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Following the success of Jurassic Park, director Steven Spielberg convinced Michael Crichton, the writer of the original Jurassic Park novel, to write a follow-up book. Spielberg wanted to use it as the source material for the upcoming sequel. The Lost World: Jurassic Park got its cinematic release in 1997, becoming a bona fide cash cow for Universal Pictures.

Although The Lost World: Jurassic Park takes its name and inspiration for the plot from Crichton's The Lost World, there are marked departures between the two properties. From characterizations to resolutions, the film takes a different course than the book for added drama and suspense. But it's these changes that keep fans interested in both mediums while never compromising on what makes the franchise great.

The Compy Attack Is From the First Book

The Lost World: Jurassic Park's opening moment takes inspiration not from the sequel novel but from the original. The...

Jamie Lee Curtis was born for the Hollywood life, given that she was the daughter of actors Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh. But being from a high-profile family also presents its own set of challenges. Something that even Lee Curtis was not immune to. Despite having the versatility to be an actor, she was constantly labeled a nepotism baby. But even this status couldn’t stop the actress from getting fired from the ABC show Operation Petticoat.

Jamie Lee Curtis in a still from Perfect || Columbia Pictures

While this might have been a huge disappointment for her given that she was just 19 years old at the time, However, this setback led her to her career’s biggest break, which was the Halloween franchise.

A set-back that brought forth a huge opportunity for Jamie Lee Curtis Jamie Lee Curtis in a still from Halloween Kills || Universal Pictures

Jamie Lee Curtis is...

After making his inordinately stylish and often hilarious slasher film Stagefright, Dario Argento protégé Michele Soavi teamed up with the maestro for 1987’s The Church, a hallucinatory gothic concoction that was originally intended as the third entry in the Demons series before Lamberto Bava passed the directorial torch to Soavi. Although vastly different in tone and atmosphere than the Bava films, The Church still bears distinct traces of their core idea: Ravening demons are inadvertently let loose to run gruesomely amok within a confined space, in this instance a gothic cathedral located somewhere in Germany.

Where the Demons films take visual media as their primary mode of representation, Soavi and co-writers Argento and Franco Ferrini imbue The Church with a literary bent, which is apt for a story that centers around the interpretation of medieval texts. What’s more, the film overtly references works as disparate as M.R. James’s...

In an alternate timeline where classic slashers like Friday the 13th, A Nightmare on Elm Street and Halloween are actually historical accounts of the murderous monsters in those movies, a journalist and her two cameramen set out to follow and film the first killing spree of one of horror's best and brightest serial killers. No, not Crystal Lake's hulking, hockey mask-wearing Jason Vorhees, nor the man of everyone's nightmares, Freddy Krueger from Elm Street. The most villainous of them all reigns from a small town called Glen Echo -- and his name is Leslie Vernon.

Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon is a 2006 mockumentary-styled, dark comedy film that takes a deep look at the conventions of slasher movies and creates an effective parody of the genre, along with a how-to guide in the ways of being an effective serial killer. Leslie Vernon himself, played perfectly by Nathan Baesel,...

Jamie Lee Curtis is an American actress, producer and children’s author. Known primarily for her performances in the horror/thriller genre over the years, Curtis has become widely regarded as a “scream queen.”

Jamie Lee Curtis Biography: Age, Early Life, Family, Education

Jamie Lee Curtis was born on November 22, 1958 (Curtis: Age 64) in Santa Monica, California. Curtis was born to two actors. Her mother Janet Leigh was of Danish, German, and Scotch-Irish descent. Her father Tony Curtis was Jewish, and was a son of emigrants from Mátészalka, Hungary. Curtis has one older sister, actress Kelly Curtis, and four half-siblings from her father’s later marriages.

In 1962, Curtis’s parents had divorced. Her father wasn’t around much at all, as Curtis has stated that her father was “not interested in being a father.” After his death, Curtis and her siblings discovered they had been completely removed from his will. Following the divorce,...

Chicago – When the envelope was opened, containing the name of the Best Supporting Actress Oscar at the 95th Academy Awards earlier this month, it was veteran actor Jamie Lee Curtis who won the honor. She brought down the house with her memorable “we just won an Oscar” speech.

She tearfully finished with “ … and my mother [Janet Leigh] and my father [Tony Curtis], who were both nominated in different categories, I just won an Oscar.”

Photographer Joe Arce of HollywoodChicago.com has captured both Jamie Lee Curtis and Tony Curtis in his lens, with the Exclusive Portrait of Jamie Lee from 2004 published for the first time. Tony Curtis was photographed during his last trip to Chicago in 2009. He passed away in 2010.

Jamie Lee Curtis in Chicago, circa 2004

Photo credit: Joe Arce of Starstruck Foto for HollywoodChicago.com

Jamie Lee Curtis is the daughter of Hollywood “It” couple Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis,...

This The Gilded Age interview contains spoilers.

The Gilded Age ended season 1 by formally introducing the Russell family into the ranks of New York high society in 1882. Den of Geek was unable to get an invite to the Russell’s extremely spacious living room but we interviewed actor Morgan Spector to analyze George Russell’s plot during the season finale. We discussed George’s opinions on the lives of his wife and kids, the Turner fiasco, and where he believes the character is headed next season.

Den Of Geek: Was George’s storyline filmed in order? When did you find out what the end of this story was going to be?

Morgan Spector: We filmed by location and because we shot in 2020 during Covid, we wanted to shoot location by location and keep everybody kind of separated. But the scripts were written…we had the ability at the beginning...

Pearl Jam offers a startling vision for an Earth ravaged by climate change in a new animated video for their song “Retrograde,” directed by Emmy-winning Australian filmmaker Josh Wakely (“Beat Bugs”). The clip, the latest from Pearl Jam’s “Gigaton” album, extends that project’s environmentally conscious themes by featuring teenage climate change activist Greta Thunberg as a fortune teller revealing the dire consequences of inaction.

Throughout the video, Thunberg observes giant waves overwhelming such world landmarks as London Bridge, the skyscrapers of Manhattan and even the Space Needle of Pearl Jam’s Seattle hometown. But just as “Retrograde” the song strikes a balance between despair (references to “seven seas rising forever” and a “future fading out”) and determination (“It’s going to take much more than ordinary love to lift us up”), the clip aims to “imagine the future and then try to alter it,” according to Wakely.

“Something...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences added more details Monday to the news relayed at the Oscar Nominees Luncheon by president David Rubin that the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures has reached 95% of its funding goal. AMPAS said the institution has raised more than $368 million in pledges and cash, near its $388 million pre-opening campaign goal.

The Campaign for the Academy Museum was launched in 2012, headed by chair Bob Iger and co-chairs Annette Bening and Tom Hanks. Rubin gave Iger a shout-out today at the luncheon at the Ray Dolby Ballroom.

The Academy Museum is still targeting a 2020 open date for its Mid-Wilshire District home, saying the 300,000 square-foot public and exhibition space is in its final exhibition design, build-out, and testing stages.

“The motion picture community and movie fans from around the world know how much the Academy Museum will mean for the global appreciation and enjoyment of the movies,...

Fundraising for the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures has reached more than $368 million in pledges and cash, making up 95% of its $388 million campaign goal.

The announcement was by Academy President David Rubin at the nominees luncheon on Monday, less than two weeks before the 92nd Academy Awards on Feb. 9. The Academy also said the facility would open later this year at Wilshire Boulevard and Fairfax Avenue, where the former May Co. department store was located, following final exhibition design, build-out and testing. It gave no specific date.

The museum was first announced in 2012 with chair Bob Iger and co-chairs Annette Bening and Tom Hanks, when the Academy unveiled plans by architect Renzo Piano, and projected that the museum would open in 2016. The Academy launched a $250 million fundraising campaign and collected $200 million in pledges. After that, however, fundraising stalled and costs ballooned.

Museum director Bill Kramer said, “The motion picture community...

Tony Curtis would’ve celebrated his 94th birthday on June 3, 2019. The Oscar-nominated performer starred in dozens of movies throughout his career, becoming famous as the charismatic leading man of romantic comedies, action films, and prestige dramas. But how many of his titles remain classics? In honor of his birthday, let’s take a look back at 15 of his greatest films, ranked worst to best.

Born in 1925 in The Bronx, New York, Curtis got his start in movies thanks mainly to his good looks. He first gained attention as a serious actor thanks to Alexander Mackendrick‘s searing drama “Sweet Smell of Success” (1957), in which he played an unscrupulous publicist who agrees to do the bidding of an amoral Broadway critic (Burt Lancaster). The film brought him a BAFTA nomination as Best Actor.

SEEBurt Lancaster movies: 20 greatest films ranked worst to best

He earned his one and only Oscar bid the...

Tony Curtis would’ve celebrated his 94th birthday on June 3, 2019. The Oscar-nominated performer starred in dozens of movies throughout his career, becoming famous as the charismatic leading man of romantic comedies, action films, and prestige dramas. But how many of his titles remain classics? In honor of his birthday, let’s take a look back at 15 of his greatest films, ranked worst to best.

Born in 1925 in The Bronx, New York, Curtis got his start in movies thanks mainly to his good looks. He first gained attention as a serious actor thanks to Alexander Mackendrick‘s searing drama “Sweet Smell of Success” (1957), in which he played an unscrupulous publicist who agrees to do the bidding of an amoral Broadway critic (Burt Lancaster). The film brought him a BAFTA nomination as Best Actor.

He earned his one and only Oscar bid the following year as Best Actor for Stanley Kramer‘s...

Pearl Jam were cresting when they made an appearance on the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards. Not only did they win Video of the Year for “Jeremy,” trouncing video warhorses like Aerosmith, Peter Gabriel and R.E.M., but they also performed on the show, giving the network footage to air when the band moved away from making music videos. The peak of the evening was when Neil Young joined them onstage for a lively rendition of his 1989 hit “Rockin’ in the Free World.” Young just sauntered onstage in jeans, T-shirt...

In a sense, one could point to the 1991 film The Sect as the link between Jamie Lee Curtis and giallo master Dario Argento, but only considering he co-wrote and co-produced this bizarrely flavored B-grade genre title which starred her lesser known sister, Kelly Curtis. Filmed in Germany (which accounts for the appearance of notable German co-star Herbert Lom), Argento protégé Michele Soavi (Cemetery Man, 1994) helms this thriller about a lonely kindergarten teacher with a pet rabbit who discovers a terrifying secret in the basement of her home, which makes her an object of interest to a murderous cult.… Read the rest

Continue reading...

Steven Spielberg is the most famous filmmaker in the world, so it was only a matter of time before his lengthy filmography was scrutinized by 21st century standards. The Bechdel test was going to find him eventually.

The Bechdel test — coined by graphic novelist Alison Bechdel, it calls for a movie to have at least two named woman characters, who speak to each other about something other than a man — has its flaws, but it’s a simple, quantifiable way to measure whether a movie’s portrayal of women is credible. It’s not an issue that would have come up for Spielberg when he launched his career nearly 50 years ago, but times have changed.

Read More: Lgbt Superheroes: Why ‘Wonder Woman’ Could Never Have Been The Lesbian Avenger We Still Need

At a Women In Film luncheon held on Tuesday, the actress and director Elizabeth Banks said Spielberg “never...

Also known as The Devil's Daughter, the 1991 horror film The Sect (helmed by Cemetery Man director Michele Soavi) is coming to Blu-ray this spring, and Scorpion Releasing has now revealed the official cover art and special features for the release.

According to Blu-ray.com, The Sect Blu-ray is expected to be released in May, and we'll keep Daily Dead readers updated as more details are divulged. In the meantime, check out the official bonus features and cover art below.

From Scorpion Releasing: "Here is our custom cover art for Michele Soavi's The Sect. done by artist Wes Benscoter.

The special features on the disc will be: New 2k scan with extensive color correction. English and Italian track with english subtitles New exclusive interview with the maestro himself, Dario Argento Interviews with Michele Soavi, screenwriter Gianni Romoli, actor Giovanni Lombardo Radice, composer Pino Donaggio, set designer Massimo Antonello Geleng,...

Nick Aldwinckle Nov 24, 2016

The Bottom Shelf returns, with a video nasty, The Howling 2, and a tribute to the late Herschell Gordon Lewis...

To most, September 26th is the date when, in 1680, the Dutch city Gorinchem suffered a citizen’s revolt due to an imposed tax on cereal. From now on, though, that will change, as any right-thinking person will remember that date in 2016 as the day The Godfather Of Gore, the great Herschell Gordon Lewis, died.

The brain behind a range of vintage cult classics, spanning the gamut of exploitation cinema, from splatter movies to comedy erotica and supernatural witchcraft thriller (niche!), Lewis’ influential sixties and seventies productions paved the way for the video nasties of the eighties and the gory likes of David Cronenberg and Peter Jackson and stand up today as camp, gawdy historical documents of a bygone era. As such, to coincide with an impeccably timed release...

Jasper, a grasshopper with a cane and a top hat, is caught in a plastic box that he sees as an opportunity. "Hop on board this luxurious viewing vehicle," he tells five little bugs staring back at him from the outside, "for the spectacular spectacle of the Magical Mystery Tour!" These tiny creatures — the stars of Beat Bugs, the new animated children's series on Netflix — are intrigued. And off they go.

Grandparents will recognize Jasper as a huckster right of of The Music Man. Parents will recognize Eddie Vedder's...

Showtime has released the official trailer for its highly-anticipated, new music series Roadies, the first television series written, created, directed and executive produced by Oscar winner Cameron Crowe. The one-hour ensemble comedy will premiere on Sunday, June 26th at 10 p.m. Et/Pt on air, on demand and over the internet. Starring Luke Wilson (Old School, Enlightened) and Screen Actors Guild Award nominee Carla Gugino (San Andreas), Roadies gives an insider's look at the reckless, romantic, funny and often poignant lives of a committed group of "roadies" who live for music and the de facto family they've formed along the way.

The series chronicles the rock world through the eyes of music's unsung heroes and pays homage to the backstage workers who put the show on the road while touring the United States for the successful arena-level group, The Staton-House Band. This first look at Roadies features the song "Hard Sun...

Cinema Retro has received the following press release:

On Friday April 24th Omaha Film Historian Bruce Crawford will host his 36th tribute to classic films with a screening of the comedy classic, Some Like It Hot!

Special guest will be Kelly Curtis, daughter of  star Tony Curtis . Artist Nicolosi will once again have a commemorative U.S. Postal Envelope honoring the film, and will be unveiled at the event. 

Details: Friday April 24th, 7pm at the Joslyn Art Museum 2200 Dodge. St. Omaha Ne. 68102

Some Like It Hot was listed the #1 greatest film comedy of all time on the AFI "100 years, 100 Laughs" poll.

Tickets are $23 at all Omaha Hy Vee food stores customer service counters and go on sale beginning April 1st.

A benefit for the Omaha Parks Foundation for more information please call 402-926-8299

and www.omahafilmevent.com ...

Some myths have a greater shelf life than others. From the salacious to the downright nasty, Hollywood has been the source of a lot of compelling fiction, and we're here to set the record straight about how one juicy bit of hearsay snowballs into a big fat whopper of a lie.

Today's tawdry tidbit involves actress/ children's book author/ "True Lies" hottie Jamie Lee Curtis and whether or not she was born with some extra equipment … you know, down there? Without inciting some crazy "birther movement" for her to reveal her birth certificate to the press, we'll delve into this rumor with as much grace as the Internet will allow.

History

On November 22, 1958 a future scream queen, Baroness of Haden-Guest and Golden Globe winner named Jamie Lee Curtis came bouncing into the world at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Hollywood, California. She was the second daughter of power couple Tony Curtis...

Janet Leigh Tony Curtis, previous husbands. (See previous post: Janet Leigh Psycho / MGM Actress. Photo: Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis.) From 1951 to 1962 Janet Leigh was married to Universal star Tony Curtis, her third of four husbands. Actresses Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween, True Lies) and Kelly Curtis (the Eddie Murphy comedy Trading Places) are their daughters. Nine years before her marriage to Tony Curtis, the 14-year-old Leigh had eloped with her boyfriend, John Carlisle, in Reno, Nevada. Shortly thereafter, the marriage was annulled at the behest of her parents. Leigh’s second marriage, in 1946, was to struggling musician Stanley Reames. The couple [...]...

Eddie Vedder has found himself in quite a jam. The singer announced on Thursday that he must postpone his U.S. solo tour due to temporary nerve damage in his right arm stemming from a recent back surgery. "After having worked aggressively with doctors and physical therapists for the last eight weeks to repair the damage, the intensity of the injury and the time needed to heal has made it impossible to play the shows as scheduled," Pearl Jam manager Kelly Curtis said in a statement posted on the band's website. "There was hope up until the last minute that the treatments would be successful." The 15-city tour, which had been scheduled to kick off in Las Vegas next Tuesday, has now been...

New Orleans -- Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam has postponed his 15-city U.S. solo tour because of nerve damage in his right arm.

The damage stems from a back injury he suffered earlier this year. Pearl Jam manager Kelly Curtis says Vedder worked aggressively with doctors and physical therapists for the last eight weeks to repair the damage, but he is not well enough to play. Curtis says the singer is frustrated, but remains positive that he will be better this summer.

The tour dates will be rescheduled for November and December, except for the Jazz Fest performance. Tickets will be honored for the rescheduled dates, and refunds will be available upon request through the point-of-purchase.

Eddie Vedder has postponed his 15-city solo tour due to temporary nerve damage in his right arm, according to the Pearl Jam website. The tour by the Pearl Jam lead singer was slated to kick off only five days from now, on April 10, in Las Vegas. The dates have been rescheduled for November and December. In a statement on the website, Pearl Jam manager Kelly Curtis attributed the nerve damage to a back injury Vedder sustained earlier this year. "After having worked aggressively with doctors and physical therapists for the last eight weeks to repair the damage, the intensity of...

Hollywood legend Tony Curtis has died at the age of 85. Jamie Lee Curtis' actor father passed away on Wednesday, September 29. No further details were available as WENN went to press. Born Bernard Schwartz to Jewish immigrants from Hungary, the star endured a tough upbringing in the Bronx borough of New York, which saw him spend a year in an orphanage with his younger brother Julius because his parents were too poor to feed them.

He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II before deciding to pursue his love of acting and enrolling in the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York with German director Erwin Piscator. He moved to Hollywood in 1948 when he was 23 and landed a contract with Universal Pictures. It was then that Schwartz changed his name to Tony Curtis, adopting his first name from the book Anthony Adverse and his last name from Kurtz,...

Tony Curtis, who grew beyond his start as a studio-groomed matinee idol to play snappily seductive schemers in such 1950s classics as "The Sweet Smell of Success" and "Some Like It Hot," died Wednesday evening of cardiac arrest at his home in the Las Vegas-area city of Henderson, Nev. He was 85.

"He died peacefully here, surrounded by those who love him and have been caring for him," his wife, Jill Curtis, told the Associated Press outside their home. "All Tony ever wanted to be was a movie star. He didn't want to be the most dramatic actor. He wanted to be a movie star ever since he was a little kid."

A flamboyant personality with a ribald wit and zest for the high life, Curtis epitomized the storied glamour of old Hollywood. Widely known for his onscreen sizzle and his offscreen personal life -- he and first wife Janet Leigh...

Hollywood legend Tony Curtis has died. The NY Times is reporting the classically handsome movie star who earned an Oscar nomination as an escaped convict in Stanley Kramer.s 1958 movie The Defiant Ones, but whose public preferred him in comic roles in films like Some Like It Hot (1959) and The Great Race (1965), died Wednesday of a cardiac arrest in his Las Vegas area home. He was 85.

His death was confirmed by the Clark County coroner, The Associated Press reported.

As a performer, Mr. Curtis drew first and foremost on his startlingly good looks. With his dark, curly hair, worn in a sculptural style later imitated by Elvis Presley, and plucked eyebrows framing pale blue eyes and wide, full lips, Mr. Curtis embodied a new kind of feminized male beauty that came into vogue in the early 1950s. A vigorous heterosexual in his widely publicized (not least by himself) private life,...

Tony Curtis, a heartthrob of the 1950s, died of a cardiac arrest at his Las Vegas home Wednesday, reports the Associated Press.

Born Bernard Schwartz in the Bronx, he was discovered at the age of 23 by a talent agent, and landed a contract at Universal, where his name was changed to Tony Curtis.

The actor appeared in more than 100 films, but was best known for "Some Like It Hot," "Sweet Smell of Success" and "The Defiant Ones,...

Tony Curtis, who channeled a rough childhood marked by tragedy into a polished and sustained career on the large and small screen for over sixty years, died yesterday of a cardiac arrest at his home in Las Vegas, his daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis, reported to Entertainment Tonight. He was 85.

Born Bernard Schwartz in the Bronx in 1925, Curtis grew up in poverty. The eldest child of immigrant parents, he had almost no formal education and began to sneak into the movies with his younger brother Julius as a means of escape. When he was 10 years old, however, the financial strain on the family became too much to bear and Tony and his brother briefly became wards of the state, admitted to an orphanage for a number of weeks before being reclaimed by his parents. This experience helped shape a strong sense of independence in the boy as Curtis was prematurely forced to learn one of life's toughest lessons; namely, that the only person you can count on is yourself.

In 1938, shortly before Curtis’s bar mitzvah, his brother and constant companion Julius was tragically killed in a traffic accident. Devastated, Tony pulled further away from the conventional life that his parents had always hoped for in the belief that life was to be experienced head-on and hands-on and a few years later joined the Navy. He was honorably discharged after three years of service and with no other plans for a career, auditioned for the New York Dramatic Workshop when he realized the GI Bill would pay for acting school. As is so often the case, fate stepped in for Curtis, as he caught the eye of a theatrical agent during one of his many small stage appearances. Joyce Selznick just happened to be the niece of film producer David Selznick, who ended up offering Curtis a seven-year contract with Universal Studios.

Arriving in Hollywood in 1948 at age 23, he changed his name to Tony Curtis and quickly made an impression with a two-minute role in 'Criss Cross' (1949), in which he makes Burt Lancaster jealous by dancing with Yvonne De Carlo. Based on the strength of that role, Curtis finally got the chance to demonstrate his acting flair, as he was cast in a small, but important role in Sierra (1950). This led to his first big-budget movie, Winchester '73 (1950), which allowed the ambitious, yet still raw talent the chance to act alongside Jimmy Stewart.

Curtis worked steadily throughout the early ‘50’s, consciously working in various genres while actively seeking roles in movies that had some kind of social relevance. His breakout performance as the scheming press agent Sidney Falco in Sweet Smell of Success (1957) was the beginning of a great run for the versatile Curtis, who followed an Oscar-nominated performance as a bigoted, escaped convict chained to Sidney Poitier in The Defiant Ones (1958) and with a broadly comic turn opposite Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe in Some Like it Hot (1959).

He was drawn to roles and films that would challenge audiences. Curtis was advised against appearing as the subordinate sidekick Antoninus in the epic Spartacus (1960), playing second fiddle to Kirk Douglas, but he was taken with the part and the chance to work with the director Stanley Kubrick. He garnered a significant amount of controversy (and critical acclaim) by playing against type the self-confessed murderer Albert DeSalvo in The Boston Strangler (1968). It was around this time that Curtis ventured into television where he co-starred with Roger Moore in the series “The Persuaders!” (1971) and later, created memorable supporting characters in “McCoy” (1975) and “Vega$” (1978).

On the personal front, Curtis was an avid painter throughout his life and one of his surrealist works went on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 2007. More famously, as he detailed in his autobiography “American Prince: A Memoir”, Curtis had relationships with a number of famous actresses, including Natalie Wood and a brief, but widely publicized affair with Marilyn Monroe. He was married five times, most notably to Janet Leigh, with whom he had two daughters, Jamie Lee and Kelly Curtis. His last marriage, to Jill Vandenberg, who was 42 years his junior, was in 1998 and lasted until his death. Curtis had six children, five which survive him: two with Leigh, two from his second wife Christine Kaufmann, and two from his third, Leslie Allen.

Hollywood legend Tony Curtis has died at the age of 85.

Jamie Lee Curtis' actor father passed away on Wednesday after suffering a cardiac arrest in bed at his Las Vegas home.

No further details were available as WENN went to press.

Born Bernard Schwartz to Jewish immigrants from Hungary, the star endured a tough upbringing in the Bronx borough of New York, which saw him spend a year in an orphanage with his younger brother Julius because his parents were too poor to feed them.

He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II before deciding to pursue his love of acting and enrolling in the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York with German director Erwin Piscator.

He moved to Hollywood in 1948 when he was 23 and landed a contract with Universal Pictures. It was then that Schwartz changed his name to Tony Curtis, adopting his first name from the book Anthony Adverse and his last name from Kurtz, from his mother's family.

Curtis made his film debut with an uncredited appearance in 1949's Criss Cross, but it was only in the mid-1950s that he emerged as a breakout star with roles in movies including 1957's Sweet Smell of Success and alongside Sidney Poitier in The Defiant Ones (1958), a performance which landed him a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

He also starred in dramas The Outsider and The Boston Strangler, but he will perhaps be best remembered for his performance in Some Like It Hot (1959) with Marilyn Monroe and Jack Lemmon. In 2000, the American Film Institute named the movie classic the greatest American comedy film of all time.

Curtis also embarked on a variety of TV projects and was immortalised as 'Stony Curtis' on popular cartoon The Flintstones in the early 1960s. In the '70s, he co-starred with former James Bond actor Roger Moore in The Persuaders! series, and went on to land roles in U.S. TV shows McCoy and Vega$.

The actor scaled down the number of films he made in the 1980s and embarked on a career as a surrealist painter. His works became such a hit in the art world, he was able to command more than $25,000 (£16,700) a piece and his painting The Red Table went on display at the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2007.

Curtis was later awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was presented with the prestigious French honour, the Order of Arts and Letters, in 1995. He was also an Emmy nominated star and collected two Golden Globes, in 1958 and 1961.

His final role as an actor was in 2008 romantic war drama David & Fatima, in which he starred with Oscar winner Martin Landau, although he expressed a desire to return to the screen earlier this year.

Outside Hollywood, Curtis was also known for his high-profile personal life - he was married to actress Janet Leigh for 11 years and they had two children together, Jamie Lee and Kelly Curtis, who both followed their parents into showbusiness.

He openly admitted to cheating on Leigh during their union and divorced her in 1962 to wed Christine Kaufmann, his then-17-year-old German co-star in Taras Bulba. He fathered two kids with her but his second marriage lasted just four years.

He was married a further three times and had two more children with third wife Leslie Allen, although their son Nicholas died from a heroin overdose in 1994, aged 23.

Renowned womaniser Curtis later revealed he had had a brief fling with Marilyn Monroe in 1949, and detailed their love affair in his autobiography American Prince: A Memoir.

Curtis was dogged by ill health in his later years and came close to death when he was struck down by pneumonia and fell into a coma in December 2006. He regained consciousness several days later but the virus left him weak and he was resigned to using a wheelchair to get around as he could only walk short distances.

He was hospitalised in August last year when he suffered an asthma-like attack and was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (Copd), a condition which sent him to seek medical attention again in New York in early 2010.

In July, Curtis was admitted to hospital in Las Vegas after another Copd attack after being taken ill at an exhibition of his artwork.

He is survived by his fifth wife Jill Vandenberg Curtis, who he wed in 1998 despite their 42-year age difference, and his five children.

Academy Award-nominated actor Tony Curtis has died in his home Wednesday after suffering from a cardiac arrest. The former Hollywood heartthrob, the father of actress Jamie Lee Curtis, was 85.

Curtis was best known for his role alongside Marilyn Monroe in Billy Wilder's 1959 hit comedy "Some Like It Hot." He earned an Oscar nod for his memorable role as an escaped convict alongside Sidney Poitier in the award-winning "The Defiant Ones" in 1958.

He had made over 140 films and appeared frequently on television in his career that lasted six decades.

Curtis, the son of Hungarian Jewish immigrants, married six times. His first wife was actress Janet Leigh, the mother of his daughters Jamie Lee and Kelly Curtis. They had been touted as Hollywood's golden couple during their marriage from 1951 to 1962.

Movie legend Tony Curtis has been hospitalized in Las Vegas after suffering an asthma attack at an art exhibition. The 85-year-old "Some Like It Hot" star was showing his paintings in Henderson, Nevada last week when he was taken ill.

Sources tell TMZ Curtis has not yet been released from hospital, but he's in a stable condition. The actor recently revealed he's keen to return to the big screen three years after fighting for his life during a near-fatal battle with pneumonia.

Tony Curtis now uses a wheelchair and can only walk short distances. Curtis married five times and once had an affair with actress Marilyn Monroe. He has six children, including actresses Jaime Lee and Kelly Curtis. His son Nicholas died of a heroin overdose in 1994 when he was just 23.

"We just found out our new album is No. 1," Eddie Vedder told the packed crowd during the Pearl Jam show at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Los Angeles. "We had some No. 1 albums a while ago. We didn't give a shit then." He paused for a moment, gave a crooked laugh, took a sip of red wine, and said, "We don't give a shit now. But some of us are dads. So now, we can say to our kids, 'Hey, just remember, your dad is No. 1.'" It's been 13 years since Pearl Jam had a No. 1 album. Their new effort, "Backspacer," which has already spawned radio hit "The Fixer," was released under the new, no-label, direct-to-retail model. The band, led by manager Kelly Curtis and former Sony Music President/COO Michele Anthony (Sony is the band's old...

'Get Some' is from upcoming album, Backspacer.

By Gil Kaufman

Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder (file)

Photo: Scott Gries/ Getty Images

Pearl Jam could not have picked a bigger platform on which to debut their new song, "Get Some," than Conan O'Brien's first "Tonight Show" episode. And the veteran Seattle band did not disappoint, ripping through the blistering track for the first time in public.

The song will appear on the group's forthcoming ninth studio album, Backspacer, due in the fall, which finds them reuniting with longtime producer and friend Brendan O'Brien for the first time in more than a decade.

"Launching a show like this takes a lot of hard work, and one of the things that has sustained me over the past three months was knowing that at the end of our first show, I would get to watch a performance by one of the greatest rock bands in the world,...

  Pearl Jam has inked a deal with Target to distribute its next CD, reportedly called "Backspacer." Billboard reports that the Seattle band, whose contract with longtime home Epic Records, has been up for awhile now, will turn to the mass merchant as its retail partner for the new album, but, unlike many other such deals, Target will not be the only place fans can purchase the CD.   "Target ended up allowing us to have other partners," the band's longtime manager Kelly Curtis tells Billboard. "We'll be able to take care of all levels of the Pearl Jam fan...We wish...

Janet Leigh, whose notorious shower scene in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho shocked moviegoers in the 1960s and earned her an Oscar nomination, died Sunday at her home in Beverly Hills. She was 77. The actress -- who had battled vasculitis, an inflammation of the blood vessels, for the past year -- was surrounded by her husband, Robert Brandt, and her daughters Kelly Curtis and Jamie Lee Curtis, according to Heidi Schaeffer, a spokesman for Jamie Lee Curtis. Although Leigh established herself in the '50s with a steady string of costume dramas and romantic comedies, her appearance in Psycho left moviegoers with an iconographic screen moment, which eclipsed her surrounding career. As the scheming secretary Marion Crane, she met her death just 45 minutes into the film at the hands of the knife-wielding Anthony Perkins. That Hitchcock would kill off his star in the first half of the movie was considered a daring gambit, and the brutally edited sequence earned Psycho a reputation as the granddaddy of slasher movies.

Actress Janet Leigh, whose ill-fated shower in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho became one of the most frightening moments in cinema, died Sunday at her home in Beverly Hills; she was 77. According to a spokeswoman for Leigh's daughter, Jamie Lee Curtis, Leigh "died peacefully" at her home on Sunday afternoon, and had been battling vasculitis, an inflammation of the blood vessels, for the past year. A California native, Leigh (birth name Jeannette Helen Morrison) was reportedly discovered by actress Norma Shearer, who saw a photo of a young girl on the desk of Leigh's father and asked if she could borrow it. A screen test for MGM followed, and Leigh was cast in 1947's The Romance of Rosy Ridge. A number of ingénue rolls followed, most notably Little Women, Angels in the Outfield, and The Naked Spur. In 1951, Leigh married the equally photogenic Tony Curtis, and their romance and marriage was press fodder for years, even as they appeared in less-than-memorable films together, including Houdini, The Perfect Furlough, and The Vikings; the two divorced in 1962 after having two daughters, Kelly and Jamie Lee. Leigh's roles improved with her age, and she graduated from maidens in costume dramas to more contemporary heroines, and throughout the 50s she starred in My Sister Eileen, Pete Kelly's Blues, and Jet Pilot, among other films.

Leigh had one of her most memorable roles as Charlton Heston's abducted wife in Orson Welles' 1958 noir classic Touch of Evil, but just two years later she made film history by playing the doomed heroine Marion Crane in Psycho. Her brief but memorable turn in the Hitchcock film, punctuated by the classic shower scene in which the actress was slashed to death by Anthony Perkins, earned Leigh a Golden Globe and her only Academy Award nomination. Though she also appeared opposite Frank Sinatra in the now-classic The Manchurian Candidate, Leigh's Psycho turn overshadowed the rest of her career, a fact that she happily embraced, writing a book about the film's making, Psycho: Behind the Scenes in the Classic Thriller, in 1995. Leigh worked sporadically through the 70s, and appeared with daughter Jamie Lee in 1980's The Fog, but went into semi-retirement in the 80s and 90s; she appeared again with her daughter in the 1998 sequel Halloween: H20. Leigh is survived by her fourth husband, Robert Brandt, and daughters Jamie Lee Curtis and Kelly Curtis. --Prepared by IMDb staff...

Janet Leigh, the wholesome beauty whose shocking murder in the classic Alfred Hitchcock thriller Psycho was credited with making generations of film fans think twice about stepping into a motel room shower, died Sunday. She was 77. The actress' husband, Robert Brandt, and her daughters, actresses Kelly Curtis and Jamie Lee Curtis were at their mother's side when she died at her Beverly Hills home, Heidi Schaeffer, a spokeswoman for Jamie Lee Curtis, told The Associated Press on Monday. "She died peacefully at home," Schaeffer said. Leigh had suffered from vasculitis, an inflammation of the blood vessels, for the past year.