24 May 2015

Birthdays
Gina Sarno b. 1989 (The Avengers)
Ricky Mabe b. 1983 (Ghost Ghirls, This Is the End, Nightmare Man, Big Wolf on Campus, Frankenstein and Me)
Naomi Ryan b. 1977 (Guardians of the Galaxy, Doctor Who)
Will Sasso b. 1975 (Southland Tales, The X Files, Sliders, Doctor Who, The Odyssey [1994 TV])
Dash Mihok b. 1974 (Gotham, Punisher: War Zone, I Am Legend, The Day After Tomorrow)
Greg Berlanti b. 1972 (writer, The Flash, Arrow, The Tomorrow People, Wrath of the Titans, Green Lantern, No Ordinary Family)
Garett Maggart b. 1969 (Vampire)
Dana Ashbrook b, 1967 (Welcome to Paradox, Charmed, W.E.I.R.D. World, The Hidden Room, Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat, Ghost Dad, Return of the Living Dead II, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!)
John C. Reilly b. 1965 (Guardians of the Galaxy, Dark Water)
Michael Chabon b. 1963 (won 2008 Hugo and Nebula for The Yiddish Policeman’s Union)
Kristin Scott Thomas b. 1960 (The Golden Compass, Code 46, Gulliver’s Travels)
Doug Jones b. 1960 (The Flash [2015], Arrow [2015], Hellboy, The Strain, Teen Wolf [TV], Falling Skies, The Watch, Dragon Age: Redemption, Fallout: Nuka Break, The Guild, Legion, Super Capers: The Origins of Ed and the Missing Bullion, Quarantine, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Lady in the Water, Pan’s Labyrinth, Doom, Men in Black II, The Time Machine, Side Effects, Alien Hunter, Monkeybone, Buffy, Mystery Men, Bug Buster, Mimic, Tank Girl, Batman Returns, Warriors of Virtue, Galgameth)
Alfred Molina b. 1953 (The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Spider-Man 2, Species, Ladyhawke, Raiders of the Lost Ark)
Nell Campbell b. 1953 (Shock Treatment, The Rocky Horror Picture Show)
Jim Broadbent b. 1949 (Cloud Atlas, Harry Potter, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, The Chronicles of Narnia, Comic Relief: Doctor Who – The Curse of Fatal Death, Smilla’s Feeling for Snow, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, Brazil, Time Bandits, Erik the Viking)
James Cosmo b. 1948 (Game of Thrones, Flashforward, The Color of Magic, The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrome, The 10th Kingdom, Super Gran, Highlander)
Sybill Danning b. 1947 (Virus X, The Lair, Grindhouse, Superboy, The Phantom Empire, Amazon Women on the Moon, Warrior Queen, Howling II: … Your Sister is a Werewolf, V, Hercules [1983], Battle Beyond the Stars, Meteor)
Gary Burghoff b. 1943 (Wonder Woman)
Tommy Chong b. 1938 (Evil Bong, Sliders)
Mai Zetterling b. 1925 died 17 March 1994 (The Witches, H.G. Wells’ Invisible Man)
Carmine Infantino b. 1925 died 4 April 2013 (illustrator, DC Comics)
Lilli Palmer b. 1914 died 27 January 1986 (The Boys from Brazil)
Willis Bouchey b. 1907 died 27 September 1977 (The Munsters, My Mother the Car, Twilight Zone, Panic in Year Zero!, Them!, Red Planet Mars)

Notes from the birthday list.
1. The Picture Slot. In previous years, the Picture Slot went to Doug Jones from Hellboy and Alfred Molina from Raiders of the Lost Ark. This year, I decided on Nell Campbell as Columbia from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, one of several excellent possible choices.

2. The hard to spot Canadians. No one has one of those obvious resumes today, but we do have three people born north of the border, Tommy Chong, Will Sasso and Ricky Mabe.

3. Sorry, sweetie, I'm going with last year's numbers. Last year when I was compiling the list I added both Sybill Danning and Jim Broadbent and I remarked to a friend that Ms. Danning was two years older than Mr. Broadbent. Ms. Danning was never a star, but I lusted after her back in the 1980s. (As much as I enjoy his work, I must admit I have never lusted after Mr. Broadbent.) This year on both imdb.com and Wikipedia, Ms. Danning's year of birth is list as 1952, magically trimming five years off her age. Her first role was in a German soft porn film in 1968. It possible that she lied about her age, making herself 21 instead of 16 when that was filmed and now she is correcting that fib. The other possibility is that she'd rather be 63 now instead of 68. Whichever it is, I'm going with last year's numbers.

4. The Guy at the Bong... I mean, Door. This is one of those lists with major gaps in ages. The oldest living person is Tommy Chong at 77. The next people on the list were born 13 years before him and both are dead. This makes Tommy Chong the Guy at the Door, the cutoff between the living and the dead on today's list. As always, special birthday wishes to the person who has this random demographic distinction.

5. Wait... they did genre? I clicked on Gary Burghoff's name on imdb.com because I recognized it, not knowing he had a guest starring role on Wonder Woman. I was likewise unaware of Tommy Chong's roles in Evil Bong and Sliders.

6. Hey... no Star Trek! In April, every day had a birthday of someone who was on one of the many incarnations of Star Trek. In May, there have now been four days without any Trek reference. Go figure.

Many happy returns to all the living on the list, especially Tommy Chong, and to the dead, thanks for all the memories.

Movie released
Epic released, 2013

 

Predictor: Robert A. Heinlein in The Door Into Summer, serialized in 1956, published in hardcover in 1957.

Prediction: I was surprised as anyone when it turned out we had divisions stashed away at Thule and other places no one suspected. It has been known since the ‘30s that the human body could be chilled until it slowed down to almost nothing. But it had been a parlor trick or a last-resort therapy, until the Six Weeks War.

Reality: A few "predictions" here and a change of what was supposed to have happened in the past from Heinlein's point of view in the late 1950s. Let's take them separately.

1. People can be frozen and thawed and the technology has been around since the 1930s.  Umm... no. It's vital to the plot of Heinlein's exciting adventure, but there isn't any technology like this even today.

2. There was a big nuclear war sometime between 1956 and 1970. Also, no, thank goodness. As I have written many times, fear of nuclear war was a huge part of life in the late 20th Century, but this years marks the 70th anniversary of the last time a nuke was used during warfare. Nukes were used twice, three days apart in August of 1945. That means the "no nuclear war" streak is currently at 25,490 days and counting. I do not say this to claim that there will never be another nuclear weapon used as a weapon of war, but when measured on a human scale, seventy years is a long time.

Looking one day ahead... INTO THE FUTURE!

Is tomorrow Monday already? This means another dip into The OMNI Future Almanac. (I'll also give you the heads up that it's Towel Day, just in case you forgot.)

Join us then... IN THE FUTURE!