "I Made It Through the Rain," I was tickled to see his Judy Garland Kleenex dispenser.

Many of the song choices were thoughtfully apropos of the current crisis, offering comforting reassurance of the eventual return of resilience and togetherness while people in major cities all over the country self-isolate as the infection rate of the coronavirus pandemic continues to climb. Maybe Tituss Burgess at his home keyboard singing "The Glory of Love" is exactly the kind of uplift we all need right now.

Even in the seemingly random numbers, the entire enterprise was characterized by a spirit of generosity and sharing.

Kristin Chenoweth celebrated a Starbucks romance in "Taylor the Latte Boy." Matthew Morrison goofed it up on ukulele to a mashup of "The Bare Necessities" and "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah" from his Disney Dreamin' album. Alan Menken whipped through a medley of his songs from The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Little Shop of Horrors, among others, at the piano. Ben Platt, also at the keyboard, did Bob Dylan's "Make You Feel My Love." And Adrienne Warren, the sensational star of Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, growled out "Simply the Best" from her bathtub. That was on the third attempt during a particularly troublesome audio patch, by which time her bubbles were history.

Prompted by O'Donnell, more than one guest reminded viewers that The Actors Fund is not just about Broadway artists pulling star salaries but also stagehands, makeup artists, wigmakers and ushers who work in what is very much a gig economy. The organization provides emergency financial assistance, social services, affordable housing, healthcare and insurance counseling and addiction support.

"Everything's a one-off," said Tony-winning actor Brian Stokes Mitchell, who serves as chairman of The Actors Fund. "That's how we get by, and many people are living on the edge right now."

"We're all just one, two, maybe three paychecks away from bankruptcy," added Billy Porter, whose mother is in an Actors Fund nursing home. "In this community, our whole job description is insecurity," said Judith Light.

Porter, along with Lea Salonga and longtime activist Light recalled how Broadway was on the frontlines of another life-threatening struggle during the early days of the AIDS crisis. All of them urged viewers to stay strong and take the time to reflect on the value of solidarity.

While O'Donnell has never been shy about her opposition to Donald Trump and everything he stands for, the show was remarkably light on politics, with just the occasional dig slipping through. She opened with a little celebratory "Yay!" while admitting she had missed the president's daily coronavirus press update, and then explained that she and her guests were not there to talk Trump. When Harvey Fierstein, O'Donnell's 2005 stage husband in Fiddler on the Roof, reminded her of all the election work still to be done, she said, "Let's all just know, we deserve a leader who tells the truth." And the delays in making coronavirus testing more widely available prompted a comment that the government should have gotten busy on that back in January when the writing was already on the wall.

Mostly, however, the hastily revamped Rosie O'Donnell Show was about bringing people together at this time of anxiety and isolation, as the host reconnected with artists whom she has championed since her reign as the Queen of Nice. "Everyone in the community loves you," she told Chita Rivera in a particularly effusive greeting. "You are our queen mother!"

Many of the performers would have been decompressing after rehearsals or Sunday matinees if the Broadway shutdown hadn't happened — Criss in American Buffalo, Broderick and Parker in Plaza Suite, Warren in Tina, Lauren Patten and Elizabeth Stanley in Jagged Little Pill. Sunday would have been LuPone's opening night in the gender-flipped revival of Company. Gavin Creel, who abruptly ended his London run in Waitress to fly home and is in isolation in a cabin in upstate New York, revealed the fear that he might have contracted the virus, given that several others in the cast have fallen ill, with one of them testing positive.

The show bridged the gap separating us from artists whose work we normally experience on the other side of the footlights. Most of us will never again get to see Stephen Sondheim and Andrew Lloyd Webber exchange greetings in song on the birthday the two composers happen to share. From those celebrated veterans to rising-star newbies, the common denominator here was everybody facing the crisis just like us, reaching out a hand of friendship, albeit from a mandatory safe distance.

#darren criss #rosie o’donnell #rosie o'donnell show livestream #the hollywood reporter #press #march 2020

41 notes · View notes

blackkudos · 4 years

Text

Meshach Taylor

Meshach Taylor (April 11, 1947 – June 28, 2014) was an American actor. He was Emmy-nominated for his role as Anthony Bouvier on the CBS sitcom Designing Women (1986–93). He was also known for his portrayal of Hollywood Montrose, a flamboyant window dresser in Mannequin. He played Sheldon Baylor on the CBS sitcom Dave's World (1993–97), appeared as Tony on the short-lived NBC sitcom Buffalo Bill opposite Dabney Coleman, and appeared as the recurring character Alastair Wright, the social studies teacher and later school principal, on Nickelodeon's sitcom, Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide.

Early life

Taylor was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Hertha Mae (née Ward) and Joseph T. Taylor, former dean of students at Dillard University in New Orleans, who was also the first dean of arts and sciences at Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis.

After the family moved from New Orleans to Indianapolis, Taylor graduated from Crispus Attucks High School in 1964, where he took an interest in acting, and went on to study in the dramatic arts programs at Wilmington College (Ohio) and Florida A&M University. Leaving Florida A&M a few credits shy of graduation, he worked in Indianapolis as a State House reporter for AM radio station WIFE (now WTLC), where he used the on-air name Bruce Thomas, and as the host of a community-affairs program on television station WLWI (now WTHR), as Bruce Taylor. Many years later, in May 1993, he received his bachelor's degree in theatre arts from Florida A&M.

Career

Theater and teleplays

Taylor's first professional acting gig was in a national tour of Hair. He honed his craft in repertory theater as a member of Chicago's Goodman Theatre, and the Organic Theater Company alongside Joe Mantegna, André DeShields, Dennis Franz, Keith Szarabajka, Jack Wallace, and director Stuart Gordon. While in Chicago, he appeared in David Rabe's Streamers, Native Son (1979 Joseph Jefferson Award Nomination for Actor in a Principal Role in a Play), The Island and Athol Fugard’s Sizwe Banzi Is Dead, for which he garnered the 1977 Joseph Jefferson Award for Actor in a Principal Role in a Play. He received an Emmy Award for his role as Jim in the WTTW production of Huckleberry Finn and hosted the Chicago television show Black Life. In 1998, Taylor made his Broadway debut as Lumiere in Beauty and the Beast, where he starred alongside Toni Braxton. In September, 2012, he appeared in Year of the Rabbit at Ensemble Studio Theater-LA as Vietnam veteran JC Bridges.

Television and film

In 1977, Taylor moved to Los Angeles, where he crafted a gallery of memorable characters in film and on television, including his Emmy nominated turn in the CBS sitcom Designing Women. Taylor played Anthony Bouvier, the assistant at the fictitious Sugarbaker interior design firm in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1989, he received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series. In May 1981, the ninth season of M*A*S*H, he was seen as a corpsman in the final episode, "The Life You Save".

From 1993-97, he was a series regular as plastic surgeon Sheldon Baylor on Dave's World (CBS), and had a recurring role as Alastair Wright, the history teacher turned school principal, on Nickelodeon's sitcom, Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide (2004–07) and Buffalo Bill on NBC with Dabney Coleman.

Other appearances include: The Unit, Jessie, Hannah Montana as a fashion designer, All of Us as Neesee's father, The Drew Carey Show, Static Shock, Caroline in the City, Aaahh!!! Real Monsters, Women of the House, In the Heat of the Night, Punky Brewster, What's Happening Now!!, Hill Street Blues, ALF, Melba, The Golden Girls, Cagney & Lacey, Barney Miller, Lou Grant, The White Shadow, The Incredible Hulk, The Secret of NIMH 2: Timmy to the Rescue and Barnaby Jones.

In 1996, Taylor hosted his own series on HGTV, The Urban Gardener with Meshach Taylor, and in 1998, he hosted Meshach Taylor's Hidden Caribbean on The Travel Channel. He was a regular panelist on the 2000 revival of the television game show To Tell the Truth. He co-hosted Living Live! with Florence Henderson on Retirement Living TV; in 2008 until the program was revamped as The Florence Henderson Show.

Taylor had been friends with actor Joe Mantegna since they appeared together in 1969 in the musical Hair. Taylor guest-starred in 2012 on Criminal Minds' eighth season in the episode "The Fallen", opposite Mantegna as Harrison Scott, Rossi's former Marine sergeant with whom he served in Vietnam . In January 2014, he reprised this role in "The Road Home" which aired January 22, 2014, just five months before his death. Mantegna led a Criminal Minds tenth season episode "Anonymous", to honor Taylor on January 21, 2015.

Taylor appeared in such feature films as Mannequin, Mannequin Two: On the Move, and Damien: Omen II.

Personal life

Taylor married actress Bianca Ferguson in 1983. He had four children, three with Bianca and one from a previous marriage. His children include daughters Tamar Taylor, Esme Taylor, Yasmine Taylor, and son Tariq Taylor, along with four grandchildren.

Death

Suffering from colorectal cancer, Taylor died on June 28, 2014, at his home in Altadena, California. Taylor was survived by his wife, their four children, his mother Hertha Ward Taylor (who celebrated her 100th birthday 11 days before Meshach died), two siblings, and four grandchildren. A memorial service to celebrate his life was held at Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills) on July 6, 2014.

#04/11 #06/28

5 notes · View notes

vinyl-problemchen · 4 years

Photo

Record #030: Candide - 1974 Broadway Cast Recording

(07/10/2020)

Candide is a weird beast that I have uh complex feelings about. Generally, I do enjoy what Bernstein wrote, most of it a lot, and there are numbers in Candide that are truly stunning or at least highly entertaining; and I am very much here for a critique, or rather a mocking of that blind-eyed optimism that presumably only privileged people can afford, so I get it, Voltaire, I get it.

But. I really hate that novella and I really hate the show as a whole. It is a cynical, one-joke affair that even given how short the book is, goes on for way too long. And unfortunately that’s also true of Candide, the stage work, and here Candide the cast recording.

Usually I am the first to applaud any record of a musical that tries to capture the entire score and maybe even include some of the spoken bits so you can get as much of it as home as possible without reading a synopsis. It’s a great idea and certainly makes sense if there is more music than dialogue in the first place, or maybe if narration is already worked into the show, as it was here. Unfortunately what works for, say, Sweeney Todd, or Follies, maybe even Show Boat doesn’t for Candide as it only draws attention to the works biggest flaw - the source material (and the adaptation for it, here done by Hugh Wheeler)

And, to be honest, not all songs or musical sequences in Candide are great. So combine the overextension of the narrative with songs that aren’t fun and you get a recording that deeply irritated me the longer it went on. A truly frustrating experience.

The positive: the numbers that are good are indestrucible, and the re-orchestrations by Hershy Kay are fun (although the piano filling in for a proper string section is a bit sad, pointing to the unfortunate trend of cutting instrumentalists from the band pits due to, to quote Alan Jay Lerner, “Good Economics”), the cast is mostly solid. I usually love Lewis J Stadlen but his Voltaire voice is grating. Mark Baker seems to have been a cuter and younger Candide than Rounseville, but it’s sad to lose Voice in that process. A criticism that seems to basically apply to the entire cast (minus Stadlen, who as Pangloss, is better than his predecessor in the 1956 production) although June Gable as the Old Lady is probably the stand out.

Some of the new songs/revisions with Sondheim lyrics are good too, most of all “Life Is Happiness” but even that becomes a tough listen with all the interjections by Voltaire. Ah well.

Hm. Yeah. Think that’s one for the “Records I Turned Out To Hate” pile... womp womp.

Favourite Track: A1, “Overture”. Indestructible even with the smaller orchestrations, and nothing irritating to sour it.

#candide #cast recordings #my record collection #record diary #leonard bernstein #1970s #broadway

2 notes · View notes

tomhiddleslove · 5 years

Text

How can such a cool play make us sweat? Chalk it up to the incredible heat generated by the starry cast of Broadway’s latest “Betrayal,” featuring Tom Hiddleston and Zawe Ashton as a long-married couple and Charlie Cox as the secret lover.

Director Jamie Lloyd’s impeccable direction — now on Broadway, after a hot-ticket London run — strips Pinter’s 1978 play to its bare bones: the excruciating examination of the slow death of a marriage. It’s a daring approach, leaving the characters nowhere to hide. Certainly not in the language, which is so famously spare that even the pauses pulse with unspoken emotion and hidden meaning. And definitely not in the staging, which is the essence of minimalism.

Soutra Gilmour’s clean-lined sets and monochromatic costumes, along with Jon Clark’s extraordinarily suggestive lighting, are visual definitions of the 14-year marriage of Robert (Hiddleston) and Emma (Ashton), and the intrusive inclusion of Emma’s lover Jerry (Cox). Penetrating strip lighting from above alternately exposes their faces and blots out their expressions by suddenly thrusting them into silhouette. And if that isn’t enough to illustrate the dynamic of their intertwined relationships, a revolving stage keeps pushing the characters together and then pulling them firmly apart in chilling tableaux of alienation.

All in all, Lloyd’s bold attack is a beautifully bleak approach to Pinter’s most relatable play, the dissection of a marriage, a love affair, and a friendship. Pinter famously said that, of all his plays, “Betrayal” is the one that most closely adheres to his own life.

The narrative unfolds in reverse, opening with a devastating scene of the former lovers sitting in a café. Emma is clearly still attached to Jerry and to her fond memories of their affair, while Jerry seems to have put it far behind him. When Ashton delivers Emma’s line “Just like old times,” she gives it a flirtatious flip – only to encounter Jerry’s indifferent response: “Mmm.”

When she says that she has been thinking of him, Cox delivers Jerry’s unkind reaction – “Good God. Why?” – as a verbal slap in the face. (Emma doesn’t flinch, but I did.) And when she asks him if he ever thinks of her, his answer – “I don’t need to think of you” – is pure Pinteresque ambiguity.

But what’s a Pinter play without menace? Here, it’s Robert – in Hiddleston’s charged performance, a man who could either howl in pain or take Jerry’s head off — lurking off to the side, but never out of sight. His is a striking physical performance, as well as an emotionally complicated one. But his commanding presence is something of a feint. Robert may look like a pillar of strength, but of the three of them, he seems most likely to be permanently scarred by the double betrayal of his wife and his best friend.

From that searing opening scene, the play unfolds in reverse, all the way back to the beginning of this illicit affair, lightening in mood as it moves through time. There are, however, certain topical refrains that keep repeating themselves, like the two friends’ inability to set and follow up on a date to play squash – a manly sport known to bring out the beast in its players. It’s a cool Pinteresque joke to keep these two in a perpetual standoff. Is each man afraid to make such a bluntly symbolic attack on his rival, or are they both fearful of destroying their friendship?

Lloyd’s staging keeps all three characters onstage and quietly observing throughout the play, which sounds creepy and sort of is. But it’s also sort of trippy to catch glimpses of their hidden thoughts. Ashton is the most articulate in this body-speak. With her long, long legs and incredibly graceful movements, she gives Emma an enhanced presence that goes beyond words. Even when she’s in repose, you can’t tear your eyes away from her.

Thanks to the precision of Lloyd’s direction, our eyes are always focused on the proper bit of minimalist action – a quick sideways glance, a casual crossing of the legs – while our heads are occupied with Pinter’s layered thoughts. Of all Pinter’s often-puzzling work, this play is the one that clearly speaks to you, thinks for you, and may even feel for you.

[ Link to full article in source below. ]

#Tom Hiddleston #Zawe Ashton #Charlie Cox #Betrayal Broadway #bernard b jacobs theater #jamie lloyd production #harold pinter play #Theatre tom #tom hiddleston stage performance #Tom as robert #Zawe as emma #Charlie as jerry #Variety review article #hiddles 2019 #Broadway debut #new york city

26 notes · View notes

insanityclause · 5 years

Link

18 notes · View notes

dweemeister · 5 years

Text

A list of all films featured in 2019′s 31 Days of Oscar

This is the exhaustive list of all 388 short- and feature-length films featured during this year’s 31 Days of Oscar marathon (up from 296 last year). Best Picture winners and the one (and only) winner for Unique and Artistic Production are in bold. Asterisked (*) films are films I haven’t seen in their entirety as of the publishing of this post.

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927)

Two Arabian Knights (1927)*

The Crowd (1928)

Sadie Thompson (1928)*

Speedy (1928)

Street Angel (1928)

A Woman of Affairs (1928)

White Shadows in the South Seas (1928)*

The Broadway Melody (1929)

The Divine Lady (1929)*

Weary River (1929)*

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

The Big House (1930)

The Doorway to Hell (1930)*

Flight Commander (1930)*

The Criminal Code (1931)*

Little Caesar (1931)

The Public Enemy (1931)

Flowers and Trees (1932 short)

Grand Hotel (1932)

What Price Hollywood? (1932)*

42nd Street (1933)

Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933)

Morning Glory (1933)*

The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933)*

Cleopatra (1934)*

Imitation of Life (1934)

It Happened One Night (1934)

Manhattan Melodrama (1934)*

The Thin Man (1934)

Alice Adams (1935)*

Captain Blood (1935)

A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935)*

Top Hat (1935)

Dodsworth (1936)

Fury (1936)*

The Great Ziegfeld (1936)

Libeled Lady (1936)

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936)

Captains Courageous (1937)

Night Must Fall (1937)*

The Prisoner of Zenda (1937)

A Star Is Born (1937)

Way Out West (1937)*

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)

Boys Town (1938)

Merrily We Live (1938)*

Pygmalion (1938)

You Can’t Take It with You (1938)

Beau Geste (1939)

Dark Victory (1939)

Gone with the Wind (1939)

Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939)

Gulliver’s Travels (1939)

Lady of the Tropics (1939)*

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)

Ninotchka (1939)

Only Angels Have Wings (1939)*

Stagecoach (1939)

The Wizard of Oz (1939)

Wuthering Heights (1939)*

Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)

The Great McGinty (1940)

The Mark of Zorro (1940)

Night Train to Munich (1940)*

Our Town (1940)

The Philadelphia Story (1940)

Rebecca (1940)

Strike Up the Band (1940)

The Thief of Bagdad (1940)

Waterloo Bridge (1940)

Dumbo (1941)

Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941)

Suspicion (1941)

Bambi (1942)

Casablanca (1942)

Johnny Eager (1942)*

Kings Row (1942)*

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

Mrs. Miniver (1942)

Now, Voyager (1942)

Random Harvest (1942)

To Be or Not to Be (1942)

Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)

The Desert Song (1943)*

The Human Comedy (1943)*

Lassie Come Home (1943)

The Ox-Bow Incident (1943)

The Song of Bernadette (1943)

Henry V (1944)*

Lifeboat (1944)

National Velvet (1944)

Anchors Aweigh (1945)

Blithe Spirit (1945)*

Brief Encounter (1945)

The Lost Weekend (1945)

They Were Expendable (1945)*

The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)

The Harvey Girls (1946)

It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

The Stranger (1946)*

First Steps (1947)*

Forever Amber (1947)*

Life with Father (1947)*

The Perils of Pauline (1947)*

Bicycle Thieves (1948, Italy)

Hamlet (1948)

The Naked City (1948)

The Red Shoes (1948)

I Remember Mama (1948)

Romance on the High Seas (1948)*

Adam’s Rib (1949)*

Battleground (1949)

The Heiress (1949)

A Letter to Three Wives (1949)*

Mighty Joe Young (1949)*

On the Town (1949)

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)

The Stratton Story (1949)*

The Third Man (1949)

White Heat (1949)

All About Eve (1950)

Broken Arrow (1950)*

Destination Moon (1950)*

Mystery Street (1950)*

Rashômon (1950, Japan)

An American in Paris (1951)

Royal Wedding (1951)

Show Boat (1951)*

Strangers on a Train (1951)

High Noon (1952)

The Quiet Man (1952)

Umberto D. (1952, Italy)

The Band Wagon (1953)

The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T (1953)*

From Here to Eternity (1953)

Julius Caesar (1953)*

Lili (1953)

Little Fugitive (1953)*

Little Johnny Jet (1953 short)*

Titanic (1953)*

Brigadoon (1954)

La Strada (1954, Italy)

On the Waterfront (1954)

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

Seven Samurai (1954, Japan)

A Star Is Born (1954)

Blackboard Jungle (1955)

It’s Always Fair Weather (1955)

Marty (1955)

Speedy Gonzales (1955 short)

To Catch a Thief (1955)

Around the World in 80 Days (1956)

The Bespoke Overcoat (1956 short)*

Forbidden Planet (1956)

Lust for Life (1956)

Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956)*

The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)

Funny Face (1957)

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957)

12 Angry Men (1957)

The Defiant Ones (1958)

Gigi (1958)

Mon Oncle (1958, France)

The Young Lions (1958)*

Ben-Hur (1959)

South Pacific (1958)

The 400 Blows (1959, France)

North by Northwest (1959)

Inherit the Wind (1960)

Macario (1960, Mexico)*

The Time Machine (1960)

Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961)

The Children’s Hour (1961)*

Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)

Through a Glass Darkly (1961, Sweden)*

West Side Story (1961)

Days of Wine and Roses (1962)

How the West Was Won (1962)

Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

The Longest Day (1962)

The Miracle Worker (1962)

To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)

Bye Bye Birdie (1963)

Charade (1963)

Cleopatra (1963)

The Leopard (1963, Italy)

Tom Jones (1963)*

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963, Italy)*

A Hard Day’s Night (1964)

Mary Poppins (1964)

My Fair Lady (1964)

The Pink Phink (1964 short)*

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964, France)

Doctor Zhivago (1965)

A Patch of Blue (1965)*

The Sound of Music (1965)

The Battle of Algiers (1966, Algeria)

Fantastic Voyage (1966)

Grand Prix (1966)*

A Man for All Seasons (1966)

The Professionals (1966)

Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

The Dirty Dozen (1967)

Doctor Dolittle (1967)*

In the Heat of the Night (1967)

Two for the Road (1967)*

Bullitt (1968)*

Funny Girl (1968)

The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (1968)*

The Lion in Winter (1968)*

Oliver! (1968)

It’s Tough to Be a Bird (1969 short)*

The Magic Machines (1969 short)*

Marooned (1969)*

Midnight Cowboy (1969)*

The Great White Hope (1970)*

I Girasoli (1970, Italy)*

Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion (1970, Italy)*

Patton (1970)

Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970)

Fiddler on the Roof (1971)

The French Connection (1971)

The Last Picture Show (1971)*

The Godfather (1972)

Sounder (1972)

Travels with My Aunt (1972)*

The Day of the Dolphin (1973)*

The Way We Were (1973)*

Blazing Saddles (1974)

Nashville (1975)

Harlan County U.S.A. (1976)

Network (1976)

The Slipper and the Rose (1976)

Taxi Driver (1976)

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Smokey and the Bandit (1977)

California Suite (1978)*

Superman (1978)

The Black Hole (1979)

The Black Stallion (1979)

Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)

A Little Romance (1979)

Every Child (1979 short)

Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)

Atlantic City (1980)*

Kagemusha (1980, Japan)

Das Boot (1981, Germany)

Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Annie (1982)

Tron (1982)

Victor/Victoria (1982)*

Blue Thunder (1983)*

Amadeus (1984)

Dune (1984)*

The Times of Harvey Milk (1984)

Agnes of God (1985)*

Back to the Future (1985)

Legend (1985)*

My Life as a Dog (1985, Sweden)

Silverado (1985)*

Hoosiers (1986)

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)

Au revoir les enfants (1987, France)

The Last Emperor (1987)

The Princess Bride (1987)

The Untouchables (1987)*

Stand and Deliver (1988)

Willow (1988)*

Do the Right Thing (1989)

For All Mankind (1989)

Glory (1989)

Henry V (1989)

When Harry Met Sally… (1989)*

Dances with Wolves (1990)

Misery (1990)*

Beauty and the Beast (1991)

The Prince of Tides (1991)*

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1991)

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

A River Runs Through It (1992)

Toys (1992)*

Unforgiven (1992)

The Age of Innocence (1993)*

Philadelphia (1993)*

The Remains of the Day (1993)

Schindler’s List (1993)

Legends of the Fall (1994)

Three Colors: Red (1994, France/Poland)

Mr. Holland’s Opus (1995)

Hamlet (1996)

Sleepers (1996)*

Star Trek: First Contact (1996)

Children of Heaven (1997, Iran)

Four Days in September (1997, Brazil)*

Titanic (1997)

Saving Private Ryan (1998)

The Sixth Sense (1999)*

South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999)

Toy Story 2 (1999)

Erin Brokovich (2000)*

O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)*

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Monsters Inc. (2001)

Y Tu Mamá También (2001, Mexico)*

Chicago (2002)

Big Fish (2003)*

I, Robot (2004)*

The Phantom of the Opera (2004)

Walk the Line (2005)*

The Danish Poet (2006)*

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Pan’s Labyrinth (2006, Mexico)

Persepolis (2007, France/Iran)

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)*

The Dark Knight (2008)

Frost/Nixon (2008)*

Man on Wire (2008)*

Milk (2008)*

The Reader (2008)*

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

The Wrestler (2008)*

The Secret in Their Eyes (2009, Argentina)*

Biutiful (2010, Mexico)*

How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

The Artist (2011, France)

Hugo (2011)

A Separation (2011, Iran)

The Act of Killing (2012, Indonesia/Norway/Denmark)*

Frankenweenie (2012)*

Life of Pi (2012)

Lincoln (2012)

Skyfall (2012)

Ida (2013, Poland)

Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)

12 Years a Slave (2013)

American Sniper (2014)

Interstellar (2014)

Song of the Sea (2014)

Creed (2015)

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

The Revenant (2015)

Spotlight (2015)

We Can’t Live Without Cosmos (2015 short, Russia)

World of Tomorrow (2015 short)

Ennemis intérieurs (2016 short, France)

Fences (2016)

Moonlight (2016)

My Life as a Zucchini (2016, Switzerland)

Pearl (2016 short)

Baby Driver (2017)*

Dunkirk (2017)

Loving Vincent (2017)

The Shape of Water (2017)

At Eternity’s Gate (2018)*

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018)

Cold War (2018, Poland)

Hale County This Morning, This Evening (2018)*

Mary Poppins Returns (2018)

Shoplifters (2018, Japan)

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)

The eight nominees for Best Picture, including the winner, Green Book (2018)

The fifteen nominees for the short film categories (2018)

#31 Days of Oscar

7 notes · View notes

rose-of-pollux · 7 years

Text

The Beast of Broadway Affair (MFU fic), part 4/5

Title: The Beast of Broadway Affair Rating: PG13 (for action/danger) Chapter summary: As Napoleon makes another desperate decision, Illya uncovers the next phase of Gaston’s plan, but he may already be too late. Notes: This version of the fic (cross-posted to AO3) is slash implied; if you prefer reading gen, there is a gen version on ff.net, but I can’t link to it with tumblr’s new linking restrictions

Act IV: Learning You Were Wrong

After getting him inside and making sure Napoleon was otherwise alright, Illya was on the phone to U.N.C.L.E., informing them of the THRUSH sneak attack Midtown—while omitting the details of Napoleon’s transformation, of course. Napoleon, who had now changed once again while bemoaning another set of shredded clothes, took a look at him to make sure that Illya was focused on the call before slipping out into the corridor and heading to Dr. Fisk’s apartment a few doors down.

He knocked on the door, not even noticing Baba Yaga slipping out the door, as well, following him silently as Dr. Fisk opened the door.

“Mr. Solo?” Fisk asked. “Is something wrong?”

“Yes,” Napoleon said, trying to stay calm. “Whatever you gave me to calm me down didn’t work—at all. I guess I must be resistant to it.”

“Oh dear. I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Do you have anything stronger you can give me?” Napoleon asked.

“Mr. Solo, please don’t make me do that,” Fisk said. “I could get in deep trouble as it is, giving you that first dose without a prescription.”

“I need something stronger,” Napoleon said, through gritted teeth, still not noticing Baba Yaga, whose tail was lashing as she stared at Fisk. “Please! Before Illya finds out! I can’t explain it now, but it’s absolutely vital--”

“Alright, alright—but this is absolutely the last time,” Fisk said. “Do I make myself clear?”

“As crystal,” Napoleon responded, pushing past him and rolling up his sleeve again as Fisk now went for a syringe with red liquid in it.

But just as he injected the syringe into Napoleon’s arm, the both of them gave a start as Baba Yaga screeched in fury, leaping at the doctor and clawing and biting at his arm.

“Baba Yaga!” Napoleon chided, pulling the empty syringe out of his arm himself. “What’s gotten into you!?”

He collected the hissing and spitting Mau as she swiped an angry paw towards Fisk, tense with rage.

“I’m sorry,” Napoleon offered. “I guess she thought you had some ill intentions with that needle; she’s really protective of Illya and me…” He blinked as Baba Yaga hissed again, her ears flattened back as she glared at Fisk. “Easy, my dear, easy… I’m alright…” He looked back at Dr. Fisk and shrugged.

“That’s… fine…” Fisk said. “No charge for this, either; just don’t come back here again, okay?”

“Okay,” Napoleon promised, and he carried the still-agitated cat out.

Fisk watched them go, regretting what he had been forced to do by Gaston once again. If Gaston was right about the modified serum, then Napoleon Solo would never be coming back again—not as a human, at any rate.

Napoleon, of course, was blissfully unaware of what was coursing through his bloodstream, instead focusing on the bizarre behavior of the cat, who was still agitated and yowling as he brought her back inside the apartment he shared with Illya.

“Where did you go!?” Illya demanded.

“Baba Yaga’s upset about something,” Napoleon said, ducking the question entirely as he handed her off to Illya.

This did, temporarily, distract the Russian as he attempted to soothe the Egyptian Mau, who could not be consoled.

“Perhaps she has sensed your biorhythms are off and is worried,” he suggested.

“Yeah, that must be it,” Napoleon said. He sat down on the couch, frowning. If the sedative was stronger, shouldn’t he have begun to feel the effects already?

“I have instructed U.N.C.L.E. to be on the lookout for THRUSH activity Midtown,” Illya said. “However, there is every chance in the world that THRUSH might come here looking for you. We should go to Headquarters, Napoleon. You’ll be safe there, and perhaps the sense of security will prevent any further transformations…” He trailed off. “Are you alright, Napoleon?”

“Hmm? Yeah, I’m fine.”

Illya wasn’t convinced, but Baba Yaga continued to attempt to break free, distracting him again. Puzzled and concerned, Illya placed her on the ground, and she ran to the apartment door, clawing at it as if she wanted to get out.

“…Odd…” Illya said. “I have only ever seen her act like this once before.”

“When was that?” Napoleon asked.

“When that jealous lab technician poisoned me,” Illya recalled. “She was absolutely furious and knew who he was by scent alone; she was trying to track him down…” He trailed off again, turning back to Napoleon.

“…You know what? I remember that, too,” Napoleon said, realizing that Illya was beginning to get wise to what he had done. “I think--”

“Napoleon, has anyone given you anything in the last 24 hours?”

“…OK, look, I know it wasn’t the smartest thing to do--” Napoleon sighed as Illya facepalmed. “Look, I was desperate, okay? I’m trying not to transform again, so I went to Dr. Fisk down the hall to give me some sedatives--”

“You what!?” Illya exclaimed.

“Well, I had to do something to keep my adrenaline down! It didn’t work, so I just got another dose of something stronger, but it hasn’t kicked in yet…”

Illya stared at him.

“You blockhead!” Illya exclaimed. “Of all the doctors in New York, you would go to Fisk!?”

“Well, he lives right down the hall, and he hasn’t done anything to warrant our suspicions--”

“And do you not think that THRUSH hasn’t figured that out—that they’ve been keeping him under surveillance all this time and waiting for the opportunity to use him against us the moment one of us got desperate!?” Illya said. “I will tell you why Fisk’s ‘sedatives’ aren’t working on you, Napoleon—I will stake my life on the fact that they are not sedatives at all, but the drug that is causing your transformations!”

Napoleon just stared at his partner, stunned.

Baba Yaga screeched loudly again, still clawing at the door. Illya grabbed his Special and motioned for Napoleon to follow. Shaken, Napoleon did so, also taking his Special. The moment Illya opened the door, Baba Yaga ran out like a blur of motion, stopping outside Fisk’s apartment and clawing angrily at the door.

Fisk, unsure of what the sound was, had opened the door, and, without so much as a greeting, Illya shot him with a tranquilizer and forced the door open.

Baba Yaga rushed in and started clawing at the fallen doctor.

“What did it look like?” Illya asked, going over the vials and syringes on the table and counter.

“That was what he gave me just now—that red one,” Napoleon said. “That’s the syringe he used on me right beside it—didn’t have time to throw it out yet.”

“He used a different one before?”

“Yeah, a bright pink one…” Napoleon said. “That’s it, there—I’d recognize it anywhere. There isn’t anything else like it.”

Illya pocketed both of the bottles, and then unceremoniously dragged Fisk out the door, with Baba Yaga still attempting to use him as a scratching post.

Napoleon exhaled, trying to get a grip on himself.

“Illya…” he said, quietly. He gave the Russian a sheepish look as he looked back at him. “Illya, I’m sorry. I was incredibly stupid.”

Illya’s expression softened.

“I know. You are under tremendous strain, and I cannot imagine what you must be going through. You panicked, as was natural for the situation. But, in future, do not try to hide things from me, especially when you know that I love you and have your best interests at heart.” He gently touched Napoleon’s cheek. “Now, please, stay calm. I will take you and Baba Yaga to Headquarters, and I want the two of you to relax while I interrogate Fisk.”

Baba Yaga stopped attacking Fisk and murorwed at Illya.

“That’s right, I need you to use your wonderful purring to keep your father calm. Can I count on you?”

Baba Yaga now rubbed up against Napoleon, prompting him to carry her again. She did, indeed, begin to purr as Napoleon carried her out, and as Illya resumed dragging Fisk behind them.

*********************************

Illya had made sure that Napoleon and Baba Yaga were relaxing before he analyzed the two vials of drug and then went to the interrogation room. Illya waited as Fisk stirred and slowly came awake in the interrogation room; Fisk took a moment to get his bearings, and then let out a gasp of horror as he saw Illya standing there, the rage evident in his eyes.

“M-Mr. Kuryakin!?” he stammered. “What happened!? Where are we!?”

“You are in the interrogation room of U.N.C.L.E. Headquarters,” Illya said, coldly. “You have been arrested for inflicting grievous bodily harm on an U.N.C.L.E. agent.”

“I did no such thing, Mr. Kuryakin!”

“Then why did you poison my partner?” Illya quipped back.

“It wasn’t poison!” Fisk insisted. “It…” He trailed off, catching himself.

“Then, what was it?” Illya asked.

“Sedatives,” Fisk lied. “Your partner came to me asking for sedatives, and so I gave him two different kinds.”

“He came to you for sedatives, but you did not give him sedatives,” Illya hissed, placing the results of both analyses on the table in front of Fisk. “These drugs were designed to react with adrenaline, not calm the body.”

Fisk paled.

“Now, you will tell me everything,” Illya insisted.

“I… I can’t…” Fisk said. “He will kill me.”

“Who?”

Fisk shook his head.

“Let me guess,” Illya said. “Gaston of THRUSH?”

Fisk cringed.

“I will take that as a ‘yes.’ What did Gaston want with you—with Napoleon?” Illya asked.

“If I tell you, he will kill me!” Fisk cried.

“Do you know something, Doctor Fisk? I, too, am a doctor—twice over; I have a PhD in quantum mechanics—the study of atoms and subatomic particles, and I have a degree in pathology. See, in addition to being a field agent, I also perform autopsies for this organization.” Illya leaned across the table, bringing his face an inch from Fisk’s. “So, unless you wish to have the atoms of your deepest internal organs exposed to daylight on my autopsy table, it would be in your best interest to talk.”

“You wouldn’t--!”

“Napoleon is the merciful one, not me. And after you went along with Gaston to help turn him into the Beast of Broadway, I can honestly tell you that the Beast you helped Gaston unleash is nothing compared to the beast you have unleashed right in front of you.” He raised a hand to Fisk’s throat. “Talk.”

“Okay, okay—I’ll talk!” Fisk squeaked. “Gaston showed up a few days ago at my apartment—said he needed me to administer that pink vial to Napoleon Solo if he ever came by my apartment asking for sedatives. I didn’t think it would ever happen; Mr. Solo had never come to me for anything, but, lo and behold—he did this morning, and so I did exactly what Gaston ordered me to.”

“And the other vial?”

“After I reported the first ‘success,’ Gaston had that sent over—said that Mr. Solo would be running in to get more sedatives after the first ‘dose’ failed. I didn’t want to do it, Mr. Kuryakin, but--”

“But, nevertheless, you did,” Illya said, coldly. “You threw a noble man—a far better man than you--under the bus just to save your own cowardly skin when you could have come to us first! We would have helped you against THRUSH!”

Fisk flinched.

“I thought about it,” he confessed. “But Gaston seemed to have tabs on me—he knew where I’d been and what I’d done in the last week. I had to obey him; I was afraid for my life, Mr. Kuryakin!”

“And now I am afraid for my partner’s life; you have no sympathy from me,” Illya spat back. “Did you know what the drugs did?”

“Gaston said that the pink one would temporarily turn Mr. Solo into the Beast,” Fisk confessed. “They’d tested it extensively, he said, and needed him to have one more dose before they perfected the red one so that he would be desperate to take the red one. Gaston was right—again; Mr. Solo just showed up to get a stronger sedative, and so I did just what Gaston ordered, and gave him the red one.”

“And what’s the red one?”

Fisk looked away.

“Gaston said it was a perfected, self-sustaining version of the pink version—as you know, the pink version metabolizes in the body after the adrenaline spike, but this new red one will continue to synthesize itself from the products of the reaction even after the adrenaline spikes.” He looked up, apologetically, at Illya as the Russian’s face paled. “If Mr. Solo transforms again, this time, it will be permanent.”

#Napoleon Solo #Illya Kuryakin #napollya #the man from uncle #mfu fic #The Beast of Broadway Affair

3 notes · View notes

timeless-hollywood-classics · 4 years

Text

Mickey Rooney (born Ninnian Joseph Yule Jr.; September 23, 1920 – April 6, 2014) was an American actor, vaudevillian, comedian, producer and radio personality. In a career spanning nine decades and continuing until shortly before his death, he appeared in more than 300 films and was among the last surviving stars of the silent-film era.

At the height of a career that was marked by declines and comebacks, Rooney performed the role of Andy Hardy in a series of 16 films in the 1930's and 1940's that epitomized American family values. A versatile performer, he became a celebrated character actor later in his career. Laurence Olivier once said he considered Rooney "the best there has ever been". Clarence Brown, who directed him in two of his earliest dramatic roles, National Velvet and The Human Comedy, said he was "the closest thing to a genius I ever worked with".

Rooney first performed in vaudeville as a child and made his film debut at the age of six. At 14, he played Puck in the play and later the 1935 film adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream. Critic David Thomson hailed his performance as "one of the cinema's most arresting pieces of magic". In 1938, he co-starred in Boys Town. At 18, he was the first teenager to be nominated for an Oscar for his leading role in Babes in Arms, and he was awarded a special Academy Juvenile Award in 1939.[4] At the peak of his career between the ages of 15 and 25, he made 43 films, which made him one of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's most consistently successful actors and a favorite of MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer.

Rooney was the top box-office attraction from 1939 to 1941 and one of the best-paid actors of that era, but his career would never again rise to such heights. Drafted into the Army during World War II, he served nearly two years entertaining over two million troops on stage and radio and was awarded a Bronze Star for performing in combat zones. Returning from the war in 1945, he was too old for juvenile roles but too short to be an adult movie star, and was unable to get as many starring roles although there are numerous inexpensively made but critically well-received films noir with Rooney playing the lead during the post-war period and 1950s. Nevertheless, Rooney's popularity was renewed with well-received supporting roles in films such as Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961) with Audrey Hepburn, Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) with Anthony Quinn and Jackie Gleason, It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), and The Black Stallion (1979). In the early 1980s, he returned to Broadway in Sugar Babies and again became a celebrated star. Rooney made hundreds of appearances on TV, including dramas, variety programs, and talk shows, and won an Emmy in 1982 plus a Golden Globe for his role in Bill (1981).

Rooney was born Ninnian Joseph Yule Jr. on September 23, 1920 in Brooklyn, New York, the only child of vaudevillians Nellie W. Carter, from Kansas City, Missouri and Joe Yule, a native of Glasgow, Scotland. His mother was a former chorus girl and a burlesque performer. When Rooney was born, his parents were appearing in a Brooklyn production of A Gaiety Girl. Rooney later recounted in his memoirs that he began performing at the age of 17 months as part of his parents' routine, wearing a specially tailored tuxedo.

Rooney's parents separated when he was four years old in 1924, and he and his mother moved to Hollywood the following year from Greenpoint, Brooklyn. He made his first film appearance at age six in 1926, in the short Not to be Trusted. Rooney got bit parts in films such as The Beast of the City (1932) and The Life of Jimmy Dolan (1933), which allowed him to work alongside stars such as Joel McCrea, Colleen Moore, Clark Gable, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., John Wayne and Jean Harlow. He enrolled in the Hollywood Professional School and later attended Hollywood High School, graduating in 1938.

His mother saw an advertisement for a child to play the role of "Mickey McGuire" in a series of short films. Rooney got the role and became "Mickey" for 78 of the films, running from 1927 to 1936, starting with Mickey's Circus (1927), his first starring role. During this period, he also briefly voiced Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. He made other films in his adolescence, including several more of the McGuire films. At age 14, he played the role of Puck in the Warner Brothers all-star adaptation of A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1935. Rooney then moved to MGM, where he befriended Judy Garland, with whom he began making a series of musicals that propelled both of them to stardom.

In 1937, Rooney was selected to portray Andy Hardy in A Family Affair, which MGM had planned as a B-movie.[14] Rooney provided comic relief as the son of Judge James K. Hardy, portrayed by Lionel Barrymore (although former silent film leading man Lewis Stone played the role of Judge Hardy in subsequent pictures). The film was an unexpected success, and led to 13 more Andy Hardy films between 1937 and 1946, and a final film in 1958.

According to author Barry Monush, MGM wanted the Andy Hardy films to appeal to all family members. Rooney's character portrayed a typical "anxious, hyperactive, girl-crazy teenager", and he soon became the unintended main star of the films. Although some critics describe the series of films as "sweet, overly idealized, and pretty much interchangeable," their ultimate success was because they gave viewers a "comforting portrait of small-town America that seemed suited for the times", with Rooney instilling "a lasting image of what every parent wished their teen could be like".

Behind the scenes, however, Rooney was like the "hyperactive girl-crazy teenager" he portrayed on the screen. Wallace Beery, his co-star in Stablemates, described him as a "brat", but a "fine actor". MGM head Louis B. Mayer found it necessary to manage Rooney's public image, explains historian Jane Ellen Wayne:

Mayer naturally tried to keep all his child actors in line, like any father figure. After one such episode, Mickey Rooney replied, "I won't do it. You're asking the impossible." Mayer then grabbed young Rooney by his lapels and said, "Listen to me! I don't care what you do in private. Just don't do it in public. In public, behave. Your fans expect it. You're Andy Hardy! You're the United States! You're the Stars and Stripes. Behave yourself! You're a symbol!" Mickey nodded. "I'll be good, Mr. Mayer. I promise you that." Mayer let go of his lapels, "All right," he said.

Fifty years later, Rooney realized in hindsight that these early confrontations with Mayer were necessary for him to develop into a leading film star: "Everybody butted heads with him, but he listened and you listened. And then you'd come to an agreement you could both live with. ... He visited the sets, he gave people talks ... What he wanted was something that was American, presented in a cosmopolitan manner."

In 1937, Rooney made his first film alongside Judy Garland with Thoroughbreds Don't Cry. Garland and Rooney became close friends as they co-starred in future films and became a successful song-and-dance team. Audiences delighted in seeing the "playful interactions between the two stars showcase a wonderful chemistry".[27] Along with three of the Andy Hardy films, where she portrayed a girl attracted to Andy, they appeared together in a string of successful musicals, including Babes in Arms (1939). During an interview in the 1992 documentary film MGM: When the Lion Roars, Rooney describes their friendship:[28]

Judy and I were so close we could've come from the same womb. We weren't like brothers or sisters but there was no love affair there; there was more than a love affair. It's very, very difficult to explain the depths of our love for each other. It was so special. It was a forever love. Judy, as we speak, has not passed away. She's always with me in every heartbeat of my body.

In 1937, Rooney received top billing as Shockey Carter in Hoosier Schoolboy but his breakthrough-role as a dramatic actor came in 1938's Boys Town opposite Spencer Tracy as Father Flanagan, who runs a home for wayward and homeless boys. Rooney was awarded a special Juvenile Academy Award in 1939, for "significant contribution in bringing to the screen the spirit and personification of youth". Wayne describes one of the "most famous scenes" in the film, where tough young Rooney is playing poker with a cigarette in his mouth, his hat is cocked and his feet are up on the table. "Tracy grabs him by the lapels, throws the cigarette away and pushes him into a chair. 'That's better,' he tells Mickey." Louis B. Mayer said Boys Town was his favorite film during his years at MGM.

The popularity of his films made Rooney the biggest box-office draw in 1939, 1940 and 1941. For their roles in Boys Town, Rooney and Tracy won first and second place in the Motion Picture Herald 1940 National Poll of Exhibitors, based on the box office appeal of 200 players. Boys' Life magazine wrote, "Congratulations to Messrs. Rooney and Tracy! Also to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer we extend a hearty thanks for their very considerable part in this outstanding achievement." Actor Laurence Olivier once called Rooney "the greatest actor of them all".

A major star in the early 1940s, he appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1940, timed to coincide with the release of Young Tom Edison; the cover story began:

Hollywood's No. 1 box office bait in 1939 was not Clark Gable, Errol Flynn or Tyrone Power, but a rope-haired, kazoo-voiced kid with a comic-strip face, who until this week had never appeared in a picture without mugging or overacting it. His name (assumed) was Mickey Rooney, and to a large part of the more articulate U.S. cinema audience, his name was becoming a frequently used synonym for brat.

During his long and illustrious career, Rooney also worked with many of the screen's female stars, including Elizabeth Taylor in National Velvet (1944) and Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961)." With his appearing with Marilyn Monroe in The Fireball (1950) and with Grace Kelly in The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954), Rooney is the only actor ever co-starring with four of the greatest female screen legends ever. Rooney's "bumptiousness and boyish charm" as an actor developed more "smoothness and polish" over the years, writes biographer Scott Eyman. The fact that Rooney fully enjoyed his life as an actor played a large role in those changes:

You weren't going to work, you were going to have fun. It was home, everybody was cohesive; it was family. One year I made nine pictures; I had to go from one set to another. It was like I was on a conveyor belt. You did not read a script and say, "I guess I'll do it." You did it. They had people that knew the kind of stories that were suited to you. It was a conveyor belt that made motion pictures.

Clarence Brown, who directed Rooney in his Oscar-nominated performance in The Human Comedy (1943) and again in National Velvet (1944), enjoyed working with Rooney in films:

Mickey Rooney is the closest thing to a genius that I ever worked with. There was Chaplin, then there was Rooney. The little bastard could do no wrong in my book ... All you had to do with him was rehearse it once.

In June 1944, Rooney was inducted into the United States Army, where he served more than 21 months (until shortly after the end of World War II) entertaining the troops in America and Europe in Special Services. He spent part of the time as a radio personality on the American Forces Network and was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for entertaining troops in combat zones. In addition to the Bronze Star Medal, Rooney also received the Army Good Conduct Medal, American Campaign Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, and World War II Victory Medal, for his military service.

Rooney's career slumped after his return to civilian life. He was now an adult with a height of only 5 feet 2 inches (1.57 m) and he could no longer play the role of a teenager, but he also lacked the stature of most leading men. He appeared in a number of films, including Words and Music in 1948, which paired him for the last time with Garland on film (he appeared with her on one episode as a guest on The Judy Garland Show). He briefly starred in a CBS radio series, Shorty Bell, in the summer of 1948, and reprised his role as "Andy Hardy", with most of the original cast, in a syndicated radio version of The Hardy Family in 1949 and 1950 (repeated on Mutual during 1952).

In 1949 Variety reported that Rooney had renegotiated his deal with MGM. He agreed to make one film a year for them for five years at $25,000 a movie (his fee until then had been $100,000 but Rooney wanted to enter independent production.) Rooney claimed he was unhappy with the billing MGM gave him for Words and Music.

His first television series, The Mickey Rooney Show, also known as Hey, Mulligan, was created by Blake Edwards with Rooney as his own producer, and appeared on NBC television for 32 episodes between August 28, 1954 and June 4, 1955.[46] In 1951, he made his directorial debut with My True Story, starring Helen Walker.[47] Rooney also starred as a ragingly egomaniacal television comedian, loosely based on Red Buttons, in the live 90-minute television drama The Comedian, in the Playhouse 90 series on the evening of Valentine's Day in 1957, and as himself in a revue called The Musical Revue of 1959 based on the 1929 film The Hollywood Revue of 1929, which was edited into a film in 1960.

In 1958, Rooney joined Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra in hosting an episode of NBC's short-lived Club Oasis comedy and variety show. In 1960, Rooney directed and starred in The Private Lives of Adam and Eve, an ambitious comedy known for its multiple flashbacks and many cameos. In the 1960s, Rooney returned to theatrical entertainment. He still accepted film roles in undistinguished films but occasionally appeared in better works, such as Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963).

He portrayed a Japanese character, Mr. Yunioshi, in the 1961 film version of Truman Capote's novella Breakfast at Tiffany's. His performance was criticized by some in subsequent years as a racist stereotype. Rooney later said that he would not have taken the role if he had known it would offend people.

On December 31, 1961, Rooney appeared on television's What's My Line and mentioned that he had already started enrolling students in the MRSE (Mickey Rooney School of Entertainment). His school venture never came to fruition. This was a period of professional distress for Rooney; as a childhood friend, director Richard Quine put it: "Let's face it. It wasn't all that easy to find roles for a 5-foot-3 man who'd passed the age of Andy Hardy." In 1962, his debts had forced him into filing for bankruptcy.

In 1966, Rooney was working on the film Ambush Bay in the Philippines when his wife Barbara Ann Thomason— a former model and aspiring actress who had won 17 straight beauty contests in Southern California—was found dead in her bed. Her lover, Milos Milos—who was one of Rooney's actor-friends—was found dead beside her. Detectives ruled it a murder-suicide, which was committed with Rooney's own gun.

Francis Ford Coppola had bought the rights to make The Black Stallion (1979), and when casting it, he called Rooney and asked him if he thought he could play a jockey. Rooney replied saying, "Gee, I don't know. I never played a jockey before." He was kidding, he said, since he had played a jockey in at least three past films, including Down the Stretch, Thoroughbreds Don't Cry, and National Velvet. The film garnered excellent reviews and earned $40 million in its first run, which gave Coppola's struggling studio, American Zoetrope, a major boost. It also gave Rooney newfound recognition, along with a nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

In 1983, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences gave Rooney their Academy Honorary Award for his lifetime of achievement.

In addition to his movie roles, Rooney made numerous guest-starring roles as a television character actor for nearly six decades, beginning with an episode of Celanese Theatre. The part led to other roles on such television series as Schlitz Playhouse, Playhouse 90, Producers' Showcase, Alcoa Theatre, The Soldiers, Wagon Train, General Electric Theater, Hennesey, The Dick Powell Theatre, Arrest and Trial (1964), Burke's Law (1963), Combat! (1964), The Fugitive, Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre, The Jean Arthur Show (1966), The Name of the Game (1970), Dan August (1970), Night Gallery (1970)

In 1961, he guest-starred in the 13-week James Franciscus adventure–drama CBS television series The Investigators. In 1962, he was cast as himself in the episode "The Top Banana" of the CBS sitcom, Pete and Gladys, starring Harry Morgan and Cara Williams.

In 1963, he entered CBS's The Twilight Zone, giving a one-man performance in the episode "The Last Night of a Jockey" (1963). Also in 1963, in 'The Hunt' for Suspense Theater, he played the sadistic sheriff hunting the young surfer played by James Caan. In 1964, he launched another half-hour sitcom, Mickey. The story line had "Mickey" operating a resort hotel in southern California. His own son Tim Rooney appeared as his character's teenage son on this program, and Emmaline Henry starred as Rooney's wife. The program lasted for 17 episodes.

When Norman Lear was developing All in the Family in 1970, he wanted Rooney for the lead role of Archie Bunker.[66] Rooney turned Lear down; and the role eventually went to Carroll O'Connor.

Rooney garnered a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Limited Series or a Special for his role in 1981's Bill. Playing opposite Dennis Quaid, Rooney's character was a mentally handicapped man attempting to live on his own after leaving an institution. His acting quality in the film has been favorably compared to other actors who took on similar roles, including Sean Penn, Dustin Hoffman and Tom Hanks. He reprised his role in 1983's Bill: On His Own, earning an Emmy nomination for the turn.

Rooney did voice acting from time to time. He provided the voice of Santa Claus in four stop-motion animated Christmas TV specials: Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town (1970), The Year Without a Santa Claus (1974), Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July (1979) and A Miser Brothers' Christmas (2008). In 1995, he appeared as himself on The Simpsons episode "Radioactive Man".

After starring in one unsuccessful TV series and turning down an offer for a huge TV series, Rooney, now 70, starred in the Family Channel's The Adventures of the Black Stallion, where he reprised his role as Henry Dailey in the film of the same name, eleven years earlier. The series ran for three years and was an international hit.

Rooney appeared in television commercials for Garden State Life Insurance Company in 2002.

A major turning point came in 1979, when Rooney made his Broadway debut in the acclaimed stage play Sugar Babies, a musical revue tribute to the burlesque era costarring former MGM dancing star Ann Miller. Aljean Harmetz noted that "Mr. Rooney fought over every skit and argued over every song and almost always got things done his way. The show opened on Broadway on October 8, 1979, to rave reviews, and this time he did not throw success away. Rooney and Miller performed the show 1,208 times in New York and then toured with it for five years, including eight months in London. Co-star Miller recalls that Rooney "never missed a performance or a chance to ad-lib or read the lines the same way twice, if he even stuck to the script". Biographer Alvin Marill states that "at 59, Mickey Rooney was reincarnated as a baggy-pants comedian—back as a top banana in show biz in his belated Broadway debut."

Following this, he toured as Pseudelous in Stephen Sondheim's A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. In the 1990s, he returned to Broadway for the final months of Will Rogers Follies, playing the ghost of Will's father. On television, he starred in the short-lived sitcom, One of the Boys, along with two unfamiliar young stars, Dana Carvey and Nathan Lane, in 1982.

He toured Canada in a dinner theatre production of The Mind with the Naughty Man in the mid-1990s. He played The Wizard in a stage production of The Wizard of Oz with Eartha Kitt at Madison Square Garden. Kitt was later replaced by Jo Anne Worley.

Rooney wrote a memoir titled Life is Too Short, published by Villard Books in 1991. A Library Journal review said that "From title to the last line, 'I'll have a short bier', Rooney's self-deprecating humor powers this book." He wrote a novel about a child star, published in 1994, The Search For Sunny Skies.

Despite the millions of dollars that he earned over the years, such as his $65,000 a week earnings from Sugar Babies, Rooney was plagued by financial problems late in life. His longtime gambling habit caused him to "gamble away his fortune again and again". He declared bankruptcy for the second time in 1996 and described himself as "broke" in 2005. He kept performing on stage and in the movies, but his personal property was valued at only $18,000 when he died in 2014.

Rooney and his wife Jan toured the country in 2005 through 2011 in a musical revue called Let's Put on a Show. Vanity Fair called it "a homespun affair full of dog-eared jokes" that featured Rooney singing George Gershwin songs.

In 2006, Rooney played Gus in Night at the Museum. He returned to play the role again in the sequel Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian in 2009, in a scene that was deleted from the final film.

On May 26, 2007, he was grand marshal at the Garden Grove Strawberry Festival. Rooney made his British pantomime debut, playing Baron Hardup in Cinderella, at the Sunderland Empire Theatre over the 2007 Christmas period, a role he reprised at Bristol Hippodrome in 2008 and at the Milton Keynes theatre in 2009.

In 2011, Rooney made a cameo appearance in The Muppets and in 2014, at age 93, he reprised his role as Gus in Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb, which was dedicated to him and to Robin Williams, who also died that year. Although confined to a wheelchair, he was described by director Shawn Levy as "energetic and so pleased to be there. He was just happy to be invited to the party."

An October 2015 article in The Hollywood Reporter maintained that Rooney was frequently abused and financially depleted by his closest relatives in the last years of his life. The article said that it was clear that "one of the biggest stars of all time, who remained aloft longer than anyone in Hollywood history, was in the end brought down by those closest to him. He died humiliated and betrayed, nearly broke and often broken." Rooney suffered from bipolar disorder and had attempted suicide two or three times over the years, with resulting hospitalizations reported as "nervous breakdowns".

At the time of his death, he was married to Jan Chamberlin Rooney, although they had separated in June 2012. He had nine children and two stepchildren, as well as 19 grandchildren and several great-grandchildren. Rooney had been addicted to sleeping pills, and overcame the sleeping pill addiction in 2000 when he was in his late 70s.

In the late 1970s, Rooney became a born-again Christian and was a fan of Pat Robertson.

In 1997, Rooney was arrested on suspicion of beating his wife, Jan, but charges were dropped due to lack of evidence.

On February 16, 2011, Rooney was granted a temporary restraining order against stepson Christopher Aber and Aber's wife, Christina, and they were ordered to stay 100 yards from Rooney, his stepson Mark Rooney and Mark's wife, Charlene Rooney. Rooney claimed that he was a victim of elder abuse.

On March 2, 2011, Rooney appeared before a special U.S. Senate committee that was considering legislation to curb elder abuse, testifying about the abuse he claimed to have suffered at the hands of family members. In 2011, all of Rooney's finances were permanently handed over to a conservator, who called Rooney "completely competent".

In April 2011, the temporary restraining order that Rooney was previously granted was replaced by a confidential settlement between Rooney and his stepson, Aber. Christopher Aber and Jan Rooney denied all the allegations.

In May 2013, Rooney sold his home of many years, reportedly for $1.3 million, and split the proceeds with his wife, Jan.

Rooney was married eight times, with six of the marriages ending in divorce. In 1942, he married his first wife, actress Ava Gardner, who at that time was still an obscure teenage starlet. They divorced the following year, partly because he had apparently been unfaithful. While stationed in the military in Alabama in 1944, Rooney met and married Betty Jane Phillips, who later became a singer under the name B.J. Baker. They had two sons together. This marriage ended in divorce after he returned from Europe at the end of World War II. His marriage to actress Martha Vickers in 1949 produced one son but ended in divorce in 1951. He married actress Elaine Mahnken in 1952 and they divorced in 1958.

In 1958, Rooney married model-actress Barbara Ann Thomason. She was murdered in 1966 by stuntman and actor Milos Milos, who then shot himself. Thomason and Milos had an affair while Rooney was traveling, and police theorized Milos shot her after she wanted to break off the affair. Rooney then married Barbara's best friend, Marge Lane. That marriage lasted 100 days.

He was married to Carolyn Hockett from 1969 to 1975. In 1978, Rooney married his eighth and final wife, Jan Chamberlin. Their marriage lasted until his death, a total of 34 years (longer than his seven previous unions combined), although they separated in 2012.

Rooney died on April 6, 2014 of natural causes, including complications from diabetes, in Los Angeles at the age of 93. A group of family members and friends, including Mickey Rourke, held a memorial service on April 18. A private funeral, organized by another set of family members, was held at Hollywood Forever Cemetery, where he was interred, on April 19. His eight surviving children said in a statement that they were barred from seeing Rooney during his final years.

At his death, Vanity Fair called him "the original Hollywood train wreck". He struggled with alcohol and pill addiction. Ava Gardner was his first wife, and he married an additional seven times. Despite earning millions during his career, he had to file for bankruptcy in 1962 due to mismanagement of his finances. Shortly before his death in 2014 at age 93, he accused some family members of mistreatment and testified before Congress about what he said was physical abuse and exploitation by family members. By the end of his life, his millions in earnings had dwindled to an estate that was valued at only $18,000. He died owing medical bills and back taxes, and contributions were solicited from the public.

Rooney was one of the last surviving actors of the silent film era. His film career spanned 88 years, from 1926 to 2014, continuing until shortly before his death. During his peak years from the late 1930s to the early 1940s, Rooney was among the top box-office stars in the United States.

He made forty-three pictures between the age of 15 and 25. Among those, his role as Andy Hardy became one of "Hollywood's best-loved characters," with Marlon Brando calling him "the best actor in films".

"There was nothing he couldn't do", said actress Margaret O'Brien.[109] MGM boss Louis B. Mayer treated him like a son and saw in Rooney "the embodiment of the amiable American boy who stands for family, humbug, and sentiment," writes critic and author, David Thomson.

By the time Rooney was 20, his consistent portrayals of characters with youth and energy suggested that his future success was unlimited. Thomson also explains that Rooney's characters were able to cover a wide range of emotional types, and gives three examples where "Rooney is not just an actor of genius, but an artist able to maintain a stylized commentary on the demon impulse of the small, belligerent man:"

Rooney's Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935) is truly inhuman, one of cinema's most arresting pieces of magic. ... His toughie in Boys Town (1938) struts and bullies like something out of a nightmare and then comes clean in a grotesque but utterly frank outburst of sentimentality in which he aspires to the boy community ... His role as Baby Face Nelson (1957), the manic, destructive response of the runt against a pig society.

By the end of the 1940s, Rooney's movie characters were no longer in demand and his career went downhill. "In 1938," he said, "I starred in eight pictures. In 1948 and 1949 together, I starred in only three." However, film historian Jeanine Basinger notes that although his career "reached the heights and plunged to the depths, Rooney kept on working and growing, the mark of a professional." Some of the films which reinvigorated his popularity, were Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962), It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) and The Black Stallion (1979). In the early 1980s, he returned to Broadway in Sugar Babies, and "found himself once more back on top".

Basinger tries to encapsulate Rooney's career:

Rooney's abundant talent, like his film image, might seem like a metaphor for America: a seemingly endless supply of natural resources that could never dry up, but which, it turned out, could be ruined by excessive use and abuse, by arrogance or power, and which had to be carefully tended to be returned to full capacity. From child star to character actor, from movie shorts to television specials, and from films to Broadway, Rooney ultimately did prove he could do it all, do it well, and keep on doing it. His is a unique career, both for its versatility and its longevity.

#mickey rooney #classic hollywood #golden age of hollywood #classic movie stars #old hollywood #silent era #silent stars #classic cinema #silent cinema

1 note · View note

todaybirthday-blog · 4 years

Text

Greg Cipes Biography, Age, Weight, Height, Friend, Like, Affairs, Favourite, Birthdate & Other

This Biography is about one of the best Musician Greg Cipes including his Height, weight, Age & Other Detail… Biography Of Greg Cipes Real Name Greg Cipes Profession Voice Actors, Musicians Nick Name Gregory M. Cipes, Gregory Michael Cipes Famous as Actor/ Voice Actor/ Musician Nationality American Personal life of Greg Cipes Born on 04 January 1980 Birthday 4th January Age 40 Years Sun Sign Capricorn Height 1.75m Born in Coral Springs, Florida Father Geoff Cipes Mother Robin Mrasek Married No Personal Fact of Greg Cipes Greg Cipes is a multi-talented American artist; he is an actor, musician, voice actor, composer and professional surfer. His interest in the entertainment industry stems from his thespian grandparents and his father, who is a television director. He has been a part of various sides of the entertainment industry such as theatre, national commercials, Broadway, video games, films and numerous television shows. He achieved most of what is mentioned, before the age of fifteen, which is incredible for someone that young. Today, he stands as one of the most popular and recognized voice artists, in the world. Greg Cipes has also self-produced his own album in the past, which gave him his entry into yet another vertical of the showbiz, that is, production. Ever since then, he has produced many albums, and is in the process of creating and producing his own television show. He is best known for his voiceover for Beast Boy in the Teen Titans animated series and for Michelangelo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Read the full article

#gregcipes

0 notes

papermoonloveslucy · 7 years

Text

LUCY AND THE BOGIE AFFAIR

S2;E13 ~ December 15, 1969

Directed by Herbert Kenwith ~ Written by Pat McCormick and Jim McGinn

Synopsis

When Kim and Craig find a stray dog in the rain, they take it home and name it Bogie. Next morning, it gives birth to a litter of puppies! Just as they've managed to give away all the puppies to good homes, Harry hears that there's a reward and they have to retrieve them again!

Regular Cast

Lucille Ball (Lucy Carter), Gale Gordon (Harrison Otis Carter), Lucie Arnaz (Kim Carter), Desi Arnaz Jr. (Craig Carter)

Guest Cast

Lord Nelson (Bogie) makes his fourth appearance with Lucille Ball after playing Nelson, Mr. Mooney's dog in three episodes of “The Lucy Show.”

Jack LaLanne (Himself) was a nationally known exercise guru who owned a chain of health clubs and hosted a long-running television show from 1952 to 1983.

Happy (Himself) is Jack LaLanne's dog. He appeared with LaLanne on many of his television shows.

Eugene Molnar (Jack's Cameraman) appeared on four episodes of the series. These are his only screen credits.

Sherry Alberoni (Candy) was a second-season replacement Mousketeer on “The Mickey Mouse Club” (1955). She also dubbed Patty Duke's vocals in the film Valley of the Dolls (1967). This is her only appearance with Lucille Ball.

Steve March (Steve) is the son of Mel Torme and the adopted son of the Arnaz family's friend, Hal March. Mel Torme appeared several times on “The Lucy Show.” Hal March appeared on “I Love Lucy.” Steve March will appear in one more episode starring Sammy Davis Jr. and will write a song for an episode starring Ann-Margret.

Debbie Westcott (Debbie Westcott) was the daughter of Desilu Prop Master Kenneth Westcott. This is her only screen credit.

Irwin Charone (Mr. Farnsworth) made five appearances on “The Lucy Show.” The expressive character actor also did an equal number of “Here’s Lucy” episodes. He died in January 2016 in Maplewood, New Jersey, at the age of 93.

This is the first of 14 episodes directed by Herbert Kenwith. Born in New Jersey, Kenwith started out as an actor on Broadway, and then produced 65 productions at Princeton's McCarter Theatre. One of these starred a young Lucille Ball, in a show headed to Broadway but never made it due to the serious illness of its leading man. He died in 2008 at the age of 90.

This is the first and only episode of the series written by comedian turned writer Pat McCormick. McCormick previously wrote “Lucy in London” in 1966. This is the only episode written by Jim McGinn as well as his only collaboration with McCormick.

Lucille Ball was a dog lover and owned many dogs during her life.

Kim and Craig name the dog they find Bogie because it had the same sad look standing in the rain as Humphrey Bogart does at the end of 1942's Casablanca.

When Kim effusively hugs her mother when she comes home, Lucy reminds her she was “just at work, not walking on the moon!” The moon walk of John Glenn and Buzz Aldrin occurred on July 20, 1969 just after this episode went before the cameras.

Coming home in a thunderstorm, Lucy unwittingly says “It's not a fit night out for man, nor beast!” not knowing the kids have hidden Bogie in the kitchen. Lucy initially attributes the quote to Shakespeare (wrong!) and then to W.C. Fields (right!). The line was spoken by Fields in the 1933 film The Fatal Glass of Beer. The quote was also spoken by Gale Gordon in “Lucy and the Monsters” (TLS S3;E18).

When Lucy sees Bogie in the kitchen, she jokes that he's a shaggy horse and calls him “Matt Dillon's last mount!” Matt Dillon was a character played by James Arness (above) on “Gunsmoke,” the long-running western that was “Here's Lucy's” lead-in on CBS.

After Lucy agrees to let Bogie stay, she says “If you want anything, just whistle” paraphrasing Lauren Bacall's famous line to Humphrey Bogart in the film To Have and Have Not (1944).

The nine puppies go to:

Stevie – Craig's girl crazy classmate

Blanche – Lucy's lonely friend from New Orleans

Candy – Kim's friend looking for the latest trend

Pauline Lopus – Lucy's friend looking for a watchdog

Debbie Westcott – Craig's classmate who takes a puppy in exchange for going steady with Craig

Natalie Schwartz (unseen) – a friend of Craig's

Freddy Dawson (unseen) – a friend of Kim's

Lucy tries to give one to Jack LaLanne but he ends up giving her one of his dog Happy's pups instead. Including the one she was intending to give LaLanne, this still leaves one puppy unaccounted for by the script.

Lucy's telephone call with an unseen Blanche from New Orleans is likely a nod to Tennessee Williams' 1947 play and 1951 film A Streetcar Named Desire, whose principal character Blanche Dubois lives in New Orleans.

To convince Candy that owning old English Sheepdog puppies is the newest fad, Kim crops photos of the pups with music celebrities Barbra Streisand and Herb Alpert and tapes the photos to the inside of her locker. In 1969 singer Streisand won an Oscar for her performance in the film Funny Girl. Herb Albert was a trumpeter who performed with his group the Tijuana Brass. In 1969 they released the album Warm.

Lucy's telephone call with the unseen Pauline Lopus is a tribute to her childhood friend Flo Pauline Lopus, whose name used on many Lucille Ball sitcoms.

Harry has been diagnosed with an allergy to dog fur. In “Lucy and Harry's Tonsils” (S2;E5) we learn that Harry is also allergic to flowers.

Harry dictates a letter to Rylander, Mosier and Tebbit. These names are Gale Gordon's go-to addressees for dictation, having been used on both “Here's Lucy” and on “The Lucy Show.”

Craig says he is now going steady with both Debbie Westcott and Natalie Schwartz. Kim has to go the prom and the spring formal with Freddy Dawson (who she calls “The Creature from the Black Lagoon”). Both Natalie and Freddy don't appear on camera. In real life, Natalie Schwartz was a wealthy friend of Lucille Ball's from Rancho Mirage. Her husband Danny was the owner of Elmhurst Dairies in Queens, NY.

Trying to get the reward for Bogie and the nine pups, Harry appoints himself banker of the group. This is ironic since Gale Gordon's previous character with Lucille Ball was banker Theodore J. Mooney.

In the high school scenes, Craig wears his letter sweater with the large “A” on the chest. It was mentioned in “Lucy and Carol Burnett” (S1;E17, above) that Kim and Craig attend Angeles High School. In that episode, many of these sweaters were worn by the boys in the chorus of the musical fundraiser.

Humphrey Bogart never appeared on screen with Lucille Ball. However, in “Ricky's Movie Offer” (ILL S4;E5) Desi Arnaz does an impression of Bogart.

In “Lucy and the Andrews Sisters” (S2;E6) Lucy blows a kiss to a large poster of Bogart from the movie Casablanca. Coincidentally, a poster of W.C. Fields - who Lucy quotes in the episode - is hung next to Bogart!

Lucy's children bring home a dog against their mother's wishes, just like Little Ricky did in “Little Ricky Gets a Dog” (ILL S6;E14).

The only other “Lucy” show to feature more dogs was “Lucy and Viv Learn Judo” (TLS S1;E22) in 1963.

Shut the Door! When Harry comes in to share the news about the reward, he leaves the front door open – in a house with unleashed dogs!

Where the Floor Ends! In Jack LaLanne's studio and in the Carter home, the camera pulls back too far and reveals the cement stage floor. This is a weekly occurrence.

“Lucy and the Bogie Affair” rates 3 Paper Hearts out of 5

This episode is for dog lovers! The cute puppies and shaggy Bogie are the best parts. There is some attempt at a funny montage of getting rid of the dogs to various owners, but it lacks comic rhythm. Jack LaLanne was a better fitness coach than an actor! Unusually, the comic finale of the episode happens off-screen!

4 notes · View notes