- Title: Showbiz deaths in 2024: Carl Weathers, O.J. Simpson, Roberto Cavalli
- Date: 5th December 2024
- Summary: February Carl Weathers LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (FILE - NOVEMBER 20, 2015) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF ACTOR AND EX-FOOTBALL PLAYER, CARL WEATHERS (L) AND ACTOR-WRITER, SYLVESTER STALLONE (R) AT THE PREMIERE OF "CREED" LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (FILE - NOVEMBER 13, 2019) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF WEATHERS SPEAKING TO REPORTERS AT THE PREMIERE FOR "THE MANDAL
- Embargoed: 19th December 2024 02:04
- Keywords: Akira Toriyama Carl Weathers David Seidler David Soul Glynis Johns Iris Apfel Louis Gosset Jr. Norman Jewison O.J. Simpson Richard Lewis Roberto Cavalli Seiji Ozawa Toby Keith celebrity deaths 2024
- Location: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- City: VARIOUS LOCATIONS
- Country: Various
- Topics: Celebrities,Arts/Culture/Entertainment
- Reuters ID: LVA00P811211072024RP1
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: PLEASE NOTE: THIS EDIT CONTAINS FOOTAGE THAT WAS ORIGINALLY 4:3 AND MONOCHROME.
EDITORS, PLEASE NOTE: THIS EDIT IS PART OF A SERIES OF SHOWBIZ YEARENDERS RUNNING DEC. 2-5, 2024
Glynis Johns
Glynis Johns, the husky-voiced British actress most widely known for her role as a suffragette who reconnects with her children thanks to a magical nanny in the blockbuster 1964 movie musical "Mary Poppins," died at the age of 100 on January 4.
Johns, a versatile film and stage veteran who won a Tony Award in 1973 for her role in the Stephen Sondheim musical "A Little Night Music" and was nominated for an Oscar for the 1960 film "The Sundowners," died of natural causes at an assisted living facility in the Los Angeles area, her manager said.
David Soul
British-American actor David Soul died aged 80 following an illness on January 4. The actor was best known for his role as Kenneth Hutch in the 1975 television detective series “Starsky and Hutch”.
Soul also had a successful singing career, scoring a number one in U.S. and UK charts with his single “Don’t Give Up On Us” in 1977.
Norman Jewison
Canadian film director Norman Jewison, whose eclectic array of masterpieces included the 1967 racial drama "In the Heat of the Night", the 1987 tart romantic comedy "Moonstruck" and the 1971 musical "Fiddler on the Roof," died on January 20 at the age of 97.
Jewison, who was nominated three times for the Academy Award for best director and received a lifetime achievement Oscar in 1999, died at his home, his publicist said.
Carl Weathers
U.S. actor Carl Weathers, a former professional American football player who shot to stardom by playing the brash and charismatic boxer Apollo Creed in the "Rocky" movies, died on February 2, aged 76.
Though he had other prominent roles, starring in the recent "Star Wars" spin-off series "The Mandalorian" and the 1987 science fiction horror movie "Predator," Weathers was best known for playing Apollo Creed opposite Sylvester Stallone's Rocky Balboa in the hit movies of the 1970s and 1980s.
He had a brief career playing for the Oakland Raiders of the National Football League and retired from the sport to pursue acting.
Toby Keith
U.S. country music star Toby Keith died on February 5, age 62.
Best known for his 1993 hit "Should've Been a Cowboy", Keith announced in 2022 that he had been diagnosed with stomach cancer, saying he needed time to "breathe, recover and relax".
Seiji Ozawa
Japan's Seiji Ozawa, one of the best-known orchestra conductors of his generation, died on February 6 of heart failure. He was 88.
Ozawa, who was born in China, spent decades in the rarefied atmosphere of top orchestras around the world but wore baseball-themed ties to interviews and preferred to be called by his first name, not "maestro".
His bushy hair and smile charmed audiences, especially in the United States, where his tenure as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra spanned nearly three decades.
Richard Lewis
U.S. comedian Richard Lewis, who rose to fame with his neurotic, self-deprecating wit and later appeared for more than two decades alongside Larry David on the hit HBO series "Curb Your Enthusiasm," died on February 27, aged 76.
The comic, who disclosed last year that he had Parkinson's disease, died at his home in Los Angeles after suffering a heart attack, his publicist said.
Iris Apfel
U.S. fashion icon and entrepreneur Iris Apfel died at her home in Palm Beach, Florida on March 1, aged 102.
Apfel's long career saw her working in interior design and fashion. Following commercial appearances, she signed a modelling contract with IMG in 2019, at the age of 97.
Apfel published her biography titled "Iris Apfel: Accidental Icon" in 2018 and a Barbie doll was created in her image by toymaker Mattel in the same year.
Akira Toriyama
Japanese manga comic creator Akira Toriyama, known for popular titles like "Dragon Ball" and "Dr. Slump," died on March 1, aged 68.
"Dragon Ball", first published in Weekly Shonen Jump comic magazine in 1984, was later adopted into movies, video games and TV series, which were distributed in more than 80 countries.
Toriyama was also known as a character and monster designer of the blockbuster role-playing game series "Dragon Quest."
David Seidler
British-American playwright and television and film writer David Seidler, who won an Oscar for his script for "The King’s Speech", died on March 16, aged 86.
Seidler won the best original screenplay golden statuette for “The King’s Speech” at the 2011 Academy Awards, where the film about stammering wartime British monarch King George VI also won best picture as well as best actor and best director prizes for Colin Firth and Tom Hooper respectively.
Seidler, who had a stammer, also wrote the script for the stage version of “The King’s Speech”, which opened in London in 2012.
Louis Gossett Jr.
Louis Gossett Jr., the first Black man to win an Academy Award as best supporting actor, died on March 29, aged 87.
The U.S. actor's roles ranged from an enslaved man in the TV mini-series "Roots" to the title role in "Sadat" in which he played the Egyptian leader who made peace with Israel.
The tall, imposing actor made history in 1983 when he became only the second Black man, after actor Sidney Poitier 19 years earlier, to win an Oscar. Gossett took home the award for best supporting actor as Sergeant Emil Foley in the romantic drama "An Officer and a Gentleman."
Gossett, who was also a producer, director, social activist and the founder of the Eracism Foundation to combat racism, died at a rehabilitation center in Santa Monica, California.
O.J. Simpson
O.J. Simpson, the American football star and actor who was sensationally acquitted in 1995 of murdering his former wife in what U.S. media dubbed the "trial of the century", died on April 10, aged 76, after a battle with cancer.
Simpson was found not guilty in the 1994 stabbing deaths of former wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles, although he was found responsible for her death in a civil lawsuit.
Simpson later served nine years in a Nevada prison after being convicted in 2008 on 12 counts of armed robbery and kidnapping two sports memorabilia dealers at gunpoint in a Las Vegas hotel.
Nicknamed "The Juice," Simpson was one of the best and most popular athletes of the late 1960s and 1970s.
As an actor, he appeared in movies including "The Towering Inferno" (1974), "Capricorn One" (1977) and the "The Naked Gun" cop spoof films in 1988, 1991 and 1994, playing a witless police detective.
Roberto Cavalli
Italian fashion designer Roberto Cavalli, known for his animal-print designs loved by celebrities, died on April 12, aged 83. He had been ill for some time.
Cavalli, who founded his label in the early 1970s, used bright colours and patchwork effects in his often revealing creations. He expanded into real estate and often spent evenings in his popular "Just Cavalli Cafe," a nightclub in central Milan.
He is survived by his six children and his partner Sandra Bergman Nilsson.
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