SQUIDOO REVIEW: "PIRATES."

Walter Matthau.........................Captain Thomas Bartholamew Red.
Cris Campion.........................."The Frog" - Jean Baptiste.
Charlotte Lewis.........................Maria Delores de la Jenya de la Calde.
Damien Thomas.......................Don Alfonso de la Torré.
Olu Jacobs................................Boomako.
Ferdy Mayne.............................Captain Linares.
Richard Pearson......................The Padré.
John Gill....................................The Master Carpenter.

Born in 1920 in New York city, WALTER JOHN MATTHOW was the second son of two Russian Jewish immigrants. He grew up in impoverished circumstances on the Lower East Side and started selling soft drinks when he was 11. He joined a Yiddish theatre group, and earned 50c per performance. His father left the family when Walter was 3. He graduated from Seward Park High School during the
Depression and became a forest ranger in Montana, a gym instructor for the Works Progress Administration, and a boxing coach for the police. He served in WWII in the Army Air corps with the Eighth Air Force, 453rd Bombardment Group with Jimmy Stewart in England as a B-24 Liberator radio man and gunner. He returned home with the rank of Sergeant and six battle stars.

He gained a role on Broadway in 1948 as an understudy in Anne of the Thousand Days with Rex Harrison. In 1966 he was cast in The Fortune Cookie, and his career was launched. He won an Oscar for this role. He suffered a heart attack during production due to his heavy smoking and gambling. He immediately gave up smoking, and walked between 2 and 5 miles every day thereafter. His next major role was in 1968 in The Odd Couple, for which he is well known. He continued acting for the next 30 years, playing many memorable characters, often in company with Jack Lemmon.

Over the years he battled heart disease and contracted two types of cancer, and also had a heart by-pass in 1976. In 1993 he was in hospital with double pneumonia, in 1995 he had a colon tumor taken out, and in 1999 he again went into hospital with pneumonia and was also found to have cancer again. He died on July 1 in 2000 of a heart attack. He was 79.

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OTHER FACTS:

Nickname: Jake.

Height: 6'3" - Walked with a pronounced slouch.

Wives:
Grace Geraldine Johnson, 1948-58, divorced, 2 children.
Carol Grace, 1959-2000 (his death), 1 child.

Loved classical music, and often sang Mozart on set.

Was a gambling addict.

Won 2 Tony awards:
1962 for A Shot in the Dark - Best Supporting Actor;
1965 for The Odd Couple - Best Actor (Oscar Madison).

Nominated for Tony award:
1959 for Once More with Feeling - Best Supporting Actor.

Made 9 movies with Jack Lemmon:
Buddy Buddy (1981);
The Fortune Cookie (1966) - Won Academy Award;
The Front Page (1974);
The Grass Harp (1995);
Grumpier Old Men (1995);
Grumpy Old Men (1993);
The Odd couple II (1998);
The Odd couple (1968);
Out To Sea (1997).

Jack Lemmon directed Kotch in 1971, which starred Mr Matthau, and both actors were also in JFK in 1991, but not together.

Was cast in the lead role of The Seven Year Itch (1955), but 20th Century Fox executives disagreed with director Billy Wilder's choice, so Tom Ewell played the role in the movie instead.

Had an intense dislike of Barbara Steisand, and was quoted as telling her that she had
"no more talent than a butterfly's fart !" However, in 1986 he contributed to her Streisand Foundation charity by attending her $5,000.00 per couple TV concert.

Had an older brother named Henry.

Played albert Einstein in "I.Q." (1994).

Loved Hebrew National Kosher hot dogs.

Born in 1933 in Paris, RAJMUND ROMAN LIEBLING survived WWII by wandering around the Polish countryside and staying with various families.
His mother had died in a concentration camp, but his father had survived the experience, and the two were re-united in 1945. Young Polanski attended technical school, but his favourite pastime was going to the cinema.

In the 1950's he started acting, and was in Andrzej Wajda's "Pokolenie" (1955), and then went to the Lodz Film School. He made "Dwaj ludzie z szafa" (1958); "Le gros et le maigre" (1961); and Ssaki (1962). He debuted his feature "Noz w wodzie" in 1962. He left Poland and went to France where he met Gerard Brach, a scriptwriter, and the two worked together often. Their films "Repulsion" (1965), and Cul-de-sac (1966) were made in England and respectively won a Silver and a Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival.

In 1968 Roman Polanski went to Hollywood, where he made "Rosemary's Baby." His wife, Sharon Tate, was murdered by the Mansons and he returned to Europe in 1969. He appeared in the U.S. again for the release of Chinatown in 1974, which did well. He now lives in France.

He released Tess in 1979 which gained several Oscars, and Cesar awards in France. His subsequent works were intermittent, and he did some work in the theatre. He still does some acting in other directors' films overseas.

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OTHER FACTS:

Has 2 children, Morgane and Elvis.

Made "Tess" in 1979 after reading the Thomas Hardy novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles.

First Oscar for The Pianist (2002) in 2003 - Best Director. Harrison Ford flew to France to give him the award.

When he won the Best Director Oscar, he was the oldest recipient up to that time.

Originally, Polanski wanted Jack Nicholson to play the lead, "Captain Red", in 'Pirates', but he demanded too much money. When Roman Polanski asked Nicholson exactly how much he wanted, he just said "I want more!"

Was to have directed "The Double" with John Travolta, Isabelle Adjani and John Goodman in Paris in 1996. Mr Travolta pulled out just before shooting began due to changes in the screenplay. Steve Martin was brought in as his replacement, but Isabelle Adjani refused to work without John Travolta and left the production too. The project collapsed.

Was offered the job of directing the re-make of King Kong in 1976, but refused it.

Warner's approached him in 1989 to direct The Master and Margarita, a novel by Mikhail A Bulgakov. Polanski adapted the script for it, and said it was his best ever script. Warner's pulled the plug because of budget and also cited irrelevance of subject, as the Berlin Wall had fallen.

Directed four Oscar-nominated performances:
Ruth Gordon;
Jack Nicholson;
Faye Dunaway;
Adrien Brody.
Ruth Gordon and Adrien Brody won their Oscars.

Was to direct "Pompeii" from the novel by Robert Harris in 2007. Orlando Bloom and Scarlett Johansson would star, but Polanski pulled out due to the imminent Screen Actors' Guild strike.

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REFERENCES
IMDb.com; Wikipedia.org; Soulpix.com; Flikr.com.