Ron Thompson, the unheralded actor who starred on Broadway for Charles Gordone in the Pulitzer Prize-winning No Place to Be Somebody and played father and son musicians for Ralph Bakshi in the animated cult classic American Pop, has died. He was 83.
Filmmaker Joe Black told The Hollywood Reporter that he found Thompson in his Van Nuys apartment on Saturday afternoon. The two had worked together in eight features, including Hate Horses (2017), Chicks, Man (2018) and Suffrage (2023), and Black visited him a couple times a week to help him out.
“For a man of his age, he was so full of life, he had such a presence,” Black said. He called Thompson “the Sam Jackson to my Tarantino.”
In 1969, Thompson originated off-Broadway the role of Shanty Mulligan in the Joseph Papp-produced No Place to Be Somebody, starring Ron O’Neal, then accompanied the drama to Broadway and on a tour around the country.
Filmmaker Joe Black told The Hollywood Reporter that he found Thompson in his Van Nuys apartment on Saturday afternoon. The two had worked together in eight features, including Hate Horses (2017), Chicks, Man (2018) and Suffrage (2023), and Black visited him a couple times a week to help him out.
“For a man of his age, he was so full of life, he had such a presence,” Black said. He called Thompson “the Sam Jackson to my Tarantino.”
In 1969, Thompson originated off-Broadway the role of Shanty Mulligan in the Joseph Papp-produced No Place to Be Somebody, starring Ron O’Neal, then accompanied the drama to Broadway and on a tour around the country.
- 4/16/2024
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Richard Roundtree, the ultracool actor who helped open the door to a generation of Black filmmakers and performers with his portrayal of private eye John Shaft, “the cat that won’t cop out when there’s danger all about,” died Tuesday. He was 81.
Roundtree died at his home in Los Angeles of pancreatic cancer, his manager, Patrick McMinn, told The Hollywood Reporter.
He was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1993 and had a double mastectomy. “Breast cancer is not gender specific,” he said four years later. “And men have this cavalier attitude about health issues. I got such positive feedback because I spoke out about it, and it’s been quite a number of years now. I’m a survivor.”
Roundtree also portrayed the title character opposite Peter O’Toole as Robinson Crusoe in Man Friday, was featured as an army sergeant opposite Laurence Olivier as Gen. Douglas MacArthur in the Korean...
Roundtree died at his home in Los Angeles of pancreatic cancer, his manager, Patrick McMinn, told The Hollywood Reporter.
He was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1993 and had a double mastectomy. “Breast cancer is not gender specific,” he said four years later. “And men have this cavalier attitude about health issues. I got such positive feedback because I spoke out about it, and it’s been quite a number of years now. I’m a survivor.”
Roundtree also portrayed the title character opposite Peter O’Toole as Robinson Crusoe in Man Friday, was featured as an army sergeant opposite Laurence Olivier as Gen. Douglas MacArthur in the Korean...
- 10/25/2023
- by Chris Koseluk
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
‘Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan’ (Photo © 2002 by Paramount Pictures)
Created by the late Gene Roddenberry, Star Trek has been around in one form or another since the first episode of Star Trek: The Original Series (Tos) debuted on NBC on Sept. 8, 1966.
Tos lasted three seasons and 79 episodes. However, it found a new life in syndication. With the success of 1977’s Star Wars and 1977’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (during the nascent days of the summer blockbuster), long-time Trekkies were hoping to see their beloved characters on the big screen, which they did in 1979’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
Today, Trek is a pop culture juggernaut. It has to its name 13 feature films, eight TV series, three animated series, and numerous novels, comics, action figures, and other merchandise. Pretty impressive. Not to mention pretty intimidating if you want to go where no one has gone before for the first time.
Created by the late Gene Roddenberry, Star Trek has been around in one form or another since the first episode of Star Trek: The Original Series (Tos) debuted on NBC on Sept. 8, 1966.
Tos lasted three seasons and 79 episodes. However, it found a new life in syndication. With the success of 1977’s Star Wars and 1977’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind (during the nascent days of the summer blockbuster), long-time Trekkies were hoping to see their beloved characters on the big screen, which they did in 1979’s Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
Today, Trek is a pop culture juggernaut. It has to its name 13 feature films, eight TV series, three animated series, and numerous novels, comics, action figures, and other merchandise. Pretty impressive. Not to mention pretty intimidating if you want to go where no one has gone before for the first time.
- 7/24/2023
- by Kurt Anthony Krug
- Showbiz Junkies
Melvin Van Peebles, an actor, writer, director, producer and icon of Black cinema whose films include Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song and Watermelon Man, died Tuesday night at his Manhattan home. He was 89.
Showbiz & Media Figures We’ve Lost In 2021 – Photo Gallery
His death was confirmed by his son, Mario Van Peebles, who said in a statement: “Dad knew that Black images matter. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what was a movie worth? We want to be the success we see, thus we need to see ourselves being free. True liberation did not mean imitating the colonizer’s mentality. It meant appreciating the power, beauty and interconnectivity of all people.”
Janus Films and Criterion Collection also announced the news on Twitter and said in a statement: “In an unparalleled career, distinguished by relentless innovation, boundless curiosity and spiritual empathy, Melvin Van Peebles made an indelible mark on the...
Showbiz & Media Figures We’ve Lost In 2021 – Photo Gallery
His death was confirmed by his son, Mario Van Peebles, who said in a statement: “Dad knew that Black images matter. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what was a movie worth? We want to be the success we see, thus we need to see ourselves being free. True liberation did not mean imitating the colonizer’s mentality. It meant appreciating the power, beauty and interconnectivity of all people.”
Janus Films and Criterion Collection also announced the news on Twitter and said in a statement: “In an unparalleled career, distinguished by relentless innovation, boundless curiosity and spiritual empathy, Melvin Van Peebles made an indelible mark on the...
- 9/22/2021
- by Erik Pedersen
- Deadline Film + TV
Douglas Turner Ward, the director, actor and playwright who co-founded the landmark, influential Off Broadway Black theater group the Negro Ensemble Company, died Saturday, Feb. 20, at his home in New York City. He was 90.
His death was announced by his wife Diana Ward.
Ward had already begun a solid New York stage acting career in the 1950s and ’60s – including Off Broadway roles in The Iceman Cometh and on Broadway in A Raisin in the Sun – when, according to The New York Times, he wrote a 1966 editorial for that newspaper headlined “American Theater: For Whites Only?” The article called for the establishment of a Black repertory theater company. Turner wrote, “Not in the future…but now!”
A year later the Ford Foundation awarded a $434,000 grant to create the Negro Ensemble Company with Ward as artistic director, along with Robert Hooks and Gerald S. Krone in other leadership roles.
The Company...
His death was announced by his wife Diana Ward.
Ward had already begun a solid New York stage acting career in the 1950s and ’60s – including Off Broadway roles in The Iceman Cometh and on Broadway in A Raisin in the Sun – when, according to The New York Times, he wrote a 1966 editorial for that newspaper headlined “American Theater: For Whites Only?” The article called for the establishment of a Black repertory theater company. Turner wrote, “Not in the future…but now!”
A year later the Ford Foundation awarded a $434,000 grant to create the Negro Ensemble Company with Ward as artistic director, along with Robert Hooks and Gerald S. Krone in other leadership roles.
The Company...
- 2/23/2021
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Douglas Turner Ward, a Tony-winning playwright, director and actor who co-founded New York’s trailblazing Negro Ensemble Company, has died. He was 90.
Ward, inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame in 1996, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan, his wife, Diana Ward, told The New York Times.
Energized by the success of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun and with help from a Ford Foundation grant, Ward, actor Robert Hooks and theater manager Gerald Krone officially launched the Negro Ensemble Company in 1967 as a home for Black playwrights, actors and crewmembers.
The theater group’s The River ...
Ward, inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame in 1996, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan, his wife, Diana Ward, told The New York Times.
Energized by the success of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun and with help from a Ford Foundation grant, Ward, actor Robert Hooks and theater manager Gerald Krone officially launched the Negro Ensemble Company in 1967 as a home for Black playwrights, actors and crewmembers.
The theater group’s The River ...
- 2/23/2021
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Douglas Turner Ward, a Tony-winning playwright, director and actor who co-founded New York’s trailblazing Negro Ensemble Company, has died. He was 90.
Ward, inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame in 1996, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan, his wife, Diana Ward, told The New York Times.
Energized by the success of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun and with help from a Ford Foundation grant, Ward, actor Robert Hooks and theater manager Gerald Krone officially launched the Negro Ensemble Company in 1967 as a home for Black playwrights, actors and crewmembers.
The theater group’s The River ...
Ward, inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame in 1996, died Saturday at his home in Manhattan, his wife, Diana Ward, told The New York Times.
Energized by the success of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun and with help from a Ford Foundation grant, Ward, actor Robert Hooks and theater manager Gerald Krone officially launched the Negro Ensemble Company in 1967 as a home for Black playwrights, actors and crewmembers.
The theater group’s The River ...
- 2/23/2021
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
THR to look back at her career highlights. "I would say my career began with high points." She speaks fondly of the months after her sophomore year at Howard University when she spent the summer with the Negro Ensemble Company in New York. "This was during its heyday. The actors in that company were Moses Gunn, Hattie Winston, Rosalind Cash, Frances Foster, Esther Rolle," she says. "Robert Hooks was one of the directors of the theater. Douglas Turner Ward ...
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Increasingly those classic films from the wonderful early-to-mid 1970’s blaxploitation era are being released on blu-ray; the latest one soon to join the ranks, is the 1972 Fox film “Trouble Man” starring Robert Hooks, Paul Winfield, Ralph Waite, William Smithers,… Continue Reading →...
- 7/12/2016
- by Sergio Mims
- ShadowAndAct
Woodie King, Jr.'s New Federal Theatre will celebrate its 44th anniversary with a special fundraising campaign, 'Love For New Federal Theatre.' Celebrity participants and supporters of Nft themselves, including Phylicia Rashad, Spike Lee, Alicia Keys, Melba Moore, Marla Gibbs, Robert Hooks, Roscoe Orman, Ruby Dee, Avery Brooks, Glynn Turman, Kene Holiday, Chadwick Boseman, Petri Hawkins Byrd, Impotep Gary Byrd, Debbie Allen, Lynn Whitfield, Lamman Rucker, John Amos, Robert Townsend, Leslie Uggams, Ted Lange, Andre DeShields, Mike Tyson and Danny Glover, among others, will fans will have the opportunity to order a limited number of personalized Valentine's Day messages. These celebrity messages will be available for purchase on a first come, first served basis.
- 2/5/2014
- by BWW News Desk
- BroadwayWorld.com
After all the debates, controversies, and stereotype accusations have cleared, looking back on Blaxploitation cinema today it’s easy to see healthy portions of the crime and action genres. Using these genres and the struggles of the black community, these films were created for those that wanted to see African American characters on the big screen not taking shit from the man, “getting over”, and–above all else—being the heroes in movies. In the documentary Baad Asssss Cinema, Samuel L. Jackson gives his take on the heroes of Blaxploitation: “We were tired of seeing the righteous black man. And all of a sudden we had guys who were…us. Or guys who did the things we wanted those guys to do.”
The unsung supporting players in these films that backed Fred Williamson and Pam Grier and many other stars were people acting and making a living off of it.
The unsung supporting players in these films that backed Fred Williamson and Pam Grier and many other stars were people acting and making a living off of it.
- 12/4/2012
- by Gregory Day
- SoundOnSight
In a 20-minute interview that is one of the supplements to this excellent DVD edition (a Region 2 Pal UK set from the label Axiom) of Kings of the Road, a contemporary Wenders considers this film and all of his films prior and subsequent to it, and tries to tie them together. "All these films have in common," he says (in German), "is not a theme, but what ties them together, from this one, to Buena Vista Social Club, to Until The End Of The World, is the question: 'How should one live?''' In this case, for one of its characters, Robert (Hanns Zischler), the question might better be put, "How can one live?" He has driven his car into a river, and instead of drowning, he is left bereft of personal possessions. Including the car. Wenders knows his Kristofferson, that is, that freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.
- 7/25/2010
- MUBI
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