the last famous person you were surprised to discover was actually still alive

Georgie Fame, 78. Had the idea he was way older, and also dead.

June Lockhart turns 97(!) today.

me expounding the reasons erich von daniken is still alive

https://decider.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/ancient-aliens.jpg

June Lockhart turns 97(!) today.

Terry Riley, who just turned 87

von Daniken is a good one. I first heard of him when I was a kid in the 80s and at the time I assumed that he was an old guy for some reason.

Also from the von Däniken realm of supermarket paperbacks, Hal Lindsey, who wrote - or as it turns out now - co-wrote The Late Great Planet Earth, continues on at age 92. His book was a favorite of Bob Marley's and influenced Bob Dylan at the time of his Christian period.

Peter Blake, 90

On the subject of 1970s non-fiction bestsellers I was surprised to learn that Stewart Brand is still alive. He edited the Whole Earth Catalogue and later went on to found The WELL. He strikes me as one of those pre-internet cyber-futurists who were almost entirely pushed aside when the actual internet happened, because "the street finds it own use for things". Along similar lines Ted Nelson is also still alive. He devised Project XANADU, which was going to be the World Wide Web except that the World Wide Web happened instead. They're both in their eighties.

I've always mentally pictured The WELL as the stereotypical "generation starship where the inhabitants have forgotten their mission and turned into rival tribes", although I'm speaking out of my bottom because I've never been a member. I assume it was a clique of people who wrote for Mondo 2000 and nowadays send angry letters to the New York Times etc. The kind of people who have positions of power on ICANN and secretly run the internet. But I could be wrong.

I assumed Brand was dead because there's a new biography of him out. (Reviews have been mixed.)

Because of this thread and on the topic of 1970s bestsellers, I looked up Richard Bach, author of Jonathan Livingston Seagull - he is alive at 86

Somewhat related, Tom Robbins is still alive at 89

Mel Brooks. Publishing an autobiography at the age of 95.

― Zelda Zonk, Sunday, November 28, 2021 11:49 PM (seven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Happy 96th birthday!

mel b still also one of only a tiny no. of ppl to use twitter correctly:
https://i.imgur.com/EJHoE3k.png

PJ Proby. I was absolutely certain he'd died years ago but he's still performing ... at 83.

By using Twitter correctly do you mean not following anyone from your official account if youre a celebrity?

i mean not following anyone at all whoever you are

but it's definitely funnier when you have 348.5k followers

as you'd expect from a comedy genius

It was funnier still when I thought it was the erstwhile Spice Girl.

The famous-within-a-coterie Robert Madle in 1958 co-founded an organization known as First Fandom. Anyone who did anything in science fiction fandom prior to January 1, 1938 was eligible to join. Robert Madle is 102. He might have outlived "fandom."

Harrison Ruffin Tyler Sr. is not very famous, but he is alive. Harrison Ruffin Tyler Sr. is the last living grandson of President John Tyler, who was born in 1790.

Eva Marie Saint turns 98 today!

And Gina Lollobrigida is 95 today!

When EMS goes, will that bring the curtain down on all the references on Lloyd Cole's Rattlesnakes? Like "Vogue" and Lauren Bacall.

When Joe Turkel died a few days ago I remember thinking "I didn't realise Joe Turkel was still alive". He was the spooky butler in The Shining and Dr Tyrell in Blade Runner. He was only in his fifties in those films but he looked older.

I didn't realise he was still alive until he died.

doc severinsen turned 95 today

he's a good american equivalent to the various englishes panto performers who still survive

Earl Holliman, 93.

https://is-or-was.com/

This is either really easy or I'm pretty good at it.

Norman Jewison, 95

Another 95yo: actor-singer Ed Ames

Ah, yes. I have just been thinking about him for some reason.

Nancy Kwan, 83.

Glad to hear it!

As I work my way through The Sopranos again, I'm a little surprised that, 15 years later, Frankie Valli's still alive (88). Even released an album last year.

one of my friends saw him live recently, though no idea how he sounds.

be funny if he's a Tom Waits-ish baritone now

He's totally convincing in The Sopranos (and also strikingly different than all the other captain-level wiseguys). I remember really taken aback the first time I saw his name in the credits.

"remember being"

Nancy Olson, best known for playing Betty Schaefer in Sunset Boulevard, 94.

Barry Humphries, a spry 88.. born just a little after Elvis

Marion Ross (Happy Days' Mrs Cunningham), 93.

... also 93, Clu Gulager.

Patrick Duffy, former Labour MP is 102. Never heard of the fucker tbh but a notable detail about him is that he was the only MP to verbally attack Thatcher over the death of Bobby Sands while getting booed by all sides of the house, including by his Labour Right colleagues.

he was good in Man from Atlantis

this cunt is very old, but I don't think he's been around long enough for his circulatory system to start developing primitive gills!

I thought Marion Ross was a lot closer to Henry Winkler's age for whatever reason.

His name came up here three years ago, but it's worth mentioning that the actor William Daniels, who played Dustin Hoffman's dad in The Graduate and is known for his strangely old world transatlantic accent, is still kicking at the age of 95.

Rachel Robinson, widow of baseball star Jackie (1919-1972), turned 100 yesterday.

Peter Bonerz from The Bob Newhart Show is in the Marcel The Shell movie.

For some reason Nicholas van Hoogstraten popped into my mind. He's an infamous British landlord who styled himself as a cartoonish imitation of Peter Rachman (he legally changed his name to Nicholas Adolf von Hessen for no reason other than to have "Adolf" in his name). He emigrated to Zimbabwe several years ago and is apparently still alive. 77 isn't all that old, but he seems to have been around forever on account of the fact he became infamous at an early age.

He presents himself as a sinister crime boss with establishment connections, but as with e.g. Kenneth Noye he didn't seem particularly good at it, although he presumably lives a decent life in Zimbabwe.