Stephen Jones - The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror. Volume 13

British character actress Jenny Laird, who appeared in Village of the Damned (1960) and the TV movies A Place to Die and The Masks of Death (as Mrs Hudson, opposite Peter Cushing’s Sherlock Holmes), died on Halloween, aged 84. She also appeared in episodes of TV’s Doctor Who and Hammer House of Horror.

Actor and Tony award-winning composer Albert Hague, who played the cantankerous Mr Shorofsky in Fame and the spin-off TV series, died of lung cancer on November 12th, aged 81. In 1966 he scored the animated short Dr Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (narrated by Boris Karloff), and also appeared in Nightmares, Space Jam and TV’s Tales from the Darkside.

American actor Byron Sanders, who appeared in The Flesh Eaters and also modelled for Salvador Dali’s ‘Crucifixion’, died the same day, aged 76.

Veteran British comedienne and character actress Peggy Mountdied on November 13th, aged 86.

33-year-old British actress Charlotte Coleman, best remembered as Hugh Grant’s room-mate in Four Weddings and a Funeral, died of a severe asthma attack in London on November 14th. She also appeared in The Young Poisoner’s Handbook, Bearskin: An Urban Fairytale and TV’s Worzel Gummidge , as well as providing voices for the feature cartoon Faeries.

79-year-old Australian actor and screenwriter Michael St. Clairdied of a brain aneurysm while driving to an audition on November 22nd. He appeared in Skullduggery and the TV movie The Hound of the Baskervilles (1972), and scripted Mission Mars and co-wrote The Body Stealers (aka Thin Air).

Actor and opera singer Norman Lumsden, best known as author J. R. Hartley looking for a copy of his own book on flyfishing in the British Yellow Pages TV commercial, died on November 28th, aged 95. His first job was as a commercial artist for publisher Hodder & Stoughton, where he designed book covers for Leslie Charteris’s The Saint series and other titles. Benjamin Britten wrote the part of Peter Quince in his 1960 opera of A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Lumsden in mind.

John Mitchum, the actor brother of Robert, died of a stroke on November 29th, aged 82. He appeared in Bigfoot, High Plains Drifter, Telefon and Escapes.

American character actress Pauline Moore, who played one of the bridesmaids in the 1931 Frankenstein, died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease on December 7th, aged 87. Her other credits include Charlie Chan at the Olympics, Charlie Chan on Treasure Island and Charlie Chan in Reno.

Veteran Indian actor Ashok Kumar[Ganguli], who appeared in more than 300 films during a career that spanned over sixty years, died of a heart attack on December 10th, aged 90.

Singer Rufus Thomas, best known for his novelty hit ‘Do the Funky Chicken’, died of apparent heart failure in Memphis, Tennessee, on December 15th, aged 84. The Rolling Stones covered his ‘Walking the Dog’ on their first album in 1964.

72-year-old British actor Sir Nigel Hawthornedied of a heart attack on December 19th after a two-year battle against pancreatic cancer. He won a Tony Award for his stage performance as C. S. Lewis in the 1991 Broadway production of Shadowlands and was forced to pull out of playing Jack the Ripper in From Hell (2001) when potentially lethal blood clots were discovered on his lungs prior to filming. He also appeared in DreamChild, Demolition Man, Richard III, Memoirs of a Survivor, Firefox and the 1981 TV movie of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and contributed voice characterizations to Water ship Down, The Plague Dogs and Disney’s The Black Cauldron and Tarzan.

American character actor Lance Fullerdied in a Los Angeles nursing home after a long illness on December 22nd, aged 73. He portrayed the Metaluna Mutant in the classic This Island Earth, and also appeared in The She Creature (1956), Voodoo Woman, The Bride and the Beast, The Andromeda Strain and episodes of TV’s Thriller and The Twilight Zone.

American character actress [Anna] Eileen Heckartdied after a three-year battle with cancer on December 31st, aged 82. Among her many roles, she appeared in both the Broadway and film productions of The Bad Seed, gaining an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress in the part of Mrs Daigle. Her other movies include No Way To Treat a Lady and Burnt Offerings. She retired from acting in 2000.

Swiss-born leading man Paul Hubschmid(aka Paul Christian) died in Berlin of a pulmonary embolism the same day, aged 84. He appeared in Bagdad, The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, Fritz Lang’s Tiger of Eschnapur (aka Journey to the Lost City), Funeral in Berlin, The Day the Sky Exploded and Skullduggery.

FILM/TV TECHNICIANS

British cartoon film-maker Alison de Veredied on January 2nd, aged 73. In 1967 she helped create the backgrounds for The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine and made a cameo appearance as one of the photographed figures in the ‘Eleanor Rigby’ sequence.

American independent film producer/director James Hilldied of Alzheimer’s disease on January 11th, aged 84. After working as a contract screenwriter at MGM, he joined actor Burt Lancaster and agent Harold Hecht in a production partnership. In 1958, he became Rita Hayworth’s fifth and final husband. The marriage lasted two years.

Following years of poor health (his death was prematurely announced in 1996), Spanish writer/director Amando De Ossoriodied on January 13th, aged 82. His many films include Malenka The Niece of the Vampire, Tombs of the Blind Dead, Return of the Evil Dead, Night of the Sorcerers, Horror of the Zombies (1974), Night of the Seagulls and The Sea Serpent.

Film exhibitor Ted Mann, who changed the name of Hollywood’s famed Grauman’s Chinese Theatre to his own in 1973, died of a stroke on January 15th, aged 84. He also produced the 1969 adaptation of Ray Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man and Krull, and was married to actress Rhonda Fleming.

Sam Wiesenthal, who was production manager to Carl Laemmle, Jr’s vice-president at Universal Pictures, died on February 11th at the Motion Picture & Television Hospital, aged 92. With Laemmle, he was responsible for All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) and the studio’s Frankenstein and Dracula franchises. After Universal was sold in 1936, he moved on to other studios and later became an independent producer.

Screenwriter/director Burt Kennedy, best known for his comedy Westerns, died of cancer on February 15th, aged 78. He had undergone heart surgery the previous month, after which his kidneys had failed. Among his many credits are The Killer Inside Me, Suburban Commando and the TV movies The Wild Wild West Revisited and More Wild Wild West.

Former president of production at Paramount, producer Howard W. Kochreportedly died of Alzheimer’s disease on February 16th, aged 84. His credits include The Manchurian Candidate, The President’s Analyst, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, Heaven Can Wait (1978), Dragonslayer, The Keep and Ghost. During the 1950s he was a partner with Aubrey Schenck in independent production company Bel-Air, which produced such low-budget chillers as The Black Sleep, Pharaoh’s Curse and Voodoo Island, and he directed Frankenstein 1970 starring Boris Karloff.