In Memoriam

He wrote comedy history. He made generations laugh.

He was the voice of the disenfranchised, the neglected, the marginalized, and a tireless advocate for the thousands affected by HIV/AIDS. Larry Kramer, playwright, screenwriter, and activist, who had battled HIV-related illnesses for 30 years, died at 84 in his beloved New York.

For most members, Alena Prime was that diminutive presence at meetings, the widow of Marcel Dalio, the French actor best remembered for his roles in Jean Renoir’s The Rules of the Game and Grand Illusion, two of the greatest movies of all time. He was forced into exile by the Nazis and became a fixture of Hollywood films playing supporting roles most notably in Casablanca.

Sue Lyon, Stanley Kubrick's Lolita who died at 73, was the fourth-youngest actor to win a Golden Globe. Lyon was 14 years old when she won in 1963 as Most Promising Newcomer - Female, a Golden Globe category that was discontinued in 1983.

Danny Aiello, who died aged 86, was a late starter. He was 40 years old when he appeared in his first film, Bang the Drum Slowly (1973), and 56 when he was nominated for a Golden Globe for his Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role-Motion Picture, for his role as the owner of a pizzeria in Do the Right Thing (1989), writer-director Spike Lee's take on race relations in the predominantly black Brooklyn neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant.

Edward Lewis was born on December 16, 1919, in Camden, N. J.

Dutch actor Rutger Hauer, who died aged 75, was the most known and admired performer to come out of the Netherlands. He was equally comfortable acting in Dutch and English language films and TV series and always infused his roles with both action and intellect.

Franco Zeffirelli, who died recently at 96, was Italian to his core, but also had a life long love of England, and won his Golden Globe for directing a movie in English with an all British cast, based on a Shakespeare play, Romeo and Juliet, in 1968. The movie won the Best English Language Foreign Film, a discontinued Golden Globe category.

In January 2014, Niki Lauda walked into the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel to rehearse for his presentation at the next day’s Golden Globe Awards. “What a mess”, he muttered in German, looking at cables, wires, unmade tables with paper cups and candy wrappers: “I hope they clean this up.

In 1991 Frank Price was head of Columbia Pictures before it was known as Sony. Price had risen from the ranks of writer and TV executive to became a very hands-on studio head.