7 random things that happened on this day (October 25th) in showbiz history
Neil Simon & Marsha Mason
1881 Pablo Picasso is born in Malaga Spain. He's been played onscreen by everyone from Antonio Banderas to Anthony Hopkins. Okay so just guys named Tony... never mind.
1973 Legendary Playwright Neil Simon marries the then little-known actress Marsha Mason, who is acting in his Broadway production "The Good Doctor" just months after his first wife's death. Mason's screen career takes off the very next year with an Oscar nomination for Cinderella Liberty. Then she & Simon make films together that Oscar really loves for the next decade like Goodbye Girl, Only When I Laugh, and Chapter Two...
1974 Here's a piece of trivia I didn't know until today: O.J. Simpson's film debut was in a movie called The Klansman which opened on this day. This is not to be confused with BlacKkKlansman though O.J. Simpson does apparently masquerade as a member of the KKK in the movie (in order to seek vengeance). Lee Marvin and Richard Burton star. It's available to stream on Amazon Prime and it's sounds so awful, I'm tempted. Have you ever even heard of this? I had not!
1978 John Carpenter's horror classic Halloween premiered 40 years ago today in... Kansas City only ? For some reason that was where it started and it hit Los Angeles two days later and other major cities (like New York and Pittsburgh) didn't get it until November after the holiday was over. Weird!
1980 Barbra Streisand's "Guilty" album hits #1 on the charts. It becomes her most successful album (outselling A Star is Born) with 15 million copies sold worldwide.
2002 All or Nothing starring Timothy Spall and Lesley Manville opens in US theaters. Have you ever seen it? It's crushingly and mundanely sad. Did you know that it's Mike Leigh's all time lowest grosser stateside? It flopped with only $201,000 at the box office (his movies consistently gross $3-4 million in the States... though Secrets & Lies was way above that, of course)
2013 Blue is the Warmest Color opens in US theaters after months of hype following its Cannes premiere. Weirdly it did not open in France in time to qualify as the submission for the Oscars so it had to settle for Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations and a hit run at US arthouses to go with its Palme d'Or... a fate a lot of movies would kill to have, French or otherwise.
I still think of Lea Seydoux's crushing "infinite tenderness" line from time to time. How about you?
Today's Birthday Suit
← Mehcad Brooks in True Blood. Don't you miss HBO's former sluttiness sometimes?
Today's Birthdays
Oscar Winners: Screenwriter David S Ward (Sleepless in Seattle, The Sting)
Oscar Nominees: Actor Anthony Franciosa (A Hatful of Rain), Screenwriter Gloria Katz (American Grafffiti), Cinematography Nicholas Musurac Screenwriter Krzysztof Piesewicz (Three Colors: Red)
Actors: Tyler Alvarez, Mathieu Amalric, Billy Barty, Mehcad Brooks, Leo G Carroll, Bessie Carter, French legend Annie Girardot (3 César wins!), Adam Goldberg, Leslie Grossman, Josh Henderson, Brian Kerwin, Zachary Knighton, Peng Lin, Parker Mack, Melinda McGraw, Tracey Nelson, Adam Pascal, Marion Ross, Craig Robinson, and Persia White
Showbiz Peeps: Comedienne Samantha Bee, Broadway icon Barbara Cook, Producer David Furnish (aka Elton John's hubby), Producer Gale Ann Hurd (The Terminator) who was the second of James Cameron's many collaborating wives, Comedienne Minnie Pearl, Pop star Katy Perry, Singer Helen Reddy, Director Hong Sang-soo