In honor of the renowned Stars, We’ve Lost in 2023, including Tina Turner, Harry Belafonte, Raquel Welch, Lisa Marie Presley, and other figures from the entertainment industry. Continue reading to recall their life and work.
Bray Wyatt
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The 1/3-generation WWE star Windham Rotunda, additionally recognized by his ring moniker Bray Wyatt, passed away on August 24 at the age of 36. He changed into the son of Mike Rotunda, the grandson of Blackjack Mulligan, the brother of Bo Dallas, the nephew of Barry Windham and Kendall Windham, and a member of a wrestling family through delivery. He gained the WWE Championship, the WWE Universal Championship, the WWE Raw Tag Team Championship, and the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship during the route of his profession.
Hersha Parady
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Hersha Parady, who was best known for playing Alice Garvey, a teacher on Little House on the Prairie, passed away on August 23 at the age of 78. None of the other episodes and movies in which Parady appeared had the same impact as Alice. She first made an appearance in Little House’s third season as a different character, then in season four, she made her debut as Alice. Up to her spectacular last appearance, in which Alice died while attempting to save kids from a burning schoolhouse that Albert Ingalls had unintentionally set on fire, she had appeared in more than 30 episodes. In addition, Parady had appearances on Second Noah, Unsolved Mysteries, and Keenan & Kel, where he played Principal Dimly.
Terry Funk
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Terry Funk, a WWE Hall of Famer and professional wrestler, passed away on August 23 at the age of seventy-nine. Over the route of his more than 50-12 months career, Funk had a massive effect on the increase of hardcore wrestling. Throughout his career, Funk created a number of rivalries, most notably with Jerry Lawler and Ric Flair. He also served as a mentor to Mick Foley. Like many professional wrestlers, Funk worked as a sideline actor in movies and TV shows. He acted in episodes of Swamp Thing, Quantum Leap, and The Adventures of Brisco Country, Jr., as well as the arm wrestling dramas Over the Top with Sylvester Stallone and Road House with Patrick Swayze. Funk even had a brief musical career, putting out three soft rock CDs.
David Jacobs
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Dallas and Knots Landing creator and producer David Jacobs passed away on August 20 at age 84. In 1977, he received his first writing credit for the television show Kingston: Confidential. In the decades that followed, Jacobs went on to produce or write for a variety of shows, including Family, Kaz, Married: The First Year, The Lazarus Syndrome, Secrets of Midland Heights, Shannon, Chicago Story, Bodies of Evidence, and Four Corners. His most well-known work, however, was Dallas, a 356-episode drama that followed the story of the Ewing family and their vast oil company, as well as its 344-episode California spinoff Knots Landing. Additionally, Jacobs co-created the 56-episode series Paradise, which had a shorter run.
Ron Cephas Jones
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The well-known stage and film actor Ron Cephas Jones passed away on August 19 at the age of 66. He was best known for playing William Hill on the popular NBC family drama This Is Us. He won two Emmys and a Screen Actors Guild Award for his performance as William, Randall Pearson’s biological father in Sterling K. Brown. Jones won praise for his performances in Richard III, The Tempest, and Clyde’s on stage. He made appearances in movies like Across the Universe, Dolemite Is My Name, and Half Nelson in addition to television shows like Luke Cage, Mr. Robot, Truth Be Told, and Law & Order: Organized Crime. His daughter, fellow performer Jasmine Cephas Jones, is his only heir.
Nancy Frangione
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The soap opera actress Nancy Frangione, best known for her performances as Tara Martin on All My Children and Cecile DePoulignac on Another World, passed away on August 18 at the age of 70. Frangione made her soap opera debut as Tara on All My Children in 1977, playing the role until 1979. She then landed her most well-known role as the cunning Cecile in Another World in 1980, winning the Outstanding Villainess award from Soap Opera Digest in the process. Between 1980 and 1995, she would go on to reprise the part several times. Her other credits included the TV movies Sharing Richard and In the Line of Duty: A Cop for the Killing, as well as the shows The Nanny, Matlock, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, Highway to Heaven, and The Nanny.
Jerry Moss
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Co-founder of A&M Records and veteran music executive Jerry Moss passed away on August 16 at the age of 88. In 1962, Joe Cocker, Styx, Joe Jackson, Squeeze, Suzanne Vega, the Human League, Cat Stevens, Amy Grant, and Soundgarden were among the artists that the record label, which Moss co-founded with musician Herb Alpert, famously signed. The Police’s Synchronicity, Bryan Adams’ Reckless, Carole King’s Tapestry, Jackson’s Control, and Peter Frampton’s Frampton Comes Alive are just a few of the notable albums released by A&M Records. Alpert and Moss were both honored into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.
Chris Peluso
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Chris Peluso, a Broadway performer best known for his lead performances in Mamma Mia and Wicked, passed away on August 15 at the age of 40. In the theatre, Peluso initially came to prominence as the Balladeer in the Assassins revival from 2004, as Louis and Nicolas in Elton John’s Lestat, and as three of the main male characters in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. His most well-known performances, however, were as Sky in Mamma Mia on Broadway and as both Fiyero and his understudy on the Wicked tours. He also played the lead role in The Glorious Ones, an Off-Broadway show. He performed in various London shows, including Show Boat, Miss Saigon, The Woman in White, and Death Takes a Holiday. Peluso’s ability has spread internationally, as well as the U.K. tour of Funny Girl.
Darren Kent
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The 36-12 months-antique actor and director Darren Kent, who became maximum recognized for his role on Game of Thrones, handed away. Kent, an Essex local, commenced his profession as an actor within the early 2000s, securing components in the horror movie Mirrors and the delusion image Snow White and the Huntsman, starring Chris Hemsworth and Kristen Stewart, before receiving his huge ruin inside the season 4 finale of Game of Thrones. In addition to performing at the huge display in My Feral Heart, The Little Stranger, and Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, Kent, who had rare pores and skin circumstances, went on to Star in some famous TV series, together with EastEnders and the BBC rendition of Les Misérables. He became as worried behind the camera as he became in the front of it — he wrote, directed, and produced several short movies, consisting of 2021’s You Know Me.
Magoo
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At the age of 50, Magoo, a producer and half of the rap duo Timbaland & Magoo, passed away. As a part of the group Timbaland & Magoo, which was founded in Norfolk, Virginia in the 1990s when he and Timbaland were both teenagers, Magoo, real name Melvin Barcliff, gained notoriety. The couple first came together as members of the band S.B.I. (Surrounded By Idiots), which also included Larry Live and Pharrell Williams. Three studio albums by Timbaland & Magoo were released: Welcome to Our World in 1997, Indecent Proposal in 2001, and Under Construction, Part II in 2003. Among the contributors were Brandy, Twista, Ludacris, Jay-Z, and others. Other singles included “Luv 2 Luv Ya” and “People Like Myself,” in addition to the Missy Elliott and Aaliyah collaboration “Up Jumps Da’ Boogie.”
Clarence Avant
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The distinguished song producer called the Black Godfather of song, enjoyment, politics, and sports passed away on August thirteen at the age of ninety-two. For many years, Avant turned into one of the most critical behind-the-scenes dealmakers inside the leisure enterprise. He was especially important as a guardian for Black musicians. Quincy Jones, Jay Z, Whitney Houston, Lionel Richie, Snoop Dogg, Queen Latifah, and Pharrell Williams are a few who attribute his advice and support to them. His career began in the 1960s, A handful of the artists whose careers were aided by Avant’s two record labels include Little Willie John, Lalo Schifrin, Sarah Vaughan, Bill Withers, and Sixto Rodriguez. Athletes Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, and record-breaking baseball player Hank Aaron also benefited from his assistance. Hank Aaron, negotiated the richest endorsement agreement in the annals of professional sports. He supplied advice to President George H.W. Bush and became a tremendous contributor to the marketing campaign finance efforts of Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter. The Black Godfather, a Netflix documentary, is also about Avant, who changed into a celeb on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Shelley Smith
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For Love and Honor and The Associates actress Shelley Smith, a 1970s supermodel turned actor, passed away on August 8 at the age of 70. In a heartfelt Facebook video, her 18-year-old husband, actor Michael Maguire, broke the information that his wife had passed away days in advance after struggling a cardiac arrest. Smith, who was born on October 25, 1952, started her lucrative modeling career in the early Seventies, touchdown on the duvet of Harper’s Bazaar and later appearing in Vogue, Glamour, Mademoiselle, and different guides. In 1979, she made the transfer to television, co-starring with Martin Short in all 13 episodes of the ephemeral legal drama The Associates. She rose to fame as a contestant on game shows like Super Password and others around the same time, Body Language, and the $10,000 Pyramid by Dick Clark. She played Captain Carolyn Engel on the one-season NBC military drama For Love and Honor in 1983. Fantasy Island, Diff’rent Strokes, Magnum, P.I., and Murder She Wrote were among the later TV shows in which she appeared. She successfully underwent a vitro fertilization pregnancy and gave birth to her own twins before founding Hatch Fertility, an egg donor fertilization business, in 1991.
Tom Jones
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The Fantasticks’ author and songwriter Tom Jones passed away on August eleven at the age of 95. Jones, who changed into born in Littlefield, Texas, on February 17, 1928, studied acting at the University of Texas, where he met Harvey Schmidt, every other longtime operating associate. The Fantasticks, the original musical, is still their biggest success. They would go on to compose all of their major musicals together, including 110 in the Shade, I Do! I Do!, Philemon, and Celebration. Despite varied initial evaluations, it was clear that it had lasting power. The unique Off-Broadway production noticed more than 17,000 performances over the direction of its forty-two-year run, making it the longest-walking musical in history. Jones was elected into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1998, and they obtained the Tony Honors for Excellence in Theatre in 1991. Liza Minnelli, Kristin Chenoweth, Elliott Gould, F. Murray Abraham, and Glenn Close were among the cast members of the Off-Broadway and touring play. The Fantasticks not only commemorated a famous run but also established themselves as a mainstay of neighborhood and regional theater. Schmidt and Jones wrote the script for the 2000 film adaption, and in 2006, an Off-Broadway revival of the play took place.
Johnny Hardwick
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Johnny Hardwick, a voice actor and comedian best known for playing Dale Gribble on King of the Hill, has passed away. Hardwick, who turned into born in Austin, started out his career as a comedian in the Nineteen Nineties and later became the first stand-up comic to ever carry out on The Jon Stewart Show. Greg Daniels and Mike Judge approached him following a comedy performance in Los Angeles due to the fact they believed he might be an awesome healthy for the King of the Hill TV application they had been growing. On the Emmy-winning series, Hardwick worked as a writer, story editor, and producer, but he is most known for playing Dale, Hank’s chain-smoking, bug-slaying best friend. He voiced the title character in more than 250 episodes of the animated series, which aired from 1997 through 2010 and will soon receive a Hulu relaunch.
Robbie Robertson
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The Band’s longtime leader Robbie Robertson, a famed Canadian musician, passed away on August 9 after a protracted illness. He was 80. Over the direction of more than six decades, Robertson worked as a songwriter, producer, performer, actor, and film composer. He became a member of The Band (formerly known as The Hawks), which rose to reputation after helping artists consisting of Ronnie Hawkins, Bob Dylan, Garth Hudson, Richard Manuel, and Levon Helm. The Band is credited with popularizing Americana songs with songs like. The Weight, Up on Cripple Creek. The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down, no matter the fact that they handiest survived 8 years following the discharge in their debut album. Martin Scorsese’s live performance documentary The Last Waltz, which capabilities photos from their final overall performance, was able to capture it. Robertson and Scorsese would later have a protracted-lasting running relationship. Robertson collaborated with the renowned director on some of the movies, along with Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Wolf of Wall Street, and The Irishman, as a composer, track manufacturer, and tune manager. Robertson finished production on Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon before passing away.
Robert Swan
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The Untouchables, Natural Born Killers, and Hoosiers veteran character actor Robert Swan passed away on August 9 after a protracted battle with cancer. He was 78. On October 10, 1944, Swan was born in Chicago. In the 1980s sci-fi romance Somewhere in Time, which starred Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour, Swan received his first role in a major motion picture. He then gained notoriety for appearing in a number of sports movies. Swan appeared in Hoosiers with Gene Hackman, The Babe with John Goodman, and Rudy with Hoosiers director David Anspaugh. His other significant works include Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers and The Untouchables by Brian De Palma. In the 1984 ABC telefilm The Dollmaker, he appeared alongside Jane Fonda; he thereafter made an appearance on All My Children. Swan established himself as a stage performer in the Chicago theater community and established the Harbor Country Opera, an opera theatre in Michigan.
Sixto Rodriguez
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According to his official website, Sixto Rodriguez, the Detroit guitarist whose underappreciated ability was recognized in the Oscar-winning 2012 documentary Searching for Sugar Man, passed away on August 9. He was 81. Rodriguez’s songs on working-class hardships failed to connect with American listeners in the 1970s, but South Africans battling against apartheid found them to be incredibly popular. The documentary, which focused on the journey of a few worldwide fans trying to see their hero, helped to restore Rodriguez’s reputation in his native country and allowed him to tour effectively as recently as 2018.
DJ Casper
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After a seven-year struggle with cancer, DJ Casper, a musician from Chicago and the man of the “Cha Cha Slide,” the most well-known dance song ever, passed away on August 7. He was 58. Casper started out as a DJ and got his name from the all-white outfits he usually wore onstage. He originally worked as a DJ for weddings and other special occasions. He wrote the song “Cha Cha Slide” for his nephew, a personal trainer who instructed an aerobics class. When it started to catch on at neighborhood gyms and clubs, Casper created a new version in 2000 that quickly reached the top of the charts throughout the world. The catchy dance song has become a standard at weddings, sporting events, bar mitzvahs, and many other occasions around the world over the years.
William Friedkin
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The French Connection and The Exorcist’s Academy Award-winning filmmaker William Friedkin passed away on August 7 at the age of 87. Friedkin, a filmmaker linked with the New Hollywood movement of the 1970s, is best known for his films To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Bug (2006), and Sorcerer (1977). Prior to making his way into television and documentaries, such as the 1962 film The People vs. Paul Crump and the 1965 television series The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Friedkin began his career in the mailroom of Chicago TV station WGN. With Good Times, The Night They Raided Minsky’s, and The Boys in the Band, he made his feature film directing debut in the late 1960s. Rampage, The Guardian, Killer Joe, and other credits, and The Devil and Father Amorth, as well as music videos for Wang Chung (“To Live and Die in L.A.”), Barbra Streisand (“Somewhere”), and Laura Branigan (“Self Control”).
Herbert J. Siegel
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According to the New York Times, wealthy entertainment industry entrepreneur Herbert J. Siegel passed away on August 5 at the age of 95. Born in Philadelphia, Siegel is most recognized for his involvement in a number of important entertainment business transactions. He contributed significantly to the merger of Warner Communications and Time Inc. and sold 10 TV stations to media mogul Rupert Murdoch. He attempted to establish a fifth national TV network in the 1990s using the ten stations he owned. In 1995, he founded the United Paramount Network (UPN), which ultimately merged with Viacom. In 2000, his business sold a stake to Viacom. His second wife, Jeanne Sorenson, is still alive.
John Gosling
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The English rock band The Kinks confirmed John Gosling’s death on their official Twitter account at the age of 75. Gosling made his musical debut on the Kinks’ 1970 single “Lola,” which at the time of its release topped both the British and American music charts. Before eventually leaving the band in 1978, he would go on to play keyboard and sing backup on the Kinks’ eighth album and their following seven. Along with John Dalton, Mick Avory, and Dave Clarke, the guitarist was a founding member of the 1994 formation of the Kast Off Kinks, a collection of ex-members of the original band. Up to his retirement in 2008, he remained a member.
Mark Margolis
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Mark Margolis passed away on August 3 at the age of 83 after a brief illness. He was best recognized for his mesmerizing work as Hector “Tio” Salamanca in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. The character actor Margolis, whose career started on Broadway, carved himself a name for himself in movies including Scarface, Oz, Ace Venture: Pet Detective, and American Horror Story: Asylum. He also frequently appeared in Darren Aronofsky’s films, making appearances in six of them, including a lead role as Sol Robeson in the director’s first major motion picture, Pi. For his depiction of the terrifying drug runner Hector in Breaking Bad, which he later repeated on Better Call Saul, Margolis was nominated for an Emmy in 2012.
Clifton Oliver
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Actor Clifton Oliver from Broadway passed away on August 2 at the age of 47 from an unidentified illness. Oliver established himself as a performer by taking on the role of Simba in The Lion King during the show’s 2011 Broadway run, national tour, and production in Las Vegas. In addition, he played Benny opposite Jordin Sparks in the musical In the Heights and made an ensemble appearance in Wicked. His other theater roles include those in Miracle Brothers, Motown the Musical, and Dreamgirls.
Note: This is not all Stars we’ve lost in 2023. This is the list of Some Stars that we’ve lost in 2023.
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