River Phoenix

River Jude Phoenix (August 23, 1970 – October 31, 1993) was an American film actor and teen icon. He was the oldest brother of actors Rain, Joaquin, Liberty, and Summer Phoenix.

River Phoenix starred in My Own Private Idaho (1991), playing a gay hustler in search of his estranged mother. For his performance in the latter, Phoenix garnered enormous praise and won a Volpi Cup at the Venice Film Festival, along with Best Actor from the National Society of Film Critics. He was listed by John Willis as one of twelve "promising new actors of 1986".

Phoenix made a transition into more adult-oriented roles with Running On Empty (1988), playing the son of fugitive parents in a well-received performance that earned him an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor nomination,

Phoenix began acting at age 10 in television commercials. He appeared in diverse roles, making his first notable appearance in the 1986 film Stand By Me, a well-received coming of age film based on a novella by Stephen King.

On October 31, 1993, Phoenix died of a drug overdose on the sidewalk outside the West Hollywood nightclub, The Viper Room (owned by Johnny Depp).

 

Jan Michael Vincent

Jan-Michael Vincent was born on July 15, 1944 in Denver, Colorado. His father, Lloyd Vincent had a business making signs and bildboards where Jan got a job after he graduated from High school in Hanford, California in 1963. 

Vincent attended Ventura College in Southern California. His career took off in the late 1960s when casting agent Dick Clayton signed him to Universal Studios.

Vincent made an appearance on the Dragnet 1968 episode, "The Grenade," as a muscular high school student who suffered an acid attack by a mentally unstable fellow classmate. In 1969 Vincent had a starring role in the prime time soap opera The Survivors, alongside Lana Turner and George Hamilton; however, the series was canceled at midseason.

Vincent co-starred with Charles Bronson in the crime film The Mechanic, and went on to star in the cult surfing film Big Wednesday with William Katt and Gary Busey 

Vincent startled audiences with his full frontal nudity in the 1974 romance Buster and Billie. 

Then starred in the cult classic trucker movie White Line Fever and Baby Blue Marine a war film.

Vincent was cast as Stringfellow Hawke for the action-espionage series Airwolf, in which Vincent co-starred with Ernest Borgnine and is the role for which he is best known and remembered, as well as for his rate of pay. It was noted, at the time, that Vincent's salary for his work on Airwolf was the highest paid (rumoured to be $200,000 per episode) of any actor in American television. While filming Airwolf, Vincent admitted to drug and alcohol problems for which he has sought help.

After the end of Airwolf Vincent found roles in smaller budget and lower exposure film projects.

 





Add caption



 

 

Vincent was involved in two severe automobile collisions which he barely survived. As a result of one accident in 1996, in which Vincent broke three vertebrae in his neck, he sustained a permanent injury to his vocal cords from an emergency medical procedure. This has left him with a permanently raspy voice.

As of 2008, Vincent resides in Vicksberg, Mississippi.