Madrid, December 22, 2011
Heading into the Yuletide season, we figured it would be nice to touch base with the muggs all over the world. A good many have responded (some only after a bit of nudging) and we here post their replies, in the order that they were received.
We wish one and all Happy Holidays and especially good health in the coming year.
Ian Watkins & Peter Besas
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Should anyone know the whereabouts or have contacts for any of the following, please let me know since I get my e-mails to all of them bounced.
BROWN, Les
BUTLER, Bob
COHN, Larry
DAWES, Amy
DESIMIO, John
GALLOWAY, Doug
JENSEN, Elizabeth
KING, Bob
LIEB, Rebecca
PEARCE, Jacqueline
POLLACK, Dale
ROSOVSKY, Paul
SEMINARA, Vito
YERKOVICH, Sasha
YOUNG, Deborah
Thankee,
Peter
E-mail: pbesas@hotmail.com
NOTE: On December 22, 2011 we’ll be posting a year’s end survey of all the muggs we’ve been able to contact and that have replied to our query in which each gives a short run-down of his or her current activities, albeit geriatric ones.
Simesite has learned from the son-in-law of longtime Canadian stringer for Variety in Canada of the death of Gerald Pratley, who passed away in a hospital in Belleville, Ontario, on March 14 at age 87.
The last time most of us saw Pratley was at the party thrown in Sardi’s restaurant in New York in 2005 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of Variety by Sime Silverman, an event hosted by Sime’s grandson Syd Silverman, his wife and children. Pratley was one of those contributed news stories in Canada back in the 1970s and filed copy under the aegis of Toronto bureau chief, the late Sid Adilman. He was a regular at many of the yearly Variety receptions thrown by Syd during the Cannes Film Festival.
Pratley’s death has been well covered by the Canadian news media. We here quote the story posted on the Web by Northernstars.ca, the Canadian Movie Database. The photo is courtesy of former Variety stringer Antonia Zerbisias.
It’s now been nearly eight years since Roger Watkins, Peter Besas and Jack Kindred huddled in a London restaurant and decided to start up this website, which has kept many of the ex muggs in touch, and where we have posted a wide variety of notices, articles, comments, tributes and, alas, obituaries. Even if a few months should elapse without any new postings, remember we are still alive and kicking and open to all submissions which can be sent to: pbesas@hotmail.com.
As the years speed by, fewer and fewer of the old staff remain above ground, but those of us who have survived promise to continue posting this Site as an homage to those who have “gone West” (as the old World War I expression used to be) and as a platform for any of the old crowd that wants to post news or get in touch with those who used to work for the sheet that Sime Silverman founded in 1905 and whose curmudgeonly spirit we try to keep alive.
The Besas and Watkins families that run this Site wish all you ex Variety muggs all over the world a happy and especially a healthy New Year.
Thanks to Mort Bryer, we are able to offer you all this charming bit of Memorabilia which he caught on his TV set in Connecticut, and which his son, Peter, was able to transmit to us. In it all the ex-muggs can catch a heretofore unknown (to us, at least) glimpse of what the old office on 46th Street looked like back in 1943.
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