Robert Benton is probably responsible for adding the insipid "Can You Read My Mind?" sequence from Superman, I'm assuming, because not only did Benton, and his writing partner David Newman, do script rewrites on Superman but they had also written a Broadway Superman play back in the '60s where such a scene would have felt more in place.  (The play flopped, but did become a TV special.)

Robert Benton had a more successful career than that.  With Newman, they wrote Bonnie & Clyde (before a Robert Towne rewrite) and What's Up Doc? (before a Buck Henry rewrite), but Robert Benton's best film, as sole writer and director, is the Altman-esque The Late Show with Art Carney and Lily Tomlin.  As a director, Benton also made an excellent western, Bad Company, with a young Jeff Bridges, and several good films overlooked by critics like Still of the Night, Nadine and Billy Bathgate. 

Benton's most critically acclaimed films, Kramer vs Kramer and Places in the Heart, have each received their respective backlashes, but both are better than their cliched reputations, victims of that Oscar curse of overpraising otherwise very good movies.  Places, for example, is now more remembered for Sally Fields' sappy Oscar speech than for John Malkovich's breakout performance.
 

I don't know if I can say that Joe Don made every single film he was in better, but he certainly never made a film worse.  And he was always welcome.  Charlie Varrick, The Natural, Fletch, Cape Fear, The Underneath.  Too bad we never got a Joe Don Baker/M. Emmett Walsh chew-off.

The Sorrow and the Pity director, Marcel Ophuls.

......

Leslie Dilley isn't a well known name, but as an Oscar-winning art director he had a remarkable resume: Star Wars, Superman, Alien, Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, American Werewolf in London, The Abyss.
 

Al Foster, jazz drummer for the second half of the electric Miles Davis ensemble, playing on classic albums Get Up With It, Dark Magus, Agharta and Pangaea.  Foster continued as Davis' drummer in the '80s following his brief retirement.



 

Jinnistan wrote:

I have to admit that I was not aware of the name Jonathan Joss, although he is the voice behind John Redcorn on King of the Hill, one of the best characters on the show - Redcorn is a Native American "healer" who sleeps with all of the housewives unbeknowst to their husbands.

But Joss' death deserves mentioning outside of that because it happens to be a horrific example of Trump America.  Joss and his partner/husband had been receiving homophobic threats over a two year period while living in San Antonio, and recently his neighbors made good on their threat of burning his house down and killing his dogs, leaving the skull of one on display.  Finally, yesterday, a neighbor just pulled out a gun and shot Joss dead on his front lawn.  Joss' widower claims that law enforcement was informed of the threats and arson and had done nothing in response.  Joss' killer was arrested however. 

The sickness ensues....
 

How these people get through life without realizing what weak pathetic losers they are is beyond me.

Or maybe the fact that they do realize this is part of the reason they do shit like this.

Either way, just wait for Trump to pardon him before he even goes to trial.

I'm so beyond even pretending I believe in pacifism anymore.
 

Last edited by crumbsroom (6/02/2025 9:45 pm)

Harris Yulin was not a titan of revolutionary music.  But he was a sturdy character actor worth his props.

Apparently both Harris Yulin and Frederick Forsyth had relationships with Faye Dunaway.

Tying up loose ends?
 

Mick Ralphs, Mott the Hoople and Bad Company guitarist.

Mott's classic "All the Way From Memphis" chronicles Ralphs' attempt to find his lost guitar.




 

Ol' Mr. Blonde. 



We can argue about the speed with which Michael Madsen became typecast - as he describes "the guy with a cigerette and a gun" - and how much of that fate may have been due to his own bad judgement in picking roles, maybe he could have rejected all of these direct-to-video Tarantino rip-offs in the early and mid-90s.  But there's still a number of more interesting films which highlight his talent and charisma - Kill Me Again, Thelma and Louise, The Getaway, The Winner, Donnie Brasco.  A too-young 67 suggests some hard living as well.