happy birthday jack nicholson

need i say more? he turned 72 on april 22. we know him, we love him, he's crazy... its that wild collaborator with the monkees, mr. jack 'eyebrows' nicholson. (forgive this post for being so short, i've been awake for almost 24 hours.)

alma

i christened a new book tonight, lovers. i was working with limited supplies, all the same, i think i came up with a great-looking cover. the star is none other than mr. alain whyte. he was morrissey's guitarist and close collaborator for a long time. if my recollection is correct, i think this picture was taken backstage, sometime in the mid-90's. that's as close as i can get right now, as a time frame. i love alain whyte. according to the ghostly computer sources, he was born alain gordon whyte on july 3rd, 1967. he was not a performer on morrissey's latest tour, but is apparently still a collaborator. sort of like the 'mccartney' to morrissey's 'lennon.' i don't mean to imply anything, but the two men have been very close. it is even rumored by some that hot alain was 'the one' who broke morrissey out of his spell of long-suffering self-induced celibacy. but that's just a rumor. but hey, morrissey could do a lot worse, don't you think? alain is a brilliant songwriter and instrumentalist. he's a dreamy singer with an exquisite vocal range. and he looks great. he can be seen, prominently featured in the must-have dvd of morrissey's live show 'who put the M in Manchester?' (if you haven't seen it, then you haven't seen 'recent morrissey.') he's done a few rockabilly-flavored solo projects, but to me he'll always be one of morrissey's band. he's just marvelous. oh, and i almost forgot... the book title, 'alma,' comes from my own name, almadora. (mmm, no kidding.) and lets see who else is featured in the little medallions. okay, from left to right, we have: a young miss jane fonda, just starting out in new york, then we've got the one and only mr. neil innes in drag, then the one and only miss georgina hale, then mr. john (duran) taylor, getting his makeup on, in a still-frame from the 'girls on film' video, then just an aqua star, and last but never, never least, we've got a shot of davy jones from the monkees' classic 'fair tale' episode. so that's it. a brand new book with all those clean pages. wish me luck. (and click to enlarge)

happy birthday tim curry

ohhhh yesss! this is definitely a birthday i wouldn't want to go by unnoticed. he was born on april 19th, 1946. if my math is right, that would make him... 63 today? wow... tim curry, ladies and gentlemen. i think its safe to say there's nobody 'in the business' quite like him. he can really do it all. and that voice!! so silky and dark and richly dramatic... but he never quite goes overboard. (vocally.) um, there's so much i could say about tim... he really never flops, does he? i mean, even if he's in a real 'turkey-roo' of a movie, he sometimes manages not to suck in it, personally. i was aware of tim curry before i fell head-first into the fishnet subculture that was the 'rocky horror' scene in greensboro, north carolina... its hard for me to remember not being aware of him, but something happened in the wild year that was 1987. that 'something' was 'the rocky horror picture show,' ...and there wouldn't really have been a 'rocky horror picture show' without tim curry's dazzlingly classic portrayal of the devious and gloriously sexy dr. frank-n-furter. i don't care, as many times as i've seen 'rocky horror,' (and we're talking about well over 100 times just in the theater) ...as many times as i've seen it, frank's entrance can still give me chills. hey, it makes me wanna roll 'sweet transvestite' right now!! it must be weird for other actors to 'take on' that part in the stage production. it must be rather daunting to make the role of frank-n-furter your own creation, with the glittering, saucy, sensual, sexy, electric tim curry peformance always lurking somewhere in the background, representing the standard. so um, hey... i almost forgot to mention... happy birthday tim. i really do love you. and thanks. (this shot is a gleaming image from the 'floorshow' near the end... the bit known by rocky horror fans as 'whatever happened to fay wray?') (click to enlarge, babies...!! )

leaud smokes

i've been 'aware of' jean-pierre leaud for a long time... more or less since the time my brother got a job in a local video chain. but i've really only seen him 'in action' in one film; 'last tango in paris.' he's so french and gorgeous, you know? so um, since he was more or less a stranger to me, i looked up his mini-biography to see if there was any striking information that would make him more to me than just a pretty face... but hey, guess what? i didn't find anything! he seems like just a groovy french actor that led a pretty typical 'french actor' life. i have no idea if he's like, 'boring for real,' but that really doesn't matter here on 'planetcool.' tonight he's only required to smoke a sleek cig and look very gorgeous whilst doing it. so dig him, he's lovely and french!

cool leia

ahhh, classic princess leia. i stumbled upon some great screen shots of the slinky princess a couple of nights ago. i have no idea who took them, but whoever it was, they had a pretty good eye. i've always loved this frame of leia retouching her sweet 'buns' after the ordeal in the trash compactor. but if you watch the film, the shot is almost 'blink and miss it,' so i thank the talented fan who snagged it for me. she looks pretty sweet for a girl who was almost mangled amidst a rancid swamp of 'death star' liquid waste. and hey, don't even get me started on the huge 'snakey thing' that almost drowned luke. so umm, yeah i think this one enlarges pretty well. man, she was beautiful. its on my desktop as we speak.