Franco Zeffirelli

popular name: Maila Nurmi

date_of_death: January 10, 2008

age: 82

cause_of_death: Natural causes

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: Known professionally as Maila Nurmi, she was an American actress who created the campy 1950s character Vampira. The image of Vampira is certainly iconic. With her memorable and striking image, Vampira cemented herself as a star of horror, fashion, and drama. She relocated to Los Angeles from Oregon in 1940, with hopes of becoming an actress. After several minor film roles, she found success with her Vampira character, television's first horror host. Nurmi hosted her own series, The Vampira Show, from 1954 to 1955, on KABC-TV. After the show's cancellation, she appeared in the 1959 cult film Plan 9 From Outer Space, directed by Ed Wood. She is also billed as Vampira in the 1959 film The Beat Generation, where she appears out of character and instead plays a beatnik poet. Nurmi also appeared in the 1959 crime film The Big Operator. She was portrayed by Lisa Marie in Tim Burton's 1994 biopic, Ed Wood.

popular name: Gloria Holden

date_of_death: March 22, 1991

age: 87

cause_of_death: Heart attack

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: Alluring, dark-haired former model and English leading lady Gloria Holden was active in Hollywood from the late 1930s through the 50s. Holden is best remembered as the title character in "Dracula's Daughter" (1936) and as Paul Muni's wife in the Oscar-winning 1937 film "The Life of Emile Zola." Often cast as a femme fatale, Holden also appeared in "Test Pilot" (1938) opposite Spencer Tracy and Myrna Loy, "This Thing Called Love" (1941) and "The Eddie Duchin Story" (1956). Her performance in "Dracula's Daughter" influenced the writings of horror novelist Anne Rice, and Dracula's Daughter is directly mentioned in Rice's novel The Queen of the Damned. In July 1937, Holden was assigned to play the character of Marian Morgan in The Man Without a Country (1937). The Technicolor short co-starred John Litel and was nominated for a Short Subject (Color) Academy Award. Her film career ended with This Happy Feeling (1958).

popular name: Yul Brynner

date_of_death: October 10, 1985

age: 65

cause_of_death: Lung cancer

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: Exotic leading man of American films, famed as much for his completely bald head as for his performances, Yul Brynner masked much of his early life in mystery. He traveled to the U.S. in 1941 to study with acting teacher Michael Chekhov and toured the country with Chekhov's theatrical troupe. That same year, he debuted in New York as Fabian in "Twelfth Night" (billed as Youl Bryner). After working in a very early TV series, Mr. Jones and His Neighbors (1944), he played on Broadway in "Lute Song" with Mary Martin, winning awards and mild acclaim. He and his wife, actress Virginia Gilmore, starred in the first TV talk show, Mr. and Mrs. (1948). Brynner then joined CBS as a television director. He made his film debut in Port of New York (1949). Two years later Mary Martin recommended him for the part he would forever be known for: the King in Richard Rodgers' and Oscar Hammerstein II's musical "The King and I". Brynner became an immediate sensation in the role, repeating it for film (The King and I (1956)) and winning the Oscar for Best Actor. For the next two decades, he maintained a starring film career despite the exotic nature of his persona, performing in a wide range of roles from Egyptian pharaohs to Western gunfighters, almost all with the same shaved head and indefinable accent. In the 1970s he returned to the role that had made him a star, and spent most of the rest of his life touring the world in "The King and I".