Sixteen Candles

Three Hollywood heavyweights are celebrating birthdays today.

Original Reagan-savant, Alex P. Keaton, or Michael J. Fox, turns 50 today. Fox won three Emmy Awards in the 1980's for his famous role on the popular sitcom,
"Family Ties", and then went on to star in the one of the biggest comedic movies of all time, "Back to the Future".

Fox scored a rare "Hollywood Daily Double" when he had a second successful sitcom,
"Spin City" in the 1990's. Fox won two more Emmys in his career after "Family Ties", one for "Spin City" and another in 2009 for a guest appearance on "Rescue Me".



To see photos taken at the recent TV Land Awards where Fox reunited with his "Family Ties" castmates, click here.











Johnny Depp is only two years behind Michael J. Fox; he turns 48 today. Depp started out on the 80's cop show, "21 Jump Street", and quickly transitioned to movie stardom, starring in such films as "Edward Scissorhands", "Ed Wood", "Donnie Brasco", "Sleepy Hollow", "Chocolat" and "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory". But, of course, Depp is currently raking in billions, literally, by starring in the string of "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies.

Depp has been nominated for an Oscar three times, in 2004 for the first
"Pirates" movie, in
2005 for "Finding Neverland", and in 2008 for "Sweeney Todd". Depp has come full circle in his career as he's currently filming the big screen adaptation of his 80's t.v. show, "21 Jump Street", but the Depp film about which we are the most excited is the upcoming "Dark Shadows", in which Depp plays the famous 1960's t.v. vampire, Barnabas Collins.



And finally, current holder of the Oscar for Best Actress, Natalie Portman, celebrated her 30th birthday today.
Portman started out as a child actress, making her feature film debut in 1994 in "Leon: The Professional", but of course shot to fame five years later in "Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace" as Queen Amidala. Before winning the Oscar this year, Portman received one other Oscar nomination, in 2005 for Best Supporting Actress for "The Closer".

So We're Guessing Mickey and Goofy Won't Be Getting Together Anytime Soon?

In the new edition of Vanity Fair Magazine, rock legend Patti Smith interviews actor Johnny Depp, and the conversation got very interesting when Depp described Disney's initial reaction to his portrayal of his "Pirates of the Caribbean" character, Jack Sparrow. Following is an excerpt from the VF.com piece.

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“They couldn’t stand him. They just couldn’t stand him,” Depp says of Disney’s reaction to his controversial interpretation of Sparrow. “I think it was Michael Eisner, the head of Disney at the time, who was quoted as saying, ‘He’s ruining the movie.’ Depp reveals to Smith, however, that he remained unfazed by the studio’s hysteria.

“Upper-echelon Disney-ites, going, What’s wrong with him? Is he, you know, like some kind of weird simpleton? Is he drunk? By the way, is he gay?… And so I actually told this woman who was the Disney-ite… ‘But didn’t you know that all my characters are gay?’ Which really made her nervous.”

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Wow. And you wonder why we rarely ever see anything really edgy or interesting coming out of mainstream Hollywood?

Hollywood Watch: Vampires and Queens of Rock

Two major Hollywood "remakes" are currently in pre-production and/or filming. One of the remakes is actually a retelling of the story of one of rock's greatest stars, Janis Joplin. After years of development and several actresses attached to the lead role, it looks like Oscar-nominee Amy Adams has finally landed the part of the hard-singing, hard-living rock goddess who died at 27 of a drug overdose. Adams might seem a strange choice for the role; until now Adams has made a career out of playing sweet-natured, quiet, very meek young women, nothing like the loud, boisterous, hard-partying Joplin. But sometimes actors score their greatest triumphs when playing against type, so you never know, this might be the role that finally makes Adams a huge star and wins her that elusive Oscar.

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.(jonathan frid as

"barnabas collins")

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An even more interesting project is the remake of the 1960's gothic soap opera, ABC's "Dark Shadows". For those too young to remember, "Dark Shadows" told the story of Barnabas Collins, a vampire, the Stoddard family, and an assortment of witches, werewolves, ghosts, etc. For those of us of a particular generation, it was the show that we ran home from school everyday to see, only to have the bejesus scared out of us for our efforts. Tim Burton is directing, and his go-to star, Johnny Depp, will play Barnabas Collins. We're not sure who else is in the cast of the current movie, but the original cast of the 1966-71 t.v. show had some interesting members..(the cast of "dark shadows").

(johnny depp as "barnabas collins")

In addition to Jonathan Frid as Barnabas, the creepy soap also starred Oscar-nominated Grayson Hall as Dr. Julia Hoffman. Hall was nominated in 1965 as Best Supporting Actress for "Night of the Iguana". Also starring was Joan Bennett, who had been a major Hollywood star in the 1930's and sister to fellow movie star, Contance Bennett. Other stars of the pre-Twilight vampire saga included Alexandra Isles, who later became the mistress to suspected wife-murderer, Klaus Von Bulow; Kate Jackson, who would later go on to t.v. stardom as a "Charlie's Angel"; and Mitch Ryan, who next found major t.v. success as Greg's father on "Dharma and Greg". Other notable cast members included John Karlen, who later played Harvey Lacey, the husband of Lacey of "Cagney and Lacey"; Louis Edmonds, who played Langley Wallingford for 16 years on "All My Children"; the very sexy David Selby, who played Richard Channing on "Falconcrest"; and on and on. You've probably figured out by now that the t.v. show was so popular that it successfully launched the careers of many young actors, many of whom are still working today.
(jonathan frid and grayson hall).
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(kate jackson)

One of the most interesting actors to appear on "Dark Shadows" was Dennis Patrick, who went on to fame as Vaughn Leland on "Dallas". In addition to starring in more than 1800 t.v. guest roles in his four decade career, coincidental to his role on "Dark Shadows", he actually played the very first t.v. vampire in a 1950 episode of "Stalag 13". In another strange twist of fate, Patrick died in a house fire, fire being the only thing beside a wooden stake which will kill a vampire.
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.But for the craziest trivia nuts out there, like us, here's the best one. Denise Nickerson was featured on "Dark Shadows" as Amy Jennings, from 1968-1970. Not sure who Nickerson is? Soon after her role on "Dark Shadows", Nickerson played the role of none other than Violet Beauregarde in the iconic 1971 movie, "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory".

(denise nickerson as "violet beauregarde")