Big Picture
Kim: Workout Wonder Plus, Jessica Alba shops and Courteney Cox steals a smooch. Get the latest pics!
MORE PHOTOS +Most Commented
- TV's Top Couples Tournament: Vote in the Final Round! (2036)
- TV's Top Couples Tournament: This Round Is Closed, Please Stand By (696)
- Afternoon Mail! Are Gleeks Having More Sex Than Vamps? (586)
- TV's Top Couple Tournament: And the Winner Is... (483)
- Beyoncé and Jay-Z Share First Photos of Baby Blue Ivy! (394)
- Whitney Houston Dead at 48 (394)
- Morning Mail! Is Lea Michele Ready to Walk Like an Egyptian? (286)
- Life After Breaking Dawn?! Maybe, Says Studio Head! (226)
- Blind Vice! Nevis Divine's Sad Past (214)
- Morning Mail! Céline Dion Talks Whitney Houston's Tragic Death (211)
Top 10 Stories
- Whitney Houston Death Certificate Reveals Burial Location, Still No Cause of Death
- Real Housewives' Michaele Salahi and Her New Man, Neal Schon, Sued by Her Ex for $50 Million
- Whitney Houston's Hotel Death Room Already Booked? Not So Fast...
- Chris Brown Plays Victim, Claims Media Out to Get Him
- Bobbi Kristina Godmother CeCe Winans Hopes to Be "Very Involved" in Her Life, Says Source
- Lindsay Lohan Evades Federal Taxes…Again! Working Out "Acceptable Arrangement" With IRS
- Khloé Kardashian Odom Talks Kim and Reggie Reports: "I Love the Bush and the Tush"
- Bobby Brown: Bobbi Kristina "Doing Much Better" as Whitney Houston Funeral Approaches
- Up All Night First Look: Watch Alanis Morissette and Maya Rudolph Perform a Curse-Filled Duet
- Did Sony Try to Cash In on Whitney Houston's Death? Label Apologizes for Pricing "Mistake"
Fashion Police
Leighton's Valentine's Look Plus, Ashlee Simpson and Cate Blanchett. Rate the highs and lows!
MORE PHOTOS +
Our Partners
"Breakfast Club" Principal Dies at 67
Paul Gleason, best known for playing the angry high school principal in The Breakfast Club and the villain in Trading Places, died Saturday. He was 67.
Gleason succumbed to mesothelioma, a rare form of lung cancer linked to asbestos, members of his family said. The cancer was diagnosed only a month ago, but Gleason's exposure to asbestos was believed to have occurred while he was working construction jobs in the 1950s.
Over the course of his career, Gleason appeared in more than 60 feature films and in numerous television shows. Aside from playing grouchy Principal Richard Vernon in 1985's The Breakfast Club and the loathsome Clarence Beeks in 1983's Trading Places, he also appeared in 1988's Die Hard, 2001's Not Another Teen Movie (in which he again played a character named Richard Vernon) and 2002's National Lampoon's Van Wilder.
On the small screen, he guest-starred on shows including Friends, Malcolm in the Middle and Seinfeld. He also played Dr. David Thornton on ABC's All My Children from 1976-78.
He made his Broadway debut in 1971 opposite Maureen Stapleton in Neil Simon's The Gingerbread Lady and also appeared in the 1972 revival of The Front Page, with John Lithgow and Richard Thomas.
Gleason was also an avid athlete who played football at Florida State and Triple-A minor league baseball for several clubs in the late '50s before deciding to become an actor, a decision he reportedly made after watching 1961's Splendor in the Grass with his friend, Jack Kerouac. By the mid-'60s, he was studying with his mentor Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio.
Apart from his dramatic and athletic pursuits, Gleason was also an aspiring poet, and had recently published a book of poetry.
Born May 4, 1939 in Jersey City, New Jersey, Gleason grew up in Miami. In addition to his wife, Susan Gleason, he is survived by two daughters and a granddaughter.
"My dad was an intelligent, hard-working Renaissance man," his daughter Shannon Gleason-Grossman told the Los Angeles Times. "His motto was to always keep working."
Funeral plans had not yet been determined.
0 Comments
Now loading...