Sunday, December 2, 2007

Celebrity deaths in threes

By Rick Morris

We've made this topic a segment on The FDH Lounge program previously, and we will again on December 2. Whether real or imagined, many people are under the impression that celebrity deaths tend to come in groups of three and that they can be quite eclectic. We at The FDH Lounge feel that this topic is a fun and interesting one and in no way disrespectful to the deceased celebrities. The utter randomness of some of the names being mixed together can be, frankly, entertaining. I'd wager that some of the celebrities themselves might have gotten a chuckled had they known with whom they'd be sharing obituary space!

Here are the ones we've featured on the program previously:

May 2002 – Dan Devine, Joseph Bonnano, Seattle Slew

December 2006 – James Brown, Gerald Ford, Saddam Hussein

August 2005 – Barbara Bel Geddes, Peter Jennings, King Faud

* February 2000 – Tom Landry, Jim Varney, Charles Schulz (also Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and Derrick Thomas, who we had not noted at the time of our broadcast)

March 1999 – Dusty Springfield, Stanley Kubrick, Joe DiMaggio

June 2001 – Carroll O’Connor, John Lee Hooker, Jack Lemmon

August 2007 – Merv Griffin, Phil Rizzuto, Brian “Crush” Adams


And here's our the new additions to the list:

April 1992 – Sam Walton, Sam Kinison, Benny Hill

January/February 1992 – Audrey Hepburn, Arthur Ashe, Andre the Giant

October 1993 – Vincent Price, Federico Fellini, River Phoenix

May 1994 – George Peppard, John Wayne Gacy, Jacqueline Onassis

April 1995 – Burl Ives, Howard Cosell, Ginger Rogers

July 1995 – Wolfman Jack, Eva Gabor, Bob Ross

July 1997 – Robert Mitchum, James Stewart, Charles Kuralt

April 1998 – Wendy O. Williams, Tammy Wynette, Pol Pot

April 2002 – Robert Urich, Wahoo McDaniel, Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes

February 2003 – Curt Hennig, Johnny Paycheck, Dolly the Sheep

August 2004 – Rick James, Fay Wray, Julia Child

January 2007 – Benny Parsons, Art Buchwald, Bam Bam Bigelow

July 2007 – Tom Snyder, Ingmar Bergmann, Bill Walsh

October/November 2007 – Robert Goulet, Norman Mailer, The Fabulous Moolah

The past week has had several candidates as well: Evel Knievel, Sean Taylor, Major League Baseball pitcher Joe Kennedy, Quiet Riot lead singer Kevin Dubrow and former head of the KGB Vladimir Kryuchkov (hat tip to the FDH New York Bureau for this latest bunch). One comment I have received from friends who've seen our list is that it contains a lot of pro wrestlers. My sad reply? "They've got to stop dropping dead prematurely in such numbers, then they won't be represented here in such quantity."

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