R.I.P. CELEBRITY DEATHS 2019(NON WRESTLERS)

[Bazzy]

Classic film "Downfall" Bruno Ganz played Hitler great

[jimsteel]

Singer and actress Charo's husband of more than 40 years is dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound ... TMZ has learned.

Kjell Rasten shot himself Monday afternoon around 2 PM in the Beverly Hills home where he and '70s icon Charo lived ... according to law enforcement sources. We're told Charo was home at the time and someone in the house called 911.

Police and paramedics responded, and Rasten was transported to a hospital, but they were unable to save him. We're told he was pronounced dead at the hospital.

Rasten was a TV producer in the '70s and '80s. He and Charo married in 1978, and had one child together ... actor and producer Shel Rasten.

Charo and Kjell, along with their son, appeared on a 2015 episode of the ABC show, "Celebrity Wife Swap." They swapped with Charo's old "Love Boat" co-star, Jill Whelan.

Kjell was 79 years old.

[jimsteel]

KARL LAGERFELD DEAD AT 85

The fashion world is mourning after legendary designer Karl Lagerfeld's death Tuesday in Paris.

Lagerfeld died in a Parisian hospital ... according to Chanel, where he served as creative director. He was reportedly admitted on Monday night. No cause of death has been released, but there'd been a buzz about his health since he missed 2 Chanel shows last month.

He'd appeared on the runway at the end of every Chanel event since joining the fashion house in 1983. At the close of one of the January shows in Paris, the announcer wished Karl a quick recovery.

German-born Lagerfeld, who previously worked for Fendi, was the toast of the fashion world for decades ... commonly seen rocking his trademark shades at Chanel shows.

He worked closely with modeling legends like Linda Evangelista, Claudia Schiffer and Stella Tennant.

[jimsteel]

MY 600-LB LIFE' STAR SEAN MILLIKEN DEAD AT 29


Sean Milliken -- who starred on TLC's "My 600-lb Life" -- is dead ... TMZ has confirmed.

His father, Matt, announced the sad news on Facebook ... saying Sean passed away Sunday in a hospital due to complications from an infection. He added, "Sunday he was having problems with his breathing, they were able to resuscitate him and a short time later his heart stopped."

Sean, who reached a weight as high as 900 pounds, was on the show for only one episode in 2016. He became bedridden during his senior year of high school -- when he was already at least 400 lbs -- after suffering a debilitating leg injury.

The same year he appeared on the reality show, he told People he was planning on moving to Houston to see if he could qualify for weight loss surgery. He reportedly lived on his own in Texas prior to his death, but it's unclear if he ever went under the knife.

Sean was 29.

[TTX]

www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/don-newcombe-former-dodgers-great-and-inaugural-cy-young-award-winner-dead-at-92/

[jimsteel]

Gerald “Jerry” Blum, former president and general manager of former top 40 powerhouse 790/WQXI-AM and what was then known as 94Q, passed away Saturday. He was 86.

Blum was the inspiration for the Arthur “Big Guy” Carlson character played by Gordon Jump in the CBS sitcom “WKRP in Cincinnati,” according to Hugh Wilson, the creator of the show who passed away in 2018.

Blum ran WQXI from 1960 to 1989 and what is now WSTR-FM (Star 94.1) from 1967 until 1989. At the time, WQXI was known as “Quixie from Dixie” and drew huge ratings when people primarily listened to AM radio.

He was inducted into the Georgia Radio Hall of Fame in 2007.

[jimsteel]

Former NFL and college player T.J. Cunningham fatally shot over parking spot in Colorado

Anthony "T.J." Cunningham, a former Seattle Seahawks player and assistant principal at a Colorado high school, has died after being shot during a parking dispute, the Arapahoe County Sheriff's Office said.

Cunningham, 46, an NFL safety during the 1996 season, was shot by a neighbor early Sunday and taken to a hospital, where he died the next day, the sheriff's office said via Twitter.

The neighbor, Marcus Johnson, 31, was originally held on attempted murder charges, but the charges were amended to first-degree murder after Cunningham's death, authorities said.
It's not clear whether Johnson, who is being held without bond, has an attorney.


Cunningham texted Johnson hours before the shooting, sheriff's spokeswoman Deborah Sherman told CNN.
"It was a dispute that morning, they were texting back and forth, and then they said let's settle this at the school," she said.
The shooting occurred in the parking lot of Eaglecrest High School in Aurora, where deputies found Cunningham with gunshot wounds, according to a probable cause document. After the shooting, a sheriff's officer said, Johnson called deputies to say that he had shot his neighbor. The handgun was in his car.
Witnesses told investigators the two men had had an "ongoing parking dispute," according to the officer. Cunningham's brother told investigators he accompanied the former player to the parking lot, where the two neighbors were to "box it out," referring to their dispute. Their homes are about a mile from the school.
Cunningham and Johnson walked toward each other, yelling obscenities, the court document said. Johnson, who said Cunningham had a bottle, shot him three time in the head and chest, according to the document. Cunningham's brother told investigators the former NFL player was unarmed.
Cunningham was pronounced dead Monday afternoon.
Aurora Public Schools said in a statement, "We are deeply saddened to learn that one of our assistant principals, Anthony (TJ) Cunningham passed away."
Counselors were available at Hinkley High School, where Cunningham worked, throughout the week, the statement said.

Cunningham played wide receiver and defensive back at the University of Colorado. He was the 209th overall pick in the 1996 NFL draft by Seattle, according to the Seahawks website.

[jimsteel]

CASINO' ACTOR VINNY VELLA DEAD AT 72
From Liver Cancer

Vinny Vella -- who starred in "Casino" and several other gangster movies -- has died after battling cancer.

His rep posted a message late Wednesday night, saying ... "We are saddened to report that Vinny Vella has passed and I'm sure that no one is more saddened than himself. Vinny loved life from his family to his friends and fans he was easily one of the funniest, endearing actors to have ever graced the screen."

Vinny's son, Vinny Vella Jr., tells us his father had liver cancer.

Vinny, who has 74 acting credits to his name, memorably played deli owner/mobster Artie Piscano alongside Robert De Niro in "Casino." He also acted with De Niro in "Analyze That."

He had smaller roles in other films like "Donnie Brasco," "Kissing Jessica Stein," "Kill the Irishman," "Mambo Cafe," "This Thing of Ours" and "Find Me Gui

[jimsteel]

Peter Tork, a member of the Monkees, has died at 77.

Tork had been battling adenoid cystic carcinoma, a rare cancer affecting his tongue, in 2009, his sister told the Washington Post.

“The Monkees” TV show ran from 1966-68. Lead singer Davy Jones died in 2012.

Surviving band members Michael Nesmith and Micky Dolenz have been performing past hits in “The Monkees Present: The Mike & Micky Show” tour. They’re scheduled to play at Lancaster’s American Music Theatre next month.

If the Monkees were a manufactured version of the Beatles, a "prefab four" who auditioned for a rock 'n' roll sitcom and were selected more for their long-haired good looks than their musical abilities, Tork was the group's Ringo, its lovably goofy supporting player.

On television, he performed as the self-described "dummy" of the group, drawing on a persona he developing while working as a folk musician in Greenwich Village, where he flashed a confused smile whenever his stage banter fell flat. Off-screen, he embraced the Summer of Love, donning moccasins and "love beads" and declaring that "nonverbal, extrasensory communication is at hand" and that "dogmatism is leaving the scene."

A versatile multi-instrumentalist, Tork mostly played bass and keyboard for the Monkees, in addition to singing lead on tracks including "Long Title: Do I Have to Do This All Over Again," which he wrote for the group's psychedelic 1968 movie, "Head," and "Your Auntie Grizelda."

At age 24, he was also the band's oldest member when "The Monkees" premiered on NBC in 1966. Not that it mattered: "The emotional age of all of us," he told the New York Times that year, "is 13."

Created by producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider, "The Monkees" was designed to replicate the success of "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help!," director Richard Lester's musical comedies about the Beatles.

The band featured Tork alongside Nesmith, a singer-songwriter who played guitar, and former child actors Dolenz and Jones, who played the drums and sang lead, respectively. Like their British counterparts, the group had a fondness for mischief, resulting in high jinks involving a magical necklace, a monkey’s paw, high-seas pirates and Texas outlaws.

"The Monkees" ran for only two seasons but won an Emmy Award for outstanding comedy and spawned a frenzy of merchandising, record sales and world tours that became known as Monkeemania.

In 1967, according to one report in The Washington Post, the Monkees sold 35 million albums - “twice as many as the Beatles and Rolling Stones combined” - on the strength of songs such as “Daydream Believer,” “I’m a Believer” and “Last Train to Clarksville,” which all rose to No. 1 on the Billboard record chart.

For much of the 1970s, Tork struggled to find his own way. He formed an unsuccessful band called Release, was imprisoned for several months in 1972 after being caught with "$3 worth of hashish in my pocket," and worked as a high school teacher and "singing waiter" as his Monkees wealth dried up. He also said he struggled with alcohol addiction - "I was awful when I was drinking, snarling at people," he told the Daily Mail - before quitting alcohol in the early 1980s.

By then, television reruns and album reissues had fueled a resurgence of interest in the Monkees, and Tork had come around to what he described as the essential nature of the music group, which he joined for major reunion tours about once each decade, beginning in the mid-'80s, in addition to performing as a solo artist.

"This is not a band. It's an entertainment operation whose function is Monkee music," he told Britain's Telegraph newspaper during a Monkees tour in 2016. "It took me a while to get to grips with that but what great music it turned out to be! And what a wild and wonderful trip it has taken us on!"

[TTX]

Another Monkee leaves us. RIP Peter.