Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Director and producer involved in many successful
television ventures, including The End of the Pier Show and Late Night Line-Up

Andrew Gosling, who has died aged 71, was a television
pioneer.  In 1974, he was one of the first to use blue screen, a by-product of
colour television, while he was directing (and I was producing) the musical
comedy series The End of the Pier Show for BBC2. 

The show featured John Wells, John Fortune, Madeline
Smith and the composer and conductor Carl Davis, with three new songs and a
couple of guests each week.  Wells once described it as “a programme for
dirty-minded insomniacs”.  Andrew had heard that if a particular colour were
isolated, he could make our microscopic studio look bigger by inlaying artwork
behind (and sometimes in front) of the performers, and give perspective by
“drawing” the scenery.  The illustrator Bob Gale agreed to create dozens of artwork
captions for each programme.  But the studio size restricted our efforts, and an
infuriating blue halo would keep appearing round the performers. 

So when we did The Snow Queen (1976), an hour-long fairy
tale with live actors and animated cartoon animals in the same shot, we
graduated to a larger studio.  Until that moment there had been an edict that
“the BBC does not do fairy tales”.  They were considered too difficult.  But
bolstered by sheer ignorance, and the new possibilities of blue screen, Andrew
and I ignored the rule and went for it.  The Snow Queen certainly had plenty of
rough edges but, as noone had seen anything quite like it before on television,
we got away with it.  The programme, shown on BBC2 on Christmas Day, sold all
over the world. 

Andrew was born in West Tytherley, Hampshire, one of four
children of Robin, a farmer, and his wife, Angela.  The success of his Eton
production of Murder in the Cathedral resulted in Andrew being selected for a
job with the Oxford Playhouse.  He then worked as an “ASM and small parts” at
the Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond, Yorkshire, followed by a stint with the
Century travelling theatre.  He became a trainee at Associated Redifussion
television in the 1960s, and learned film editing.  At the Gordon Bradley production
company he edited early pop promos, including Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields
by the Beatles. 

Joining BBC2 in the late 1960s, Andrew edited films for
arts features.  Then he worked on the long-running Late Night Line-Up and a film
celebrating Wordsworth’s bicentenary (1970), which was our first collaboration. 
Andrew switched to studio directing for LNLU and its spin-off Up Sunday
(1972-73), with Willie Rushton, Clive James, James Cameron (“the conscience of
Fleet Street”) and Kenny Everett.  There was something of “the Fringe” about it;
we were certainly strapped for cash. 

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After the Snow Queen came an “experimental musical”, with
artwork by Graham McCallum, In the Looking Glass (1977).  The Light Princess
(1978) and The Mystery of the Disappearing Schoolgirls (1980) both featured
artwork by the children’s illustrator Errol le Cain.  Andrew directed them with
a reassuring calmness that he did not necessarily feel. 

The Ghost Downstairs (1982) received a Design and Art
Direction award for the best use of graphics in a drama – and caught the eye of
the animation director Richard Williams, celebrated for his Oscar-winning film
of A Christmas Carol (1971).  He suggested we make a Hollywood feature using the
new techniques, but the BBC was not into that sort of thing – so Williams did
it himself, as animation director on Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). 

Andrew worked with blue (and green) screen for the TV
movies Moving Pictures (1980), with Alison Steadman and Wells, and The Pyrates
(1986), an adaptation of George Macdonald Fraser’s book.  He and I also made
rather more conventional programmes, including two series of the sketch show
Rutland Weekend Television (1975-76) with Eric Idle and The Innes Book of
Records (1978-81) with Neil Innes. 

Then Andrew saw a copy of the Mirror’s “Jane” strip
cartoons in a Soho bookshop and in 1982 we did two series featuring Glynis
Barber as the accident-prone glamour girl.  The programme won a Royal Television
Society original programme award, two Baftas for McCallum’s wonderful artwork,
and featured on a Radio Times cover. 

Together Andrew and I made an assortment of gardening
programmes for Catalyst TV, including Geoff Hamilton’s Gardener’s World.  Andrew
directed a Canadian musical, The King of Friday Night (1985) and a musical
documentary in Australia, Song of the Outback (2010).  He was a prime mover in
several TV development projects in Kenya (1995) and Uganda (1998-99), including
soap operas that promoted important underlying messages on health and
education.  Our April fool spoof A Question of Fact (1986), which suggested that
Hitler had visited the UK at the invitation of Unity Mitford, featured in a
retrospective screening at the National Film Theatre on 1 April 2014. 

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For many years Andrew and his second wife, Imogen
Halahan, and their daughter, Matilda, lived an idyllic existence on the island
of Osea in the Blackwater Estuary, Essex.  The island was the subject of his
1981 film Causeway’s End.  Andrew enjoyed sailing, and loved cycling (10 miles
every day, minimum).  That interest was immortalised in Bicycle Clips (1983). 
His outlook on life was always cheerful.  Even during his last long illness he
emanated a feeling of optimism.  He was a great family man, the perfect work
colleague and a wonderful friend. 

He is survived by Imogen, whom he married in 1977, and
Matilda; by two daughters, Amanda and Catherine, from his first marriage, to
Rosie, which ended in divorce; and by his sister, Annabel, and brothers,
Alexander and Robert. 

• Andrew Gosling, television director and producer, born
26 October 1944; died 11 May 2016

Monday, May 30, 2016

It has only now become known that the
film, TV and theater star Sieghardt Rupp died in July 2015 aged 84 years. There had been long been rumors of his death
and the German film archive confirmed it only now. 

By the late-1990s, the actor Sieghardt
Rupp, known for his appearances in "crime films", had completely
withdrawn from the theater and film business.  Most recently, he lived a very secluded
life, even his death had not been revealed, according to "courier" at
his request.  During the preparations of the retrospective on the occasion of
his 85th birthday that the film archive had now learned that the actor is no
longer alive. 

In fact, the actor died on July 20,
2015, at 84 years in Vienna, as well as the Vienna newspaper "Falter"
reported the previous week.  Sieghardt Rupp was born on June 14, 1931 in
Bregenz. He studies at the University of
World Trade in Vienna (today a business university), the son of a school
principal he soon and moved to the Max Reinhardt Seminar. 

Appeared in "A Fistful of Dollars"

After engagements at the Stadttheater
Klagenfurt, the Landestheater Linz and at the Vienna Volkstheater he committed to
the Josefstadt, guesting in the summer months at various outdoor stages (Bad
Hersfeld, Wunsiedel, Melk, Stockerau, Perchtoldsdorf). 

One of his first film roles he played in
1959 in the Showgirl thriller "Girl for the Mambo Bar" under director
Wolfgang Glück ("Student Gerber", "'38 - Vienna Before the
Fall").  In the 1960s they build Rupp under the name Tommy Rupp in home
movies such "The Ranger Christl" for the heartthrob, lies in the stereotypes. With the movie "Among Vultures" he
appeared 1964 as the western genre in which he was also in "A Fistful of Dollars" as
the villain Esteban Rojo under the direction of Sergio Leone and became
internationally known. 

Success as the customs investigator Kressin in
"Tatort"

He also appeared in comedies (such as
"The Last Temptation" with Louis de Funes, 1966), war movies ("Steiner
- the Iron Cross" with Richard Burton, Robert Mitchum, Rod Steiger, 1977)
Success and literary adaptations such as "Lulu" ( 1962) along with Hildegard
Knef and Mario Adorf. Heruled as the villain.  Definitively a star in
the German-speaking countries, he finally gained stardom in the 1970s for his
role as customs investigator Kressin in "Tatort". 

After he exited from the "crime
scene" Rupp again increased his work load on the stage and taught from
1986 also at the Reinhardt Seminar as a specialist in "role
design". For his portrayal of
conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler at the theater in the Josefstadt 1997 he was
awarded the Kainz Medal.  The Film Archive honors the film, TV and theater star
now from June 1 to 28 with a retrospective. 

Friday, May 27, 2016

August 12, 1938 - May 20, 2016 Rosanna Levinson, nee
Huffman, passed away on May 20, 2016 at her home in Santa Monica, CA.  After a
diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, she decided not to seek treatment but instead
to spend her final days at home with the family she loved, her cat Happy, and
Turner Classic Movies.  Even through her illness Rosanna kept her wicked sense
of humor. 

Rosanna was born in 1938 in Timblane, a small coal mining
town in Pennsylvania, to Doras and Christine Huffman, followed later by her
beloved brother Joe.  Despite not knowing the rules of any sport, Rosanna was
her high school's head cheerleader and Homecoming Queen.  She put herself
through two years of teaching college before moving to New York with the dream
of singing on Broadway.  She promptly did, landing the lead role in "Half a
Sixpence." 

She met television writer Richard Levinson at a party and
after multiple proposals, she finally said yes.  The two were married, moved to
Los Angeles, and had one daughter, Chrissy.  Rosanna continued to act in Los
Angeles, both on stage and screen.  She played the lead role in the critically
acclaimed musical "Jane Heights" and worked as a voiceover artist for
nearly 30 years in both film and television. 

After losing her adored husband Richard to a heart attack
when she was only 47, Rosanna raised their daughter with joy, love, and endless
support.  No one had more fun than she did, and the friends who filled her life
were equally joyful and cherished.  Before she died, she made clear that she
would desperately miss seeing her grandchildren, Leo and Margot, grow into
adults; she would miss her nightly calls with her daughter; she would miss
Christmas dinner, but she also made clear that it was her time, and that she
was ready to go. 

Her service will be private, but if you wish to make a
donation in her name, she was a big supporter of The Humane Society.  The sun
will shine a little less bright without her, but Rosanna would rather have you
sing than cry.  So hum a little tune for her. 

About Me

Born in Toledo, Ohio in 1946 I have a BA degree in American History from Cal St. Northridge.  I've been researching the American West and western films since the early 1980s and visiting filming sites in Spain and the U.S.A. Elected a member of the Spaghetti Western Hall of Fame 2010.