Passages

[DimitriL]

Bud Cort after a lengthy illness.

https://variety.com/2026/film/news/bud- ... 236659856/

[beamish14]

Bud Cort after a lengthy illness.

https://variety.com/2026/film/news/bud- ... 236659856/

Oh, fuck. I adored him. Literally teaching The Chocolate War now and about to show his wonderful cameo in Keith Gordon’s adaptation.

I love how he was on set during the production of Electric Dreams despite it being a voice role, and he said his lines essentially while inside of a box

That obit should have mentioned his starring role in the Canadian film Why Shoot the Teacher?

[HJackson]

James Van Der Beek

I missed his public statement about having cancer so this came as quite a shock. Excluding sitcoms, Dawson's Creek might be the show I've watched the most - maybe it's time for another go around...

[domino harvey]

My wife loves the show, Samsung TVs have a Dawson Creek channel that she has on constantly. Had to call to tell her so she heard it from me!

[Beloved Aunt]

I find it hard to believe Bud Cort was never cast in a Todd Solondz film. He must have at least been contacted at some point, for that!

[colinr0380]

James Van Der Beek

I missed his public statement about having cancer so this came as quite a shock. Excluding sitcoms, Dawson's Creek might be the show I've watched the most - maybe it's time for another go around...

That's terrible. I never really watched Dawson's Creek (though bizarrely I distinctly remember that in the UK they showed a "Halloween"-themed episode of the show in a special late at night timeslot on Channel 4 just before the UK television premiere of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in 2000, so I caught that one by default!), but he is amazing in the 'anti-Dawson's Creek role' as Patrick Bateman's brother in Roger Avary's adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis's novel The Rules of Attraction, particularly in the early split screen scene and the perfect final scene slamming directly into Erasure's "Stop!" over the end credits that I highlighted in a previous "Algo-Rhythm" month.

[Zot!]

RIP Bud Cort. A cute girl in High School once told me I gave off Bud Cort's Harold vibes, which was apparently a positive in her eyes. So I think it's important it be acknowledged that cute teenage girls in the 90's knew who Bud Cort was and thought well of him. Sadly the young lady met a tragic end herself due to an unintentional overdose.

[hearthesilence]

I didn’t realize that was him in Michael Mann’s Heat! I guess that’s common when you mostly associate someone with roles they played in their youth, at least when you miss everything they did in the decades in-between.

[Orlac]

James Van Der Beek

I missed his public statement about having cancer so this came as quite a shock. Excluding sitcoms, Dawson's Creek might be the show I've watched the most - maybe it's time for another go around...

That's terrible. I never really watched Dawson's Creek (though bizarrely I distinctly remember that in the UK they showed a "Halloween"-themed episode of the show in a special late at night timeslot on Channel 4 just before the UK television premiere of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in 2000, so I caught that one by default!),

I remember that night as my grandma recorded TCM for me and the Mark Kermode documentary on slasher films that night...we still have that tape and it shows she also recorded Who Wants to be a Millionaire? that night!

And funnily enough, the only thing I've seen Van Der Beek in is his cameo in Scary Movie!

[hearthesilence]

Andrew Ranken, drummer for the Pogues who played on every Pogues album and is credited with coming up with the title of their 1985 masterpiece Rum Sodomy & the Lash.

[colinr0380]

Re: Bud Cort, it may be time to re-watch the short film by Eric Red from 1986 Telephone in which he appears.

[Brian C]

I didn’t realize that was him in Michael Mann’s Heat! I guess that’s common when you mostly associate someone with roles they played in their youth, at least when you miss everything they did in the decades in-between.

I had no idea either! I had to look up who he played (Dennis Haysbert’s asshole boss at the diner), but now that I know, it seems obvious.

I find I often fail to recognize actors in small roles where I don’t expect them and where the performance doesn’t call attention to itself. Plus, he was uncredited to boot.

[hearthesilence]

Curious as to why he was cast - could be Michael Mann's choice but could very well be the suggestion of the casting director. Along with Jon Voigt (and of course DeNiro and Pacino) one wonders if it's meant as nod to the "New Hollywood" era.

[Finch]

Bud Cort is also excellent in a small role as the dad who sends his daughter into gay therapy in But I'm A Cheerleader.

[hearthesilence]

Jamie Lee Curtis posted an amusing anecdote about Cort (with photos to prove it).

[Zot!]

Jamie Lee Curtis posted an amusing anecdote about Cort (with photos to prove it).

Genius! Yeah, I remember thinking…woah, Bud Cort when I saw Heat.

[Murdoch]

James Van Der Beek

I'm devastated, his turn in Do t Trust the B- was fantastic. He could be a great comedic actor. I used to binge Dawson reruns during my schooldays. Absolutely tragic

[thirtyframesasecond]

Varsity Blues was his first big film, wasn't it - though seemed weird than the nerd from Dawsons Creek was suddenly a jock character. I know he was in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, but I've tried to eliminate all memory of that film from my mind.

[Lemmy Caution]

The great historian Roy Medvedev at 100. The best writer and analyst on the Soviet Union and the ex-Soviet Union from the 1970's to at least 2010 or later. He tackled the flaws in the USSR, while managing to stay alive and unimprisoned. Medvedev leaves a complicated legacy. He remained a committed Marxist and apparently was reasonably on board with Putin.

His twin brother and frequent collaborator Zhores was a dissident biologist, and after he was sent to a mental hospital in 1970, the brothers wrote an expose about the Soviet misuse of psychiatric facilities to stifle and punish dissidents. Zhores also exposed an unknown 1950's Soviet nuclear accident and linked it to the lax administration and poor scientific ability which led to Chernobyl. Zhores was exiled to London in 1973, and died in 2018, age 93/

The Medvedev Brothers wrote a number of books on soviet leaders, with a dispassionate analytical eye and ability to write in clear, direct language. Check out A Splinted Ukraine from 2007, where Roy Medvedev runs through the history of Ukraine, identifies the varied regions with their different histories, noting how that fragmentation along with language and religious divisions makes it difficult for Ukraine to unite and choose a direction. Essential to an understanding of Ukraine, and you wish it was written later than 2007, to hear his thoughts and analyses of Ukraine today and the war.

[Yakushima]

The great historian Roy Medvedev at 100. The best writer and analyst on the Soviet Union and the ex-Soviet Union from the 1970's to at least 2010 or later. He tackled the flaws in the USSR, while managing to stay alive and unimprisoned. Medvedev leaves a complicated legacy. He remained a committed Marxist and apparently was reasonably on board with Putin.

His twin brother and frequent collaborator Zhores was a dissident biologist, and after he was sent to a mental hospital in 1970, the brothers wrote an expose about the Soviet misuse of psychiatric facilities to stifle and punish dissidents. Zhores also exposed an unknown 1950's Soviet nuclear accident and linked it to the lax administration and poor scientific ability which led to Chernobyl. Zhores was exiled to London in 1973, and died in 2018, age 93/

The Medvedev Brothers wrote a number of books on soviet leaders, with a dispassionate analytical eye and ability to write in clear, direct language. Check out A Splinted Ukraine from 2007, where Roy Medvedev runs through the history of Ukraine, identifies the varied regions with their different histories, noting how that fragmentation along with language and religious divisions makes it difficult for Ukraine to unite and choose a direction. Essential to an understanding of Ukraine, and you wish it was written later than 2007, to hear his thoughts and analyses of Ukraine today and the war.

Also, a big supporter of Putin and Russia's war in Ukraine (he blamed it on Ukraine and the West).

[Never Cursed]

Robert Duvall

[dadaistnun]

Frederick Wiseman

[Matt]

Robert Duvall

Robert Duvall (1931-2026) moved here

Frederick Wiseman

Frederick Wiseman (1930-2026) thread here

[beamish14]

Songwriter Billy Steinberg. With collaborator Tom Kelly, wrote a staggering number of huge hits, including “Like a Virgin”, “I Touch Myself”, “So Emotional”, and The Pretenders’ “I’ll Stand by You”

[hearthesilence]

The #1 hit he co-wrote with Susanna Hoffs for the Bangles may be better-known, but I vastly prefer the other hit single they wrote for the same album.