Died at 99
male
Harry Belafonte (born Harold George Bellanfanti Jr.; March 1, 1927 – April 25, 2023) was an American singer, actor and activist, who popularized calypso music with international audiences in the 1950s. Belafonte is one of the few performers to have received an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony (EGOT), although he won the Oscar in a non-competitive category. He earned his career breakthrough with the album Calypso (1956), which was the first million-selling LP by a single artist. Belafonte was best known for his recordings of "Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)", "Jump in the Line (Shake, Senora)", "Jamaica Farewell", and "Mary's Boy Child". He recorded and performed in many genres, including blues, folk, gospel, show tunes, and American standards. He also starred in films such as Carmen Jones (1954), Island in the Sun (1957), Odds Against Tomorrow (1959), Buck and the Preacher (1972), and Uptown Saturday Night (1974). He made his final screen appearance in Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman (2018). Belafonte considered the actor, singer, and activist Paul Robeson a mentor, and he was a close confidant of Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. He was a vocal critic of the policies of the George W. Bush and Donald Trump administrations. Belafonte acted as the American Civil Liberties Union celebrity ambassador for juvenile justice issues. Belafonte won three Grammy Awards (including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award), an Emmy Award, and a Tony Award. In 1989, he received the Kennedy Center Honors. He was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1994. In 2014, he received the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award at the Academy's 6th Annual Governors Awards and in 2022 was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the Early Influence category. Description above from the Wikipedia article Harry Belafonte, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
Harry Belafonte
Nicholas Scratch
for Nicholas Scratch in The Fantastic Four
Suggested by bobbyhavens
The Fantastic Four are a superhero team created for Marvel Comics by the legendary duo of writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby in 1961. While on an outer space test flight in an experimental spacecraft, Reed Richards, Ben Grimm, and siblings Sue and Johnny Storm are bombarded with cosmic rays, resulting in each of them manifesting superhuman abilities. Reed is able to stretch, twist and re-shape his body to inhuman proportions. Sue can bend light, rendering herself and others invisible, and additionally can create force fields which she can use offensively and defensively in a number of ways. Johnny gains pyrokinetic abilities, allowing him to project fire from his body for various purposes, including flight. Ben becomes a massive rock-like humanoid possessing superhuman strength and durability. As a team, they operate out of the Baxter Building, located at 42nd Street and Madison Avenue in New York City.
