Yves Montand

Posted in Père Lachaise Cemetery with tags , , on October 2, 2023 by Cade

October 13, 1921 – November 09, 1991

Italian-born French singer and actor Yves Montand dropped out of school at age 11 to help his family make ends meet. He spent his spare time in movie theatres watching American comedies and westerns and decided he wanted to become a performer. He worked his way up through local amateur nights and eventually landed in Paris where he met the legendary singer Édith Piaf. Under Piaf’s guidance, Montand became a popular crooner and a successful career was launched.
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Thomas Hardy

Posted in Westminster Abbey with tags , , on September 25, 2023 by Cade

June 02, 1840 – January 11, 1928

You can take the boy out of Wessex, but you can’t take the Wessex out of the boy.

Victorian novelist, poet and lover of old buildings, Thomas Hardy, wrote often about the fantasized English county of Wessex in his works. Though the places he referenced were real (including his home county of Dorset,) he recalled the archaic name “Wessex” to incorporate it all into an idealized whole. The themes and arcs of his stories played heavily on the country life of his youth. When he relocated to London in his 20s, the stark difference between the metropolitan privilege of the capital and the struggles of his beloved rural stomping grounds became a central tenant in his writings.

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Frédéric Chopin

Posted in Père Lachaise Cemetery with tags , on September 18, 2023 by Cade

March 01, 1810 – October 17, 1849

Polish composer and general virtuoso, Frédéric Chopin, is one of the most well-regarded 19th Century Romantic composers. Predominantly written and performed on piano, Chopin’s catalogue of waltzes, études, preludes and mazurkas (folk songs popular in his native Poland) remain amongst the most popular of their kind to this day.

Chopin began taking piano lessons at a very young age and it was immediately clear that the boy possessed genius-level talent. It didn’t take long for him to become fairly well-known and regarded throughout Europe and he soon became of the earliest living music celebrities.
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Samuel Beckett

Posted in Montparnasse Cemetery with tags , , , on September 11, 2023 by Cade

April 13, 1906 – December 22, 1989

Samuel Barclay Beckett was born in 1906 in Foxrock, Ireland, just outside of Dublin. He studied literature at Trinity College. He played cricket. He traveled. He wrote. While teaching in Paris – a city that would eventually become his full-time home – Beckett met fellow Irish author James Joyce and their interactions and relationship would eventually solidify the direction of Beckett’s literary career. By the time he was 40, he realized that, while Joyce pushed for knowledge as fuel for his creativity, Beckett himself was better suited to embrace his own “ignorance”. This decision freed Beckett up to concentrate his writings on the everyday absurdity and bleakness of life.

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Keith Moon

Posted in Golders Green Crematorium with tags , , on September 4, 2023 by Cade

August 23, 1946 – September 07, 1978

Keith John Moon is widely regarded as one of the greatest rock and roll drummers of all time, if only because of his wholly unique playing style and over-the-top behavior. Moon joined London-based band, the Who in 1964, just before they recorded their debut album and took their place as one of the tent poles in what would become the legendary “British Invasion” era of rock and roll. Though he often quipped that he “was just filling in” on drums with the band (he claims he was never formally asked to join) Moon played with the iconic group for nearly 15 years…through the absolute height of their productivity and popularity.

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Marie Curie

Posted in The Pantheon with tags , on August 28, 2023 by Cade

November 07, 1867 – July 04, 1934

Maria Skłodowska-Curie, most commonly referred to as Marie Curie, was the first woman ever awarded a Nobel Prize. Skłodowska moved to Paris with her sister from their native Poland in 1891. Her natural curiosity and demanding work ethic led to great success in her academic endeavors. With multiple degrees under her belt, she embarked on a career in research in Paris. She met another researcher named Pierre Curie and the began working together. Eventually, the two fell in love and were married. Then, as is the case with most newlywed couples…they discovered “radioactivity.”

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Georges Méliès

Posted in Père Lachaise Cemetery with tags , on August 21, 2023 by Cade

December 08, 1861 – January 21, 1938

Georges Méliès loved to entertain. As a boy, he built puppets, painted and longed to be on stage. His dream took detours through the military and his family’s shoe business, but he remained persistent. When he discovered the art of stage illusions, he developed a lifelong passion for the craft.

In 1888, Méliès’ father died and he used his inheritance to buy a theatre. Georges plunged headlong into the art of stage magic, creating dozens of new effects and illusions on his stage. He was living his dream.

Then, in 1895, the Lumière brothers invented a cinematograph…one of the very first movie projectors.

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Charles Dickens

Posted in Westminster Abbey with tags , on August 14, 2023 by Cade

February 07, 1812 – June 09, 1870

Charles Dickens is perhaps the greatest – certainly the most famous – English novelist of all time. His 1843 novella, A Christmas Carol, has been turned into no fewer than 3 million1 stage productions and movies. And that is all by itself with no mention of his other gargantuan hits like Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities, David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Nicholas Nickleby and dozens of others. His stable of characters, the settings of his stories and the richness of his writing created a new adjective in the English language: Dickensian. Something that is Dickensian is said to be the absolute epitome of common life in Victorian England.

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Peter Sellers

Posted in Golders Green Crematorium with tags , , on August 7, 2023 by Cade

September 08, 1925 – July 24, 1980

“There is no me. I do not exist. There was a me once, but I had it surgically removed.” -Peter Sellers, The Muppet Show (1978)

The backlots and back alleys of the entertainment industry are full of funny people who are quietly battling demons. Occasionally, a generational talent comes along that consistently delights audiences…all the while dealing with internal struggles like depression or substance abuse. The funny façade is oftentimes just that: a façade. You saw it with superstars like Chris Farley, Robin Williams, John Belushi, Richard Pryor…and Peter Sellers.

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Victor Hugo

Posted in The Pantheon with tags , on July 31, 2023 by Cade

February 26, 1802 – May 22, 1885

Most widely known as one of the greatest French writers of all time, Victor Hugo was so much more than a teller of stories. A true Renaissance Man, Hugo was a novelist, of course, but also a poet, a statesman, a dramatist, an activist, an artist…the list is lengthy. The son of a general in the Napoleonic army, Hugo moved around a lot in his youth. The stress of the constant moving led to his parents separating and he and his brother landing in a boarding school in Paris. He wrote from an early age. His first poem was submitted to a competition when he was 15. The words kept coming. In all he published more than 30 novels, 21 collections of poetry, 11 plays and countless essays as well as thousands of drawings.

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