Emerkeith Davyjack's Celebrity Deaths

The death of former child actor Jackie Cooper ( not to be confused with the , somewhat less fortunate as an adult and , infamously , ripped off by his parents Jackie Coogan ) inspires me to start a " Celebrity Deaths - That , Um , Don't Have The Most Obvious Connectuions To Our Beloved Genre , As Those Folks Will Tend To Get A Solo Thread , Admittedly..." omnibus thread .

Directly , Cooper played Perry White in the Salkind/Reeve series of Superman movies , and , as per Wikipedia , about the last thing he did in the directing of episodic TV series that occupied much of his later working years were episodes of the Salkind Superboy series...

Cooper also starred in the CBS series Hennessy ( Probably the subject of a couple Dell FOUR COLOR COMICS issues anyway , wasn't it ????????? ) , enthused over by our Cmdr. Benson , and another B&W-era series , The People's Choice .

In pre-TV days movies with ____ ____ made them something of a team

Replies

The Baron March 23, 2026 at 5:38pm

RIP Hanna-Barbera Composer Ted Nichols His music formed a large part of the soundtrack of my childhood.
- ClarkKent_DC > The Baron March 23, 2026 at 10:06pm
  
  I have a large assortment of television soundtrack CDs, including soundtracks for The Flintstones and Scooby Doo, Where Are You? Fortunately, both of those include the background and interstitial music from those shows. (Unfortunately, the tunes are not given titles and are tacked onto the end of better-known tracks, making them hard to locate.)
  
  So I'm happy to put a name to the man who composed and/or scored such wonderfully entertaining music. Thank you, Ted Nichols.
ClarkKent_DC March 23, 2026 at 10:10pm

From The Hollywood Reporter: "Valerie Perrine, ‘Superman’ Actress and ‘Lenny’ Oscar Nominee, Dies at 82"

The Hollywood Reporter wrote:

Valerie Perrine, the former Las Vegas showgirl who earned a best actress Oscar nomination for portraying Lenny Bruce’s drug-addicted stripper wife in Lenny and played Lex Luthor’s secretary in a pair of Superman films, died Monday. She was 82.

Perrine’s death at her home in Beverly Hills was announced by friend and soulmate Stacey Souther. She was diagnosed in 2015 with Parkinson’s disease, which eventually robbed her of her mobility and much of her ability to eat and speak.

“She faced Parkinson’s disease with incredible courage and compassion, never once complaining,” he wrote. “She was a true inspiration who lived life to the fullest — and what a magnificent life it was. The world feels less beautiful without her in it.”
- Richard Willis > ClarkKent_DC March 24, 2026 at 5:45pm
  
  Parkinson’s took the life of the husband of one of my first cousins and also the former owner of my LCS, a personal friend of ours.
Jeff of Earth-J March 31, 2026 at 1:18pm

Not a "celebrity" exactly, but Lance Jones of Gwandanaland posted the following "Sad News About Our Friend Brian S. Muehl":

Since not everyone has heard, Brain S. Muehl passed away eariler this week. Brian was not only a critical part of the public domain publishing industry, but an active promoter on social media and most importantly, a good friend to so many people, both in and out of comics.

Brian was a huge supporter of Gwandanaland when we had our darkest days, and his encouragement kept me going. He also worked closely with me and with others in ACHERON PRESS, continuing his passion of seeing that books came into existence that otherwise would never see the light of day. Those of you who knew Brian well enough understand that he liked to.... um.... fly close to the sun when it came to picking books for publication. This only made his impact greater.

His family is working to allow some remote viewing of a memorial planned for this coming Friday. I will be sure that any information about that is passed along.

Brian didn't expect to go, but he was practical, and we talked a few times about "what if." So, those series he started but never got a chance to finsih we will make sure are completed. I have spoken with the family and they also want his legacy to continue. Any ACHERON books you purchase will benefit his family.

We are working on a few memorial projects at Gwandanaland; details as they are finalized. Any ideas you might have in that regard, please share them.

The public domain print-on-demend world is pretty small, and a legend has left us.

Lance
The Baron April 13, 2026 at 1:31pm

RIP Sid Krofft
The Baron May 10, 2026 at 11:45am

RIP Koji Suzuki Suzuki was the author of the Ring Trilogy, Dark Water and many other books. Several of his books were adapted for film in both Japan and the U.S. I've read several of his novels in English translation, they're worth a look if you can find them.
The Baron May 31, 2026 at 5:13pm

RIP Joe "Handyman" Negri I knew him from Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, I didn't know that he was also well-known as a musician.
The Baron June 4, 2026 at 10:04am

"Persepolis" Author Marjane Satrapi has died. According to a family statement, she died of "sadness"" over her husband's death.
- Captain Comics > The Baron June 4, 2026 at 2:06pm
  
  Well, nuts. I really enjoyed "Persepolis" and even wrote a paper on it in a college Mideast history class. (I didn't request it. It was assigned by the professor, who was also a "Persepolis" fan.)

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