In 2024, we've experienced the loss of several luminaries in the world of entertainment. These beloved figures—actors, comedians, musicians, singers, and coaches—have touched our lives with their talent, passion, and dedication. They've left an indelible mark on our hearts and shaped the world of entertainment in ways that will continue to inspire and influence generations to come.
Among the incredible actors who bid farewell this year, we mourn the loss of a true chameleon who effortlessly.
Authorities say a 25-year-old former two-time "American Idol" contestant has been struck and killed by a car in a New Jersey shore town.
The Asbury Park Press reports that Alexis Cohen, of Allentown, Pa., was killed early Saturday in Seaside Heights.
Deputy Chief Michael Mohel of the Ocean County Prosecutors Office says an autopsy indicated she suffered chest, head and abdominal injuries. Mohel says investigators are seeking more information about the collision.
Cohen auditioned in Philadelphia for the popular Fox singing competition in August 2007, and the episode was aired in January 2008. She tried out again during the show's eighth season.
A video of her angry rant after being rejected by judges went viral on the Internet.
ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Former boxing champion Vernon Forrest is dead at 38 after being shot multiple times in a neighborhood southwest of downtown Atlanta, officials said Sunday.
Police say they have no suspects in the death of former boxing champion Vernon Forrest.
An Atlanta police spokeswoman said it appeared that Forrest, 38, had been robbed, which led to a confrontation in which he was shot several times in the back.
Police had no suspects as of midday Sunday, said the spokeswoman, Sgt. Lisa Keyes.
Mark Guilbeau, senior investigator with the Fulton County Medical Examiner's office in Atlanta, said an autopsy will be conducted Sunday, and results are expected by afternoon.
Forrest was the International Boxing Federation welterweight champion in 2001, the World Boxing Council welterweight champion in 2002-2003, and the WBC light welterweight champion in 2007-2008 and 2008-2009, according to the BoxRec Web site.
He was named the World Boxing Hall of Fame fighter of the year in 2002, according to BoxRec.
(CNN) -- E. Lynn Harris, the author who introduced millions of readers to the "invisible life" of black gay men, was a literary pioneer whose generosity was as huge as his courage, friends said Friday.
E. Lynn Harris touched fans with his courage and his kindness, friends say.
Harris, 54, died Thursday night while on a business trip to Los Angeles, California, said Laura Gilmore, his publicist.
Harris wrote a series of novels that exposed readers to characters rarely depicted in literature: black, affluent gay men who were masculine, complex and, sometimes, tormented.
Keith Boykin, an author and friend, said Harris encouraged the black community to talk openly about homosexuality.
"We have a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy in the black community," Boykin said. "E. Lynn Harris encouraged people to ask and to tell."
How Harris broke ground
In books like "Invisible Life," "A Love of My Own," and his New York Times best-selling memoir, "What Becomes of the Brokenhearted," Harris virtually invented a new genre: books that depicted black gay men living double lives.
Though Harris wrote primarily about black gay men, some of his biggest fans were black women. His books became staples in black beauty salons, bookstores and book clubs.
"It was hard to go on a subway in places in New York or D.C. and not see some black woman reading an E. Lynn Harris novel," Boykin said.
Harris was an unlikely literary pioneer. He was a former IBM executive who decided to write about his life. He started off in 1991 selling books from the trunk of his car to African-American beauty salons and bookstores.
He eventually became one of the nation's most popular writers with an estimated 4 million of his books in print.
Tina McElroy Ansa, author of "Taking After Mudear," met Harris at the beginning of his literary career when he was selling his first book "Invisible Life." She said they were both so poor they only had enough money to buy each other's book.
Ansa said she took Harris' "Invisible Life" home and was stunned by the time she reached page 20. She came across a scene where Harris depicted two black men playing in the snow with one another.
She immediately dropped the book, called Harris and told him she had never read such a scene before.
"I had never seen homosexual love in African-American men portrayed that way," she says. "It was playful, loving, and it wasn't hidden."
Years later, when Harris became successful, he thanked Ansa for her early encouragement.
"He gave me a string of pearls," Ansa said.
In 2000, Harris told the magazine Entertainment Weekly how important "Invisible Life" was for him.
''When I wrote "Invisible Life," it had to be the first book out of me -- it helped me to deal with my own sexuality,'' Harris said. "'For me, my 20s and early 30s were spent just hiding and running, because there was no one to tell me that my life had value and the way I felt was okay.''
Standing room only at his book events
"It's heartbreaking; he had such a generous spirit," said Tananarive Due, author of "Blood Colony."
"When I was just starting out, he flew me to an event out of his own pocket and put me up just because he thought more people should know my work," Due said.
Harris was as generous with his fans as he was with his friends, some said.
They describe an author who held dinner parties for aspiring writers at his home, loved meeting and hugging fans at book readings, and never seemed to let his fame change him.
"You could get trampled at an E. Lynn Harris reading," Ansa said. "People loved him."
Due said Harris would answer up to 200 e-mails from his fans each day. She said Harris had been a cheerleader in college "and a spirit of joy followed him through his life."
"He genuinely loved being around people and remembered names," Due said. "I remember seeing him at an event in Florida, and one woman in the crowd raised her hand and he said, 'Oh, Mary, you were here for my hardcover book signing.'"
Nonetheless, Harris had his share of personal pain.
He was born in Flint, Michigan, and grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas. In his 2003 memoir, he wrote about enduring abuse by his stepfather and an attempted suicide in 1990.
And he had critics. Some said Harris was a mediocre writer who stumbled on a winning literary formula. Boykin says Harris was stung by some of the criticism.
"He always said 'I'm not a James Baldwin,'" Boykin said, referring to the openly gay black author from the 1960s. "He was writing accessible literature for the masses."
Boykin said Harris received most of his criticism not from outraged straight critics, but people within the black community.
"He was hurt by some of the criticism from some black gay men who felt he wasn't portraying them accurately and others who thought he was telling too much," Boykin said.
In a 2003 Detroit Free Press interview, Harris said he resisted becoming an advocate for gay rights.
"It's such a small part of who I am, " he said. "It's what I do when I'm with my partner that puts this label on me. Most of my friends are straight. I tend to have a regular life, if you will."
Due said there has traditionally been a lot of pain associated with homosexuality in the black community. Harris took a little of that pain away with his life and his books.
"He really helped let the air in," Due said. "He helped us all breathe a little better."
Los Angeles physician Joel Weisman, one of the first to identify HIV/AIDS in 1980 from his Sherman Oaks office, died Saturday. He was 66.
Known as "the dean of Southern California gay doctors," Weisman made the discovery nearly three decades ago, when he realized that three of his male patients, all gay, started suffering from similar symptoms (including drastic weight loss, pneumonia, and fevers). With UCLA immunologist Martin S. Gottlieb -- who also had a patient with similar symptoms -- the pair wrote a report in a 1981 issue of the Centers for Disease Control's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, signaling the official start of the AIDS epidemic. The two doctors cited health information among five patients, who died shortly thereafter, of what would eventually be known as AIDS.
Following their report, cases of immunodeficiency were being reported globally. By the end of 1982, 618 cases were reported. Twenty years later, the full toll had reached 500,000.
Weisman became an advocate for his patients and others with HIV when in 1983 he became founding chairman of AIDS Project Los Angeles. There, Weisman played a critical role in increasing services to those with the virus.
He also helped establish the first AIDS-specific hospital unit at the Sherman Oaks Hospital and Health Center. Weisman also pushed to fund AIDS research as an original member of amFAR. He later became chairman of the organization from 1988 to 1992. Dr. Mervyn Silverman lead the board of directors of amFAR from 1986 to 1996, including the period while Weisman was chairman of the board. Silverman described his colleague as a diligent advocate in the early stages of the AIDS epidemic.
"Hearing about him really upset me because he was very caring, very compassionate, he wasn't just part of the gay community, or the medical profession," Silverman said. "He was someone who really cared about the issues, especially with his involvement with APLA and amFAR. I never got the sense, working with him, that anything he was doing was for self aggrandizement or to be in the spotlight. He just did what he did."
Silverman remembers Weisman's work with amFAR during the early years as being controlled during such a hectic time.
"The foundation was in its very formative years, and if you've worked with a new foundation, you'll know that it can get crazy, especially because with amFAR you had people who were there for one reason, and it was to solve this mystery and get on with it," he said. "When you have that kind of commitment and dedication, the organizational things get more difficult. So in the beginning, you have mostly people who are there volunteering because of the cause, during that time, it's a very difficult maturation. I look at the board today compared to the board back then, and it's like night and day."
Weisman died in his home after suffering from heart disease and being ill for several months, his partner of 17 years, Bill Hutton, told the Los Angeles Times. He is survived by Hutton, his brother Mark, his daughter Stavey Weisman-Bogue Foster, a granddaughter, and two nieces. Donations may be made in his name to amFAR, AIDS Project Los Angeles, or the Kansas City University of Medicine and Biosciences College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Gidget the Chihuahua, whose Taco Bell commercials made her a star, has died. She was 15.
The owner of Studio Animal Services in Castaic says Gidget suffered a massive stroke late Tuesday at her trainer's home in Santa Clarita and had to be euthanized.
Gidget was the sassy mascot in Taco Bell commercials from 1997 to 2000. While other dogs had bit parts, it was her bug-eyed, big-eared face that was seen pronouncing "Yo quiero Taco Bell," Spanish for "I want Taco Bell," in a male voice dubbed by Argentine actor Carlos Alazraqui. A few years later, Alazraqui landed the role for which he is best known: Deputy James Garcia on Comedy Central's "Reno 911!"
The Taco Bell ads provoked some criticism from activists who said they used Mexican stereotypes.
Gidget also had a role in the movie "Legally Blonde 2," but others associated with the ad campaign weren't so lucky. Earlier this year, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the creators of the Chihuahua character hadn't been properly compensated for their work, and Taco Bell was ordered to pay $42 million.
Gidget's trainer, Sue Chipperton, in an interview earlier this year with the People Pets website, described the diminutive dog as a consummate professional on the set. But, she said, Gidget had been the victim of typecasting, which limited her career choices (or, rather, Chipperton's choices on her behalf).
Waller passed away Friday (July 17) at a hospital near his home in Connecticut after he went into cardiac arrest. His cause of death was listed as cardiovascular disease, reports the Associated Press.
Peter And Gordon had a string of chart-topping hits in the '60s, including a handful written by their friend, Paul McCartney. Their hits included 'A World Without Love'
and 'I Don't Want To See You Again'.
Waller was born in Scotland and met his bandmate Peter Asher at Westminster School in London. "Gordon played such a significant role in my life that losing him is hard to comprehend – let alone to tolerate," Asher said in a statement.
"He was my best friend at school almost half a century ago. He was not only my musical partner but played a key role in my conversion from only a snooty jazz fan to a true rock and roll believer as well. Without Gordon I would never have begun my career in the music business in the first place. Our professional years together in the '60s constitute a major part of my life, and I have always treasured them."
Discography
In Touch With... (by Peter and Gordon) (1964)
Peter and Gordon (by Peter and Gordon) (1964)
World Without Love (by Peter and Gordon) (1964)
Hurtin' 'n' Lovin' (by Peter and Gordon) (1965)
I Don't Want to See You Again (by Peter and Gordon) (1965)
I Go to Pieces (by Peter and Gordon) (1965)
True Love Ways (by Peter and Gordon) (1965)
Best of Peter and Gordon (by Peter and Gordon) (1966)
Peter and Gordon Sing & Play the Hits of Nashville (1966)
Somewhere (by Peter and Gordon) (1966)
Woman (by Peter and Gordon) (1966)
In London for Tea (by Peter and Gordon) (1967)
Knight in Rusty Armour (by Peter and Gordon) (1967)
Lady Godiva (by Peter & Gordon) (1967)
Hot Cold & Custard (by Peter & Gordon) (1968)
and Gordon (solo) (1972)
Best of Peter and Gordon (by Peter & Gordon) (1983)
Hits of Peter and Gordon (by Peter & Gordon) (1983)
Best of Peter and Gordon (by Peter & Gordon) (1991)
Ultimate Peter and Gordon (by Peter & Gordon) (2001)
Definitive Collection: Knights in Rusty Armour (by Peter & Gordon) (2003)
David Ferguson defended the moral rights of musicians, composers and creators. After the advent of the digital world and at a time when ideas about ownership, piracy and copyright started to be tested, he sought to make musicians aware of their rights and help them to speak to government with a coherent voice.
Underpinning all his political lobbying was a lifelong commitment to social justice and a passionate, often fiery belief in the importance of songwriters and composers to the multibillion-pound music industry.
David Ferguson was born in South London in 1953 and grew up in a fiercely political household. A love of debate ran in the family. Both his parents were Labour Party activists, although the most enduring influence on his beliefs was his maternal grandmother, Constance Lewcock. One of the original suffragettes, she had been imprisoned for plotting to blow up a railway arch at Durham in 1914. On her release she became a well-loved Labour Party councillor for Newcastle upon Tyne. Ferguson kept a picture of her with him until he died.
After attending Bessemer Grange school in Southwark, Ferguson was given a scholarship to Dulwich College in 1964. It was during this particularly liberal period in the school’s history that his interests in music, drama and political ideology really took shape.
On leaving Dulwich he took a degree in Slavonic studies at London University before taking a job with the Traverse Company in Edinburgh creating sound collages to accompany the plays. He then moved to the Victoria Theatre in Stoke-on-Trent, where his soundscapes with guitars, tapes and a modified Rolf Harris stylophone became integral to many of their productions of the early 1970s. Although lacking any formal musical training Ferguson began to explore early sound design through the use of synthesisers, keyboards, drones and tape effects. It was an imaginative approach that formed the basis of much of his later professional work.
It was a chance meeting with an old school friend, David Rhodes, at a concert by Brian Eno’s experimental rock troupe, the 801, in the autumn of 1976, that changed the course of his professional life.
The two shared a love of the esoteric sounds of Amon Düül, Neu!, Kraftwerk, Can and experimental French operatic rockers Magma. Their first band Manscheinen quickly morphed into Random Hold (named after Ferguson’s love of fruit machines) with the addition of Bill MacCormick of the 801, the singer Simon Ainsley and Michael Phips — the ex-drummer with the Glitter Band.
Early shows were edgy and exciting. At one, when he was supporting Adam and the Ants at the Rock Garden, a group of neo-Nazis stormed the stage. Ferguson emerged from behind his keyboards and invited them all to take him on one by one.
Word about Random Hold spread. A double-page spread in the Melody Maker in which he told the interviewer Allan Jones that they made “dark music for swinging suicides”, and the patronage of Peter Gabriel, ensured that the band soon became the subject of a bidding war among record companies.
The band signed to Polydor and recorded their debut album with Peter Hammill of Van der Graaf Generator at John Lennon’s former home, Tittenhurst Park. The subsequent album was not as commercial as Polydor would have liked but the band got good reviews and toured to support its release with Peter Gabriel, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and XTC. During this period Ferguson also contributed keyboards to Peter Gabriel’s worldwide hit, Biko.
After three commercially disappointing albums, Random Hold disbanded. Rhodes joined Peter Gabriel’s band and Ferguson went into music for television. He built his own studio at his house in Waterloo and was taken on by the BBC Radiophonic workshop, which added him to its list of freelancers. His first big TV music assignment was for the 1987 Emmy and Baftawinning Granada documentary The Sword of Islam. Soon his haunting mood pieces were in demand. His work appeared on everything from thrillers to hard-hitting documentaries including Black Box, X Cars, Fire in the Blood and Under the Sun. Inspector Rebus, the much loved Auf Wiedersehen Pet and the cult Granada drama Cracker were his most notable successes.
It was while working on one high-profile commission that Ferguson took on the cause that would dominate the last 20 years of his life. He received a late-night call from an American lawyer who told him that he would “never work in this industry again” if he didn’t sign the publishing rights in his music over to the TV production company. The bullying practice of coercive publishing, where large media companies demand all rights in music compositions, including any future royalties, would become widespread.
Throughout it all, Ferguson’s passionate, often uncompromising advocacy won him the respect of even his fiercest adversaries,
In 2007 Ferguson had pancreatic cancer diagnosed. He underwent treatment and briefly entered remission. When the cancer returned late in 2008 he withdrew from public life, dedicating his remaining months to travel, gastronomy and working with his son Sam on a final music project. Recorded at Peter Gabriel’s Real World studios in Bath, the album features ex-members of Random Hold, Roxy Music and Peter Gabriel’s touring band.
In February 2009 he married Silvana, a fellow music rights activist whom he met while lobbying in France.
David Ferguson’s final public appearance was at the Ivor Novello Awards in May 2009, where he received Basca’s highest accolade, the Academy Fellowship. Typically, he chose this final platform to attempt to galvanise the industry one last time, “Get your bloody act together you lot,” he said, shaking a defiant hand at the audience.
He is survived by Sara, his formerpartner, their son Sam, and his wife Silvana.
David Ferguson, musician, composer and rights activist, was born on May 24, 1953. He died of pancreatic cancer on July 5, 2009, aged 56
