Banner Graphic, Volume 22, Number 123, Greencastle, Putnam County, 27 January 1992 — Page 4

THE BANNERGRAPHIC January 27,1992

People in the news Jose Ferrer is dead at age 80 MIAMI (AP) Jose Ferrer, who won an Oscar in 1950 as lovelorn, long-nosed Cyrano de Bergerac and was nominated for his portrayal of the painter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, has died at age 80. Ferrer, who died of undisclosed causes Sunday at Doctors’ Hospital in suburban Coral Gables, was known for his rich, aristocratic baritone and his use of disguises to play villians as well as comic figures. He made his reputation as a classical actor with a 1946 Broadway triumph in “Cyrano de Bergerac,” wearing an enormous false nose for the role of the homely romantic. He won an Academy Award for best actor in the role on screen. LATER HE WAS nominated for an Oscar after strapping his legs back to play the gnomish ToulouseLautrec in the 1952 film “Moulin Rouge.” “Jose was not a pretty face. He was not a handsome matinee idol, not a Clark Gable or Charles Boyer,” said Alan Greer, a board member at the Coconut Grove Playhouse, where Ferrer was artistic director. “He was an actor. And he could play so many different parts because of that” Ferrer won two Tony Awards for acting in “Cyrano de Bergerac” in 1947 and “The Shrike” in 1952 and a third for his direction of “The Fourposter,” “Stalag 17” and “The Shrike,” all in the 1951-52 Broadway season. Ferrer received an Oscar nomination for his film debut, as the Dauphin opposite Ingrid Bergman in the 1948 film “Joan of Arc.” Among his other film roles was that of the embittered defense attorney Lt. Barney Greenwald in “The Caine Mutiny” in 1954. HIS OTHER FILMS included “Lawrence of Arabia,” “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” “Ship of Fools” “Dune” and “A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy.” On television, Ferrer starred in two productions of “Cyrano de Bergerac.” More recently he played a rich, aristocratic father on "Newhart.” Ferrer last appeared on stage in a 1990 musical version of lonesco’s “Rhinoceros” in England. He was preparing to star with Judd Hirsch in Herb Gardner’s “Conversations With My Father” on Broadway when he became ill last month. • LOS ANGELES (AP) C&C Music Factory and Color Me Badd lead the nominations for the American Music Awards Monday night with six apiece. Philadelphia’s Boyz II Men and Whitney Houston each have five nominations. Country star Garth Brooks and Natalie Cole have four apiece. Thirty trophies will be given out in pop-rock, soulrhythm & blues, country, heavy metal-hard rock, rap, adult contemporary and dance categories. Rap star Hammer will be host of the three-hour show, which will be broadcast on ABC beginning at 8 p.m. EST.

Simon bridges troubled waters

NEW YORK (AP) South Africa after the demonstrations, the death threats, the bombing that Paul Simon finally felt comfortable in the country where his “Graceland” album was bom. “It finally felt like music. Once we felt that, it became like the rest of the tour,” Simon said.

“The people danced to it, just like they danced all over the world.” The Jan. 15 performance for 20,000 in Port Elizabeth was a welcome change from Simon’s first week in the land of apartheid. As the first American artist to play South Africa since the end of the U.N. cultural boycott, Simon discovered the stage was secondary to politics. BEFORE HE AND HIS Bom at the Right Time

band played a single note on their five-city tour, they were criticized by a militant South African group that wanted the boycott continued. Then the office of Simon’s promoter was bombed Jan. 7. Protesters threatened more attacks before the opening of two shows in Johannesburg. When Simon took the stage four days after the bombing, armored vehicles and bomb-sniffing dogs surrounded the stadium. Fans were searched. “The first shows were stressful,” Simon said. “I thought in terms of music, they were pretty good shows, considering the fact that people in the band

THE FAMILY CIRCUS^

Substitute cartoonist Billy fills in while Bil Keane does a home repair job.

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PAUL SIMON

By Bil Keane

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GLORIA ESTEFAN No musical politics

MIAMI (AP) Gloria Estefan says she doesn’t mix politics with her music, but that performing during the Super Bowl halftime show was itself a statement. Her performance Sunday reached about 100 million viewers worldwide, probably none of them in her native Cuba, where she doubts Fidel Castro would allow it. “I think the image of a successful Cuban exile to him is totally contrary to what he feeds them in his propaganda,” Mrs. Estefan, 34, said recently. “So that’s why my music isn’t really political at all when you think about it, but our image is.” • NEW YORK (AP) Cybill Shepherd, raised in Memphis and starring in a TV movie of the same name, plans to keep her identity with the Tennessee city going strong: She is building a second home in the Mississippi river port. “My creativity kind of springs from there some way,” said the 41-year-old actress. It’s also the place where she went on a date with Elvis Presley, she told USA Weekend. Shepherd, who lives in Los Angeles, appears Monday night in the TNT movie “Memphis,” a story of kidnapping and racism based on a novel by Shelby Foote. “I’m a product of the segregated South,” Shepherd said. “I wanted to do a story about the hatred of racism, and (how) sometimes the most incongruous people break through.” • COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) Grant says, he wrestled under the moniker Gorgeous George. Now he grapples with larger issues at the pulpit. The 67-year-old is a fundamentalist preacher, and he no longer even watches wrestling. “When God let me know that I had sufficient preparation to preach I left the business because I no longer needed it,” Grant said. Grant said he was not the only Gorgeous George of the ring. “There were others. But I originated my own gimmick,” he said. Grant, who lives in York County, traveled the 70 miles Sunday to deliver a sermon at Columbia’s Alpine Baptist Church.

had a lot on their mind like, were they going to be alive when it’s over?” SIMON MET WITH members of AZAPO, the group that opposed his performances, and found their demands unrealistic and self-promoting. He said he never considered not playing. “Otherwise, you empower these people,” he said. Simon’s arrival for the first post-boycott visit was appropriate. His Grammy-winning 1986 album, “Graceland,” was based largely on South African rhythms and his current band features South African musicians. But the tour turned out to be about more than music. He shook hands and posed for pictures with South African politicians of all hues. In a bit of political maneuvering, he introduced Ladysmith Black Mombazo leader Joseph Tshabalala to African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela. Tshabalala’s brother, Headman, was shot and killed by a white security guard a month before Simon’s arrival. The alleged killer remains free on S3BO bail. “I WANTED TO MAKE sure the world would be watching the South African justice system in this trial, and I do have a feeling there is a lot of attention,” Simon said. During the trip, good news came from the United States: Simon’s “Rhythm of the Saints” received a Grammy nomination few album of the year. If he wins on Feb. 25, Simon will become the first four-time album of the year winner and the first person to win Grammys in four decades. Simon and his band will play one more show together after South Africa at the Grammy awards before going their separate ways.

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