PETER SELLERS
Peter Sellers (born Richard Henry Sellers; 8 September 1925 – 24 July 1980) was an English film actor, comedian and singer. He became known to a worldwide audience through his many film characterisations, among them Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther series of films. Although the bulk of his work was comedic, often parodying characters of authority such as military officers or policemen, he also performed in other film genres and roles. Films demonstrating his artistic range include I’m All Right Jack (1959), Stanley Kubrick’s Lolita (1962) and Dr. Strangelove (1964), What’s New, Pussycat? (1965), Casino Royale (1967), The Party (1968), Being There (1979), and five films of The Pink Panther series (1963–78). Sellers’s versatility enabled him to portray a wide range of comic characters using different accents and guises, and he would often assume multiple roles within the same film, frequently with contrasting temperaments and styles. Turner Classic Movies calls Sellers “one of the most accomplished comic actors of the late 20th century”. English filmmakers the Boulting brothers described Sellers as “the greatest comic genius this country has produced since Charles Chaplin”. (More from Wikipedia)
The Modern Lovers is probably best known for their song “Pablo Picasso”. (Another of their tracks is “Roadrunner”; “Roadrunner” was covered by Sex Pistols on their little-known, sort-of second album, The Great Rock ’n’ Roll Swindle). I actually first heard the song on the Phranc album, Positively Phranc (1991), where (with Jonathan Richman’s blessing) she had rewritten the song as “Gertrude Stein” in honor of the famed Paris avant-garde writer Gertrude Stein who was the life partner of Alice B. Toklas – her 1954 recipe for marijuana brownies was celebrated in the Peter Sellers film, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas (1968). An excerpt of “Pablo Picasso” (as performed by Burning Sensations) appears in the 1985 cult classic film, Repo Man that has been in heavy rotation on my TiVo for most of the year.
(December 2016)
