LOS ANGELES — Burt Young, the Oscar-nominated actor who played Paulie, the rough-hewn, mumbling-and-grumbling best friend, corner-man and brother-in-law to Sylvester Stallone in the “Rocky” franchise, has died.

Young died Oct. 8 in Los Angeles, his daughter, Anne Morea Steingieser, told the New York Times on Wednesday. No cause was given. He was 83.

FILE – Burt Young, a cast member of the film “Rocky Balboa,” gestures at the premiere of the film in Los Angeles, Dec. 13, 2006. 

Young had roles in acclaimed films and television shows including “Chinatown,” “Once Upon a Time in America” and “The Sopranos.”

But he was always best known for playing Paulie Pennino in six “Rocky” movies. The short, paunchy, balding Young was the sort of actor who always seemed to play middle-aged no matter his age.

When Paulie first appears in 1976’s “Rocky,” he’s an angry, foul-mouthed meat packer who is abusive to his sister Adrian (Talia Shire), with whom he shares a small apartment in Philadelphia. He berates the shy, meek Adrian for refusing at first to go on a Thanksgiving-night date with his buddy and co-worker Rocky Balboa, and destroys a turkey she has in the oven.

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The film became a phenomenon, topping the box office for the year and making a star of lead actor and writer Stallone, who paid tribute to Young on Instagram on Wednesday night.

Along with a photo of the two of them on the set of the first film, Stallone wrote “you were an incredible man and artist, I and the World will miss you very much.”

“Rocky” was nominated for 10 Oscars, including best supporting actor for Young. It won three, including best picture. Young and co-star Burgess Meredith, who was also nominated, lost to Jason Robards in “All the President’s Men.”

As the movies went on, Young’s Paulie softened, as the sequels themselves did, and he became their comic relief. In 1985’s “Rocky IV” he reprograms a robot Rocky gives him into a sexy-voiced servant who dotes on him.

Paulie was also an eternal pessimist who was constantly convinced that Rocky was going to get clobbered by his increasingly daunting opponents. His surprise at Rocky’s resilience brought big laughs.

“It was a great ride, and it brought me to the audience in a great way,” Young said in a 2020 interview with Celebrity Parents magazine. “I made him a rough guy with a sensitivity. He’s really a marshmallow even though he yells a lot.”

FILE – Sylvester Stallone, left, mugs with “Rocky” co-star Burt Young before a screening of the 1976 film to celebrate its 20th anniversary, Nov. 15, 1996, in Beverly Hills, Calif. 

Born and raised in Queens, New York, Young served in the Marine Corps, fought as a professional boxer and worked as a carpet layer before taking up acting, studying with legendary teacher Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio.

On stage, in films and on television, he typically played small-time tough guys or down-on-their luck working class men.

In a short-but-memorable scene in 1974’s “Chinatown,” he plays a fisherman who throws a fit when Jack Nicholson’s private detective Jake Gittes shows him pictures proving his wife is cheating on him.

Young also appeared in director Sergio Leone’s 1984 gangster epic “Once Upon a Time in America” with Robert De Niro, the 1986 comedy “Back to School” with Rodney Dangerfield, and the 1989 gritty drama “Last Exit to Brooklyn” with Jennifer Jason Leigh.

In a striking appearance in season three of “The Sopranos” in 2001, he plays Bobby Baccalieri, Sr., an elderly mafioso with lung cancer who pulls off one last hit before a coughing fit leads to him dying in a car accident.

He guest-starred on many other TV series including “M*A*S*H,” “Miami Vice” and “The Equalizer.”

Later in life he focused on roles in the theater and on painting, a lifelong pursuit that led to gallery shows and sales.

His wife of 13 years, Gloria, died in 1974.

Along with his daughter, Young is survived by one grandchild and a brother, Robert.

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Jimmy Buffett

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AP file, 2010

Tina Turner

Tina Turner, the unstoppable singer and stage performer who teamed with husband Ike Turner for a dynamic run of hit records and live shows in the 1960s and ’70s and survived her horrifying marriage to triumph in middle age with the chart-topping “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” died May 24, 2023, at 83. Few stars traveled so far — she was born Anna Mae Bullock in a segregated Tennessee hospital and spent her latter years on a 260,000 square foot estate on Lake Zurich — and overcame so much. Her trademarks included a growling contralto that might smolder or explode, her bold smile and strong cheekbones, her palette of wigs and the muscular, quick-stepping legs she did not shy from showing off. She sold more than 150 million records worldwide, won 12 Grammys, was voted along with Ike into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991 (and on her own in 2021 ) and was honored at the Kennedy Center in 2005. Her life became the basis for a film, a Broadway musical and an HBO documentary in 2021 that she called her public farewell.

AP file, 2009

Tony Bennett

Tony Bennett, the eminent and timeless stylist whose devotion to classic American songs and knack for creating new standards such as “I Left My Heart In San Francisco” graced a decadeslong career that brought him admirers from Frank Sinatra to Lady Gaga, died July 21, 2023. He was 96, just two weeks short of his birthday. The last of the great saloon singers of the mid-20th century, Bennett often said his lifelong ambition was to create “a hit catalog rather than hit records.” He released more than 70 albums, bringing him 19 competitive Grammys — all but two after he reached his 60s — and enjoyed deep and lasting affection from fans and fellow artists.

AP file, 2006

Bob Barker

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AP file, 2007

Raquel Welch

Raquel Welch, whose emergence from the sea in a skimpy, furry bikini in the film “One Million Years B.C.” would propel her to international sex symbol status throughout the 1960s and ’70s, died Feb. 15, 2023. She was 82. Welch’s breakthrough came in 1966’s campy prehistoric flick “One Million Years B.C.,” despite having a grand total of three lines. Clad in a brown doeskin bikini, she successfully evaded pterodactyls but not the notice of the public.

AP file, 1982

Lisa Marie Presley

Lisa Marie Presley, the only child of Elvis Presley and a singer-songwriter dedicated to her father’s legacy, died Jan. 12, 2023. She was 54. Presley shared her father’s brooding charisma — the hooded eyes, the insolent smile, the low, sultry voice — and followed him professionally, releasing her own rock albums in the 2000s.

AP file, 2012

Jim Brown

Pro Football Hall of Famer Jim Brown, the unstoppable running back who retired at the peak of his brilliant career to become an actor as well as a prominent civil rights advocate during the 1960s, died May 18, 2023. He was 87. One of the greatest players in football history and one of the game’s first superstars, Brown was chosen the NFL’s Most Valuable Player in 1965 and shattered the league’s record books in a short career spanning 1957-65. Brown led the Cleveland Browns to their last NFL title in 1964 before retiring in his prime after the ’65 season to become an actor. He appeared in more than 30 films, including “Any Given Sunday” and “The Dirty Dozen.” When he finished playing, Brown became a prominent leader in the Black power movement during the civil rights struggles of the 1960s.

AP file, 1965

Harry Belafonte

Harry Belafonte, the civil rights and entertainment giant who began as a groundbreaking actor and singer and became an activist, humanitarian and conscience of the world, died April 25, 2023. He was 96. With his glowing, handsome face and silky-husky voice, Belafonte was one of the first Black performers to gain a wide following on film and to sell a million records as a singer; many still know him for his signature hit “Banana Boat Song (Day-O),” and its call of “Day-O! Daaaaay-O.” But he forged a greater legacy once he scaled back his performing career in the 1960s and lived out his hero Paul Robeson’s decree that artists are “gatekeepers of truth.”

AP file, 2011

Sinéad O’Connor

Sinéad O’Connor, the gifted Irish singer-songwriter who became a superstar in her mid-20s and was known as much for her private struggles and provocative actions as for her fierce and expressive music, died July 26, 2023, at age 56. Recognizable by her shaved head and with a multi-octave mezzo soprano of extraordinary emotional range, O’Connor began her career singing on the streets of Dublin and soon rose to international fame. She was a star from her 1987 debut album, “The Lion and the Cobra,” and became a sensation in 1990 with her cover of Prince’s ballad “Nothing Compares 2 U,” a seething, shattering performance that topped charts from Europe to Australia and was heightened by a promotional video featuring the gray-eyed O’Connor in intense close-up.

AP file, 2014

David Crosby

David Crosby, the brash rock musician who evolved from a baby-faced harmony singer with the Byrds to a mustachioed hippie superstar and an ongoing troubadour in Crosby, Stills, Nash & (sometimes) Young, died Jan. 18, 2023, at age 81. While he only wrote a handful of widely known songs, the witty and ever opinionated Crosby was on the front lines of the cultural revolution of the ’60s and ’70s — whether triumphing with Stephen Stills, Graham Nash and Neil Young on stage at Woodstock, testifying on behalf of a hirsute generation in his anthem “Almost Cut My Hair” or mourning the assassination of Robert Kennedy in “Long Time Gone.”

AP file, 2017

Paul Reubens

Paul Reubens, the actor and comedian whose character Pee-wee Herman became a cultural phenomenon through films and TV shows, died July 30, 2023, at age 70. Reubens died after a six-year struggle with cancer that he did not make public, his publicist said in a statement.

AP file, 2009

Lance Reddick

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AP file, 2013

Richard Belzer

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AP file, 2013

Mark Margolis

Mark Margolis, who had a breakout role as a mobster in “Scarface” but became best known decades later for his indelible, fearsome portrayal of a vindictive former drug kingpin in TV’s “Breaking Bad,” died Aug. 3, 2023. He was 83. Margolis was nominated for an Emmy in 2012 for outstanding guest actor in “Breaking Bad” as Hector “Tio” Salamanca, the murderous elderly don who was unable to speak following a stroke. But this actor did not need dialogue; he communicated via facial expressions and the sometimes menacing use of a barhop bell taped to his wheelchair.

AP file, 2014

Angus Cloud

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AP file, 2019

Clarence Avant

Clarence Avant, the judicious manager, entrepreneur, facilitator and adviser who helped launch or guide the careers of Quincy Jones, Bill Withers and many others and came to be known as the “Black Godfather” of music and beyond, died Aug. 13, 2023. He was 92.

AP file, 2019

Cindy Williams

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AP file, 2012

Alan Arkin

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AP file, 2011

Gordon Lightfoot

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AP file, 2012

Jeff Beck

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AP file, 2010

Bobby Caldwell

Bobby Caldwell, a soulful R&B singer and songwriter who had a major hit in 1978 with “What You Won’t Do for Love” and a voice and musical style adored by generations of his fellow artists, died March 14, 2023. He was 71. The smooth soul jam “What You Won’t Do for Love” went to No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 6 on what was then called the Hot Selling Soul Singles chart. It became a long-term standard and career-defining hit for Caldwell, who also wrote the song.

AP file, 2013

Gary Rossington

Gary Rossington, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s last surviving original member who also helped to found the group, died March 5, 2023, at age 71. According to Rolling Stone, it was during a fateful Little League game, Ronnie Van Zant hit a line drive into the shoulder blades of opposing player Bob Burns and met his future bandmates. Rossington, Burns, Van Zant, and guitarist Allen Collins gathered that afternoon at Burns’ Jacksonville home to jam the Rolling Stone’s “Time Is on My Side.”

AP file, 2017

Wayne Shorter

Wayne Shorter, an influential jazz innovator whose lyrical, complex jazz compositions and pioneering saxophone playing sounded through more than half a century of American music, died March 2, 2023. He was 89.

AP file, 2013

Jerry Springer

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AP file, 2010

Jacklyn Zeman

Jacklyn Zeman, who became one of the most recognizable actors on daytime television during 45 years of playing nurse Bobbie Spencer on ABC’s “General Hospital,” died May 10, 2023. She was 70. Zeman joined “General Hospital” in 1977 as Barbara Jean, who went by Bobbie, and was the feisty younger sister of Anthony Geary’s Luke Spencer.

AP file, 2016

John Beasley

John Beasley, the veteran character actor who played a kindly school bus driver on the TV drama “Everwood” and appeared in dozens of films dating back to the 1980s, died May 30, 2023. He was 79. Beasley played an assistant coach in the 1993 football film “Rudy” and a retired preacher in 1997’s “The Apostle,” co-starring and directed by Robert Duvall.

AP file, 2017

Michael Lerner

Michael Lerner, the Brooklyn-born character actor who played a myriad of imposing figures in his 60 years in the business, including monologuing movie mogul Jack Lipnick in “Barton Fink,” the crooked club owner Bugsy Calhoun in “Harlem Nights” and an angry publishing executive in “Elf” died April 8, 2023. He was 81.

AP file, 2012

Tom Sizemore

Tom Sizemore, the “Saving Private Ryan” actor whose bright 1990s star burned out under the weight of his own domestic violence and drug convictions, died March3, 2023, at age 61. Sizemore became a star with acclaimed appearances in “Natural Born Killers” and the cult-classic crime thriller “Heat.”

AP file, 2013

Charles Kimbrough

Charles Kimbrough, a Tony- and Emmy-nominated actor who played a straight-laced news anchor opposite Candice Bergen on “Murphy Brown,” died Jan. 11, 2023. He was 86. Kimbrough played newsman Jim Dial across the 10 seasons of CBS hit sitcom “Murphy Brown” between 1988 and 1998, earning an Emmy nomination in 1990 for outstanding supporting actor in a comedy series. He reprised the role for three episodes in the 2018 reboot.

AP file, 2008

Julian Sands

Actor Julian Sands, who starred in several Oscar-nominated films in the late 1980s and ’90s including “A Room With a View” and “Leaving Las Vegas,” was found dead on a Southern California mountain in June 2023, five months after he disappeared while hiking. He was 65. Sands, who was born, raised and began acting in England, worked constantly in film and television, amassing more than 150 credits in a 40-year career. During a 10-year span from 1985 to 1995, he played major roles in a series of acclaimed films.

AP file, 2019

Cynthia Weil

Cynthia Weil, a Grammy-winning lyricist of notable range and endurance who enjoyed a decades-long partnership with husband Barry Mann and helped write “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” “On Broadway,” “Walking in the Rain” and dozens of other hits, died June 1, 2023, at age 82.

AP file, 2010

Sheldon Harnick

Tony- and Grammy Award-winning lyricist Sheldon Harnick, who with composer Jerry Bock made up the premier musical-theater songwriting duos of the 1950s and 1960s with shows such as “Fiddler on the Roof,” “Fiorello!” and “The Apple Tree,” died June 23, 2023. He was 99.

AP file, 2016

Barrett Strong

Barrett Strong, one of Motown’s founding artists and most gifted songwriters who sang lead on the company’s breakthrough single “Money (That’s What I Want)” and later collaborated with Norman Whitfield on such classics as “I Heard It Through the Grapevine,” “War” and “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone,” died Jan. 29, 2023. He was 81. 

AP file, 2004

Willis Reed

Willis Reed, who dramatically emerged from the locker room minutes before Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals to spark the New York Knicks to their first championship and create one of sports’ most enduring examples of playing through pain, died March 21, 2023. He was 80.

AP file, 1970

Tim McCarver

Tim McCarver, the All-Star catcher and Hall of Fame broadcaster who during 60 years in baseball won two World Series titles with the St. Louis Cardinals and had a long run as one of the country’s most recognized, incisive and talkative television commentators, died Feb. 16, 2023. He was 81.

AP file, 2003

Billy Packer

Billy Packer (left), an Emmy award-winning college basketball broadcaster who covered 34 Final Fours for NBC and CBS, died Jan. 26, 2023. He was 82. Packer’s broadcasting career coincided with the growth of college basketball. He worked as analyst or color commentator on every Final Four from 1975 to 2008. He received a Sports Emmy for Outstanding Sports Personality, Studio and Sports Analyst in 1993. 

AP file, 2006

The Iron Sheik

The Iron Sheik, a former pro wrestler who relished playing a burly, bombastic villain in 1980s battles with some of the sport’s biggest stars and later became a popular Twitter personality, died June 7, 2023. He was 81. During his pro wrestling career, he donned curled boots and used the “Camel Clutch” as his finishing move during individual and tag team clashes in which he played the role of an anti-American heel for the WWF, which later became the WWE.

AP file, 2009

Treat Williams

Actor Treat Williams, whose nearly 50-year career included starring roles in the TV series “Everwood” and the movie “Hair,” died June 12, 2023, after a motorcycle crash in Vermont. He was 71. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for his role as hippie leader George Berger in the 1979 movie version of the hit musical “Hair.”

AP file, 2018

Bill Richardson

Bill Richardson, a two-term Democratic governor of New Mexico and an American ambassador to the United Nations who dedicated his post-political career to working to secure the release of Americans detained by foreign adversaries, died Sept. 2, 2023. He was 75.

AP file, 2021

Daniel Ellsberg

Daniel Ellsberg, the history-making whistleblower who by leaking the Pentagon Papers revealed longtime government doubts and deceit about the Vietnam War and inspired acts of retaliation by President Richard Nixon that helped lead to his resignation, died June 16, 2023. He was 92.

AP file, 1973

Pat Robertson

Pat Robertson, a religious broadcaster who turned a tiny Virginia station into the global Christian Broadcasting Network, tried a run for president and helped make religion central to Republican Party politics in America through his Christian Coalition, died June 8, 2023. He was 93.

AP file, 2015

Robert Blake

Robert Blake, the Emmy award-winning performer who went from acclaim for his acting to notoriety when he was tried and acquitted in the killing of his wife, died March 9, 2023, at age 89. Blake, star of the 1970s TV show, “Baretta,” never recovered from the long ordeal which began with the shooting death of his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley, outside a Studio City restaurant on May 4, 2001. The story of their strange marriage, the child it produced and its violent end was a Hollywood tragedy played out in court. Blake portrayed real-life murderer Perry Smith in the movie of Truman Capote’s true crime best seller “In Cold Blood.”

AP file, 1977

Ted Kaczynski

Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski, the Harvard-educated mathematician who retreated to a dingy shack in the Montana wilderness and ran a 17-year bombing campaign that killed three people and injured 23 others, died June 10, 2023. He was 81. Branded the “Unabomber” by the FBI, Kaczynski died by suicide at the federal prison medical center in Butner, North Carolina.

AP file, 1996

Lloyd Morrisett

Lloyd Morrisett, the co-creator of the beloved children’s education TV series “Sesame Street,” which uses empathy and fuzzy monsters like Abby Cadabby, Elmo and Cookie Monster to charm and teach generations around the world, died Jan. 15, 2023. He was 93. 

AP file, 2019

Chaim Topol

Chaim Topol, a leading Israeli actor who charmed generations of theatergoers and movie-watchers with his portrayal of Tevye, the long-suffering and charismatic milkman in “Fiddler on the Roof,” died March 8, 2023, at age 87. A recipient of two Golden Globe awards and nominee for both an Academy Award and a Tony Award, Topol long has ranked among Israel’s most decorated actors.

AP file, 2015

Len Goodman

Len Goodman, a long-serving judge on “Dancing with the Stars” and “Strictly Come Dancing” who helped revive interest in ballroom dancing on both sides of the Atlantic, died April 22, 2023. He was 78.

AP file, 2007

Burt Bacharach

Burt Bacharach, the singularly gifted and popular composer who delighted millions with the quirky arrangements and unforgettable melodies of “Walk on By,” “Do You Know the Way to San Jose” and dozens of other hits, died Feb. 8, 2023. The Grammy, Oscar and Tony-winning composer was 94. Over the past 70 years, only Lennon-McCartney, Carole King and a handful of others rivaled his genius for instantly catchy songs that remained performed, played and hummed long after they were written. He had a run of top 10 hits from the 1950s into the 21st century, and his music was heard everywhere from movie soundtracks and radios to home stereo systems and iPods, whether “Alfie” and “I Say a Little Prayer” or “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again” and “This Guy’s in Love with You.”

AP file, 1979

Stella Stevens

Stella Stevens, a prominent leading lady in 1960s and 70s comedies perhaps best known for playing the object of Jerry Lewis’s affection in “The Nutty Professor,” died Feb. 17, 2023. She was 84. She was a prolific actor in television and film up through the 1990s, officially retiring in 2010.

AP file, 1968

Barry Humphries

Tony Award-winning comedian Barry Humphries, internationally renowned for his garish stage persona Dame Edna Everage, a condescending and imperfectly-veiled snob whose evolving character has delighted audiences over seven decades, died April 22, 2023. He was 89.

AP file, 2013

Annie Wersching

Actor Annie Wersching, best known for playing FBI agent Renee Walker in the series “24″ and providing the voice for Tess in the video game “The Last of Us,” died Jan. 29, 2023. She was 45. Her first credit was in “Star Trek: Enterprise,” and she would go on to have recurring roles in the seventh and eighth seasons of “24,” “Bosch,” “The Vampire Diaries,” Marvel’s “Runaways,” “The Rookie” and, most recently, the second season of “Star Trek: Picard” as the Borg Queen. 

AP file, 2010

Dave Hollis

Dave Hollis, who left his post as a Disney executive to help his wife run a successful lifestyle empire, died Feb. 12, 2023. He was 47. Hollis worked for Disney for 17 years and had been head of distribution for the company for seven years when he left in 2018 to join his wife’s venture. The parents of four moved from Los Angeles to the Austin area, collaborated on livestreams, podcasts and organized life-affirming conferences. In their podcast, “Rise Together,” they focused on marriage.

AP file, 2015

Christine King Farris

Christine King Farris, the last living sibling of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., died June 29, 2023. She was 95. For decades after her brother’s assassination in 1968, Farris worked along with his widow, Coretta Scott King, to preserve and promote his legacy. But unlike her high-profile sister-in-law, Farris’ activism — and grief — was often behind the scenes.

AP file, 2015

David Jude Jolicoeur

David Jude Jolicoeur, known widely as Trugoy the Dove and one of the founding members of the Long Island hip-hop trio De La Soul, died Feb. 12, 2023. He was 54. De La Soul’s debut studio album “3 Feet High and Rising,” produced by Prince Paul, was released in 1989 by Tommy Boy Records and praised for being a more light-hearted and positive counterpart to more charged rap offerings. De La Soul signaled the beginning of alternative hip-hop. 

AP file, 2015

Robbie Knievel

Robbie Knievel, an American stunt performer who set records with daredevil motorcycle jumps following the tire tracks of his thrill-seeking father — including at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas in 1989 and a Grand Canyon chasm a decade later — died Jan. 13, 2023. He was 60.

AP file, 2000

Gina Lollobrigida

Italian film legend Gina Lollobrigida, who achieved international stardom during the 1950s and was dubbed “the most beautiful woman in the world” after the title of one of her movies, died Jan. 16, 2023. She was 95. Besides “The World’s Most Beautiful Woman” in 1955, career highlights included Golden Globe-winner “Come September,” with Rock Hudson; “Trapeze;” “Beat the Devil,” a 1953 John Huston film starring Humphrey Bogart and Jennifer Jones; and “Buona Sera, Mrs. Campbell.”

AP file, 1950s

Lynette Hardaway (“Diamond”)

Lynette Hardaway, an ardent supporter of former President Donald Trump and one half of the conservative political commentary duo Diamond and Silk, died Jan. 9, 2023. She was 51. Hardaway (pictured at left), known by the moniker “Diamond,” carved out a unique role as a Black woman who loudly backed Trump and right-wing policies.

AP file, 2018

Adam Rich

Adam Rich, the child actor with a pageboy mop-top who charmed TV audiences as “America’s little brother” on “Eight is Enough,” died Jan. 7, 2023. He was 54. Rich had a limited acting career after starring at age 8 as Nicholas Bradford, the youngest of eight children, on the ABC hit dramedy that ran from from 1977 to 1981.

AP file, 2002

Bobby Hull

Hall of Fame forward Bobby Hull, who helped the Chicago Blackhawks win the 1961 Stanley Cup Final, has died. Hull was 84. The two-time MVP was one of the most prolific scorers in NHL history, leading the league in goals seven times. Nicknamed “The Golden Jet” for his speed and blond hair, he posted 13 consecutive seasons with 30 goals or more from 1959-72.

AP file, 2019

Charles White

Charles White, the Southern California tailback who won the Heisman Trophy in 1979, died Jan. 11, 2023. He was 64. A two-time All-American and Los Angeles native, White won a national title in 1978 before claiming the Heisman in the following season, when he captained the Trojans and led the nation in yards rushing.

AP file, 1979

Robbie Robertson

Robbie Robertson, The Band’s lead guitarist and songwriter who in such classics as “The Weight” and “Up on Cripple Creek” mined American music and folklore and helped reshape contemporary rock, died Aug. 9, 2023, at 80. The Canadian-born Robertson was a high school dropout and one-man melting pot — part-Jewish, part-Mohawk and Cayuga — who fell in love with the seemingly limitless sounds and byways of his adopted country and wrote out of a sense of amazement and discovery at a time when the Vietnam War had alienated millions of young Americans.

AP file, 2015

Samuel “Joe” Wurzelbacher

Samuel “Joe” Wurzelbacher, who was thrust into the political spotlight as “Joe the Plumber” after questioning Barack Obama about his economic proposals during the 2008 presidential campaign, and who later forayed into politics himself, died Aug. 27, 2023. He was 49.

AP file, 2008

Mohamed Al Fayed

Mohamed Al Fayed, the flamboyant Egypt-born businessman whose son was killed in a car crash with Princess Diana, died Aug. 30, 2023. He was 94. Al Fayed, the longtime owner of Harrods department store and the Fulham Football Club, was devastated by the death of son Dodi Fayed in the car crash in Paris with Diana 26 years ago. He spent years mourning the loss and fighting the British establishment he blamed for their deaths.

AP file, 2016

Jerry Richardson

Jerry Richardson, the Carolina Panthers founder and for years one of the NFL’s most influential owners until a scandal forced him to sell the team, died March 1, 2023. He was 86.

AP file, 2013

Sister André

Lucile Randon, a French nun known as Sister André and believed to be the world’s oldest person, died Jan. 17, 2023, at age 118. She was born in the town of Ales, southern France, on Feb. 11, 1904. She was also one of the world’s oldest survivors of COVID-19.

AP file, 2022

Tatjana Patitz

Tatjana Patitz, one of an elite group of famed supermodels who graced magazine covers in the 1980s and ’90s and appeared in George Michael’s “Freedom! ’90” music video, died at age 56.

AP file, 2006

Russell Banks

Russell Banks, an award-winning fiction writer who rooted such novels as “Affliction” and “The Sweet Hereafter” in the wintry, rural communities of his native Northeast and imagined the dreams and downfalls of everyone from modern blue-collar workers to the radical abolitionist John Brown in “Cloudsplitter,” died Jan. 7, 2023. He was 82.

AP file, 2004

Cardinal George Pell

Cardinal George Pell, a onetime financial adviser to Pope Francis who spent 404 days in solitary confinement in his native Australia on child sex abuse charges before his convictions were overturned, died Jan. 10, 2023. He was 81.

AP file, 2018

Ken Block

Ken Block, a motorsports icon known for his stunt driving and for co-founding the action sports apparel brand DC Shoes, died Jan. 2, 2023, in a snowmobiling accident near his home in Utah. Block rose to fame as a rally car driver and in 2005 was awarded Rally America’s Rookie of the Year honors.

AP file, 2013

Walter Cunningham

Walter Cunningham, the last surviving astronaut from the first successful crewed space mission in NASA’s Apollo program, died Jan. 3, 2023. He was 90. Cunningham was one of three astronauts aboard the 1968 Apollo 7 mission, an 11-day spaceflight that beamed live television broadcasts as they orbited Earth, paving the way for the moon landing less than a year later.

AP file, 2014

Anton Walkes

Professional soccer player Anton Walkes died Jan. 18, 2023, from injuries he sustained in a boat crash off the coast of Miami. He was 25. Walkes began his career with English Premier League club Tottenham and also played for Portsmouth before signing with Atlanta United in MLS. He joined Charlotte for the club’s debut MLS season in 2022.

AP file, 2017

Pat Schroeder

Former U.S. Rep. Pat Schroeder, a pioneer for women’s and family rights in Congress, died March 13, 2023. She was 82. Schroeder took on the powerful elite with her rapier wit and antics for 24 years, shaking up stodgy government institutions by forcing them to acknowledge that women had a role in government. She was elected to Congress in Colorado in 1972 and won easy reelection 11 times from her safe district in Denver.

AP file, 1999

Seymour Stein

Seymour Stein, the brash, prescient and highly successful founder of Sire Records who helped launched the careers of Madonna, Talking Heads and many others, died April 2, 2023, at age 80. Stein helped found the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation and was himself inducted into the Rock Hall in 2005.

AP file, 2005

Klaus Teuber

Klaus Teuber, creator of the hugely popular Catan board game in which players compete to build settlements on a fictional island, died April 1, 2023. He was 70. The board game, originally called The Settlers of Catan when introduced in 1995 and based on a set of hexagonal tiles, has sold tens of millions of copies and is available in more than 40 languages.

AP file, 1995

Ginnie Newhart

Ginnie Newhart, who was married to comedy legend Bob Newhart for six decades and inspired the classic ending of his “Newhart” series, died April 23, 2023. She was 82.

AP file, 1985

Vida Blue

Vida Blue, a hard-throwing left-hander who became one of baseball’s biggest draws in the early 1970s and helped lead the brash A’s to three straight World Series titles before his career was derailed by drug problems, died May 6, 2023. He was 73.

AP file, 1976

Martin Amis

British novelist Martin Amis, who brought a rock ‘n’ roll sensibility to his stories and lifestyle, died May 20, 2023. He was 73. Amis was a leading voice among a generation of writers that included his good friend, the late Christopher Hitchens, Ian McEwan and Salman Rushdie. Among his best-known works were “Money,” a satire about consumerism in London, “The Information” and “London Fields,” along with his 2000 memoir, “Experience.”

AP file, 2012

Doyle Brunson

Doyle Brunson, one of the most influential poker players of all time and a two-time world champion, died May 14, 2023. He was 89. Brunson, called the Godfather of Poker and also known as “Texas Dolly,” won 10 World Series of Poker tournaments — second only to Phil Hellmuth’s 16. He also captured world championships in 1976 and 1977 and was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame in 1988.

AP file, 2011

Hodding Carter III

Hodding Carter III, a Mississippi journalist and civil rights activist who as U.S. State Department spokesman informed Americans about the Iran hostage crisis and later won awards for his televised documentaries, died May 11, 2023. He was 88.

AP file, 2003

Ray Stevenson

Ray Stevenson, who played the villainous British governor in “RRR,” an Asgardian warrior in the “Thor” films, and a member of the 13th Legion in HBO’s “Rome,” died May 21, 2023. He was 58. He made his film debut in Paul Greengrass’s 1998 film “The Theory of Flight.” In 2004, he appeared in Antoine Fuqua’s “King Arthur” as a knight of the round table and several years later played the lead in the pre-Disney Marvel adaptation “Punisher: War Zone.” Though “Punisher” was not the best-reviewed film, he’d get another taste of Marvel in the first three “Thor” films, in which he played Volstagg. Other prominent film roles included the “Divergent” trilogy, “G.I. Joe: Retaliation” and “The Transporter: Refueled.”

AP file, 2017

Astrud Gilberto

Astrud Gilberto, the Brazilian singer, songwriter and entertainer whose off-hand, English-language cameo on “The Girl from Ipanema” made her a worldwide voice of bossa nova, died June 5, 2023, at age 83.

AP file, 1981

Tori Bowie

U.S. Olympic champion sprinter Tori Bowie died May 2, 2023, from complications of childbirth, according to an autopsy report. At the 2016 Rio Olympics, Bowie won silver in the 100 and bronze in the 200. She then ran the anchor leg on a 4×100 team with Tianna Bartoletta, Allyson Felix and English Gardner to take gold.

AP file, 2017

Silvio Berlusconi

Silvio Berlusconi, the boastful billionaire media mogul who was Italy’s longest-serving premier despite scandals over his sex-fueled parties and allegations of corruption, died June 12, 2023. He was 86. A onetime cruise ship crooner, Berlusconi used his television networks and immense wealth to launch his long political career, inspiring both loyalty and loathing.

AP file, 2021

John Goodenough

John Goodenough, who shared the 2019 Nobel Prize in chemistry for his work developing the lithium-ion battery that transformed technology with rechargeable power for devices ranging from cellphones, computers, and pacemakers to electric cars, died June 25, 2023, at age 100.

AP file, 2019

Coco Lee

Coco Lee, a Hong Kong-born singer and songwriter who had a highly successful career in Asia, has died by suicide July 5, 2023. She was 48. She was the first Chinese singer to break into the American market, and her English song “Do You Want My Love” charted at #4 on Billboard’s Hot Dance Breakouts chart in December 1999.

If you or someone you know exhibits warning signs of suicide, call 1-800-273-TALK, text 741741 or visit suicidepreventionlifeline.org.

AP file, 2005

Jane Birkin

Actor and singer Jane Birkin, who made France her home and charmed the country with her English grace, natural style and social activism, died July 16, 2023, at age 76. The London-born star and fashion icon was known for her musical and romantic relationship with French singer Serge Gainsbourg. Their songs notably included the steamy “Je t’aime moi non plus” (“I Love You, Me Neither”). Birkin’s ethereal, British-accented singing voice interlaced with his gruff baritone in the 1969 duet that helped make her famous and was forbidden in Italy after being denounced in the Vatican newspaper.

AP file, 2021

Steve Harwell

Steve Harwell, the longtime frontman of the Grammy-nominated pop rock band Smash Mouth died Sept. 4, 2023. He was 56. Smash Mouth was known for hits including “All Star” and “Then The Morning Comes.”

AP file, 2008

Michael McGrath

Michael McGrath, a Broadway character actor who shined in zany, feel-good musicals and won a Tony Award for “Nice Work If You Can Get It,” died Sept. 14, 2023. He was 65. McGrath was in over a dozen Broadway shows including “Plaza Suite,” “She Loves Me,” “Tootsie” and “Spamalot” as well as on television as the sidekick to Martin Short on “The Martin Short Show.”

AP file, 2012

Fernando Botero

Renowned Colombian painter and sculptor Fernando Botero, whose depictions of people and objects in plump, exaggerated forms became emblems of Colombian art around the world, died Sept. 15, 2023. He was 91.

AP file, 2013

David McCallum

Actor David McCallum, who became a teen heartthrob in the hit series “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.” in the 1960s and was the eccentric medical examiner in the popular “NCIS” 40 years later, died Sept. 25, 2023. He was 90. McCallum’s work with “U.N.C.L.E.” brought him two Emmy nominations, and he got a third as an educator struggling with alcoholism in a 1969 Hallmark Hall of Fame drama called “Teacher, Teacher.” McCallum returned to television in 2003 in another series with an agency known by its initials — CBS’ “NCIS.”

AP file, 1975

Brooks Robinson

Hall of Fame third baseman Brooks Robinson, whose deft glovework and folksy manner made him one of the most beloved and accomplished athletes in Baltimore history, died Sept. 26, 2023. He was 86. Coming of age before the free agent era, Robinson spent his entire 23-year career with the Orioles. He almost single-handedly helped Baltimore defeat Cincinnati in the 1970 World Series and homered in Game 1 of the Orioles’ 1966 sweep of the Los Angeles Dodgers for their first crown. Robinson participated in 18 All-Star Games, won 16 consecutive Gold Gloves and earned the 1964 AL Most Valuable Player award after batting .318 with 28 home runs and a league-leading 118 RBIs.

AP file, 2007

Michael Gambon

Veteran actor Michael Gambon, who was known to many for his portrayal of Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore in six of the eight “Harry Potter” films, died Sept. 28, 2023. He was 82. No matter what role he took on in a career that lasted more than five decades, Gambon was always instantly recognizable by the deep and drawling tones of his voice. He was cast as the much-loved Dumbledore after the death of his predecessor, Richard Harris, in 2002.

AP file, 2011

Dianne Feinstein

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California, a centrist Democrat and champion of liberal causes who was elected to the Senate in 1992 and broke gender barriers throughout her long career in local and national politics, died Sept. 29, 2023. She was 90. Feinstein, the oldest sitting U.S. senator, was a passionate advocate for liberal priorities important to her state — including environmental protection, reproductive rights and gun control — but was also known as a pragmatic lawmaker who reached out to Republicans and sought middle ground.

AP file, 2011

Dick Butkus

Dick Butkus, a middle linebacker for the Chicago Bears whose speed and ferocity set the standards for the position in the modern era, died Oct. 5, 2023. He was 80. Butkus was a first-team All-Pro five times and made the Pro Bowl in eight of his nine seasons before a knee injury forced him to retire at 31. He was the quintessential Monster of the Midway and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1979, his first year of eligibility. Trading on his image as the toughest guy in the room, Butkus enjoyed a long second career as a sports broadcaster, an actor in movies and TV series, and a sought-after pitchman for products ranging from antifreeze to beer.

AP file, 2019

Michael Chiarello

Michael Chiarello, a chef known for his Italian-inspired Californian restaurants who won an Emmy Award for best host for “Easy Entertaining With Michael Chiarello” and appeared on Bravo’s “Top Chef” and “Top Chef Masters,” died Oct. 6, 2023. He was 61.

AP file, 2013

Louise Glück

Nobel laureate Louise Glück, a poet of unblinking candor and perception who wove classical allusions, philosophical reveries, bittersweet memories and humorous asides into indelible portraits of a fallen and heartrending world, died Oct. 13, 2023, at age 80.

AP file, 2016

Suzanne Somers

Suzanne Somers, the effervescent blonde actor known for playing Chrissy Snow on the television show “Three’s Company” and who became an entrepreneur and New York Times best-selling author, died Oct. 15, 2023. She was 76. Somers appeared in many television shows in the 1970s, including “The Rockford Files,” “Magnum Force” and “The Six Million Dollar Man,” but her most famous part came with “Three’s Company,” which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1984 — though her participation ended in 1981.

AP file, 2007

Piper Laurie

Piper Laurie, the strong-willed, Oscar-nominated actor who performed in acclaimed roles despite at one point abandoning acting altogether in search of a “more meaningful” life, died Oct. 14, 2023. She was 91. Laurie arrived in Hollywood in 1949 as Rosetta Jacobs and was quickly given a string of starring roles with Ronald Reagan, Rock Hudson and Tony Curtis, among others. She went on to receive Academy Award nominations for three distinct films: The 1961 poolroom drama “The Hustler”; the film version of Stephen King’s horror classic “Carrie,” in 1976; and the romantic drama “Children of a Lesser God,” in 1986. She also appeared in several acclaimed roles on television and the stage, including in David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks” in the 1990s as the villainous Catherine Martell.

AP file, 2009

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Directors Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas and actors James Caan and Robert Duvall all spent several weeks in a western Nebraska. It was 1968, and while the movie got little attention at the time, it proved pivotal in the evolution of Hollywood.

Friday, August 18th 2023, 7:54 AM MDT

Updated: Sunday, August 20th 2023, 9:30 AM MDTBy Leo Adam Biga, Flatwater Free Press

Rex Peterson trick riding while on tour.

Provided by Stephen Mack via Flatwater Free Press

Four years before the release of “The Godfather,” a nearly unknown contingent consisting of director Francis Ford Coppola and actors Robert Duvall and James Caan rolled into a western Nebraska town. 

They weren’t alone. Future mega-director George Lucas, cinematographer Bill Butler and actress Shirley Knight joined them in Ogallala for the Coppola feature “The Rain People.” It was 1968, and though the resulting work received little attention at the time, it went on to play an outsized role in the evolution of Hollywood and cinema.

Three films, plus a TV miniseries, emerged from this Hollywood-Nebraska intersection, including a no-holds-barred documentary Duvall made about a rambunctious trick-riding rodeo family, the Petersons.

The film, “We’re Not the Jet Set,” premiered in New York City to good reviews but fell out of circulation due to subsequent rights issues. It paints an unvarnished family portrait, complete with coarse, politically incorrect language.

“It’s true to who we were,” said Kris Peterson Springer, who appears in the doc with her siblings, parents and paternal grandparents. “I’m in no way embarrassed or ashamed by it.”

K.C. Peterson, Kris’ brother, regards Duvall’s largely self-financed labor-of-love as a gift bestowed on the family, perhaps the ultimate home movie. 

The Petersons plan to organize a public screening of it at the Prairie Theatre in Ogallala during an upcoming family reunion. 

This incongruous melding of cowboy hospitality and high art originally happened by accident as the freewheeling production of “Rain People” wended its way from the East Coast to the South to the Midwest. The loose route left plenty of room for inspiration and discovery.

“We were on the road, God, for that whole picture. I had really no idea where we were going from day to day,” Caan said before his death in 2022.

The movie might never have ended up in Nebraska if a location scout traveling ahead didn’t happen upon Ogallala. After seeing it, Coppola decided that’s where the story would culminate. The last four weeks of shooting unfolded there. 

“Once there, we felt at home and there were many good places that suited our story,” said Coppola, 84. “The people were nice and … we were all happy there.”

The schedule paralleled the fictional road trip of its pregnant protagonist, Natalie (Knight). She flees suburban housewife life for the open road, traversing Long Island, Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri and Nebraska to “find herself.” She gets involved with a brain-damaged ex-football player (Caan) and a motorcycle cop (Duvall). The maternal and romantic entanglement ends in tragedy.

Though arriving by chance, Duvall and Caan formed enduring friendships with the Petersons and another ranch family, the Haythorns. The experience also reinforced relationships among the film artists that led to alliances and projects pivotal to “New Hollywood.” 

Coppola was still finding his way as a filmmaker. 

Duvall, now 92, was a last minute replacement for Rip Torn. 

Getting the short notice gig proved fortuitous for Duvall’s career, said Knight. 

“That changed a lot of film history actually, if you think about it, because he started doing all that work with Francis.” 

“Rain People” provided Caan with the most challenging role of his career until playing Brian Piccolo in “Brian’s Song.” “I was like depressed through that whole picture, mostly because of this character I played.” 

Despite his discomfort, Caan said it was a great opportunity. 

“Just from talking to him (Coppola), I knew he knew actors. When we started working together I knew he was something special. The guy pretty much knew about everything.”

New USC film school grad Lucas came along for the ride to document the making of the movie. His short doc chronicling “Rain People” was released as “Filmmaker – A Diary by George Lucas.” 

“George’s film is excellent – he caught the spirit of this exciting trip,” said Coppola, “which for us was an adventure into filmmaking.” 

Duvall and Caan remembered the quiet, scrawny Lucas wielding a camera and sound system strapped to his chest to capture behind the scenes moments. 

Knight, who thought Lucas “was adorable,” took away an important lesson.

“Be nice to everybody … because that assistant could turn out to be George Lucas.”

Soon after wrapping in Ogallala, Coppola and Lucas formed American Zoetrope in San Francisco. “Rain People” was the production company’s first release. Under the Zoetrope banner Coppola produced the younger filmmaker’s first two features: “THX 1138” in 1971, starring Duvall, and “American Graffiti” in 1973.

In between the Lucas films, Coppola made “The Godfather,” then “Godfather II” and “The Conversation,” cementing his reputation as a contemporary American master.

While Coppola slogged through “Apocalypse Now,” Lucas parlayed the unexpected popularity of “American Graffiti” to turn his Saturday matinee fantasy “Star Wars” into Hollywood’s biggest franchise and the foundation of his LucasFilm-SkyWalker Ranch production and effects empire. 

“George Lucas was, and still is, like a younger brother to me. I knew early on he was a great talent, and though a different personality to my own, one that was very helpful and stimulating to me,” Coppola said. 

The emergence of Coppola and Lucas marked a new wave encroaching on the failing old studio system out of touch with counter-culture youth audiences. Though “Rain People” did little business and received lukewarm reviews, it served as a bridge project for those involved. 

Butler, the cinematographer, contributed to “The Godfather” and replaced Haskell Wexler on “The Conversation.” He went on to photograph “Jaws” for yet another film school “brat,” Steven Spielberg. 

“Rain People” led Coppola to cast Duvall in “The Godfather” films, “The Conversation” and “Apocalypse Now” and to cast Caan in the first “Godfather” and later in “Gardens of Stone.” 

“I liked working with them very much, and yes, they were on all the early lists of names for ‘The Godfather,’” Coppola said.

“George (Lucas) got to meet Bobby and knew he should be in ‘THX 1138,’” he added. 

The many crosscurrents resulting from “Rain People” were rare for an art film, said film scholar Thomas Schatz, emeritus chair of the Department of Radio-Television-Film at the University of Texas at Austin and the author of “Hollywood Genres.”

“The Rain People” was part of “a strain of offbeat off-Hollywood road movies” that served as “character studies of American nomads, inward journeys of discovery and aimless travelogues through the American outback,” said Schatz, an Omaha native.

The 1969 movie marked the start of Coppola banding together collaborators who would join him in “his later assault on mainstream Hollywood,” Schatz added.

It is now regarded as an important early work by Coppola, who counts it among the favorites of his own films. 

“It has value, I think, beyond being an early film of mine,” he said, “but as one of the first films to touch on the theme of ‘women’s liberation.’”

Knight, who was actually pregnant by the time shooting commenced, embraced Coppola’s freewheeling vision. 

“I think what was happening with women at that time was they were coming out of the ’50s as lovely housewives in aprons into an era when women were becoming doctors and lawyers, entering politics and becoming independent,” Knight said. “Natalie was caught up in that.”

All the movie people met locals, but Duvall and Caan got to know them personally. The actors encountered a scene straight out of the movies when they met the tough and colorful ranchers. 

Fade in on a 1968 summer day in Ogallala. The sleepy agricultural and former railroad hub had been largely bypassed by the nation’s social-political churn except for some of its boys going off to Vietnam. Cut to the arrival of a small caravan of cars, vans and trucks whose occupants marked them instantly as outsiders.

Word traveled fast about these long-haired strangers with lights, cameras, cables and big city ways. It wasn’t long before Duvall and Caan, both admirers of the West and horses, asked around where they could find some mounts. They were directed to the Peterson’s circle pen just outside of town. 

Duvall still remembers the day and their encounter with the family patriarch, B.A. Peterson. He invited them to come down and ride horses any time … just before asking – in colorful language and in the same breath – if they were having any luck in town. 

Duvall recognized a cinematic family when he saw one. 

“Oh, boy, a very unique family, a rodeo circus mentality. They were kind of an identity unto themselves even in that small community I think.” 

The actors came back to ride, rope and swap stories. Duvall and Caan moved into The Lazy K next to the Peterson spread. They bought cowboy boots and had one of the Peterson brood, K.C., polish them. K.C. said he and his family took an instant liking to the actors. The family made quite an impression on them. 

“There were some pretty rough and tumble people back then,” said Duvall. 

“Yeah, they were a wild group,” Caan confirmed. “They would fight in the middle of the living room, and, oh boy, I mean fist fight, and he’s (B.A.) sitting back in a chair saying, ‘Now, no hitting in the face’ Those were the rules.”

“We had good times together. You’d tell B.A. a joke and he’d laugh for five minutes. He had a great sense of humor, that guy,” recalled Duvall.

K.C. said his father “didn’t care what he said to anybody, he didn’t care who you were. He didn’t let us call him daddy, you called him B.A. The film brought everything out about him.” 

Duvall, cinematographer Joseph Friedman and sound man Stephen Mack, who also edited the film, captured the family in all their raucous reality – the politically incorrect language, rowdy behavior and all. 

“We let it come from them. It’s their life,” Duvall said.

K.C. said his father could read a person and he trusted Duvall, giving him unbridled access to family without fear of misrepresentation or exploitation. 

“Bobby wasn’t going to change it, he was just going to put it out there how it was,” said K.C. “You won’t see another film like it, it’s totally different.” 

Duvall said he wouldn’t call the film “a pure documentary because there were certain scenes we set up … but it’s what they do and so it comes out of pretty pure behavior.”

K.C. recalled Duvall at his family’s house “all the time.” He stayed in the motel next door and would bring his wife and step-daughters to the Peterson place.

“My mom would have them sit down for a meal. She’d just feed them all. Then the next thing you know Bobby would say, ‘Hey, we need to film this.’ Bobby and crew followed us everywhere. You never knew when they might turn on a camera. And that’s kind of how it went. ”

After sharing so many intimate scenes together, Duvall was like a family member. At his invitation, some Petersons even visited him on the “The Godfather” set. 

“Jet Set” film locales include the Peterson home near the South Platte River and open rangeland. Events depicted include a cattle branding, a wild west show, the Nebraskaland parade in downtown North Platte, a graduation and an amateur boxing match. Long-gone sites figure prominently in “The Rain People,” including the Lazy Skyline Drive-In and Reptile Ranch. A house fire in Brule also makes quite a scene.

North Platte Telegraph reporter Todd von Kampen, an Ogallala native, said the Coppola film “really does capture the Ogallala I knew from my childhood.”

For Duvall and Caan, western Nebraska’s influence didn’t end with “The Rain People” or “We’re Not the Jet Set.” 

Trail-drive tales told by Walt “Waldo” Haythorn, a fellow rancher and friend of B.A. Peterson, informed Duvall’s 2006 mini-series “Broken Trail.”  

“Being around those people, the real thing, that helped me when I went on to do things … especially my favorite part, Augustus McCrae in ‘Lonesome Dove’ and ‘Broken Trail,’” said Duvall, a National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum Lifetime Achievement Award winner.

Caan took up Denny Peterson on an offer to join him at the Haythorns for a herding and branding.

“Boy, that was some experience. It’s a great tradition actually. These guys come from all over, the neighboring ranchers, like the Petersons. And then all the wives, boy what a feast they put out. A spread for all the hands. By four o’clock … I was done, I was hurtin’ boy.” 

On the last day of the four-day branding, Caan was accorded the honor of roping. “You’re tied onto your saddle and rope these big old calves out of the herd and drag ’em by the pit. I was flanking ’em and spread-eagling for two or three days.”

Caan got so into working cowboy ways he began entering weekend roping events. “It was just in my blood,” he said. 

Eventually, studios banned him from competing due to injury risk. He credits his interest in ranching with forming the foundation for “Comes a Horseman,” a western he produced and starred in with Jane Fonda.

After “The Godfather” Caan and Duvall re-teamed on Sam Peckinpah’s “The Killer Elite” and remained best friends until Caan’s death. Caan felt their shared “blatant honesty” and ability to make each other laugh contributed to their strong on-screen chemistry.

Members of the Peterson clan leveraged their horsemanship into becoming in-demand Hollywood animal trainers and wranglers. 

K.C. worked on the Duvall film, “Geronimo: An American Legend.” Older brother Rex Peterson has a list of credits ranging from “The Black Stallion” to “The Horse Whisperer” to “Hidalgo” to “1883.”

“He’s the most like his dad I guess of the guys I know. … He ain’t got time for a lot of how ya’ doins and stuff,” Duvall said.

Peterson has helped make many A-list actors look proficient on horseback, including Viggo Mortensen, whom he worked with on “Hidalgo”. Peterson’s iconic Stetson hat and handlebar mustache are his trademark look, though he’s rarely “hunted” the camera to get on screen himself, even when Duvall shot “Jet Set.” 

He did, however, relent for a close-up in the 2021 miniseries “1883” and for a small part in the new Mortensen western “The Dead Don’t Hurt.”

And he’s the subject of an in-progress documentary project by Paul Brozen, “Hats, Horses and Hollywood – The Rex Peterson Story.”

Duvall is quick to note that he doesn’t deserve credit for the Petersons’ successful entry into Hollywood. “They totally got that on their own,” he said. But the legendary actor is glad the family still treasures the film he made about them.

“It’s very moving to hear that,” he said, “because you never know if they’re going to accept something real.”

The Flatwater Free Press is Nebraska’s first independent, nonprofit newsroom focused on investigations and feature stories that matter.

The post Earlier than ‘The Godfather,’ a Coppola movie shot in western Nebraska performed a pivotal function in Hollywood’s evolution – PANHANDLE appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

BURGESS Owens made the extraordinary journey from winning the Super Bowl to working as a chimney sweep before being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.

During a 10-year NFL career, Owens starred as a safety for the New York Jets before being part of the 1980 Oakland Raiders’ Super Bowl-winning team.

Burgess Owens (left) won a Super Bowl with the Oakland RaidersCredit: Getty
Owens has since been elected to the House of RepresentativesCredit: Getty
Owens says life in the NFL prepared him for politicsCredit: Getty

But Owens and his family lost everything in the decade after his NFL glory when his electronic business failed, and he was forced to declare bankruptcy.

The University of Miami graduate moved his family of six into a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn and took a job as a chimney sweep during the day and a security guard at night.

“That was a very humbling moment,” Owens told the Salt Lake Tribune. 

“It was also a very key moment in my life that at the end of the long day, standing in the basement apartment, looking outside and just thinking that I knew this was not the way it was going to end because I believe in the American promise of second chances.”

Owens got back on his feet after taking a sales job with the Utah-based computer software company WordPerfect in Philadelphia.

Having converted to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints towards the end of his NFL career, Owens soon moved his family to Utah.

In 2020, the 68-year-old Owens became the Republican nominee in the 4th Congressional District of Utah and defeated Democratic incumbent Ben McAdams in November.

“As someone who came out of the NFL and lost everything and was a chimney sweep for a few months, a security guard at night…if I can do it, you can do it,” Owens said after his win.

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A staunch defender of Donald Trump, Owens campaigned on upholding conservative values, opposing abortion, protecting Second Amendment rights, and securing the borders.

A Fox News contributor, Owens has also opposed NFL players kneeling during the National Anthem to protest police brutality.

In November 2022, Owens won re-election to a second term.

Owens says his time in the NFL prepared him for a career in politics.

“All of the time I played in the NFL, we didn’t make a lot of money then but boy did we understand teamwork and culture,” he told Sports Illustrated. 

“After seven years in the league, I got to the Raiders. It was a locker room similar to our country. A lot of people getting second chances.

“It was a motley crew. It taught me a lot about America, about people.”

The post I performed within the NFL and received Tremendous Bowl – our locker room helped me put together for post-retirement profession appeared first on DAILY SAN FRANCISCO BAY NEWS.

In the course of their 30-year career, the Grateful Dead covered an enormous swath of geography, crisscrossing the U.S. dozens of times as well as playing Canada, Europe, and as far away as Egypt. But San Francisco was the place they called home, the city where they performed over 320 concerts at more than two dozen venues. That connection began with their debut album, which bore the phrase “San Francisco’s Grateful Dead” across the back, and they mapped that relationship in songs, recordings and performances throughout their history.

The Dead were masters of microcosm, treating each moment as an opportunity for transformation, both musical and personal, and their reverence for San Francisco was a geographic expression of that. The city honored the band’s affection, flying a tie-dye flag at City Hall to half-mast when Jerry Garcia died in 1995, and more recently, giving a hero’s welcome to offshoot band Dead & Company, who played the final three concerts of their farewell tour at Oracle Park. 

Although the band began moving to Marin in the late 1960s, the Dead never forgot their roots. In 1993, Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir and keyboardist Vince Welnick sang the national anthem to open the Giants’ season at Candlestick Park, but their most moving tribute was “Standing On the Moon,” one of Garcia and lyricist Robert Hunter’s last songs. One of the band’s great elegies, the song ends with the narrator in San Francisco, looking up at heaven and saying he’d rather “be with you.” It is a poetic summation of the Dead’s enduring affection for the city.

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Ahead of the annual Jerry Day concert taking place Aug. 5 at McLaren Park, this brief list sketches a handful of prominent sites in the Dead’s San Francisco. 

A view of Jerry Garcia’s boyhood home (in yellow) on Harrington Street in San Francisco. 

Image via Google Street View

87 Harrington St.

Jerry Garcia spent five years of his childhood here with his grandparents, after the tragic death of his father. In the late 1960s, the house became a base for visiting friends and members of the Dead’s extended family, including colorful characters such as poet Max Finstein. It was also a site for art, Garcia using it as the focal point for his illustrated “anecdotal” memoir, “Harrington Street,” published shortly after his death in 1995.

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The house where the Grateful Dead’s musicians lived in the 1960s, at 710 Ashbury St. in San Francisco. 

Barbara Munker/Picture Alliance via Getty Images

710 Ashbury

The Dead began moving into the big Victorian just up from Haight Street in summer 1966, where it quickly became a neighborhood center. It hosted a legendary Thanksgiving that fall, with dozens of friends and fellow musicians, and a historic press conference in 1967, where the band defended themselves against a police raid. Their debut album featured pictures of them at the house, which remains a site for Deadhead pilgrims today.

Author Tom Wolfe talks with Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead and the band’s manager Rock Scully under the street signs on the corner of Ashbury and Haight streets in San Francisco.  

Ted Streshinsky Photographic Arc/Corbis via Getty Images

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Upper Haight Street

The stretch of Haight between Buena Vista Park to Stanyan Street was ground zero of the hippie movement, immortalized by the Dead with a March 3, 1968, free concert that filled the street with friends, fans and neighbors. While the Dead lived in the neighborhood, they frequented Peggy Caserta’s boutique Mnasidika, the Thelin brothers’ Psychedelic Shop, and performed a handful of concerts at the Straight Theater, a short-lived neighborhood venue that played a key role in the Summer of Love.

16th and Mission

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Hunter had an apartment here in the late 1960s, and he immortalized his fondness for the neighborhood in one of his most beloved songs with Garcia, “Mission in the Rain.” 

Concert in Golden Gate Park with Grateful Dead and Jefferson Starship, on Sept. 28, 1975. 

Terry Schmitt/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images

Golden Gate Park

The Dead loved Golden Gate Park, playing free concerts at several spots, including the Panhandle, Hippie Hill, Speedway Meadows, and most famously the Polo Field, where they performed at the Human Be-In in January 1967 with an array of San Francisco bands, Beat poets and other counterculture luminaries. Garcia loved the way it contained “all these different worlds,” calling it “the work of an artist.”

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1199 Evans St.

Site of the cover portrait of the band’s famed 1970 album “Workingman’s Dead,” artist Stanley Mouse posed the band in this industrial section of the city on a hot day, which he thought “added to the downtrodden, working-class feeling of the photograph.” 

Mars Hotel (192 Fourth St.)

The Dead named their 1974 studio album for this rundown hotel, featured prominently in Jack Kerouac’s 1962 novel “Big Sur.” Stanley Mouse and Alton Kelley’s cover made the hotel the center of an otherworldly landscape; the back cover photograph showed the band lounging in the lobby, with the musicians transformed into fantastic creatures. The art captured the band’s self-deprecating sense of humor, but it also charted their continuing metamorphosis into mainstream rock stars.     

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The former site of Pacific High Studios on Brady Street in San Francisco.

Image via Google Street View

Pacific High Studios (60 Brady St.)

Originally a plastics factory, this building became the home of one of the principal studios in the San Francisco music scene. The Dead booked dozens of sessions for their 1969 album “Aoxomoxoa” here, and although they ended up scrapping those tracks, they used the studio to superb effect for “Workingman’s Dead.”  

The site of CBS Studios where the Grateful Dead recorded their album “From the Mars Hotel.”

Image via Google Street View

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CBS Studios (829 Folsom)

The Dead recorded “From the Mars Hotel” at this recently rechristened South of Market studio, site of the old Coast Recorders studio where they had recorded their 1967 paean to the Haight-Ashbury “The Golden Road.”  

Wally Heider Studios (245 Hyde St.)

One of San Francisco’s most storied studios, this long-running institution birthed dozens of famous albums, including the Dead’s 1970 masterpiece “American Beauty.” The band left its mark in other ways as well, persuading Heider to have the doors decorated with paintings.

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Bill Graham, left, rock concert producer and promoter, talks on the phone in his office at the Fillmore West music club, in San Francisco, August 1969. A promotional postcard, right; for concerts at the Fillmore Auditorium, featuring the Grateful Dead, October 1966. 

Images via Getty

Fillmore Auditorium (1805 Geary Blvd.)

Made famous by famed promoter Bill Graham, the Fillmore anchored the burgeoning San Francisco rock music scene in the 1960s, hosting the Dead 46 times. The Fillmore cemented Graham’s relationship with the Dead, and he remained one of their two principal promoters until his untimely death in 1991. 

Avalon Ballroom (1268 Sutter St.)

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Run by beloved hippie impresario Chet Helms from 1966 to 1968, the Avalon was a hub for the Haight-Ashbury scene, known for its relaxed and welcoming atmosphere. It hosted the Dead 30 times, including appearances commemorated by some of the most iconic posters in rock.

Marquee on New Year’s Eve 1978, at left, for the final shows at Winterland with the Grateful Dead, right, and the Blues Brothers in San Francisco.

Images via Getty

Winterland Ballroom (2000 Post St.)

An old ice-skating rink cum concert hall, the 5,400-seat Winterland was the next step up from the Fillmore and Avalon. It hosted the Dead 59 times between 1967 and 1978, stewarding their transition from neighborhood heroes to national icons, documented by some of the band’s most revered archival releases. Bill Graham honored that history by tapping them to close the hall with a legendary New Year’s Eve 1978 concert later released as a DVD and CD.

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Carousel Ballroom/Fillmore West (10 South Van Ness Ave.)

Occupying the old El Patio Ballroom, the Carousel was a short-lived colorful experiment in hippie entrepreneurialism cooperatively run by the Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Big Brother and the Holding Company. It lasted for part of 1968 before Bill Graham took it over and renamed it the Fillmore West. Those ventures represented a stepping stone between the Haight and the big time, not only for the Dead and the scene, but also for Graham, providing the West Coast counterpart to his Fillmore East in New York City.

FILE: Grateful Dead performing at the Warfield in San Francisco on Oct. 14, 1980. 

Larry Hulst/Getty Images

Warfield Theatre (982 Market St.)

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The site of one of the Dead’s most remarkable box office feats, the Warfield hosted the Dead for 15 nights in fall 1980, sold out with only a cryptic ad in the newspaper. The Dead played only a few more shows at the Warfield, outgrowing it after 1983, but it became a major venue for the Jerry Garcia Band in the 1990s, with devout Deadheads calling it the Church of Jerry.

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San Francisco 49ers cornerback Josh Norman (26) Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-USA TODAY Sports

Although the 49ers are in the playoffs, these four players are on their last field for San Francisco and will be gone next season.

It’s that time again, the San Francisco 49ers are back in the playoffs.

It’s been 18 long weeks of grueling, intense football and it hasn’t always been pretty. Wild card games are on, the Niners are visiting the Dallas Cowboys, and more than half the league is watching from the comfort of their own living room.

Whether or not it sounds ridiculous to fans of these other teams, they officially have Super Bowl 56 in their sights.

And why not? Anything can happen on any Sunday, and for the next few weeks it can also happen on a Saturday.

Your thoughts couldn’t be further from the off-season. Because when you start the off-season today, your team ends up in the losing column, and all you can think about right now is winning. But no matter when it happens, the process of letting players go comes. Football is a business and it can be cutthroat.

For a number of guys, dropping the hatchet is inevitable.

That being said, here are four players who aren’t in the squad for next season and have already played their last game against San Francisco.

No. 1: 49ers cornerback Josh Norman

Veteran defenseman Josh Norman was signed to start against Emmanuel Moseley after cornerback Jason Verrett was injured in Week 1.

Norman made a quick impression for the team, starting 14 games and proving his consistency by playing over 70 percent of defensive snaps. Despite his playing days, Norman has received a lot of criticism in this position and is nearing the end of his career at the age of 35.

Two big factors certainly not in his favor.

His age may not be the determining factor due to a lack of depth and proven talent at the cornerback position. But it sure doesn’t help. As if that wasn’t enough, his behavior over the past few weeks sees him prioritizing signing for the off-season.

In Week 16, Norman was roasted by Tennessee Titans wide receiver AJ Brown, who rushed for 145 yards and 11 receptions in the season. Norman then ended the night with a pass interference call that eventually led to a bench press. Head coach Kyle Shanahan decided to extend the bench press to the Los Angeles Rams game with the playoffs at stake.

That doesn’t sound like a guy that fits into the franchise plan moving forward.

Shanahan needs someone who can keep their cool under pressure and set an example for the younger players. We’ll have to wait and see if Norman plays a role in the playoffs. That’s when he’s in the lineup.

Although it was just a move at the end of the game, you’d think rookie Ambry Thomas would fly high and get the start.

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FREMONT (AP) – Last August, Vince Patton watched a YouTube video from a Tesla owner who made a startling observation: Tesla drivers could now play a video game on their car’s touchscreen dashboard while the vehicle is moving.

Curious to see for yourself, Patton drove his own Tesla Model 3 to an empty community college parking lot in 2021, activated a game called Sky Force Reloaded from a menu, and did a few loops.

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“I was just amazed that this sophisticated video game actually showed up,” said Patton, a 59-year-old retired television journalist who lives near Portland, Oregon.

He also tried Solitaire and was able to activate this game while driving. He later found that he could surf the Internet while driving.

Patton, who loves his car and says he has nothing against Tesla, fears the drivers are playing games and being dangerously distracted.

“Someone is getting killed,” he said. “It’s absolutely insane.”

Vince Patton, a new Tesla owner, demonstrates how to play video games on the vehicle’s console while driving on an enclosed course in Portland, Oregon on Wednesday, December 8, 2021. Patton, of Portland, Oregon, filed a complaint with federal regulators after discovering the feature in his new car. (AP photo / Gillian Flaccus)

Because of this, Patton decided to file a complaint with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration early last month.

“The NHTSA must ban all live video in the front seat and all live interactive web browsers while driving,” Patton wrote in his complaint. “Creating a dangerous distraction for the driver is recklessly negligent.”

On Wednesday, the NHTSA confirmed that it is investigating the matter. The New York Times first reported on Patton’s complaint on Tuesday.

“We are aware of the concerns of the drivers and are discussing the function with the manufacturer,” wrote an NHTSA spokeswoman in an email. “The Vehicle Safety Act prohibits manufacturers from selling vehicles with design defects that pose an unreasonable safety risk.”

The spokeswoman declined to provide further details on her talks with Tesla, which manufactures many of its vehicles at its Fremont facility. The Agency has not opened a formal investigation requesting documents and other detailed information. Tesla, which has disbanded its media division, did not respond to news from The Associated Press.

The NHTSA’s investigation marks the latest in a growing list of potential breaches related to advanced automotive technology under review by two federal agencies as potential safety risks.

The government is testing Tesla’s semi-automated driving system Autopilot and its software system “Full Self-Driving”, which is being tested by selected owners on public roads. In addition, as the NHTSA strengthens control under President Joe Biden, it is investigating Internet software updates to fix security issues and Tesla battery fires.

In its statement, NHTSA said it continues to research distractions from driving and that it has issued voluntary guidelines for automakers to determine if a particular task interferes with the driver’s alertness.

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“If a task does not meet the acceptance criteria,” says the statement, “the NHTSA guidelines recommend making the task inaccessible to the driver while driving.”

The agency found that distracted driver accidents killed more than 3,100 people in 2019, accounting for about 9% of all road deaths in the United States. However, safety experts argue that distracted driving accidents are underestimated.

It is unclear how long Tesla will allow games to be played while vehicles are moving. But Patton said a software update he noticed over the summer may have started Sky Force Reloaded to be used by drivers. The game, he noted, includes missiles and lasers that can be fired at objects.

Before the video games can be activated while driving, drivers are asked if they are passengers and have to click a button to confirm this. But Patton said there doesn’t seem to be a way for Tesla to confirm that fact.

“If you’re alone in the car,” he said, a driver could lie down and play while the car was driving.

“That’s not a big security barrier,” he said.

Even if only one passenger is playing the game, it can still be distracting for the driver as the game takes up about two-thirds of the touchscreen, Patton said. This also makes it harder for drivers to see warnings and controls for windshield defrosters, he said.

Previously, Patton said, games could only be played while the vehicles were in the park. Many drivers use them while waiting for the batteries at Tesla’s Supercharger stations to be charged, he said.

However, the car prevented him from watching movies on Netflix and YouTube while driving, he said.

Jason Levine, executive director of the non-profit center for car safety, said in an email that the NHTSA had the authority to declare the vehicles defective and request a recall.

“There is no question that having a large screen next to the driver, on which the driver or a passenger can play a video game while driving, poses an unreasonable safety hazard,” wrote Levine. “Recent statements from the NHTSA suggest that this feature is against the spirit and letter of the NHTSA driver distraction guidelines and against the law.”

Tesla’s autopilot system has been misused in the past by drivers who thwarted its system for detecting hands on the steering wheel. In one case, a driver was arrested in California while driving in the back seat as the car rolled down a freeway.

After investigating two autopilot fatal accidents, the National Transportation Safety Board recommended Tesla install a camera system to ensure drivers were alert. The agency said in October that Tesla hadn’t officially responded.

Tesla has said that despite their names, autopilot and full self-driving are just driver assistance systems and cannot drive themselves. It says drivers should always be careful and ready to take action.

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With all the multi-hyphenates in Hollywood, it’s no longer surprising to see a movie star doubling up as an executive producer, a writer or even a director on the same title.

But some stars aren’t content with just one billing in the acting credits.

From playing twins to whole families, some stars really prove they’re workaholics by taking on multiple roles in the same project. Here are 20 stars who had us seeing double (or triple, or quadruple…)

Eddie Murphy
The Nutty Professor

Actor Eddie Murphy poses for a composite photograph July14, 2000 in Los Angeles as characters he plays in his new movie, “The Nutty Professor 2, The Klumps”. Murphy plays the parts of Granny, Papa, Sherman, Ernie and Mama in the Universal Studios movie.
2000 Universal Studios via Online USA

In the 1996 remake of The Nutty Professor, Eddie Murphy plays not one, not two, but seven characters in the film, including the main character Sherman Klump, his alter ego Buddy Love, and Sherman’s entire family.

Playing the two main roles plus Papa Cletus Klump, Mama Anna Klump, Grandma Ida Mae Jenson, Ernie Klump Sr. and Lance Perkins gained Murphy positive reviews from the critics, while the makeup used to transform him into seven different characters was widely praised. He also reprised the roles for the sequel.

… and Coming To America

Eddie Murphy stars as Prince Akeem in Coming To America.
Paramount Pictures

This wasn’t Eddie Murphy’s first time playing dual roles, though.

In Coming To America, Murphy played Prince Akeem Joffe, Randy Watson of Sexual Chocolate, Saul, the Jewish barbershop customer, and Clarence, the owner of the barber shop.

He reprised the same four roles in this year’s sequel, Coming 2 America.

Peter Sellers
Dr Strangelove

Peter Sellers (1925 – 1980) in the title role of ‘Dr. Strangelove’, directed by Stanley Kubrick.
Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images

Considered one of the funniest films ever made, Dr Strangelove or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb saw Peter Sellers playing three iconic characters: group captain Lionel Mandrake, President Merkin Muffley, and the titular nuclear war expert Dr. Strangelove.

Columbia Pictures had only agreed to finance the movie if Sellers played at least four roles, with director Stanley Kubrick agreeing to the demand.

However, Sellers pleaded to drop the fourth role, and the role of Air Force Major T. J. “King” Kong was played by Slim Pickens.

Mike Myers
Austin Powers

Mike Meyers Stars As “Dr. Evil” In “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.”
Getty Images

Mike Myers played not only the titular British spy in the Austin Powers franchise, but donned a bald cap to play his nemesis, Dr Evil.

However, by the third film, Austin Powers: Goldmember, Myers had also taken on the roles of Fat Bastard and Dutch supervillain Goldmember.

Michael Palin
Monty Python and the Holy Grail

The cast of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, filming.
FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images

The whole Monty Python gang played multiple roles in their movies, but perhaps Michael Palin was the one to take on the biggest workload in this classic comedy.

As well as the main role of Sir Galahad the Pure, Palin also played First Swallow-Savvy Guard, Dennis, Peasant 2, Right Head, King of Swamp Castle, Brother Maynard’s Brother and Leader of The Knights Who Say Ni!, as well as voicing the narrator.

Dick Van Dyke
Mary Poppins

Dick Van Dyke, US actor, poses with a variety of kites in a publicity still for the film, ‘Mary Poppins’, USA, 1964. The film musical, directed by Robert Stevenson (1905–1986), starred Van Dyke as ‘Bert’.
Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images

Perhaps you didn’t notice when you first watched Mary Poppins as a child, but Dick Van Dyke doesn’t only play Bert, the chimney sweep with a dodgy Cockney accent.

He also plays Mr. Dawes Sr., the old director of the bank where Mr. Banks works.

The film jokes about the cameo in the credits, as “Navckid Keyd” is first credited as playing the role, before the anagram unscrambles to reveal Van Dyke’s name.

Ralph Fiennes
Sunshine

The 1999 film Sunshine tells a Hungarian-Jewish family’s story through five generations, from the creation of the Austro-Hungarian Empire through to the period after the 1956 Revolution.

Ralph Fiennes plays the three male protagonists in three generations – Ignatz Sonnenschein (Sors), Adam Sors and Ivan Sors.

“There was differences in facial hair and haircut I think, but I thought no…if the storytelling and filmmaking is clear enough, the audience will know,” Fiennes told GQ in April 2019. “It didn’t seem at all the sort of film where the actor completely changes. You’re meant to know it’s me, you’re meant to understand that it’s the same family. The fact that I’m playing all three was the linking element.”

Vanessa Hudgens
The Princess Switch

Vanessa Hudgens stars as Fiona, Margaret and Stacey in The Princess Switch: Switched Again.
Netflix

One of the latest additions to Netflix’s festive fare catalogue, The Princess Switch franchise sees Vanessa Hudgens play the dual roles of American baker Stacy De Novo and Lady Margaret Delacourt, Duchess of Montenaro, who discover they are identical after bumping into each other in the fictional country of Belgravia.

By the 2020 sequel, Switched Again, Hudgens had taken on a third role – Margaret’s evil cousin, Lady Fiona.

A third film is on its way, but Hudgens isn’t taking on a fourth character.

She told The Wrap in November 2019: “No, no, that’s just too outrageous. We’re already at max outrageous here with three characters, we’re just going to keep it at that.”

Michael J Fox
Back To The Future Part II

Michael J Fox stars as Marlene in Back To The Future II.
Universal Pictures

Not content with playing the iconic Marty McFly, Michael J Fox also played his future son and daughter, Marty Jr. and Marlene, in the Back To The Future sequel.

The three characters interacted in the same scene in a complex sequence made possible by new digital compositing technology.

Tom Hanks
Cloud Atlas

Tom Hanks stars in Cloud Atlas.
Warner Bros

Cloud Atlas was notable in that pretty much the entire cast played multiple roles across six different eras: Pacific Islands in 1849, Cambridge / Edinburgh in 1936, San Francisco in 1973, London in 2012, Neo Seoul in 2144, and Big Island in 2321.

Tom Hanks played the main character Zachary in the final era, as well as Dr Henry Goose, Hotel Manager, Isaac Sachs, Dermot Hoggins, and Cavendish Lookalike Actor in the other eras.

Halle Berry, Jim Sturgess, Ben Whishaw, Hugh Grant, Jim Broadbent, Doona Bae, Susan Sarandon, Hugo Weaving, Keith David, James D’Arcy, Zhou Xun, David Gyasi and Robert Fyfe all played at least three roles in the film, which is one of the most expensive independent movies ever made.

Alec Guinness
Kind Hearts and Coronets

Alec Guinness stars in Kind Hearts and Coronets.
FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images

This critically acclaimed comedy sees Alec Guinness playing a whopping nine characters—Ethelred, 8th Duke of Chalfont; Ethelred’s four younger brothers, The Reverend Lord Henry, General Lord Rufus, Admiral Lord Horatio and Lord Ascoyne, Banker; Lady Agatha D’Ascoyne, Ethelred’s sister; Ethelred’s nephews, Young Ascoyne and Young Henry, and the seventh duke, Ethelred’s father—in flashback sequences.

Guinness had initially been offered four parts, but said: “I read [the screenplay] on a beach in France, collapsed with laughter on the first page, and didn’t even bother to get to the end of the script. I went straight back to the hotel and sent a telegram saying, ‘Why four parts? Why not eight!?'”

It seems even eight was too few.

Armie Hammer
The Social Network

Armie Hammer plays the Winklevoss Twins in The Social Network.
Sony Pictures

Armie Hammer doubled up in The Social Network playing twins Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, and delivers one of the film’s best lines: “I’m six foot five, 220 pounds, and there’s two of me.”

Hammer acted alongside body double Josh Pence in his scenes as the twins, and his face was then digitally grafted onto Pence’s body, while other scenes used split-screen technology.

Hammer told Vulture in October 2010: “It’s very fair to say that [David] Fincher likes to push himself and likes to push technology. He likes to be the flagship, I think, and he’s paved his way in this industry by being a peerless visual director who’s willing to do things like replace people’s heads in movies. I mean, I think that’s the reason he does all those commercials, still; he can do all that R&D and test stuff that he can break out later for movies. He’s really one of the most technologically minded guys I’ve ever seen.”

Lily Tomlin
The Incredible Shrinking Woman

Lily Tomlin sitting in an over sized chair holding an over sized drinking glass in a scene from the film ‘The Incredible Shrinking Woman’, 1981.
Universal Pictures/Getty Images

In this parody of the 1957 sci-fi film The Incredible Shrinking Man, Lily Tomlin pulled quadruple duty, playing four characters.

She played Pat Kramer, the titular shrinking woman, her neighbour Judith Beasley, and Tomlin’s Laugh-In characters Ernestine, a telephone operator, and Edith Ann, a little girl.

Edith Ann is only seen in the TV version of the comedy, although her deleted scene was also included on the Blu-Ray collectors’ edition.

Paul Dano
There Will Be Blood

Paul Dano stars in There Will Be Blood.
Miramax

In There Will Be Blood, Paul Dano plays both twins Eli and Paul Sunday, but he had initially only been cast in the smaller role of Paul.

Kel O’Neill had been cast as Eli, but left the project just a couple of weeks on. It was reported that he just wasn’t the right fit, but a Daniel Day-Lewis profile in The New York Times Magazine suggested that O’Neill was “intimidated” by the actor, and left due to the pressure.

O’Neill acknowledged that he was removed from the shooting schedule and fired, but denied it had anything to do with his co-star, telling Vulture: “It wasn’t drinks every night with Daniel on set, but there’s a fundamental decency to the way he comports himself in those environments that gets lost in the shuffle of these rumours.

“After we did our first scene, he came over, shook my hand and said — sort of in character and sort of not — ‘Welcome.’ And that sets a tone where that person isn’t your enemy. I would be cautious now, especially when he’s not going to do this anymore, about making him so mythical that there’s no acknowledgement of the human being there.”

Warwick Davis
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II

Warwick Davis as Griphook in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part II.
Warner Bros

Many British actors have starred in the Harry Potter franchise, but only Warwick Davis has the distinction of playing two speaking roles.

Throughout the series, Davis played both Professor Filius Flitwick and Griphook, a goblin who works at Gringotts.

He played both roles in the final movie, and also played a bank teller in the first film, The Philosopher’s Stone.

Hank Azaria
Night At The Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

Hank Azaria arrives for the World Premiere of ‘Night at the Museum 2’ at the Empire Leicester Square on May 12, 2009 in London, England.
Jon Furniss/WireImage

Hank Azaria plays three exhibits in the second film in the Night At The Museum franchise.

As well as playing Kahmunrah, a villainous pharaoh, Azaria voices The Thinker, a famous artwork, and a statue of Abraham Lincoln.

Amy Adams also pulls double duty in the film, playing both Tess and Amelia Earhart.

Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale
The Prestige

Actors Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale pose at the premiere of Touchstone Pictures’ “The Prestige” at the El Capitan Theater on October 17, 2006 in Los Angeles, California.
Kevin Winter/Getty Images

The Prestige’s two leading men both played two roles, which must have been rather confusing on set.

Hugh Jackman played Robert “The Great Danton” Angier and magician Lord Caldlow, while Christian Bale played both Alfred “The Professor” Borden and working class magician Fallon.

The multiple roles are very important, as they are the basis of Christopher Nolan’s mind-bending ending for the critically acclaimed film.

Meg Ryan
Joe vs The Volcano

Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in a scene from the film ‘Joe Versus The Volcano’, 1990.
Warner Brothers/Getty Images

Kickstarting a string of 1990s rom-coms with Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in the leads, Joe vs The Volcano actually saw Ryan playing three roles.

Using a trio of wigs to differentiate between them, Ryan plays DeDe, Hanks’ character Joe’s shy co-worker (brunette wig), and feuding half-sisters Angelica (auburn) and Patricia (Ryan’s natural blonde hair).

Deborah Kerr
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

A scene from The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp.
FilmPublicityArchive/United Archives via Getty Images

In this wartime comedy, Deborah Kerr played three roles throughout the Boer War, World War I and World War II: Edith Hunter, Barbara Wynne, and Angela “Johnny” Cannon.

Kerr was just 21 when she was given the three roles, after Wendy Hiller pulled out of the film due to being pregnant.

Jason Isaacs
Peter Pan

It is a stage tradition that in productions of Peter Pan, the same actor plays the fearsome Captain Hook and Mr Darling, the father of Wendy, Michael and John.

So in 2003’s big screen adaptation, Jason Isaacs took on the dual roles.

However, Isaacs said it was more than tradition, telling USA Today in December 2003: “It’s much more symbolic than that. Wendy goes to a place where she’s working out what she wants to do about growing up. … When little kids imagine growing up and having a family, they look at their dad.

“It’s a little creepy, but it’s meant to be creepy. There is someone who represents all the worst things and best things about growing up. Hook is this kind of animal character who she’s strangely attracted to, but also repelled by — and he looks a lot like her dad!”

Tom Hardy
Legend

In this 2015’s biographical drama, Tom Hardy played both Reggie and Ronnie Kray, the identical twins that terrorised London’s East End in the 1950s and 1960s.

Various technologies and filming techniques, including a digital face graft onto a stunt double, were used to allow Hardy to play both twins, with the actor even getting into a fist fight with himself.

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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – San Francisco played a pivotal role in fighting AIDS in America and around the world, leaders and activists said Saturday at a ceremony marking the 40th anniversary of the first reported cases of the disease.

London Mayor Breed and US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke at the private ceremony at the National AIDS Memorial Grove in Golden Gate Park, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

When the first AIDS cases were reported in 1981, “San Francisco was left alone,” Breed said, “but we did what the San Franciscans do best – we came together. … The care system for those with HIV / AIDS was developed here in San Francisco. The renowned research that continues to this day has established itself here in our great city. “

Pelosi, who hosted the first fundraiser for the now famous AIDS quilt, said the city’s compassionate, persistent, and science-based approach to the crisis helped San Francisco and the nation.

Pelosi said AIDS activism has also served as a model for other campaigns, including the fight against breast cancer, for marriage equality, and against the military’s previous “don’t ask, say nothing” policies that prevented homosexuals from openly serving, the chronicle reports.

Joshua Gamson, a member of the National AIDS Memorial Grove Board, noticed the chance of attending an AIDS memorial as the nation emerges from the coronavirus pandemic.

“It’s weird to get out of one pandemic and think about another,” Gamson said. “This is my first time in the grove since the pandemic and I feel like I’m stepping out of a cocoon and immersed in the memories of the AIDS pandemic.”

The ceremony ended with a line of people forming to begin the hour-long ritual during which the names of those who died of AIDS were read.

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