Dead Pool 2nd August 2020

Let’s start off by awarding the points! With the passing of Olivia De Havilland – Nickie, Laura,  Dave J, Paul G, Paul C, and Sylvia each get 46 points; and not to be outdone – Liz, Mark, Shân, and Doug each get a whopping 146 points for listing her as one of their Big Three. Well done all of you, it’s certainly shook up the leaderboard somewhat. 

Look Who You Could Have Had:

In Other News

Elton John has claimed he’d “be dead” if he hadn’t quit drugs and alcohol 30 years ago. The singer celebrated his 30th year of sobriety with a touching Instagram post, in which he showed the many cards sent to him by family and friends to mark his anniversary. “Reflecting on the most magical day having celebrated my 30th Sobriety Birthday,” John wrote in a caption. “So many lovely cards, flowers and chips from my sons, David, friends in the Program, staff at the office and in our homes. I’m truly a blessed man,” he continued. “If I hadn’t finally taken the big step of asking for help 30 years ago, I’d be dead. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to all the people who have inspired and supported me along the way.” He also uploaded a picture of himself cutting into a cake shaped like the number 30, and one showing off his 30-year sobriety coin. Coincidently, it’s also thirty years since he wrote a good song. So, if you see the little fella one evening in  London town, buy him a drink, set him up a line of coke and see if he helps one of us on the Pool to score some points.  

Tamar Braxton has confirmed that she attempted suicide in early July, while calling out reality television for “toxic exploitation”. The musician, reality TV star and sister of singer Toni, was taken to hospital on 16th July after being found unresponsive in a Los Angeles hotel suite by her boyfriend. In an Instagram post, accompanied by a photograph of her and son Logan, Braxton said that she had tried to take her own life. “Mental illness is real,” she wrote. “We have to normalise acknowledging it and stop associating it with shame and humiliation. The pain that I have experienced over the past 11 years has slowly eaten away at my spirit and my mental health … It was only God’s grace and His mercy on my attempt to end my pain and my life that I am here to utilise my voice.” Braxton also wrote that she had been “betrayed, taken advantage of, overworked and underpaid” throughout her time on reality television. She cited it as the source of her mental illness, and pledged to help “those who suffer from mental illness, including those of us whose mental illness was only a result from the toxic, systematic bondage that dwells in television.” She claimed that attempts to change her work circumstances had been ignored.    

The ongoing car crash known as Katie Price has confirmed she’s broken both her feet and ankles in a post on Instagram. Sharing a photo of both her legs encased in bandaging, Katie said: “Yes it’s true I have broken my ankles and my feet, I have to have both feet operated on and pins put in been told I won’t be able to walk for 3 to 6 months.” The mother-of-five, 42, is currently in Turkey on holiday but is expected to cut her holiday short in order to return home for further treatment. Katie is said to have spent the night in hospital on Wednesday after jumping off a wall at a theme park in Turkey and fracturing both heels in the process. Katie is on holiday with her boyfriend Carl Woods and two of her children, Junior and Princess, as well as Princess’ friend. Katie’s eldest son Harvey, 18, has recently experienced health issues which resulted in him having to miss the holiday to Turkey. So they basically left him in intensive care whilst they all fucked off on a jolly. Daughter Princess, 13, said: “I’m actually having the best holiday ever.”   

Dame Barbara Windsor has been moved into a care home due to the worsening of her Alzheimer’s. Scott Mitchell, who has been married to the former EastEnders star for 20 years, said he made the decision after being advised by her neurologist. He told us: ”I feel I’m on an emotional rollercoaster. I walk around, trying to keep busy, then burst in to tears. It feels like a bereavement.” Mitchell added: ”It’s always been my biggest fear that one day I would have to take her somewhere and she’d be thinking: ‘Why would he do this to me?’” Back in June, he said Windsor, 82, would eventually need full-time care as she regularly feels “unsettled” and had trouble walking around their house. Mitchell revealed he took Windsor to the care home in mid-July, adding: “It feels like another chapter gone.” To occupy his time, Mitchell said he has decorated her room with pictures of their family, as well as the one of her receiving her Damehood from the Queen in 2016. Windsor was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2014.  

Although not famous enough for our little game, for those of you who enjoy Deadliest Catch , star Mahlon Reyes has died at the age of 38. Reyes, who was a deckhand on a crab fishing boat featured in the Discovery Channel series, suffered a heart attack on 25th July. His wife confirmed the news, telling us he initially survived and was rushed to hospital. Reyes – real name Joseph – never regained consciousness and died surrounded by his loved ones the following day. Long-running reality series Deadliest Catch began in 2005, and follows fishermen aboard fishing vessels in the Bering Sea during the Alaskan king crab and snow crab fishing seasons. Some of Mahlon’s ashes will be placed in the Bering Sea by his fellow members. He is best known by viewers as the deckhand on boats, the Seabrooke and Cape Caution. He was also a part of the fishing team led by Captain ”Wild“ Bill Wichrowski. Mahlon, who last appeared in the series in 2015, is survived by his wife and four children.

On This Day

  • 1870 – Tower Subway, the world’s first underground tube railway, opens in London, England, United Kingdom. Choo choo!
  • 1939 – Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard write a letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt, urging him to begin the Manhattan Project to develop a nuclear weapon. Yay!
  • 1990 – Iraq invades Kuwait, eventually leading to the Gulf War. That went well. 

Deaths

Last Meals

Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck were an American serial killer couple. They were convicted of one murder, are known to have committed two more, and were suspected of having killed up to 20 victims during a spree between 1947 and 1949.

After their arrest and trial for serial murder in 1949, they became known as “The Lonely Hearts Killers” for meeting their unsuspecting victims through lonely hearts ads. They both met through a lonely hearts ad themselves, both coming from similar backgrounds of a tragic childhood and a difficult life. 

Fernandez served in Spain’s Merchant Marine corps during WWII where a steel hatch fell on him, fracturing his skull and injuring his frontal lobe. The damage caused by this injury may well have affected his social and sexual behaviour. Beck, allegedly due to a glandular problem was overweight and underwent puberty prematurely. At her trial, she claimed to have been raped by her brother. She went on to claim that, when she had told her mother what happened, her mother had beaten her, claiming that she was responsible. 

Once together she posed as Fernandez’s sister, giving him an air of respectability. Their victims, feeling more secure knowing there was another woman in the house, often agreed to stay with the pair. Beck also convinced some victims that she lived alone and that her “brother” was only a guest. Beck was extremely jealous and went to great lengths to make sure Fernandez and his “intended” never consummated their relationship. When he did have sex with a woman, Beck subjected both to her violent temper. In 1949, the pair committed the three murders for which they later were convicted. Janet Fay, 66, became engaged to Fernandez and went to stay at his Long Island apartment. When Beck caught her in bed with Fernandez, she brutally attacked Fay’s head with a hammer in a murderous rage. Fernandez then strangled Fay. Fay’s family became suspicious when she disappeared, so Fernandez and Beck fled. 

Beck and Fernandez traveled to Byron Center Road in Wyoming Township, Michigan, a suburb of Grand Rapids, where they met and stayed with Delphine Downing, a 28-year-old widow with a two-year-old daughter. On February 28th, Downing became agitated, and Fernandez gave her sleeping pills to calm her. The daughter witnessed Downing’s resulting stupor and began to cry, which enraged Beck. Panicked, Beck choked the child but didn’t kill her. Fernandez thought Downing would become suspicious if she saw her bruised daughter, so he shot the unconscious woman. The couple then stayed for several days in Downing’s house. Again enraged by the daughter’s crying, Beck drowned her in a basin of water. They buried the bodies in the basement, but suspicious neighbours reported the Downings’ disappearances, leading the police to arrive at the door on March 1st, 1949 and arrested Beck and Fernandez.  

Fernandez quickly confessed. The pair vehemently denied committing 17 murders that were attributed to them, and Fernandez tried to retract his confession, saying he made it only to protect Beck. Their trial was sensationalised, with lurid tales of sexual perversity. Newspaper reporters described Beck’s appearance with derision, and she wrote protesting letters to the editors. Fernandez and Beck were convicted of Janet Fay’s murder—the only one for which they were tried—and sentenced to death. They were both executed by electrocution on March 8th, 1951. Prior to their deaths, Beck enjoyed fried chicken, fried potatoes and salad and Fernandez ate an onion omelet, french fries, chocolate candy, and a Cuban cigar.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Sam Worthington (44), Edward Furlong (43), Kevin Smith (50), Joanna Cassidy (75), Jason Momoa (41), Michael Biehn (64), Wesley Snipes (58), Emilia Fox (46), Dean Cain (54), Rico Rodriguez (22), J.K. Rowling (55), Christopher Nolan (50), Arnold Schwarzenegger (73), Hilary Swank (46), Terry Crews (52), Lisa Kudrow (57), Laurence Fishburne (59), Jean Reno (72), Carel Struycken (72), Frances de la Tour (76), Sian Gibson (44), Wil Wheaton (48), Leslie Easterbrook (71), Rachel Miner (40), David Warner (79), Elizabeth Berkley (48), Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (50), Donnie Yen (57), and Taylor Schilling (36).

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