Albano, 76, was best known as a legendary WWE wrestling manager and for playing Cyndi Lauper’s dad in her video for “Girls Just Wanna (Have Fun).” He died this morning. 

William Safire, a speechwriter for President Richard M. Nixon and a Pulitzer Prize-winning political columnist for The New York Times died on Sunday. He was 79.

His conservative politics aside, it’s pretty badass to be remembered as the “oracle of language” upon passing away:  “There may be many sides in a genteel debate, but in the Safire world of politics and journalism it was simpler: There was his own unambiguous wit and wisdom on one hand and, on the other, the blubber of fools he called ‘nattering nabobs of negativism’ and ‘hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history.’”

And the guy was like, “I used to fuck guys like you in jail.”  And then Swayze was like, “huh.”  And then he ripped out his throat.

They’ll never be another one quite like Patrick Swayze, so badass he could dance with Jennifer Grey and make her look sexy.

The LA Times has a lovely remembrance of the man.  Okay screw it, just thinking about Patrick Swayze, it’s hard to imagine a guy with more talent to either be an action hero, sensitive leading man, or just flat out funny.  So here he is with Chris Farley.

Jim Carroll, punk poet and musician has died at age 60 from a heart attack at his home in Manhattan over the weekend.

In 1978 he published “The Basketball Diaries”, an autobiographical account of being a teenage basketball star in New York City, which in 1995 was made into a film staring Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Wahlberg.  In 1978 he also formed his punk rock/new wave group The Jim Carroll Band, which released the single “People Who Died” in 1980.

The lion of the senate, and my senator for most of my life has passed away. He was 77. Kennedy family statement:

Edward M. Kennedy – the husband, father, grandfather, brother and uncle we loved so deeply – died late Tuesday night at home in Hyannis Port. We’ve lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever. We thank everyone who gave him care and support over this last year, and everyone who stood with him for so many years in his tireless march for progress toward justice, fairness and opportunity for all. He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it. He always believed that our best days were still ahead, but it’s hard to imagine any of them without him.

Kennedy’s passing also marks, in many ways, the passing of the political Kennedy dynasty.  As much a part of Massachusetts as the Red Sox, Harvard, MIT, et. al. What always amazed me about Ted Kennedy, aside from his political acumen, desire to pass legislation and respect he held in the Senate, is how he never had to campaign for the Senate.  It was a given every six years that his name would be on the ballot and Massachusetts would vote for him in record numbers.

Truly, truly, sad news.  This is the first time during the summer of death that I feel devastated.

Lester William Polsfuss, better known as Les Paul, electric guitar pioneer, passed away this morning from complications of pneumonia.

He was 94.

Paul pioneered the development of guitar sounds that came to define rock music and is also widely credited as being the innovative mind behind studio recording techniques such as overdubbing and delay effects.

If you’re playing the guitar you pretty much go for a Fender or a Les Paul, no?  That says all you need to know about the man.  [AP]

I was saddened by the news that my old friend and business colleague Billy Lee Riley had just passed away from cancer at age 75.

I am sorry it took Billy’s passing to inspire me to write this long overdue account of our friendship, but his passing on August 2 was overlooked by most in this summer which has claimed so many people.

Go on iTunes and buy “Red Hot” or “Flying Saucer Rock and Roll” by Billy Lee Riley and see if you can tell where raw, high energy punk music reared it’s ugly, but cool, head.

I last spoke with him when I heard he was diagnosed with colon cancer two or three years ago. He had kept up with and sent prayers for my own treatment for leukemia and kept in touch until he became sick himself. I am sorry I did not maintain the friendship over the years.

I had an interesting but rocky friend/manager/producer situation with Billy but when I think back to it, I only remember the fun times and the incredible music he made. Despite the usual disputes over money and booking dates (Billy had to have at least 1000.00 to leave his house and, due to his Seven Day Adventist faith, could not perform on Saturday nights – for any amount of money), we never had cross words or got angry about anything. Frustrated, but not angry.

Billy was one of those rare talents that could be the 1950’s equivalent of Axl Rose but with a good personality and great sense of cynical humor. I have a treasured copy of a letter the legendary Cowboy Jack Clement gave to me from his landlord in 1957. Jack was politely but firmly asked to vacate his Memphis apartment following an evening of drinking wine spodeodee, (yes, there is such a thing), and concluding with Billy jumping naked off the balcony and into the pool a couple of stories below. He was not hurt, thanks in part to the wine, but the other apartment complex guests were not amused.

Billy was determined to sabotage his career from the start reportedly pouring whiskey over Sam Phillips recording desk and trashing the studio because Sam chose to promote Jerry Lee Lewis over himself (”Great Balls of Fire” or “Red Hot”). Sam could not afford to promote both and had to choose between the two rivals. Imagine the outpouring of love and remembrances that would have happened last week for Billy had the choice been reversed.  MORE »

My friend texted me yesterday afternoon, “John Hughes died.”

At the time all I could find was a snippet on TMZ, but late in the night it was confirmed by just about every news outlet. The director, writer, producer, definer of high school in the 80’s died yesterday at the age of 59 of a heart attack.

He hadn’t directed a movie since Curly Sue is 1991, but he still wrote several screenplays under the psuedonym Edmond Dantes.

But, this is the gentleman who directed The Breakfast Club, Pretty in Pink, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Sixteen Candles, Weird Science, She’s Having a Baby, Uncle Buck and Planes, Trains, and Autombiles. And that’s just what he directed, never mind wrote or produced.

I know everybody will be talking about the first four movies mentioned on that list, but for my money John Hughes will always be the guy that directed the last four.  Call me crazy, but even as an eight-year-old I recognized the perverse genius that was Uncle Buck and PT&A.  Besides that, Sixteen Candles was the first movie I saw with boobies in it, so thank you John Hughes for that.  I must’ve worn out my parent’s VHS copy of that movie as a kid.  Well, at least the first fifteen minutes, when Molly Ringwald is checking out Haviland Morris in the shower.

The summer of 2009 will forever be remembered as the summer when everybody died.

Seems as if another day, another day famous person passes away.  This time it’s Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Frank McCourt, best known for his 1996 memoir Angela’s Ashes. He was also a longtime teacher at New York’s Stuyvesant High School.  He died Sunday at age 78.

A rather different version of his upbringing, however, emerged from local sources. After the publication ofAngela’s Ashes, the local newspaper, the Limerick Leader, published a photograph showing the youthful McCourt and his younger brother Malachy, smiling and smartly dressed in their scout uniforms – and not just of any scout uniforms, but those of the St Joseph’s Boy Scouts, the elite of Limerick. Another picture showed their mother Angela, whose plump figure would appear to belie McCourt’s claims of his family having suffered constant hunger.Yet for all the factual inaccuracies that were unearthed, part of McCourt’s account was undoubtedly accurate. He did lose three siblings. His father was a notorious alcoholic and Frank himself did suffer a number of eye infections, ultimately resulting in the loss of his eyelashes.

McCourt left school at 13, and at 19, as Angela’s Ashes records, he left the poverty of Limerick and his family behind, after saving enough money for a ticket to New York from a job with the Post Office. His brothers, Malachy and Michael, followed him soon after, as, eventually, did Angela.

In interviews he always came across as a warm-spirited raconteur.  Here he is with schmaltzy memoirist Mitch Albom.

News legend Walter Cronkite has died at the age of 92. Once known as “the most trusted man in America” Cronkite anchored the CBS Evening News from 1962 to 1981 with his trademark sign-off, “And that’s the way it is…”

According to the NY Times and Cronkite’s son, Chip, the cause of death was from complications of dementia.

LA Times Critic Robert Lloyd has a terrific appreciation:

The rolling rise and fall of his voice and the rhythms and pauses he built into his prose gave his reporting the subtle weight of blank verse. Cronkite cut his teeth telling stories in print and over the radio; he knew how to make pictures from words. Similarly trained reporters dominated TV news for the medium’s first decades; it was an oratorical era. But as they aged and retired, the networks turned to more telegenic models, to prettier people and — reasonably enough — a more visual approach to the news.

Network news anchors still aim for that mix of eloquence and authority that Cronkite embodied, but they compete, at a disadvantage, with the noise of an ascendant punditocracy and the mountain-from-molehill nattering of cable news organizations that live on crises — it’s not the old voice of reassuring honesty that they cultivate, but one of perpetual anxiety. There are many more rooms in the mansion that is television news nowadays, but they have grown proportionately smaller; they are no longer fit for giants.

But perhaps, the oddest and most telling tribute to the talents of Walter Cronkite, lay in this nugget from the NY Times obituary: “He was so widely known that in Sweden anchormen were once called Cronkiters.”

And since this is the 40th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, here is “the most trusted man in America” as it happened live on tv.

This happened yesterday, but I just wanted to mention that former Defense Secretary (during vast swaths of the Vietnam War) and compelling subject of Errol Morris’s documentary The Fog of War died yesterday at 93. He spent his life after 1968, probably right up until his death, wrestling with the moral consequences of a war he could not win.

The famous product spokesman was 50-years-old.  It’s like God woke up on the wrong side of the bed this week or Death has been given the green light.

Tampa police said Mays’ wife found him unresponsive Sunday morning. A fire rescue crew pronounced him dead at 7:45 a.m. It was not immediately clear how he died. He said he was hit on the head when an airplane he was on made a rough landing Saturday, and his wife, Deborah Mays, told investigators he didn’t feel well before he went to bed about 10 p.m. that night.

There were no signs of a break-in at the home, and investigators do not suspect foul play, said Lt. Brian Dugan of the Tampa Police Department, who wouldn’t answer questions about how Mays’ body was found because of the ongoing investigation. The coroner’s office expects to have an autopsy done by Monday afternoon.

”Although Billy lived a public life, we don’t anticipate making any public statements over the next couple of days,” Deborah Mays said in a statement Sunday. ”Our family asks that you respect our privacy during these difficult times.”

The King of Pop died today from cardiac arrest in Los Angeles, the L.A. Times and TMZ report.   He was 50.  Jackson was in the midst of preparing for a series of 50 sold-out shows in London’s O2 Arena and had the makings of a stirring career comeback.

Make whatever jokes you want, and lord knows I’ve made a few today at Jackson’s expense, but there’s no denying his musical legacy, cultural impact, or importance.  In a manner of speaking — personal tragedies and life craziness aside — he is 100% bona fide.

Also?  The first time he moonwalked performing “Billie Jean” at the Motown 25 celebration is still jawdropping today as it was back then.