Celebrity death thread

[Cool Chris]

Apollo Creed was one of the truly great film antagonists. Rocky is a great movie regardless, but having him as Rocky's adversary elevates that film to tremendous heights.

[wolfking]

I know him best as Chubbs from Happy Gilmour and this great scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMUVKuSJHco

What a great actor that he was Apollo Creed but was able to fucking nail it in this movie.  Possibly the start of the whole movie.

Tragic shit.

[HOF]

I've seen a lot of these movies he was in, but I had no idea while watching The Mandalorian that he was somebody known outside of The Mandalorian.

[Cool Chris]

I had no idea while watching The Mandalorian that he was somebody known outside of The Mandalorian.

I had no idea anyone would think of him as anyone other than Apollo Creed.

[HOF]

I had no idea while watching The Mandalorian that he was somebody known outside of The Mandalorian.

I had no idea anyone would think of him as anyone other than Apollo Creed.

Been a long time since I've seen any Rocky movies.

[axeman90210]

My first time seeing Carl was his wonderful appearances as "himself" on Arrested Development

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_9R5vWXjAs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDOffqDsV5Q

[Zydar]

I'm not into country music at all, but Toby Keith has passed away.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/toby-keith-dies-country-singer-stomach-cancer-rcna137412

[ReaperKK]

Wow, only 62, RIP

[Stadler]

I'm not into country music at all, but Toby Keith has passed away.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/toby-keith-dies-country-singer-stomach-cancer-rcna137412

I saw him live twice; I get not being into his schtick, but underneath all that, he was the real deal. Wrote his own songs, and was one of those guys that could stand in front of 10,000 people with just his voice and a guitar and hold you captivated.   

I love that song "Beer For My Horses".   What a great tune.

[hefdaddy42]

RIP Toby Keith.  Not a huge fan of his overall output, but he had several songs that were fantastic and get regular replay from me.

[Chino]

I've seen Toby a number of times in concert and always had a great time. He was one of the last few monsters before the era of bro-country (though he got pretty close at times). I've done Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue for karaoke dozens of times. 

[Grappler]

20 or so years ago, I really got into country and LOVED a lot of Toby Keith's songs.  Courtesy of the Red White and Blue is awesome, and his songs were just fun and generally uplifting - What About Me, Whose your Daddy, I Love This Bar.   

Just a great musician all around.  I didn't even realize he was sick - it's too bad he's gone. 

[hefdaddy42]

RIP Mojo Nixon

[TheHoveringSojourn808]

Damo Suzuki passed away.

His 3 records with CAN are among some of the coolest things I've ever heard. RIP

https://www.stereogum.com/2251276/can-vocalist-damo-suzuki-dead-at-74/news/

[Orbert]

Bummer.  I checked out some Can a while back, and while I don't remember a lot of specifics, I do remember liking a lot of it and thinking they were a pretty cool band.

[Buckeye69]

Double whammy.....

Richard Lewis

https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/28/entertainment/richard-lewis-death/index.html


Former pro wrestler Virgil

https://www.cbssports.com/wwe/news/michael-jones-best-known-as-wwfs-virgil-and-his-work-with-the-million-dollar-man-ted-dibiase-dead-at-61/

[gmillerdrake]

Richard Lewis

Obviously knew him from 'Curb' but outside of that and one of the greatest comedies of all time.....The Wrong Guys......other than that....he was always just randomly here and there but apparently made a good living at it.

[Cool Chris]

Richard Lewis was an A+ level comic.

When I was in 5th/6th grade, I was the biggest kid in the class. I wasn't abnormally large, just noticeably taller and a little chubbier than everyone else. One of the kids fancied himself the Million Dollar Man, and he would always point a thumb my direction and say "Virgil... show 'em my money!"

[El Barto]

No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.

 

[Zydar]

Richard Lewis

Obviously knew him from 'Curb' but outside of that and one of the greatest comedies of all time.....The Wrong Guys......other than that....he was always just randomly here and there but apparently made a good living at it.

I mainly remember him from Men In Tights, playing the king with the mole.

[Stadler]

No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.

I know Virgil from his "work" with the Million Dollar Man, but Ole is the one that registered with me.  I started watching wrestling with World Championship Wrestling out of Georgia (thanks, cable!) with Piper, and those guys, and the Anderson's were a part of that.  Ole and Arn.  I watch wrestling a bit now, but it's not what I remember; it's like seeing your favorite band that you saw in a club or as an opening act now headlining stadiums. 

[El Barto]

No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.

I know Virgil from his "work" with the Million Dollar Man, but Ole is the one that registered with me.  I started watching wrestling with World Championship Wrestling out of Georgia (thanks, cable!) with Piper, and those guys, and the Anderson's were a part of that.  Ole and Arn.  I watch wrestling a bit now, but it's not what I remember; it's like seeing your favorite band that you saw in a club or as an opening act now headlining stadiums. 

In our time there was a darkness to it. That's been replaced by camp now.

Obviously I was watching WCCW here in Dallas, and a regular schedule of ODs, murders, and suicides certainly contributed to that darkness.

What I've enjoyed is watching the old timers tell stories about wrestling back in the 70s and 80s. It was a lifestyle that's nearly incomprehensible to sane, rational people. It's like a bizarre combination of circus folk and rockstars. That fascinates me.

[Stadler]

No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.

I know Virgil from his "work" with the Million Dollar Man, but Ole is the one that registered with me.  I started watching wrestling with World Championship Wrestling out of Georgia (thanks, cable!) with Piper, and those guys, and the Anderson's were a part of that.  Ole and Arn.  I watch wrestling a bit now, but it's not what I remember; it's like seeing your favorite band that you saw in a club or as an opening act now headlining stadiums. 

In our time there was a darkness to it. That's been replaced by camp now.

Obviously I was watching WCCW here in Dallas, and a regular schedule of ODs, murders, and suicides certainly contributed to that darkness.

What I've enjoyed is watching the old timers tell stories about wrestling back in the 70s and 80s. It was a lifestyle that's nearly incomprehensible to sane, rational people. It's like a bizarre combination of circus folk and rockstars. That fascinates me.

Me too; I find it fascinating as well.  And that's a great description; they ACTED like rockstars, but the living conditions and pay... those guys were doing it for the love of the "game".  Kudos - I guess - to Vince McMahon for getting the money to flow, but you're right; the darkness was scrubbed for the masses.

[El Barto]

No idea who Virgil was, but I saw in the same article that Ole Anderson died the same day. That's one I actually do remember.

I know Virgil from his "work" with the Million Dollar Man, but Ole is the one that registered with me.  I started watching wrestling with World Championship Wrestling out of Georgia (thanks, cable!) with Piper, and those guys, and the Anderson's were a part of that.  Ole and Arn.  I watch wrestling a bit now, but it's not what I remember; it's like seeing your favorite band that you saw in a club or as an opening act now headlining stadiums. 

In our time there was a darkness to it. That's been replaced by camp now.

Obviously I was watching WCCW here in Dallas, and a regular schedule of ODs, murders, and suicides certainly contributed to that darkness.

What I've enjoyed is watching the old timers tell stories about wrestling back in the 70s and 80s. It was a lifestyle that's nearly incomprehensible to sane, rational people. It's like a bizarre combination of circus folk and rockstars. That fascinates me.

Me too; I find it fascinating as well.  And that's a great description; they ACTED like rockstars, but the living conditions and pay... those guys were doing it for the love of the "game".  Kudos - I guess - to Vince McMahon for getting the money to flow, but you're right; the darkness was scrubbed for the masses.

The money flowed straight to Vince. While worker pay did increase, it was still a far cry from reasonable. The bennies are good IF you're working. The day you leave you're pretty much on your own. Wrestlers are independent contractors and will never be anything more. The only thing that changed is bad press from Chris Benoit forcing him to start taking drugs seriously, and CTE will eventually force another big spending program.

Some former wrestler, another guy I'd never heard of, Macy or something, has a YT channel where he provides a lot of the details on how the WWE really worked, and it was all pretty interesting. It wasn't a bad gig, but unless you're The Rock or Hulk Hogan it wasn't a great career.

And in many ways they really were rockstars. While I seriously doubt they were getting the quality of tail that David Lee Roth was, the quantity was still there.

[Cool Chris]

Some former wrestler, another guy I'd never heard of, Macy or something, has a YT channel where he provides a lot of the details on how the WWE really worked, and it was all pretty interesting. It wasn't a bad gig, but unless you're The Rock or Hulk Hogan it wasn't a great career.

You probably mean Maven. He is an interesting case as he did not come up through normal channels but won their 1st Tough Enough competition. I was watching WWE at the time and thought he made the best of the incredible opportunity he was given. He has become a bit of a YT wrestling celebrity lately, I've heard good things about his channel. I've watched a few minutes of his videos here and there.

It was a lifestyle that's nearly incomprehensible to sane, rational people. It's like a bizarre combination of circus folk and rockstars. That fascinates me.

Well said.

[El Barto]

Some former wrestler, another guy I'd never heard of, Macy or something, has a YT channel where he provides a lot of the details on how the WWE really worked, and it was all pretty interesting. It wasn't a bad gig, but unless you're The Rock or Hulk Hogan it wasn't a great career.

You probably mean Maven. He is an interesting case as he did not come up through normal channels but won their 1st Tough Enough competition. I was watching WWE at the time and thought he made the best of the incredible opportunity he was given. He has become a bit of a YT wrestling celebrity lately, I've heard good things about his channel. I've watched a few minutes of his videos here and there.

Yeah, that's the guy. Kind of an effeminate fellow. The rest of the wrestlers kind of resented him for the way he came up. He was good enough that most of them came around. Most of what he's talking about was well after I'd lost interest, so outside of a few of the legendary guys not much of it rings with me, but he's nevertheless interesting when talking about the business side of things.

He made enough of the opportunity to establish himself, but not enough to keep from getting shitcanned. They fired him because they didn't think he was still trying to get better and figured he'd gone as far as he'd ever go (an assessment he agrees with, even if he regrets it).

Personally, I'd rather watch Gary Hart tell stories. He was everywhere for everything so he's got stories galore, and he's not bad at telling them. His stories about The Spoiler really cracked me up.

[Cool Chris]

Personally, I'd rather watch Gary Hart tell stories. He was everywhere for everything so he's got stories galore, and he's not bad at telling them. His stories about The Spoiler really cracked me up.

Spent too many seconds trying to figure out why you brought up a politician in this thread...

I used to listen to Bruce Pritchard's podcast quite a bit but then I lost interest. I will still listen to Cornette talk about wrestling on occasion. There are few individuals I'd rather listen to talk about one topic than Cornette and wrestling.

[Indiscipline]

Akira Toriyama, legendary mangaka, has passed away.
 

[Zydar]

Steve Lawrence from Steve & Eydie has passed away.

https://www.npr.org/2024/03/07/1236780408/steve-lawrence-singer-dies

[XJDenton]

Akira Toriyama, legendary mangaka, has passed away.
 

This one hit hard. A veritable legend of an entire industry.

[King Puppies and the Acid Guppies]

Akira Toriyama, legendary mangaka, has passed away.
 

This one hit hard. A veritable legend of an entire industry.

Is this the guy that created Dragon Ball?

[Indiscipline]

Yeah, and Dr. Slump.

[XJDenton]

And did the character designs for all the Dragon Quest games, Chrono Trigger, among others.

[SoundscapeMN]

Eric Carmen, 74, lead singer of The Raspberries and then had a successful solo career.

My wife is a pretty big fan, Very sad

https://abcnews.go.com/US/singer-eric-carmen-dies-74/story?id=108032890

[hefdaddy42]

Eric Carmen, 74, lead singer of The Raspberries and then had a successful solo career.

My wife is a pretty big fan, Very sad

https://abcnews.go.com/US/singer-eric-carmen-dies-74/story?id=108032890

Oh wow.  RIP