Michael Crichton dies at age 66

John Michael Crichton, M.D. (October 23, 1942 – November 4, 2008[2][3]) was an American author, producer and director, best known for his work in the science, medical fiction and thriller genres. His books have sold over 150 million copies worldwide. His works were usually based on the action genre and heavily feature technology. Many of his future history novels have medical or scientific underpinnings, reflecting his medical training and science background. He was the author of The Andromeda Strain, Congo, Disclosure, Rising Sun, Timeline, State of Fear, Prey, and Next. He was also the creator of the TV series ER, but is probably most famous for being the author of Jurassic Park, and its sequel The Lost World, both adapted into high grossing films and leading to the very successful franchise. The final book he published before his death was Next, and he also had another project set for some time in 2009.

Crichton was married five and divorced four times. He was married to Suzanna Childs, Joan Radam (1965 – 1970), Kathy St. Johns (1978 – 1980) and Anne-Marie Martin (1987 - 2003), the mother of his only child, daughter Taylor Anne (born 1989). At the time of his death, Crichton was married to Sherri Alexander.

Wikinews has related news: American author Michael Crichton dies at age 66. He died of throat cancer on November 4, 2008.

Estelle Reiner died she was 94

Estelle Reiner (June 5, 1914 – October 25, 2008), described by The New York Times as "matriarch of one of the leading families in American comedy", was an actress who was the wife of Carl Reiner and the mother of Rob Reiner. Reiner, herself, has been credited with delivering one of the most memorable lines in movie history.


Reiner was born on June 5, 1914, in the Bronx as Estelle Lebost, and graduated from James Monroe High School. Reiner was a visual artist and met her future husband, Carl Reiner, while she was working in the Catskill Mountains designing stage sets for hotel shows. She married Reiner in 1943, and had three children Rob, Lucas and Annie.[1]
Carl Reiner's 1960s television comedy, The Dick Van Dyke Show, recapitulated his career writing for Sid Caesar, with Carl Reiner playing the Caesar character and Dick Van Dyke portraying Reiner's real-life job as a writer in the role of Rob Petrie. The re-creation was so complete that the Petries in the show lived on Bonnie Meadow Road in suburban New Rochelle, New York, the same street as the real-life Reiners. As described by Rob Reiner, "Basically he wrote his own life" in The Dick Van Dyke Show and that his "mother was Mary Tyler Moore".[1]
In her 60s, Reiner became a cabaret singer and performed for decades, until just a few years before her death. She studied acting with method acting pioneer Lee Strasberg and with Viola Spolin, the American Grandmother of Improvisation. She appeared in a number of film comedies, including the 1980 film Fatso with Dom DeLuise as Mrs. Goodman, and in the 1983 pictures The Man With Two Brains with Steve Martin in the role "Tourist in Elevator" and in Mel Brooks' To Be or Not to Be as Gruba.[1][2]
Reiner's most enduring film role was in 1989's When Harry Met Sally..., in which director Rob Reiner cast his mother as a customer in a scene with stars Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan at Katz's Delicatessen, in which Ryan fakes what was described as "a very public (and very persuasive) orgasm". Approached by a waitress after Ryan finishes, Reiner deadpans "I’ll have what she’s having". The line was ranked 33rd on the American Film Institute's list of the Top 100 movie quotations, just behind Casablanca's "Round up the usual suspects".[1][3]
Reiner died of natural causes on October 25, 2008 at age 94 in her home in Beverly Hills, California.[1]

Miriam Makeba died she was 76

Miriam Makeba (4 March 1932 - 10 November 2008)[2] was a South African singer and civil rights activist. The Grammy Award winning artist is often referred to as Mama Afrika.
Zenzile Miriam Makeba was born in Johannesburg in 1932. Her mother was a Swazi sangoma and her father, who died when she was six, was a Xhosa. As a child, she sang at the Kilmerton Training Institute in Pretoria, which she attended for eight years.

Makeba later travelled to London where she met Harry Belafonte, who assisted her in gaining entry to and fame in the United States. She released many of her most famous hits there including "Pata Pata", "The Click Song" ("Qongqothwane" in Xhosa), and "Malaika". In 1966, Makeba received the Grammy Award for Best Folk Recording together with Harry Belafonte for An Evening With Belafonte/Makeba. The album dealt with the political plight of black South Africans under apartheid.

She discovered that her South African passport was revoked when she tried to return there in 1960 for her mother's funeral. In 1963, after testifying against apartheid before the United Nations, her South African citizenship and her right to return to the country were revoked. She has had nine passports, [3] and was granted honorary citizenship of ten countries.[4]

Nelson Mandela persuaded her to return to South Africa in 1990. In November 1991, she made a guest appearance in an episode of The Cosby Show, in the episode "Olivia Comes Out Of The Closet". In 1992 she starred in the film Sarafina!, about the 1976 Soweto youth uprisings, as the title character's mother, "Angelina." She also took part in the 2002 documentary Amandla!: A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony where she and others recalled the days of apartheid.



On 9 November 2008, she became ill while taking part in a concert organized to support writer Roberto Saviano in his stand against the Camorra, a mafia-like organisation local to the Region of Campania. The concert was being held in Castel Volturno, near Caserta, Italy. Makeba suffered a heart attack after singing her hit song "Pata Pata"[9], and was taken to the "Pineta Grande" clinic where doctors were unable to revive her.

Eddie Adams died she was 81

Edie Adams (April 16, 1927 – October 15, 2008) was an American singer, Broadway, television and film actress and comedienne. Adams, a Tony Award winner, "both embodied and winked at the stereotypes of fetching chanteuse and sexpot blonde
Adams was born Elizabeth Edith Enke in Kingston, Pennsylvania, and grew up in Tenafly, New Jersey.

Adams married Ernie Kovacs on September 12, 1954, in what was Kovacs' second marriage; they remained together until his death in a car accident on January 13, 1962, after which she won a "nasty custody battle" over her stepdaughters, Betty and Kippie.[2] She also worked for years to pay off Kovacs' massive back-taxes debt to the IRS.

Adams had two later marriages, briefly to photographer Martin Mills and then to trumpeter Pete Candoli. She gave birth to two children: a daughter, Mia Kovacs, who was born in 1959 and killed in an automobile accident in 1982, and a son, Joshua Mills.[2]

Edie Adams died in Los Angeles, California at age 81. According to her son, the causes were cancer and pneumonia.[1][2]

Christian Brando died he was 49

Christian Brando (May 11, 1958 – January 26, 2008) was the eldest child of actor Marlon Brando. He pled guilty to manslaughter in the death of the boyfriend of his half-sister Cheyenne. On May 16, 1990, Christian Brando shot Dag Drollet to death at Marlon Brando's residence on Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. He was released from prison in 1996. In 2005, he pled guilty to spousal abuse of his wife, Deborah Presley, and was given probation.

Brando died of pneumonia on January 26, 2008[21][22] at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles. He was 49 years old. He was admitted into Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center on January 11, 2008. Although Brando's attorney, Benjamin Brin, announced he was hospitalized with pneumonia, the prognosis was said to be a complete recovery.[23] However, an unnamed friend confirmed that Brando was in grave condition.[23].
Brando was buried on February 17, 2008 at the Kalama Oddfellows Cemetery in Kalama, Washington,[24]. Christian, who had lived in Kalama for about 14 years was well-liked by locals who remembered him as "a regular guy". Chaplain Timothy Berg, who performed the service, said, "I guess as a society, we've made it really hard for people who are famous," Berg said. "God, he had a hard life, he really did, and I guess that's really true of a lot of people who are born into fame."
According to former girlfriend Donna Goen (as quoted in the Feb 11, 2008 edition of People magazine), at the time of his death Brando had been attempting to turn his life around. "He was trying so hard to finally have a life,"

Robert Prosky died he was 78

Prosky, a Polish American,[1] was born Robert Joseph Porzuczek in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of Helen and Joseph Porzuczek, a grocer and butcher.[2][3][4] He was raised in a working-class neighborhood and studied at the American Theatre Wing, later graduating from Temple University.[5]
Prosky appeared in such films as Thief, Christine, The Natural, Broadcast News, Green Card, Hoffa, Rudy, and Dead Man Walking. In addition to appearing in numerous films, Prosky appeared as a regular on the television shows Hill Street Blues and Veronica's Closet. Prior to his film and television career, Prosky appeared in numerous productions at the Arena Stage in Washington, DC, most notably as Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman. He was considered for the role of Martin Crane in Frasier and later made a guest appearance in the show as a reclusive writer. He also played Rebecca Howe's father on Cheers.
Prosky often performed at Arena Stage in Washington, DC, with over 100 stage credits to his name at that theatre alone. He also originated the role of Shelly Levene in David Mamet's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Glengarry Glen Ross.
Two of his sons, Andy and John Prosky, are also film, TV, and stage actors. The three have starred together in two productions of Arthur Miller's play The Price, in which the brothers' characters are brothers.
Prosky died on December 8, 2008, five days short of his 78th birthday, of complications following a heart procedure.[6] At the time of his death, he lived on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC.

De'Angelo Wilson's '8 MILE' ACTOR FOUND HANGED:body discovered in a room in Los Angeles.

*Actor De'Angelo Wilson, an up-and-coming actor whose biggest role was as DJ Iz in the 2002 Eminim film "8 Mile," has been found dead in an apparent suicide, according to AllHipHop.com.


The actor's body was discovered in a room inside of a commercial building in Los Angeles. It is believed he had hanged himself on Nov. 26.

According to AllHipHop.com, Wilson’s mother could not afford the fee to transport his body to his Dayton, Ohio hometown - so friends donated money to help out.


Wilson also starred in an episode of CBS's "CSI: NY" and in several other movies, including "Antwone Fisher," "The Salon" and "Mercy Street."