Archive for the ‘TV’ Category

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Obit watch: August 28, 2026.

Friday, August 28th, 2026

I am reliably informed by a reliable source who sent me a private message (that I don’t have permission to share here) that “Rocky Horror Picture Show” is actually still a thing, in Austin and in Washington, DC. (“The wash dc monthly showings still draw hundreds of people.”)

It is nice to leave a legacy behind you.

NYT obit for Jaye P. Morgan, for the record. (May require registration or an email address or something.)

King Harald V of Norway (NYT share link, yadda yadda.)

This is an interesting obit. The king’s daughter-in-law was close to Jeffrey Epstein. Her son is serving time for rape. And his daughter married “a self-proclaimed shaman who counted Gwyneth Paltrow among his celebrity clients and friends.”

Their relationship brought hostile attention to some of Mr. Verrett’s past utterances, including his claim that he had used an amulet — which he sold for $222 on his website — to combat Covid-19, and his assertion that cancer is a choice. The princess had also been criticized for many years for claiming to be clairvoyant and for urging others to contact “the angels and the divine universe.”

Several people sent me obits for voice actor Peter Cullen: NYT (you know the drill). The Internet Movie Voice Actor Database.

And a burning in Hell watch: Ratko Mladic, the “Butcher of Bosnia”.

On the eve of the Srebrenica massacre, he promised to avenge the conquest of Serbia centuries before by the Ottoman Muslim Turks. Over 10 days, his soldiers hunted down, captured and summarily executed thousands of Bosnian Muslims, lining them up with hands tied behind their backs and shooting them. Women were raped. International pleas for restraint were ignored.
Serb forces buried the remains, dug them up again and scattered them in distant mass graves in an organized effort to hide damning evidence of war crimes.

Posted in 1970s, Horses, Movies, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 26, 2026.

Wednesday, August 26th, 2026

Dolly Parton. NYT share link (may require registration or an email address or something).

Everyone was on this yesterday: I held off, per the policy of this blog, and I think pretty much everything that can be said has been, or will be. I only have two thoughts:

1. I know this isn’t original to Ms. Parton (it’s actually a cover of a Neil Young song, with a slightly modified lyric) but I find this to be incredibly haunting.

2. She was a zealous advocate of literacy. She wanted to put books in kid’s hands. I swear I read somewhere (but can’t find it now) that she believed books were the best way for kids to broaden their horizons and lift themselves up from poverty.

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library. You know, just in case you feel like tossing a few bucks in.

Dolly Parton’s letter to Eminem.

In other news: Jaye P. Morgan. Yes, from “The Gong Show”. (Kids, ask your parents about “The Gong Show”.)

Posted in 1970s, Books, Music, Obits, TV | 3 Comments »

Obit watch: August 24, 2026.

Monday, August 24th, 2026

Shelley Fabares, actress. THR.

Previously on WCD. Credits other than those in the headline and “Hello, Larry” include “The Incredible Hulk”, “The Rockford Files”, and “Longstreet”.

Her “Mannix” was “A Step in Time“, season 5, episode 3. She was “Gwen Townsend”.

(Edited to add 8/25: NYT share link, may require registration or an email address or something.)

Dave Marsh, cantankerous music critic. (NYT share link, may require registration or an email address or something.)

Another one of the publications that I used to read when I holed up in the UT library was “Rock & Roll Confidential”. I liked Marsh’s prose style, even if I would probably have disagreed with him on a lot of things. Then again…

In the same record guide, Mr. Marsh called the Grateful Dead, with their interminable space jams and druggy aura, an “assertedly major oeuvre that’s virtually worthless except for documentary purposes.”

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Movies, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 17, 2026.

Monday, August 17th, 2026

Violet Hensley, fiddler. (Share link, but they’re going to want you to create an account or put in your Google or Apple address or something).

Ms. Hensley made a clear distinction between a fiddle and a violin, even though they are essentially the same instrument. “If you can read music, you play the violin,” she told The Tulsa World in 1982. “I can’t read music, so I just play the fiddle.”
By the time she turned 99, Ms. Hensley had performed old-time mountain music — not bluegrass, which she deemed too fancy — at the Silver Dollar City theme park in Branson, Mo., for more than 50 years; played on radio stations and at schools; recorded at least two albums, one of them, with family members, called “Old-Time Hoedowns”; and appeared on TV programs like “Captain Kangaroo,” “The Beverly Hillbillies” and “Live! With Regis and Kathie Lee.”
She also handcrafted 73 fiddles — she played No. 4, which she made in the 1930s — thus acquiring nicknames like “The Whittlin’ Fiddler” and “Stradivarius of the Ozarks.” She could have built more fiddles if not for time spent gardening, canning, sewing and cutting her neighbors’ hair, she told CBS News when she was 90. To make ends meet, she was a cleaning lady at a hospital for many years.

There was one thing she wanted to do: play the Grand Ole Opry.

When another fiddler, Tim Crouch, read about that desire in Ms. Hensley’s autobiography, “Whittlin’ and Fiddlin’ My Own Way” (written with Randall Franks and published in 2014), he called the banjo player Mike Snider, who brought her onstage at the Opry on Aug. 6, 2016.
“This little lady was born in 1916,” he said as he introduced her, to cheers. She played “Angeline the Baker” and “Black Eyed Susie” with Mr. Snider, Mr. Crouch and other fiddle players, and received three standing ovations, Ms. Flagg, her daughter, said.

…

She performed twice more at the Opry, in 2017 and in 2018, the year she was inducted into the National Fiddler Hall of Fame in Tulsa, Okla.

…

In addition to Ms. Flagg, Ms. Hensley is survived by two other daughters, Beatrice Porter and Lewonna Nelson; three sons, Marvin, R.G. and Eddie Hensley; Wilma Flagg, a family friend who came to live with her as a teenager; 32 grandchildren; 85 great-grandchildren; 29 great-great-grandchildren; and two great-great-great-grandchildren. Her husband died in 1997. Four of their sons — Calvin, Russell and Gary Hensley and Larry Hensley, who was stillborn — predeceased her.
Making fiddles was one of many skills Ms. Hensley developed over her lifetime. She also made lye soap, tanned leather, broke horses and tended crops.
“I always say,” she told The Tulsa World, “making a fiddle is a lot easier than plowing a field with a team of mules.”

She was 109 when she passed.

Mark Rydell, director. Other credits include “The Reivers”, “Harry and Walter Go to New York”, and “The Fugitive” (the original series). NYT share link for the record.

The NYT finally got around to running an obit for Zale Parry. (Previously.) (Share link, but they’re going to want you to create an account or put in your Google or Apple address or something).

What the NYT obit lacks in timeliness, it makes up for by covering another aspect of Ms. Parry’s life: she was involved in early LSD studies. The NYT obit also reproduces her SI cover, in color.

Tommy John, pitcher.

After suffering what had been up to then considered a career-ending injury, John, then 31, underwent ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction surgery on his left (pitching) elbow in 1974, with the revolutionary procedure being performed by Dr. Frank Jobe. The procedure was named after John and has since become commonplace, performed on thousands of players — not just pitchers — with a typical recovery time of a year to 18 months.
John, nicknamed “The Bionic Man,” went on to pitch for 14 more seasons after the surgery.

…

John had 124 wins in 355 games at the time of the procedure. He pitched in 405 more games, winning 164, and finished with a career record of 288-231 — the second-most wins of any pitcher since 1900 not to be elected to the Hall of Fame — with a 3.34 ERA and 2,245 strikeouts in 760 career appearances.
Besides eight seasons with the Yankees, for whom he won 91 games over two stints, John pitched for the Chicago White Sox, Dodgers, California Angels, Cleveland Indians and Oakland Athletics during his career.

He is tied for third on the list of most seasons played, with 26. Only Nolan Ryan and Cap Anson (27 seasons) are ahead of him.

NYT share link. Baseball Reference.

Hayden Panettiere. Everyone is on this, and I’ve got nothing to add. IMDB. NYT share link, for the record.

Posted in Movies, Music, Obits, Sports, TV | 1 Comment »

Random pop culture crankery (with a little bit of gun stuff).

Tuesday, August 11th, 2026

This is from Rock Island Auction, and is a promo for an item in an upcoming auction. But it also touches on one of this blog’s areas of interest. And some friends of the blog are currently working their way through “Miami Vice”, so…”The Bren Ten Origin Story”.

Changing gears to something that’s a little less gun crankery, if MeTV sticks to their schedule, Thursday morning’s episode (8 AM Central, 9 AM Eastern) of “Perry Mason” will be “The Case of the Final Fade-Out“. This is the final episode of the original run.

The general consensus of opinion seems to be that “Mason” got progressively weaker as time went on, and season 9 has issues. While there are some good episodes in this season (I like “The Case of the Midnight Howler” and “The Case of the Cheating Chancellor“) there are some that are just remakes or stunts. (“The Case of the Dead Ringer” stands out in particular as a stunt episode. This season also includes “The Case of the Twice-Told Twist”, the only episode to be filmed in color. While I don’t consider that a “stunt” – they were preparing to move to color if the series had been renewed for season 10 – it is yet another juvenile delinquent episode.)

However, “Final Fade-Out” is a lot of fun, and a great way to end the series. There are a bunch of inside jokes, many of which are documented in the IMDB trivia. Many of the people who worked behind the scenes got (uncredited) on-screen roles in this episode. Even ErleStanleyGardnerTheCreatorOfPerryMason makes a cameo appearance as a judge in the second of the two courtroom scenes.

This is a fun episode. I always find it worth re-watching when it comes up in reruns, and I recommend it if you have not seen it previously.

Posted in Guns, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 11, 2026.

Monday, August 10th, 2026

Former Representative Ben Jones (D-Georgia). THR.

Most people would know him as “Cooter Davenport” on “The Dukes of Hazzard”. Other credits include “Movin’ On”, “Smokey and the Bandit”, and “The Lincoln Conspiracy”.

Tedde Moore, actress. Other credits include “Police Surgeon”, “Torso: The Evelyn Dick Story”, and “Odyssey 5”.

It has been a bad few days for people of the gun. One of my book buddies in the Association has been sending me obits.

Tom Marx passed away in February, but his death was announced only recently.

Tom was one of the true “industry insiders.” He began as a Chicago cop and then focused on the gun world, working at various times for Smith & Wesson, Ruger, and Blackhawk among others. His consulting encompassed design, engineering, and marketing. Marx specialized in handguns and particularly defensive handguns.

From the same obit (by Massad Ayoob in Backwoods Home), Greg Moats.

Greg had been at the legendary Columbia Conference held at world combat pistol champion Ray Chapman’s Chapman Academy in Columbia, Missouri in 1976 at which the International Practical Shooting Confederation was founded under the leadership of the legendary Jeff Cooper.

And Steven Dodd Hughes, gunsmith, author, and photographer.

I think I actually bought a gun from him about 14 years ago. I remember him being a pretty darn good guy and a pleasure to do business with.

Posted in 1970s, Guns, Movies, Obits, Politics, Smith and Wesson, TV | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: August 4, 2026.

Tuesday, August 4th, 2026

Kay Granger, former Congresswoman from Texas.

Ms. Granger left Washington in 2024, during her final year in the House, and moved into an independent living facility in Fort Worth — an arrangement that her office did not disclose for months.
When a conservative website broke the news in December 2024, Ms. Granger’s son Brandon told The Dallas Morning News that she had been experiencing “dementia issues.” In a statement at the time, Ms. Granger said she had been navigating “unforeseen health challenges that have progressed since September and made travel to D.C. difficult.”
The news caused a stir in Washington, coming as several older members of Congress also faced health issues and the Republican majority in the House was razor-thin.

Monty Roberts, horse trainer. I remember vaguely hearing about him around the time the “Horse Whisperer” was big, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to do an obit watch. Then I read the article:

“You have to give him credit. He was one of the first people to get away from the rough stuff, tying a horse to a pole and sacking it out,” Temple Grandin, the noted animal behaviorist and proponent of the humane treatment of livestock, said. “He was really observant out in the field and got to thinking about what a horse really has to say to you. A lot of people are good at reading horses, but he was a pioneer in telling people there were better ways to train horses.”
And unlike some trainers, she said, he demonstrated his methods.

…

When he was just 7, he showed his father how effective it was to treat a young stallion with kindness to instill trust.
His father, he said, flew into a rage and beat him so severely with a chain that he had to be hospitalized. He vowed never to share his unconventional ideas with his father again. But he remained convinced that there was a better way to work with horses.

…

Among his admirers was Queen Elizabeth II, who had read articles in equestrian magazines about Mr. Roberts’s methods and had longed to find a less violent method for training horses.
In April 1989, she invited Mr. Roberts to visit her and demonstrate his unconventional ideas. She was so impressed that she brought him into her royal equestrian orbit as an adviser, and he became a friend.
“She believed that no one should ever say to any human being or animal, ‘You do what I tell you to do or I’ll hurt you,’” Mr. Roberts told The New York Times in 2022.

Scott Hylands. You know, I’d never actually even heard of “Night Heat”, which surprises me: I thought I had a pretty good knowledge of cop shows. Other credits include “Blue Thunder” (the series), “Today’s F.B.I.”, “Harry O”, and “The Magician”.

For the record: Vincent Pastore, of “The Sopranos” fame. IMDB. You know, I might actually watch “Wu-Tang: An American Saga”, if I can find it.

Posted in Horses, Obits, Politics, TV | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: July 27, 2026.

Monday, July 27th, 2026

Lawrence sent me this a few days ago, but I didn’t have a link I felt like using until now: John C. Dvorak, prominent computer columnist.

I almost want to make an argument that Dvorak was a “troll” in the Internet sense of the word before there was an Internet. I’m not sure I can or want to defend that argument, but people who were around at the height of Mr. Dvorak’s career might remember some of his more trollish moments.

E.J. Peaker, actress. No “Mannix”, but she had a lot of other cop and cop-related credits: “Quincy, M.E.”, “Get Christie Love!”, and “The Streets of San Francisco”, among others.

Zale Parry. She didn’t have a lot of credits beyond “Sea Hunt”, but she was an early scuba pioneer:

In 1953, the couple helped launch Scientific Underwater Research Enterprises, which tested underwater equipment that would be sold to consumers. Two years later, she became the third woman certified as an underwater instructor in Los Angeles County.
Parry said she attempted her record-setting dive in August 1954 “to prepare a technical paper on the subject of nitrogen narcosis since we could not find enough subject matter. We wanted to give a good, true picture of what happens. The event changed my life.
“All it took was three miles off the shores of Avalon, Santa Catalina Island with a slight afternoon chop and a dive to 209 feet to a sandy rippled bottom with a strand of bull kelp and one discarded Schlitz beer can … From there on, the radio, television, newspapers and magazines had agents calling for interviews and fun game shows.”

Posted in 1970s, Media, Obits, TV | 3 Comments »

Obit watch: July 22, 2026.

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2026

Hal Williams, actor. Other credits include “Quincy, M.E.”, “Harry O”, and “Sanford”.

(Did you know they tried to make a sequel to “Sanford and Son” without Lamont? I did not.)

He was 91.

I saw this story earlier today, but didn’t make the connection until Lawrence sent me an obit: Kaylee Hottle. She was 18, and died in a car accident.

I usually try to stay away from the credits in the headline, but her only other credit in IMDB is an episode of the “Magnum, P.I.” remake. (Something called “What Doesn’t Kill Us” is listed in pre-production.)

Posted in 1970s, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: July 11, 2026.

Saturday, July 11th, 2026

Antoinette Bower, actress. Other credits include “The Starlost”, “The F.B.I.”, “Mission: Impossible”…

…and three episodes of “Mannix”. (“Deadfall“, parts 1 and 2, season 1, episodes 17 and 18. She was “Gail Mason”. “Shadow of a Man“, season 2, episode 16. She was “Barbara Sanderson”.)

Randolph Mantooth. NYT

The pair took paramedic classes, where they learned how to insert an IV, and trained with the fire department. Cinader wanted the show to be funny but told his actors that “when the [station alarm sounds], funny is left at the door. You are now a professional,” Mantooth noted. “We never got away from that.”
He added: “We never went home with Johnny Gage, we never went home with Roy DeSoto, we didn’t hear about Johnny Gage’s drunk father beating his mother. Who cared about that? [The show] was about the job.”

While that may be technically correct, there was certainly a lot of discussion of Roy DeSoto’s home life and Johnny Gage’s dating life. Their personal lives were not complete ciphers.

After “Emergency!,” Mr. Mantooth was an advocate for emergency medical workers, speaking at firefighter and paramedic symposiums across the country. He was given an award by the International Association of Fire Chiefs in 2022 honoring his work to promote the profession.

…

He and Tighe had the same agent, shared a motor home during the entire run of their show and became great friends. The series ended, Mantooth said, because his and Tighe’s original seven-year contracts had expired, Tighe didn’t want to continue and Mantooth didn’t want to go on without him.
When Mantooth raced home in 1978 to find his ranch in the Lobo Canyon area of Agoura Hills engulfed in flames, Tighe was already there, trying to get the animals safely off the property. Tighe later served as the best man at Mantooth’s 2002 wedding to actress Kristen Connors.

…

In his TV Academy Foundation interview, Mantooth got emotional talking about how in the ’70s he was saved by paramedics who figured out he had carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a malfunctioning house furnace and how other emergency personnel brought his sister back from the dead after she was injured in a car accident in the ’80s.
“Do I respect paramedics? Do I respect firefighters?” he asked. “There’s a debt I owe them that I probably can’t ever pay back. But I’m gonna try.”

Other credits include “Walker, Texas Ranger”, “Battlestar Galactica” (1979), and “The Bold Ones: The Senator” (the two-part episode “A Continual Roar of Musketry”: as I’ve noted before, Harlan Ellison praised this episode highly in one of the “Glass Teat” essays).

Peter Van Norden, actor. Other credits include “The New Odd Couple”, “Hardcastle and McCormick”, and “Madman of the People”.

Posted in 1970s, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: July 8, 2026.

Wednesday, July 8th, 2026

Louise Lasser.

Other credits include “McCloud”, “Medical Center”, and “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”.

Joby Baker.

When Pearl Harbor was bombed on Dec. 7, 1941, Baker escaped injury in the immediate aftermath when the house he was living in was hit by friendly fire. He and his stepmother quickly left the islands, taking the RMS Aquitania with thousands of other evacuees to San Francisco, he recalled in 2022.

Other credits include “12 O’Clock High” (the series), OG “Dragnet”, “Run, Joe, Run”…

…and “Mannix”. (“The Sound of Darkness“, season 3, episode 10. He was “Rudy Marin”.)

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Obits, TV | 1 Comment »

Obit watch: June 22, 2026.

Monday, June 22nd, 2026

Another one of those “it got busy up in here” obit watches.

James Bradley, author (Flags of Our Fathers).

I haven’t read the book, but the Saturday Movie Group watched the movie. I can’t put it any better than Lawrence did: “I wanted to see a movie about the flag raising, not a movie about a bond drive.”

James Burrows, sitcom guy.

Mark Singer (paywall link: sorry), New Yorker writer. Among his works: the Ricky Jay profle.

Also among his works:

Mr. Singer is also the author of “Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin” (1996), an expanded version of a New Yorker profile of a drug smuggler, murder suspect and media manipulator, that was a finalist for a National Magazine Award; and the collection “Somewhere in America: Under the Radar with Chicken Warriors, Left-Wing Patriots, Angry Nudists and Others” (2004).

Unmentioned in the obit: Brett Kimberlin is the guy who claimed to have sold marijuana to Dan Quayle.

However, Singer “decided that [he] had been lied to repeatedly by Kimberlin.” Singer concluded that Kimberlin “was not telling the truth about Quayle.” In print, Singer said he believed Kimberlin had known someone who had claimed to sell marijuana to Quayle and had then appropriated the story as his own.

Alan Greenspan, former chairman of the Federal Reserve. WP.

Clive Davis, music guy.

Posted in Books, History, Music, TV | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: June 16, 2026.

Tuesday, June 16th, 2026

NYT obit for Jane Yolen. (Previously.)

Anne Schedeen, actress. Credits other than one of the worst shows ever to air on television include “Ironside”, “Lanigan’s Rabbi”, and “The Six Million Dollar Man”.

William Smithers, actor. Other credits include “Quincy, M.E.”, “The Bold Ones: The New Doctors”, the good “Hawaii Five-0”, “The F.B.I.”, a minor SF TV series from the 1960s…

…and “Mannix”. (“Eight to Five, It’s a Miracle”, season 1, episode 21. He was “Salvatore Pucci”.)

Posted in 1970s, Books, Mannix, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: June 13, 2026.

Saturday, June 13th, 2026

Gene Shalit. THR. I realize that there’s a “don’t speak ill of the dead” factor here, but the THR story reads like a hastily and slightly re-written press release from the family.

I do remember liking the guy when I was a young person watching the “Today” show, and I’m impressed he lived to 100.

Posted in 1970s, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: June 11, 2026.

Thursday, June 11th, 2026

Lance Rentzel. He was 82.

Mr. Rentzel started out with the Vikings, but didn’t do that well, mostly due to injuries. He was traded to the Cowboys, and was a solid player. Quoting Wikipedia:

On May 2, 1967, Rentzel was traded to the Dallas Cowboys in exchange for a third-round draft choice (#76-Mike McGill). Rentzel was converted into a flanker, where he became not only an immediate starter over Pete Gent but also one of the best wideouts in the NFL. Rentzel led the team in receptions with 58 for 996 yards (two yards less than Bob Hayes). If Rentzel had gotten four more yards and Hayes two more, it would have been the first time in NFL history that a team had two 1,000-yard wide receivers. In the tenth game of the season against the Washington Redskins, Rentzel had 13 receptions for 233 yards. His 13 receptions set a franchise record and stood for 40 years until it was broken by Jason Witten in 2007. The 233 yards were good enough for third on the team at the time (now sixth). Rentzel also starred in the 1967 NFL Championship, known since as the “Ice Bowl”, scoring a fourth-quarter, go-ahead touchdown later negated by the Green Bay Packers’ game-clinching drive.

He was on top of the world. He married Joey Heatherton in 1969. But he had a problem.

In 1966, he exposed himself to two young girls in St. Paul. That incident didn’t get a lot of attention, and he pled down to “disorderly conduct”. But in 1970, he exposed himself to a 10-year old girl in University Park, Texas. That got more attention: Ms. Heatherton divorced him, and he was traded to the LA Rams. He was less successful there, and was suspended at the start of the 1973 season after being convicted of possession of marijuana. (He was still on probation for the indecent exposure charge.)

He also wrote a book, When All the Laughter Died in Sorrow, which I have in a box somewhere but haven’t read.

“Doctor Who”.

The British broadcaster has canceled a Christmas special previously announced for later this year, and showrunner Russell T. Davies has confirmed his exit.

There were rumors a few weeks ago that the Christmas special was going to be cancelled, as the BBC and showrunners couldn’t find anybody who was willing to play “Doctor Who”.

Posted in NFL, Obits, Sports, TV | Comments Closed

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