Showing posts with label Entertaiment. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Entertaiment. Show all posts

Wednesday, 3 September 2014

Friday, 15 August 2014

PuaPuadedeh : Robin Williams' wife: He had Parkinson's disease


LOS ANGELES (AP) — Robin Williams was in the early stages of Parkinson's disease at the time of his death, his wife said Thursday.
In a statement, Susan Schneider said that Williams, 63, was struggling with depression, anxiety and the Parkinson's diagnosis when he died Monday in his Northern California home. Authorities said he committed suicide.
"Robin's sobriety was intact and he was brave as he struggled with his own battles of depression, anxiety as well as early stages of Parkinson's disease, which he was not yet ready to share publicly," Schneider said.
Schneider did not offer details on when the actor comedian had been diagnosed or his symptoms.
The Marin County Sheriff's Department, which said Williams hanged himself, is conducting toxicology tests and interviews before issuing a final ruling. Lt. Keith Boyd of the Marin County Sheriff's Department did not return phone calls and email messages from The Associated Press seeking comment on Schneider's statement.
Williams' death shocked fans and friends alike, despite his candor about decades of struggle with substance abuse and mental health. With Parkinson's, Williams faced shouldering yet another challenge.
Parkinson's disease is an incurable nervous system disorder that involves a loss of brain cells controlling movement. Tremors, sometimes starting out in just one hand, are among the early symptoms.
It can also cause rigid, halting walking, slowed speech and sometimes dementia. Symptoms worsen over time and can often be treated with drugs.
Actor Michael J. Fox, who has long had the disease and is known for his efforts to fund research into it, tweeted that he was stunned to learn Williams had early symptoms.
"Stunned to learn Robin had PD. Pretty sure his support for our Fdn predated his diagnosis. A true friend; I wish him peace," Fox tweeted.
Pop star Linda Ronstadt revealed in 2013 that she had Parkinson's and said the disease had robbed her of her ability to sing. Boxer Muhammad Ali, the late radio personality Casey Kasem and the late Pope John Paul II are among other well-known figures diagnosed with the disease.
Parkinson's affects about 1 million people nationwide, 6 million globally. The cause isn't known but genes are thought to play a role.
There is no standard test for Parkinson's; doctors rely on symptoms, medical history and neurological exams to make the diagnosis.
Dr. Tanya Simuni, director of the Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorders Center at Northwestern University's medical school in Chicago, said patients often react to the diagnosis with surprise and despair.
Depression is often present even in early stages and can sometimes precede tremors that help doctors make the diagnosis, Simuni said.
It's important to emphasize that not everyone who is depressed has Parkinson's or is likely to develop it, she said, especially given "this tragic case" involving Williams in which the two diseases occurred.
She noted that many can live for years without severely debilitating symptoms, but also that 20 years after diagnosis, as many as 80 percent develop dementia. Antidepressants are among drugs commonly prescribed for the disease, along with medication to help control jerky movements.
Dr. Christopher Gomez, neurology chairman at the University of Chicago, said while it makes sense to think that a diagnosis could make someone feel depressed, depression and Parkinson's have a deeper, more organic connection. They are thought to affect the same regions of the brain, although their neurological relationship isn't well understood, he said.
"It's downright curious that there's so much depression in Parkinson's," Gomez said.
Williams had publicly acknowledged periodic struggles with substance abuse, including alcohol. Recently, depression prompted him to enter rehab.
Schneider said that those who loved Williams are taking solace in the outpouring of affection and admiration for him.
"It is our hope in the wake of Robin's tragic passing, that others will find the strength to seek the care and support they need to treat whatever battles they are facing so they may feel less afraid," she said in her statement.
Williams, whose comic brilliance first gained wide attention on the 1980s sitcom "Mork & Mindy," evolved into a respected dramatic actor who starred in films such as "Good Will Hunting," for which he won an Oscar, "Dead Poets Society" and "Mrs. Doubtfire."
He was invariably upbeat in public and with his friends and colleagues, and was known for his philanthropic efforts and support for U.S. troops and veterans.
___
Associated Press Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner in Chicago contributed to this report.

Wednesday, 13 August 2014

20 Failed Panoramic Shots That Somehow Turned Into Surrealist Art

While many of you have surely taken your share of successful panoramic photos, the Internet has showed us an equal number of hilariously failed attempts.
That novelty feature on many of our phones promises to free us from traditional four-by-six-inch constraints -- but at what cost?! *Shudder.*
And yet, some of you have embraced the rules and limitations of cellphone panoramas to create (intentionally or not) surreal things of beauty. Here are some of those things.

Sometimes panorama mode can play tricks on you.

Other times, though, you're the one doing the tricks...

... By asking your subject to run (behind you) to a new pose after the camera passes over them once.

Shooting objects in motion may lead to unintended consequences.
limobus
LIMO BUS.

Then again, you're not necessarily in the clear with stationary things, either.

So just embrace it.

(Pro Tip: "Unwrap" subjects by turning them in the same direction as your camera is moving.)
Unwrapped can

Your shots may defy all the rational rules of physics...

For no apparent reason.

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

But this will simply add visual mystique.

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

(Okay, calm down, Dalí.)
Something went wrong with a panorama...

You should hope that your lighting conditions change suddenly...

Because then stuff like this happens.

And it's awesome.

Studies in motion, too, have never been easier.

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

Or more bizarre.

So whether you're at the ends of the Earth...

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

Or hanging out at home...

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

Panorama mode can help you see your subjects in a whole new way.

Shared from panoramafail using Embeddlr

And create beautiful, beautiful exposures.

PuaPuadedeh : Lauren Bacall, screen legend, dead at 89

Lauren Bacall, screen legend, dead at 89

Two-time Tony winner, recipient of honorary Oscar in 2009


Lauren Bacall dead at 89
Lauren Bacall dead at 89 3:09
Lauren Bacall was a movie star from almost her first moment on the silver screen.
A fashion model and bit-part New York actress before moving to Hollywood at 19, Bacall achieved immediate fame in 1944 with one scene in her first film, To Have and Have Not. Leaving Humphrey Bogart's hotel room, Bacall — a lanky figure with flowing blond hair and a stunning face — murmured:
"You don't have to say anything, and you don't have to do anything. Not a thing. Oh, maybe just whistle. You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow."
With that cool, sultry come-on, not only was a star born, but the beginning of a legend, her title burnished over the years with pivotal roles, signature New York wit, and a marriage to Bogart that accounted for one of the most famous Hollywood couples of all time.
Lauren Bacall
Bacall looks at a small hand mirror while smoking during a session with famed society photographer Henry Nahum, known professionally as Baron, in 1951. (Baron/Getty Images)
Bacall died Tuesday at the age of 89 in New York, according to the managing partner of the Humphrey Bogart Estate, Robbert J.F. de Klerk. Bacall's son Stephen Bogart confirmed his mother's death to de Klerk. She was pronounced dead at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center at 5:21 p.m. Tuesday, according to Kathleen Robinson, the hospital's media relations director.
The Academy-Award nominated actress received two Tonys, an honorary Oscar and scores of film and TV roles. But, to her occasional frustration, she was remembered for her years with Bogart and treated more as a star by the film industry than as an actress. Bacall would outlive her husband by more than 50 years, but never outlive their iconic status.
They were "Bogie and Bacall" — the hard-boiled couple who could fight and make up with the best of them. Unlike Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, Bogart and Bacall were not a story of opposites attracting but of kindred, smouldering spirits. She was less than half Bogart's age, yet as wise, and as jaded as he was.
They starred in movies like Key Largo and Dark Passage together, threw all-night parties, palled around with Frank Sinatra and others and formed a gang of California carousers known as the Holmby Hills Rat Pack, which Sinatra would resurrect after Bogart's death.
She appeared in movies for more than a half-century, but none brought her the attention of her early pictures.
Not until 1996 did she receive an Academy Award nomination — as supporting actress for her role as Barbra Streisand's mother in The Mirror Has Two Faces. Although a sentimental favourite, she was beaten by Juliette Binoche for her performance in The English Patient.
She finally got a statuette in November 2009 at the movie academy's Governors Awards gala.
"The thought when I get home that I'm going to have a two-legged man in my room is so exciting," she quipped.

Her persona paralleled her screen appearances: She was blunt, with a noirish undertone of sardonic humour that illuminated her 1979 autobiography, By Myself (she published an updated version in 2005, By Myself and Then Some.)

'My childhood is a confusion'

Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske in the Bronx on Sept. 16, 1924 and was raised by her Romanian immigrant mother after her parents split when she was a child (her mother took part of her family name, Bacal; Betty added the extra L when she became an actress.)
"My childhood is a confusion," Bacall wrote in By Myself, which made Bacall one of the rare celebrity authors to win a National Book Award. She told of nightmares over the arguments of her parents, of her mother's struggle to earn a living, of being sent off to boarding school.
As a young woman, Diana Vreeland, the famed editor of Harper's Bazaar, thought she was ideal for fashion modelling, and Bacall appeared regularly in the magazine. The wife of film director Howard Hawks saw her on a magazine cover and recommended her as film material, and she went to Hollywood under a contract.
Hawks became her mentor, coaching her on film acting and introducing her to Hollywood society. He was preparing a movie to star Bogart, based on an Ernest Hemingway story, To Have and Have Not, with a script partly written by William Faulkner.
By this time she had acquired the professional name of Lauren, though Bogart and all her friends continued to call her Betty.
In By Myself, she wrote of meeting Bogart: "There was no thunderbolt, no clap of thunder, just a simple how-do-you-do."

'The Look'

On her first day of shooting, her hands were shaking so much that she couldn't manage a simple scene of lighting a cigarette.
"By the end of the third or fourth take," she wrote in By Myself, "I realized that one way to hold my trembling head still was to keep it down, chin almost to my chest and eyes up at Bogart. It worked, and turned out to be the beginning of 'The Look.'"

Work led to romance. The 23-year age difference (he called her "Baby") failed to deter them, but they faced a serious obstacle: Bogart was still married to the mercurial actress Mayo Methot, with whom he engaged in much-publicized alcoholic battles. She was persuaded to divorce him, and the lovers were married on May 21, 1945.
"When I married Bogie," she remarked in a 1994 interview, "I agreed to put my career second, because he wouldn't marry me otherwise. He'd had three failed marriages to actresses, and he was not about to have another."
Still, she appeared in a few films without Bogart: Confidential Agent (with Charles Boyer), Young Man with a Horn, (Kirk Douglas) and How to Marry a Millionaire, with Marilyn Monroe and Betty Grable.

Nearly married Sinatra

She had son Stephen in 1949 and daughter Leslie in 1952. She also became active politically, joining her husband in protesting the Hollywood blacklist of suspected Communists and campaigning for Democrats. Few could forget the picture of her slouched on top of a piano, long legs dangling, while Harry Truman — then vice president — was seated in front of the keys.
But the party began to wind down in March 1956, when Bogart was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus. On the night of Jan. 14, 1957, Bogart grabbed his wife's arm and muttered, "Goodbye, kid." He died in the early morning at the age of 57.
After a period of mourning, Bacall became romantically involved with Sinatra. When an "engagement" was mistakenly leaked by press agent "Swifty" Lazar, the singer blamed her, and he terminated the romance.
"Actually, Frank did me a great favour — he saved me from the disaster our marriage would have been," she wrote in By Myself.
Still mourning for Bogart, Bacall left Hollywood in October 1958. She made a film in England, and did a critically panned play that was significant because she would meet her second husband during her time on Broadway: Jason Robards Jr. He was similar to Bogart in that he was an accomplished actor, hard drinker — and married. After Robards was divorced from his second wife, he and Bacall married in 1961 but Robards' drinking and extramarital affairs resulted in divorce in 1969.

'I prefer to prevail'

Applause in 1970 and Woman of the Year in 1981 brought Bacall Tony awards. Among her later movies: Murder on the Orient Express, The Shootist and Robert Altman's Ready to Wear. She played Nicole Kidman's mother in the 2004 film Birth, and in recent years appeared as herself in a cameo for The Sopranos.
For decades she lived in Manhattan's venerable Dakota, where neighbours included John Lennon and Yoko Ono. She was ever protective of the Bogart legacy, lashing out at those who tried to profit from his image.
Bacall became friends with Faulkner when he was writing scripts for Hawks. One of her prized possessions was a copy of Faulkner's Nobel Prize acceptance speech on which he wrote that she was not one who was satisfied with being just a pretty face, "but rather who decided to prevail."
"Notice he didn't write 'survive,' " she told Parade magazine in 1997. "Everyone's a survivor. Everyone wants to stay alive. What's the alternative? See, I prefer to prevail."

PuaPuadedeh : Sylvester Stallone: Lundgren Put Me in Hospital During 'Rocky IV'.

Sylvester Stallone asked Dolph Lundgren to really try and knock him out in one scene, and the Swede happily obliged.

August 2014 | Declan O'Kelly
Stallone Says Dolph Lundgren Nearly Killed Him During Rocky 4
The Expendables 3 star Sylvester Stallone was in rare form at a recent An Evening with Sylvester Stallone, telling a packed Phones 4U Arena in Manchester, England, some stories about his career in the movies. One of the more interesting anecdotes was about his hate-hate relationship with Dolph Lundgren during the shooting of Rocky IV.
After watching the legendary war between middleweight boxers Marvin Hagler and Tommy Hearns, Stallone decided to ask co-star Lundgren, who played Rocky's nemesis Ivan Drago, to really try and knock him out in one of their fight scenes. Well, he got what he asked for.
"Hey I got an idea, for the first 45 seconds, really try to knock me out, I mean go for it," Stallone explains. "Bad idea. He comes across—boom, boom! He catches me in the chest. Woah. Cut, cut cut, I am directing so I can do that. CUT CUT. He says, 'What?' I said, 'What? I thought I had a car accident!
"Later that night my blood pressure goes up to 260, I go to hospital, they put me in an emergency jet and fly me back to America. Next thing I know I’m in intensive care for five days with nuns walking around." Stallone went on to say that the insurance company would not pay out until after they saw the footage of the incident. Once they did, they wrote the check. “He hit my heart so hard that it banged against my ribs and started to swell, and that usually happens in car accidents. So I was hit by a truck!”
Check out the segment below where Stallone also talks about why he hated Lundgren from the get-go (they're friends now), and he and Arnold Schwarzenegger's bitter '80s rivals. Our executive editor even went so far as tricking him into taking the lead in Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot, which was a box office bomb. Check out this review of An Evening with Sylvester Stallone.
And just to get you pumped ahead of your workout, here is a blast from the past with the Rocky IV training montage featuring Stallone as Rocky and Lundgren as Ivan Drago.

Puapuadedeh : Comedy great Robin Williams hanged himself at home


By Ann Saphir, Alex Dobuzinskis and Piya Sinha-Roy
SAN RAFAEL Calif./LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Oscar-winning actor and groundbreaking comedian Robin Williams hanged himself with a belt in his Northern California home after he had sought treatment for depression, a coroner said on Tuesday based on preliminary findings.
Williams, 63, was found dead by his personal assistant at midday on Monday in a bedroom. He was suspended from a belt wedged between a closet door and a door frame, in a seated position just off the ground, Marin County's assistant chief deputy coroner, Keith Boyd, told a news conference.
"Mr. Williams' personal assistant became concerned at approximately 11:45 a.m. when he failed to respond to knocks on his bedroom door," said Boyd.
"His right shoulder area was touching the door with his body perpendicular to the door and slightly suspended. Mr. Williams at that time was cool to the touch with rigor mortis present in his body," Boyd added.
The official preliminary cause of death was asphyxia due to hanging, he said, and conclusion of the investigation is still weeks away.
View gallery
Robin Williams 1951 - 2014
This 1987 file photo released by Touchstone Pictures shows actor Robin Williams in character as disc …
Officials also found a pocket knife near Williams and superficial cuts on his left wrist with dried red material that matched what was on the knife blade. It was not yet known if it was his blood.
Williams had been open about his struggles with alcohol and cocaine and in the past months had entered a rehabilitation center to help him maintain sobriety. But many questions remained over what could have led him to take his own life.
Williams' publicist, Mara Buxbaum, said on Monday that he had been suffering from severe depression, and Boyd acknowledged that he had been seeking treatment without giving more details.
His tragic end stood in stark contrast to the many on-screen characters he portrayed who encouraged those around them to tap into their own inner vitality, a wellspring of creativity to which he himself gave full vent in films such as "Good Morning, Vietnam" and "Dead Poets Society."
Williams was last seen alive by his wife, Susan Schneider, on Sunday night when she retired for the evening. She left the next morning around 10 a.m., thinking that her husband was still asleep.
Medical expert weighs in on Robin Williams' st …Play Video
Medical expert weighs in on Robin Williams' struggle …
Boyd would not say whether Williams had left a suicide note, nor if any drugs or alcohol were involved. The full toxicology report would take two to six weeks, he said.
In addition to his wife, Williams is survived by three grown children - daughter Zelda, and sons Cody and Zachary. Funeral arrangements are pending and his body has been released by the coroner facility in neighboring Napa County.
'THANKS CHIEF'
Tributes poured out from actors, comedians, politicians and generations of fans, including President Barack Obama who called him a "one-of-a-kind" actor.
A force of manic energy, Williams long ago established himself as one of the world's most beloved comedians, and took audiences on wild flights of imagination that often stressed one simple message: seize the day.
View gallery
A man who did not give his name enters the front gate …
A man who did not give his name enters the front gate outside of the home of Robin Williams in Tibur …
His improvisational stand-up routine broke all rules, whether he was giving a comedic account of a nuclear accident in the style of Shakespeare or grabbing a camera from an audience member and pointing the lens down his pants.
Ben Affleck, whose breakthrough role came alongside Williams and Matt Damon in 1997's "Good Will Hunting," for which Williams won his only Oscar, said he was heartbroken.
"Thanks chief - for your friendship and for what you gave the world," Affleck wrote on his Facebookpage. "Robin had a ton of love in him. He personally did so much for so many people. He made Matt and my dreams come true. What do you owe a guy who does that? Everything."
Spontaneous acts of tribute sprang up at landmarks from his career.
In Boston, scores of people jotted tributes in chalk to Williams near at bench in the lush Public Garden downtown, which featured in "Good Will Hunting".
Mourners hung signs including "You will be missed" and "RIP Robin" on the wooden fence of the home in Boulder, Colorado, where parts of the intro credits for his breakout 1970s TV comedy, "Mork & Mindy," were filmed.
On the Hollywood Walk of Fame, fans congregated around Williams' star, leaving flowers and candles to honor the actor.
"My kids grew up on 'Mrs Doubtfire'," said Erlinda Fantauzzi, referring to the hit movie in which he played a father who took on the persona of a tender British nanny to be close to his kids. "I feel so bad. He was a tortured soul and he died alone. He touched adults and children," she said.
Interest in his film work spiked on Tuesday, with "Dead Poets Society," "Mrs. Doubtfire," and "Good Morning, Vietnam" making it into the top 20 in the iTunes movie chart.
(Additional reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy and Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles, Scott Malone in Boston and Daniel Wallis in Denver; Writing by Mary Milliken; Editing by Sandra Maler)
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)