Articles by Claudia Luther

Jules Dassin, the blacklisted American filmmaker who was a master of film noir, directing such classics as “Brute Force,” “The Naked City” and “Rififi,” died late today in an Athens hospital. Read more

Augustus F. Hawkins, the first African American from California to be elected to Congress and a champion of workers, fair housing and civil rights, has died. Read more

There’s Mar Vista – the Westside community of pleasant postwar housing – and then there’s Mar Vista Hill, actually a gathering of hills that oversee their more modest mother community. Read more

Marcel Marceau, the great French mime who for seven decades mastered silence and brought new life to an ancient art form, has died. Read more

Jane Wyman, the Academy Award-winning actress whose long and distinguished film and television career was nearly overshadowed by her real-life role as the first wife of actor-turned-politician Ronald Reagan, died Monday. Read more

Charles Lane, the anonymous yet highly familiar character actor who specialized in playing humorous cranks in hundreds of film and television roles stretching back to the early 1930s, has died. Read more

Otto Natzler, a master glazer and wizard of the kiln who with his wife, Gertrud, created some of the most admired ceramic objects of the 20th century, has died. Read more

Ernest Gallo, who with his brother Julio created a post-Prohibition wine business that became one of the most dominant in the world and changed the American palate, has died. Read more

Frankie Laine, the singer with the booming voice who hit it big with such songs as “That Lucky Old Sun,” “Mule Train,” “Cool Water,” “I Believe,” “Granada” and “Moonlight Gambler,” died Tuesday at Scripps Mercy Hospital in San Diego. Read more