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Nancy Walker |
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The daughter of vaudevillians, 4'11"
entertainer Nancy Walker had wanted to establish herself as
a serious singer. But when Nancy auditioned for Broadway impresario
George Abbott, he burst out laughing at her reading of the line
"Is this where the aliens go to register?" and immediately cast
her as the hoydenish Blind Date in his 1941 musical production
Best Foot Forward. She went on to make her Hollywood debut in
the film version of this production, then returned to Broadway,
where she skyrocketed to stardom in such productions as On the
Town (1944) and Look, Ma, I'm Dancin' (1948). She continued
headlining on Broadway throughout the 1950s, occasionally showing
up on television variety series, most memorably as the teen-aged
president of the Milton Berle fan club. Despite her enormous
success as a comedienne, Walker was the archetypal "laughing
on the outside, crying on the inside" type in private life,
undergoing several years of therapy to purge herself of her
insecurities. When theatrical opportunities began drying up
in the late 1960s, Nancy relied more and more on television
for a living. She was featured as Rosie the waitress in a series
of paper-towel commercials ("It's the quicker picker upper"),
co-starred as Mildred the maid on MacMillan and Wife (1971-75),
and, most memorably, was cast as Ida Morgenstern, the Jewish
mama to end all Jewish mamas, on The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970-77)
and Rhoda (1974-78). Though nominated for five Emmies, she never
won the coveted statuette, a fact that seemed to bother her
husband David Craig (a vocal coach whom she'd met when she lost
her voice during Look Ma, I'm Dancing) more than Walker. Banking
on her renewed celebrity, she attempted several TV starring
vehicles of her own, but none lasted beyond the first season.
She had better luck as a stage director, helming such theatrical
productions of UTBU and A Pushcart Affair. In 1980, Walker made
her film directorial debut with the Village People starrer Can't
Stop the Music, produced by her then-manager Alan Carr. Nancy
Walker's final regular TV-series stint was on the 1990 Fox Network
weekly True Colors; two years later she died of lung cancer
at the age of 71. |
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Billy Crystal |
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The son of a jazz concert producer,
Billy Crystal grew up in the company of such music legends as
Billie Holiday, Pee Wee Russell, and Eddy Condon. His mind made
up by age five, Crystal knew he wanted to become a performer
-- not in music but in baseball or comedy. As he later explained
to TV Guide, he chose comedy "because God made me short" --
though from all reports he is one of the best ball players in
show business. Learning how to make people laugh by studying
the works of past masters Laurel and Hardy, Ernie Kovacs, and
Jonathan Winters, Crystal began making the club rounds at 16.
He was sidetracked briefly by New York University's film school,
where he studied to be a director under Martin Scorsese, but
upon graduation it was back to comedy when Crystal formed his
own troupe, 3's Company. On his own, he developed into an "observational"
comic, humor based on his own experiences and the collective
experiences of his audience. He came to media attention via
his impression of Howard Cosell interviewing Muhammad Ali. After
doing time as an opening act for such musicians as Barry Manilow,
Crystal struck out for Hollywood, in hopes of finding regular
work on a TV series. In 1977, he was hired to play the gay character
Jodie Dallas on Soap. Though many people expected the performer
to be typecast in this sort of part, he transcended the "sissy"
stereotype, making the character so three-dimensional that audiences
and potential employers were fully aware that there was more
to Crystal's talent than what they saw in Jodie. Thanks to Soap,
Crystal became and remained a headliner and, in 1978, had his
first crack at movie stardom as a pregnant man in Rabbit Test.
The movie was unsuccessful, but Crystal's star had not been
eclipsed by the experience; he was even entrusted with a dramatic
role in the 1980 TV movie Enola Gay. His career accelerating
with comedy records, choice club dates, regular appearances
on Saturday Night Live, and TV guest shots, Crystal had a more
successful stab at the movies in such films as This is Spinal
Tap (1984), The Princess Bride (1987), Throw Momma From the
Train (1987), and When Harry Met Sally (1989). Riding high after
a memorable emceeing stint at the Oscar ceremony, Crystal executive
produced and starred in his most successful film project to
date, an uproarious middle-age-angst comedy called City Slickers
(1991). In 1992, he mounted his most ambitious film endeavor,
Mr. Saturday Night, the bittersweet chronicle of a self-destructive
comedian. The film had great potential (as indicated by the
outtakes contained in its video cassette version), but the end
result died at the box office. That same year, Crystal again
hosted the Oscar awards, and in 1994 he repeated his earlier
success with the popular sequel City Slickers 2: The Legend
of Curly's Gold. Crystal added to his directing credits the
following year with the romantic comedy Forget Paris. Unfortunately,
the film -- which he also produced, wrote, and starred in --
was something of a flop. He subsequently focused his energies
on acting, turning up in Hamlet (1996) and Deconstructing Harry
(1997). In 1998 he had another producing stint with My Giant,
a comedy he also starred in; like his previous producing effort,
that film also proved fairly unsuccessful. However, Crystal
bounced back in 1999, executive producing and starring in Analyze
This. A comedy about a mob boss, Robert De Niro, seeking therapy
from a psychiatrist (Crystal), it won a number of positive reviews,
convincing many that the performer was back in his element.
Back in the director's chair in 2001, Crystal helmed the made-for-HBO
61*. Detailing the 1961 home-run race between Roger Maris and
Mickey Mantle, 61* struck a chord with baseball sentimentalists
and critics alike. Scripting and starring in America's Sweethearts
the same year, Crystal soon began to prepare for his vocal role
in the animated comedy fantasy Monsters, Inc. |
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Armand Assante |
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Relegated to a series of low-budget
thrillers in his later years despite impressive appearances
in such films as Paradise Alley (1978) early on, Emmy-winning
actor Armand Assante can always be relied upon to turn in a
solid performance despite the fact that full-fledged stardom
has eluded him throughout his long and varied career. A New
York City native and a graduate of Cornwall Central High School,
the handsome Irish-Italian actor got an impressive start to
his acting career when he was awarded one of the American Academy
of Dramatic Arts' highest honors while still a student at the
renowned school. Assante is well versed in both stage and screen,
and after he cut his teeth on such television dramas as How
to Survive a Marriage and The Doctors, the fledgling actor got
his big break opposite Sylvester Stallone in 1978's Paradise
Alley. High-profile roles in Private Benjamin (1980) and Unfaithfully
Yours (1984) found Assante gaining screen momentum in the early
'80s, though the dedicated thespian continued to moonlight with
numerous stage roles throughout the decade. From 1984 on, the
majority of Assante's screen work was of the television variety,
and in 1989 he was nominated for a Golden Globe for his role
in the made-for-television feature Jack the Ripper. Assante
started off the 1990s with a bang, and after gaining momentum
with such efforts as Q & A (1990), The Mambo Kings (1992), and
Hoffa (1992), an unrelentingly goofy performance in Fatal Instinct
(1993) proved that he did indeed have a sense of humor despite
his suave composure. With Judge Dredd (1995), Assante's feature
career came to something of a head in the mid-'90s, and upon
returning to the small screen he would take home an Emmy for
his chilling performance as the eponymous character in the 1996
crime drama Gotti. Kudos would continue to roll in when Assante
took the lead role in the television production of The Odyssey
(1997), and after a strong few years onscreen he would usher
in the new millennium with a voice role in the animated adventure
The Road to El Dorado (2000). After taking the lead in the made-for-television
remake of Stanley Kramer's nuclear war drama, On the Beach (2000),
Assante spent the following few years appearing in such obscure
action thrillers as Federal Protection (2001) and Partners in
Action (2002). Despite his low profile, the tireless actor was
in fact busier than ever as he appeared in no less than five
films in 2003 alone. |
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Donna Pescow |
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24 March 1954 Brooklyn, New York, USA
Gained 40 pounds for her role in Saturday Night Fever (1977).
Didn't have a driver's license until she was 25. Studied at
the American Academy of the Arts, where she lost her native
Brooklyn accent and had to relearn it for her role in Saturday
Night Fever |
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Noriyuki "Pat"
Morita |
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Best known to audiences as Mr. Miyagi,
Ralph Macchio's mentor in the "wax on, wax off" school of combat
in the 1984 hit The Karate Kid, Noriyuki "Pat" Morita is the
most prominent Japanese-American actor of his generation. Morita
is also well known for having played Arnold, the amiable diner
owner on the hit television series Happy Days, for two non-consecutive
seasons (1975-1976 and 1982-1983). His status as one of the
most familiar actors of Asian descent kept him working in a
variety of projects throughout the 1980s and '90s. Having spent
part of his youth in a Japanese internment camp during World
War II, Morita nonetheless emerged with his sense of humor intact,
giving up work as a computer programmer to concentrate on stand-up
comedy in the early '60s. After a number of nightclub and TV
variety show appearances, Morita found his first film role in
1967's Thoroughly Modern Millie as a stereotypical ethnic henchman.
His natural affability soon began shining through, winning Morita
his role on Happy Days for the 1975-1976 season. As Arnold,
Morita interacted with Richie, Fonzie, and company with a memorable
combination of good humor and exasperation. He returned to the
gig in 1982-1983 after a failed attempt to front his own series
(the critically lambasted Mr. T and Tina in 1976), a number
of small film roles, and guest appearances on such shows as
The Love Boat and Magnum P.I. His major pop culture breakthrough
was the role of janitor and karate master Mr. Miyagi in The
Karate Kid. An eccentric tutor who at first appears to be using
his student for an endless variety of household chores, Miyagi
soon reveals the method behind his training, turning the scrawny
Daniel (Macchio) into a confident fighter, while also instilling
an important message that violence should remain a last resort.
The exceedingly popular film made Morita a household name, and
audiences were left with the indelible image of a jolly and
wise old soul trying desperately to catch a fly with a pair
of chopsticks. Morita reprised the role for the two sequels
starring Macchio in (1986 and 1989), as well as The Next Karate
Kid, which starred future Oscar winner Hilary Swank, in 1994.
In the late '80s, Morita found the success that had previously
eluded him in television solo efforts with the two-season detective
series Ohara (1987-1989). In 1987, he also wrote and starred
in the World War II romance Captive Hearts, a film about a pilot
shot down over Japan who falls in love with a village woman.
Morita plays the village elder who saves the young pilot from
execution. Morita spent the 1990s continuing to work regularly
as a character actor in both television and movies. His film
roles included Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Even Cowgirls Get
the Blues (1993,) and vocal work as the Emperor in Disney's
Mulan (1998). He guest starred on such shows as The Fresh Prince
of Bel Air, Diagnosis Murder, and The Hughleys, and had a recurring
role as Mr. Tanaka on Baywatch. |
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