December 1, 2021 ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE DECEMBER 1, 1986
CARY GRANT left this life the way he played so many of his romantic screen roles. At his side in rehearsal, his wife Barbara Harris hugged and kissed him, her hand held by the Hollywood idol. The couple shared private jokes as he prepared his one-man stage show. Six hours later he was dead and another figure from Hollywood’s Golden Age was gone.
DECEMBER 1, 2005
BRITAIN’S first black Archbishop accused the Church of England yesterday of forgetting its main duty is to spread God’s message. The new Archbishop of york, Dr John Sentamu, used his inauguration ceremony to attack the ‘scandal’ of wasting its time on ‘reports, commissions and conferences’ instead of focusing on the Gospel.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
RIZ AHMED, 39. The London-born, Oxfordeducated, Emmy-winning actor and rapper starred in rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Jason Bourne. This year he became the first Muslim to be nominated for a Best Actor Oscar, for Sound Of Metal, and was named the most influential Asian in British entertainment in the Asian Power List. STEPHEN POLIAKOFF, 69. The Londonborn filmmaker, described as ‘one of the most inventive and intriguing of writerdirectors in Britain today’, made Shooting The Past, The Lost Prince and Dancing On The Edge for the BBC. One critic said all Poliakoff’s dramas have his ‘trademark stilted dialogue, odd acting and overload of posh houses’. He says he relaxes by fidgeting with a plastic straw.
BORN ON THIS DAY
MARY MARTIN (1913-1990). The U.S. singer and actress was described as one of the stars who ‘made the American musical dream most potent in the post-war years’. She was the first to play Maria von Trapp in The Sound Of Music but lost out on the film role to Julie Andrews. After retiring to Brazil, she wrote a best-selling book on needlepoint. Her son was Dallas star Larry Hagman. RICHARD PRYOR (19402005). The foul-mouthed U.S. actor and comedian, who grew up in a brothel, (pictured) sold more than a million copies of his first live comedy album before going on to a film career. Pryor, who co-wrote the film Blazing Saddles, once set himself on fire with rum while high on cocaine.
ON DECEMBER 1…
IN 1135, Henry I, the youngest of William the Conqueror’s sons, died. IN 1988, the first World Aids day was held.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Victorine (c 1840s) A) A fur tippet with long ends. B) rich satin fabric. C) A suit of the same colour throughout.
Answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED Give one’s eye teeth:
Meaning one badly wants something and would do anything to get it. Eye teeth (canines in the upper jaw) were thought to be valuable as a sign that a child had grown a full set of teeth.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
If you could hear the whispering of the dream you would hear no other sound. Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese-American writer (1883-1931)
JOKE OF THE DAY
I PACKED in my job at the chicken farm. The pay was poultry. GUESS The Definition answer: A