RIP Carlo Alighiero

The actor Carlo Alighiero died, he was 94 years old 

Always Fresh News

August 12, 2021

Mourning in the world of theater. The actor Carlo Alighiero died yesterday at the age of 94 after a short illness. The announcement was made by the family. With Alighiero goes a piece of history of theater, television and cinema. Born in 1927 in Ostra, in the Marche region, he left his wife, actress Elena Cotta – a love spanning 70 years – with whom he crossed the history of theater, television and cinema. Alighiero has trod the scenes until the last, before Covid stopped the world of entertainment. With energy, creativity, talent and fun, he has traveled an extraordinary period of time between the various arts. His story, and the one he lived with his wife, are a great story of love and passion for the show. Carlo Alighiero made his debut in the theater with the Padua building in ’52 with a classic, “L’Agamennone” by Aeschylus directed by Gianfranco De Bosio and immediately after in Vittorio Gassman’s “Amleto”. Although he was captured for a period by television which in those years was just born, he actually harbored a love for theater and a vocation to direct, attending the direction course of Orazio Costa at the Academy of Dramatic Art. the greats of the twentieth century theater, Orazio Costa, Sergio Tofano, Wanda Capodaglio, Vittorio Gassman and Silvio D’Amico with his lucid, exciting lessons in the history of theater. The academy companions were Monica Vitti, Luca Ronconi, Glauco Mauri, Luigi Vannucchi, Ileana Ghione, Renato Mainardi of whom Alighiero produced and performed with Elena the comedy “For a young girl who no one cries” at the Eliseo Theater in Rome, directed by Arnoldo Foà . With the theater came Elena Cotta, they married and had two daughters, Barbara and Olivia, and then grandchildren and great-grandchildren. 70 years have passed since their first meeting in Milan in the autumn of 1949, and then they moved to Rome to attend the Silvio D’Amico Academy. Since then, together, they have trod the scenes of all the theaters in Italy and in 2012 they celebrated the Wedding of Diamond renewing the promise of marriage made on December 30, 1952. In the Seventies the desire for family and professional unity led Carlo to a independent theatrical training, destined to live a research experience with passion: Seneca’s “Edipo”, Riccardo Bacchelli’s “Amleto”, where with the direction of Carlo, Elena interpreted the problematic role of the protagonist. Until the beautiful staging of Goldoni’s “Arlecchino servitore di due padroni” directed by Carlo who inaugurated the Teatro Manzoni in Rome of which he was artistic director until 2002. The show ended with two long tours: in China, where for the first time an Italian company landed, and in Russia, reaching as far as Siberia. It was the end of the eighties, and since then Carlo and Elena, as founding partners of Manzoni, with their company have acted steadily with a highly appreciated repertoire always witnessed by a large audience with a choice of texts of excellent theatrical tradition, making to make his debut in the theater with great entertainment personalities such as Fabrizio Frizzi – his great friend – and Rita Forte. But alongside the theater, there has also been great television, since its inception in 1954, when it was still broadcast live and TV entered the homes of all Italians. Carlo made his debut in ’54 under the direction of Alessandro Brissoni with Albertazzi and De Carmine, then worked in “Maigret” with Gino Cervi and with Andrea Camilleri, Daniele Danza, Silverio Blasi, Morandi, Anton Giulio Majano, Giuseppe Fina. The great popularity reaches her in the 60’s in the role of the assistant of Ubaldo Lay – the Lieutenant Sheridan of “Giallo Club”; but the long seriality was close to him and he proposed to the authors to “kill” his character to devote himself to the theater as an actor and director. It is difficult to condense an artistic history that has spanned such a long period of time where, alongside the beloved theater, various participations in the cinema of the seventies have also taken place (from Dario Argento to Sergio Martino, from Damiano Damiani to Lucio Fulci), radio plays that made an era, years of dubbing in the golden age (it was the voice of Anthony Quinn, personally chosen by Quinn, and many others), the extraordinary and unforgettable narrative voice of Homer of Franco Rossi’s “Odyssey” that made an era… The funeral will be held on Tuesday 14 September at 11.00 in the Church of San Francesco a Ripa in his beloved Trastevere.

 

ALIGHIERO, Carlo

Born: 2/2/1927, Ostra Marche, Italy

Died: 9/11/2021, Ostra, Marche, Italy

Carlo Alighiero’s westerns – actor, voice dubber:

Any Gun Can Play – 1967 [Italian voice of Marco Mariani]

Face to Face – 1967 [Italian voice of José Torres]

Two Crosses at Danger Pass – 1967 [Italian voice of Emilio Rodriguez]

The Ballad of Ben and Charlie – 1968 [Italian voice of Giacomo Rossi Stuart]

Death Sentence – 1968 [Italian voice of Donato Di Sepio]

The Long Day of the Massacre – 1968 [Italian voice of Franco Fantasia]

A Long Ride from Hell – 1968 [Italian voice of Franco Fantasia]

The Man Who Cried for Revenge – 1968 [Italian voice Raf Baldassare]

Ringo the Lone Rider- 1968 [Italian voice of Alfonso Rojas]

Run, Man, Run – 1968 [Italian voice of Callisto Callisti]

The Ruthless Four – 1968 [voice dubbing]

Two Guns and a Coward - 1968 [Italian voice of Lucio De Santis]

The 5-Man Army – 1969 (Captain Gutierrez)

The Price of Power – 1969 [Italian voice of Angel del Pozo]

Drop Them or I’ll oot – 1969 [Italian voice of Serge Marquand]

The Stranger’s Gundown – 1969 [Italian voice of Thomas Rudy]

Arizona Colt Returns – 1970 [Italian voice of Aldo Sambrell]

The Beast – 1970 [Italian voice of Giovanni Pallavicino]

Companeros – 1970 [Italian voice of Eduardo Fajardo]

Gunman in Town – 1970 [Italian voice of Luis Induni]

Sabata the Killer – 1970 [Italian voice of José Canalejas]

They Call Me Trinity – 1970 [Italian voice of Tony Norton]

Twilight Avengers – 1970 [Italian voice of Attilio Dottesio]

Blindman – 1971 [Italian voice of Ringo Starr]

Coffin full of Dollars – 1971 [Italian voice of Ray Saunders]

Drummer of Vengeance – 1971 [Italian voice of Craig Hill]

A Fistful Death – 1971 [Italian voice of Gordon Mitchell]

God In Heaven, Arizona on Earth – 1971 [Italian voice of Luis Induni]

Guns for Dollars – 1971 [Italian voice of Fortunato Arena]

Man of the East – 1972 [Italian voice of Tony Norton]

My Horse, Your Gun, Your Widow- 1972 [Italian voice of Luis Induni]

Prey of Vultures – 1972 [Italian voice of Alfredo Mayo]

Gunmen of the Holy Ghost – 1972 [Italian voice of Craig Hill]

Karate, Fists and Beans – 1973 [Italian voice of Luis Induni]

A Man Called Invincible – 1973 [Italian voice of Tony Norton]

Carambola – 1974 [Italian voice of Franco Fantasia]

The Crazy Bunch – 1974 [Italian voice of Tony Norton]

Ten Killers Who Came from Afar – 1974 [voice dubbing]

The White, the Yellow, the Black – 1975 [Italian voice of Rafael Albaicín]

California – 1977 [Italian voice of Romano Puppo]

RIP Art Metrano

 Art Metrano, ‘Police Academy’ actor and comedian, dead at 84

 

The New York Post

By Hanna Frishberg

September 9, 2021

 

Art Metrano, a stand-up comedian best known for playing callous police captain Ernie Mauser in the second and third “Police Academy” films, has passed away. He was 84.

The Brooklyn-born funnyman died of natural causes at his Aventura, Florida home on Wednesday, his son told The Hollywood Reporter.

In addition to his roles in the 1985 and 1986 installments of the comedic cop series, Metrano also appeared in the 1982 “Happy Days” spinoff “Joanie Loves Chachi” and guest-starred on “All in the Family,” “Bewitched,” “Starsky and Hutch” and “Mod Squad,” among other TV shows.

A Bensonhurst native, Metrano began his career studying acting with Stella Adler and John Cassavetes and doing stand-up in the Catskills, according to THR. His big break came when a producer for “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson” invited him onto the show in 1970 after seeing his mock magic act “The Amazing Metrano” on a late-night California variety show. 

Actor Art Metrano attends the 21st Annual Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon on September 1, 1986 at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Ron Galella Collection via Getty 

Carson was so delighted by Metrano’s performance on his show that he fell out of his chair with laughter and began opening doors for the curly-haired Brooklynite. 

 “He really loved it and became a big fan of mine,” Metrano said in a 2015 interview. “All of a sudden I was doing all these shows. It was just amazing.”\

Then, at the height of his success in 1989, while working on the roof of his Los Angeles home, he fell off a ladder and fractured three vertebrae, rendering him a quadriplegic.

 “He was at the peak of his career when that happened, and then it just stopped,” his son told THR. “But he managed to enjoy life and overcome adversity.”

He eventually even turned his trauma into a one-man play called “Metrano’s Accidental Comedy,” which he performed from a motorized wheelchair. 

He is survived by his wife, four children and both grand and great-grandchildren.

“Art would want all of his friends and family to continue to smile when they think of him and to laugh 

and continue on celebrating life,” his family said. 

 

METRANO, Art (Harpo Mesistrano)

Born: 9/22/1936, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York, U.S.A.

Died: 9/8/2021, Aventura, Florida, U.S.A.

 

Art Metrano’s westerns – actor:

The High Chaparral (TV) – 1969 (bartender)

The Outcasts (TV) – 1968, 1969 (Jesse, Sheriff Calloway)

Bonanza (TV) – 1970 (Leroy Gaskell)

Centennial (TV) – 1979 (Meurice)

RIP Michael Constantine

Reading native and Emmy-winning actor Michael Constantine dies at 94

Family and friends fondly remember the man best known for “Room 222,” “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”

 

Reading Eagle

By Don Botch

September 8, 2021 at 6:18 pm

Reading native Michael Constantine, an actor best known for his Emmy-winning role as high school principal Seymour Kaufman in the TV series “Room 222” from 1969 to 1974 and his portrayal of Kostas “Gus” Portokalos, the Windex bottle-toting father of the bride in the 2002 film “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” died Aug. 31 at age 94, his family disclosed Wednesday.

Constantine’s brother-in-law Michael Gordon said Constantine died peacefully of natural causes in his Reading home, surrounded by family, including his sisters, Patricia Gordon and Chris Dobbs. Constantine had been ill for several years, but the nature of his illness was not disclosed.

Constantine, whose given name was Gus Efstration, was born May 22, 1927, the son of Greek immigrants Andromache (Fotiadou) and Theoharis Ioannides Efstration.

He graduated from Reading High School in 1946 and never forgot the community where he was raised.

“Last week he could still sing all four stanzas of the Reading High School alma mater from memory,” Michael Gordon said. “He’s always considered himself a Reading native. People would come up and say, ‘You’re from California,’ (and he’d say) ‘Oh no, I’m from Reading.'”

“He loved his hometown,” Patricia added. “He came back here right after he won his Emmy for ‘Room 222.’ But then he was called back to California. He always loved coming home. He was very much a family person. He loved his children, his siblings, his parents.”

Constantine began his acting career on the stages of New York in the 1950s before going on to land roles on many well-known TV shows leading up to his big break with “Room 222,” an ABC comedy-drama set in a fictional, racially diverse Los Angeles high school.

Well known shows on which Constantine appeared prior to “Room 222” included “My Favorite Martian,” “The Twilight Zone,” “Bonanza,” “Hogan’s Heroes,” “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and “The Fugitive.”

“He was a great character actor, so when someone needed a character actor, they turned to him,” said George Hatza, retired Reading Eagle entertainment editor. As a journalist Hatza knew Constantine professionally, and he knew the actor personally from attending SS. Constantine & Helen Greek Orthodox Church in Reading together. “He was on television back in the ’50s: ‘Perry Mason,’ shows like that. He did everything.”

Hatza said it was Constantine’s upbringing that made him so adaptable.

“The thing is, he fit into all those roles because he really was the quintessential common man,” Hatza said. “They were immigrants. They came here, and his parents spoke Greek in the house. His mother spoke broken English. She was very intelligent, and very nice. The whole family, just kind, generous, sweet people. And it was the American dream. You bring your family to America and your son grows up to be a movie star, a TV star, an actor who everyone knows.”

It was Constantine’s role on “Room 222” that made him readily recognizable to many Americans. Hatza said that even though the show incorporated humor, Constantine mostly played his role straight.

“He was terrific in that role,” Hatza said. “It was considered a comedy series, but he didn’t play it for laughs. He was a principal and he played it the way a real principal would be. It was not a joke part. That’s the kind of guy he was. He had respect for the working man, and that came out in his work.”

After “Room 222,” Constantine stayed busy, landing TV roles on shows such as “Quincy, M.E.,” “The Love Boat,” “Remington Steele,” “MacGyver” and “Murder, She Wrote,” to name just a few, plus more than a dozen films, before his acclaimed role in “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” an indie romantic comedy about a middle class Greek-American woman who falls in love with the upper middle class White Anglo-Saxon Protestant.

“That was like he had a second career with ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding’. It was like, ‘Oh yeah, Michael Constantine. I remember him,'” Hatza said, laughing.

Only in this case, unlike with “Room 222,” Constantine cut loose his comedic chops, big-time.

“He was hilarious, truly hilarious,” Hatza said. “That whole Windex thing (the window cleaner was his character’s magic elixir for everything) was just a wonderful sight gag. He just really captured the whole Greek-American thing about holding on to your heritage. Their house in that movie was a satire of what people might think of Greek Americans. Everything was white and blue, which is the colors of the Greek flag. Everything was absurdly Greek. He had that whininess that only Greeks can do.

“I think he was good enough for an Oscar nomination. I was a little surprised he didn’t get one for supporting actor.”

Constantine reprised his role on the TV series “My Big Fat Greek Life” and in the 2016 film, “My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2,” the last big role of his long, distinguished career.

Through it all, whenever he was in Reading, he was a fixture in local coffee shops, where he would go to read, write screenplays and engage with fans who might recognize him.

“He would talk with anyone, chat with anyone at all,” Michael Gordon said.

Constantine’s sister Patricia said he loved hanging out at the former Borders store, Barnes & Noble and the former Take 2 Bagels in Wyomissing.

“What was so interesting was he would be over at Borders or wherever he was working and writing, and people wouldn’t bother him,” Hatza said. “They’d go up and shake his hand and walk away. It wasn’t like people were all over him. People allowed him his space, and he repaid them with courtesy when they were courteous to him. He was a good guy. A very good guy.

“When you were with him at an event, there was no sense that he was ever more than anyone else. He never put on airs like that. He was just another person invited to this picnic, or whatever. He’d just sit there and talk to everyone about the old days. That’s just the way he was.”

Charles J. Adams III, the retired WEEU radio personality and Reading Eagle correspondent, recalled seeing Constantine a month or so ago at a local restaurant.

“It’s funny,” Adams said, “because friends of ours from Chester County were going out to dinner with us, and as we were walking out, this car pulls up and this guy says, ‘Charlie Adams?,’ and I said, ‘Yeah.’ He recognized me, whoever it was. And I looked and said, ‘My gosh, it’s Michael Constantine.’

“We started talking — a nice conversation about some work we did in the past — and my friend said, ‘He recognizes you, but you didn’t recognize him? That’s kind of funny.’

“But he was that kind of guy. He was so humble.”

Adams said he interviewed Constantine for his radio show when “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” came out and they really hit it off. They then worked together on the 2010 locally produced film “Location! Location!” and Constantine asked him to accompany him to the premiere, so they walked the red carpet together.

“He was just such a nice person, so self-effacing,” Adams said. “This is tragic news, but what a life well-lived.”

Patricia Gordon described her brother as a loving, giving person.

“(He was) the most generous person you’d ever want to meet,” she said. “The world is a better place because of him — really, truly.”

CONSTANTINE, Michael

Born: 5/22/1927, Reading, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.

Died: 8/31/2021, Reading, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.

 

Michael Constantine’s westerns – actor:

Gunsmoke (TV) – 1963, 1968 (Baca, Noah Meek)

The Virginian (TV) – 1965, 1968, 1969 (Stavros Karas, Private Essex Kanin, John Halmstead)

Death Valley Days (TV) – 1965, 1966 (John Chisum, Thomas J. Pollack, George Burnett)

Iron Horse (TV) – 1967 (Sam McGinty)

The Dakotas (TV) – 1963 (John Marshak)

The Road West (TV) – 1966 (Jacob Adams)

Dundee and the Culhane (TV) - 1967

Wanted: The Sundance Woman (TV) – 1976 (Dave Riley/Dave Baker)