Georgia Engel

popular name: Noël Coward

date_of_death: March 26, 1973

age: 73

cause_of_death: Heart attack

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: A prolific performer, playwright and raconteur, Noël Coward was also a talented songwriter whose acerbic wit (both on and off stage) and sophisticated British persona were recognized worldwide. Coward first appeared onstage at the young age of 12, had his first success as a lyricist at the age of 26, and by the end of the 1930s had 9 hit musical productions. In the 1940s, he spent much of his time traveling the world, entertaining war troops, and received his only Oscar for the movie In Which We Serve. After 1945 his clipped, lisping speech and languid Englishness were wearing thin on the public and his career never regained the momentum of the prewar era. And though his stage productions and movies in the 1950s never garnered much critical praise, he nevertheless had one of the highest-paid nightclub acts going on the road.

popular name: Burt Reynolds

date_of_death: September 6, 2018

age: 82

cause_of_death: Heart attack

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: Burt Reynolds was an American actor and director, considered a sex symbol and icon of 1970s American popular culture. The wryly appealing Hollywood heartthrob carried on a long love affair with moviegoers even though his performances were often more memorable than the films that contained them. A self-mocking charmer with laugh-crinkled dark eyes, a rakish mustache and a hairy chest that he often bared onscreen, Mr. Reynolds did not always win the respect of critics. But for many years he was ranked among the top 10 movie draws worldwide, and from 1978 through 1982 he ruled the box office as few, if any, stars had done before. Reynolds first rose to prominence when he starred in television series such as Gunsmoke (1962–1965), Hawk (1966) and Dan August (1970–1971). Although Reynolds had leading roles in such films as Navajo Joe (1966) and 100 Rifles (1969), his breakthrough role was as Lewis Medlock in Deliverance (1972). Reynolds played the leading role – often a lovable rogue – in a number of subsequent box office hits, such as White Lightning (1973), The Longest Yard (1974), Smokey and the Bandit (1977), Semi-Tough (1977), The End (1978), Hooper (1978), Starting Over (1979), Smokey and the Bandit II (1980), The Cannonball Run (1981), Sharky's Machine (1981), The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982), and Cannonball Run II (1984), several of which he directed himself. He was nominated twice for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy. Looking back in 2015, Mr. Reynolds expressed regret over the roles he didn’t get and the chances he didn’t take. It was not until he was almost 40, he wrote ruefully, that he decided he “wanted to be respected as an actor and began to think I might be good if I really worked at it.” His best performance, he added, might well be “still ahead of me.” “I may not be the best actor in the world,” he concluded, “but I’m the best Burt Reynolds in the world.”

popular name: John Wayne

date_of_death: July 11, 1979

age: 72

cause_of_death: Stomach Cancer

claim_to_fame: Show Business

best_know_for: John Wayne was a major American motion-picture actor who embodied the image of the strong, taciturn cowboy or soldier and who in many ways personified the idealized American values of his era. Sadly since is passing his long held opinions of supporting white supremacy, fierce supporter of the McCarthy witch hunts of the 1950s, his stand against civil rights and his denying African-Americans and native American Indians their heritage has been, to say the least, disconcerting.