Stephen Jones - Best New Horror #26

British actor Bob Hoskins(Robert William Hoskins) died of pneumonia on April 29, aged 71. His films include Pink Floyd The Wall , Brazil , Who Framed Roger Rabbit , Heart Condition, Hook (as “Smee”), Super Mario Bros. , Rainbow , The Lost World (2001), Son of the Mask , Hollywoodland , Doomsday , A Christmas Carol (2009), Pinocchio (2010) and Snow White and the Huntsman , before he retired from acting after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. On TV Hoskins starred in the series Pennies from Heaven (1978) and appeared in episodes of Thriller (1976) and Tales from the Crypt (which he also directed), along with the mini-series Neverland (as “Smee” again).

American leading lady Judi Meredith(Judith Clare Boutin) died on April 30, aged 77. Discovered by comedian George Burns, she appeared in Jack the Giant Killer (1962), William Castle’s The Night Walker , Dark Intruder and Queen of Blood , along with an episode of TV’s Shirley Temple’s Storybook . Meredith was married to director Gary Nelson.

American leading man Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., who starred in the TV series 77 Sunset Strip (1958-64) and The F.B.I. (1965-74), died on May 2, aged 95. He appeared in Wait Until Dark , Terror Out of the Sky , Disney’s Beyond Witch Mountain , The Tempest (1983), and episodes of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour , Fantasy Island , Babylon 5 and The Visitor . For twelve years he was the voice of Bruce Wayne’s butler “Alfred Pennyworth” on the animated TV series of Batman and various spin-offs, and he also voiced “Doctor Octopus” for the 1995-97 Spider-Man cartoon series.

American character actress Pauline[Cynthia] Wagnerdied the same day, aged 103. A contract player for RKO Radio Pictures and a founding member of the Screen Actors Guild, she was Fay Wray’s stunt double on King Kong (1933) for a re-shoot of the climactic sequence on top of the Empire State Building.

American-born actor Les Carlson(Leslie M. Carlson) died of cancer in Toronto, Canada, on May 3, aged 81. As well as appearing in the David Cronenberg films Videodrome (as “Barry Convex”), The Dead Zone , The Fly (1986) and the short Camera , he was also in The Neptune Factor , Deranged , Black Christmas (1974), Deadly Harvest , The Girl from Mars , The Wishing Tree , Anonymous Rex and Bag of Bones . Carlson’s TV credits include episodes of The New Avengers , War of the Worlds , The Twilight Zone (1988), Friday the 13th: The Series , Highlander , The X Files , PSI Factor: Chronicles of the Paranormal , Odyssey 5 , Haven , Lost Girl and Murdoch Mysteries (‘The Ghost of Queen’s Park’).

Former American child actress Jacqueline[Devon] Taylordied of Alzheimer’s disease on May 5, aged 88. She was in a number of “Our Gang” comedy shorts in 1934, along with an uncredited role in Laurel and Hardy’s Babes in Toyland .

American actor, producer and bookseller Magoo Gelehrter, who portrayed “Garou”, the werewolf henchman of New England horror host “Penny Dreadful” the witch (his wife Danielle S. Gelehrter) on cable TV show Penny Dreadful’s Shilling Shockers , died after a long battle with cancer on May 16. He was 51.

British leading lady Barbara[Ann] Murraydied of a heart attack in Spain on May 20, aged 84. Her credits include A Christmas Carol (1950), Meet Mr. Lucifer , The Curse of King Tut’s Tomb and The Power (1984). On TV she appeared in the 1961 BBC-TV series The Escape of R.D.7 , The Indian Tales of Rudyard Kipling , Strange Report , The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes , Tales from the Crypt and Doctor Who . She was married (1952-64) to actor John Justin.

Hollywood actress Jane Adams(Betty Jean Bierce), who played hunchbacked nurse “Nina” in House of Dracula (1945), died on May 21, aged 94. Her other movies include the Universal serial Lost City of the Jungle , The Brute Man (with Rondo Hatton), Tarzan’s Magic Fountain (uncredited), the Columbia serial Batman and Robin (1949) and Master Minds (with the Dead End Kids). She turned up on TV in a 1953 episode of The Adeventures of Superman before retiring from the screen.

American character actor Matthew[Chandler] Cowlesdied of congestive heart failure on May 22, aged 69. He appeared in the movies They Might Be Giants , Crawlspace (1972), Brenda Starr , She’s Back , Season of the Hunted , Shutter Island and the American TV series of Life on Mars (2008-09). His second wife was actress Christine Baranski.

American actor and singer Herb Jeffries(Umberto Alejandro Ballentino) died of heart failure on May 25, aged 100. During the late 1930s and early ‘40s he starred as Herbert Jeffrey, “The Sepia Singing Cowboy”, in a handful of low-budget black Westerns with titles like The Bronze Buckaroo and Harlem Rides the Range . Jeffries went on to appear in an episode of I Dream of Jeannie and he wrote and directed the 1967 sex-murder mystery Mundo depravados starring his then-wife, legendary stripper Tempest Storm (Annie Blanche Banks). He was also the last surviving member of The Great Duke Ellington Orchestra.

German-Austrian actor Karlheinz Böhm(aka “Karl Boehm”), who starred in Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom (1960) under the name “Carl Boehm”, died of Alzheimer’s disease on May 29, aged 86. He was also in Alraune (aka Mandragore , 1952), The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm and The Venetian Affair (with Boris Karloff). Since the early 1980s he was involved with charitable work in Ethiopa and was made an honorary Ethiopian citizen in 2001.

Hong Kong-born American actress Joan Lorring(Madeline Ellis) died in Sleepy Hollow, New York, on May 30, aged 88. Nominated for an Oscar for her supporting role in The Corn is Green (1945), she also appeared in Three Strangers and The Verdict (both with Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre), The Lost Moment and an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents (as Lizzie Borden’s sister).

American actress Martha Hyerdied on May 31, aged 89. She made her movie debut in 1946, and amongst her credits are Abbott and Costello Go to Mars , Riders to the Stars , Francis in the Navy , Mistress of the World , Pyro , First Men in the Moon , Bikini Beach , Picture Mommy Dead and House of 1,000 Dolls (with Vincent Price), along with episodes of TV’s The Alfred Hitchcock Hour and Bewitched . Her second husband was film producer Hal B. Wallis.

American stuntman Tap Canutt(Edward Clay Canutt), the son of legendary stuntman Yakima Canutt, died on June 2, aged 81. His credits include The War Lord , Planet of the Apes , Beneath the Planet of the Apes and The Omega Man , all starring Charlton Heston, and the TV movie Planet Earth .