{|

Coordinates	9°02′37″N68°44′56″N
{{infobox aircraft begin |name	C-47 SkytrainC-53 Skytrooper |imageImage:020903-o-9999b-048.jpg |caption }}

{{infobox aircraft type |type

Military transport aircraft |national origin United States |manufacturerDouglas Aircraft Company |designerDouglas Aircraft |first flight23 December 1941 |introduced |retired |status |primary user United States Army Air Forces |more users Royal Air ForceUnited States NavySee operators |produced |number built>10,000 |unit cost |developed from Douglas DC-3 |variants with their own articles Douglas XCG-17 Douglas AC-47 Spooky |developed into }}

|}

The Douglas C-47 Skytrain or Dakota is a military transport aircraft that was developed from the Douglas DC-3 airliner. It was used extensively by the Allies during World War II and remained in front line operations through the 1950s with a few remaining in operation to this day.

Design and development

The C-47 differed from the civilian DC-3 in numerous modifications that included being fitted with a cargo door and strengthened floor.

During World War II, the armed forces of many countries used the C-47 and modified DC-3s for the transport of troops, cargo and wounded. The US Naval designation was R4D. Over 10,000 aircraft were produced in Long Beach and Santa Monica, California and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The Oklahoma City plant produced 5,354 C-47s from March 1943 until August 1945.

Super DC-3 (R4D-8)

In response to proposed changes to the airworthiness requirements that would limit the continuing use of the large numbers of DC-3s and surplus C-47s in commercial use in the United States, Douglas offered a late 1940s conversion of the DC-3 modified to improve takeoff and single-engined performance to meet the new Civil Air Regulations, and with increased speed to compete with newer airliners. The new model, the DC-3S or "Super DC-3", was 39 in (0.99 m) longer, allowing 30 passengers to be carried. It also had larger tail surfaces and new outer wings with a greater sweep back at the trailing edge to accommodate a rearward shift in the center of gravity. More powerful engines, either 1,475 hp (1,100 kW) Wright R-1820 Cyclones or 2,000 hp (1,490 kW) Pratt & Whitney R-2000s incorporated into larger engine nacelles, were installed along with shorter, jet ejection-type exhaust stacks. Minor changes included wheel well doors and a partially retractable tail wheel along with flush rivets and low drag antennas, that all contributed to a top speed of 250 mph. With over 75% of the original DC-3/C-47 configuration changed, the modified design ended up virtually as a new aircraft. The first DC-3S made its maiden flight on 23 June 1949.

Although the changes fully met the new FAR 4B airworthiness requirements, and significantly improved performance, there was little interest from commercial operators in the DC-3S, which was too-expensive for the smaller operators who were its main target, with only three being sold to Capital Airlines. The US Navy, however, had 100 of its R4D aircraft modified to Super DC-3 standard as the R4D-8, these later being redesignated C-117D.

Operational history

The C-47 was vital to the success of many Allied campaigns, in particular those at Guadalcanal and in the jungles of New Guinea and Burma where the C-47 (and its naval version, the R4D) made it possible for Allied troops to counter the mobility of the light-traveling Japanese army. Additionally, C-47s were used to airlift supplies to the embattled American forces during the Battle of Bastogne. But possibly its most influential role in military aviation was flying "The Hump" from India into China. The expertise gained flying "The Hump" would later be used in the Berlin Airlift, in which the C-47 would play a major role, until being replaced by the C-54.

In Europe, the C-47 and a specialized paratroop variant, the C-53 Skytrooper, were used in vast numbers in the later stages of the war, particularly to tow gliders and drop paratroops. In the Pacific, with careful use of the island landing strips of the Pacific Ocean, C-47s were even used for ferrying soldiers serving in the Pacific theater back to the United States.

C-47s in British and Commonwealth service took the name Dakota, from the acronym "DACoTA" for ''Douglas Aircraft Company Transport Aircraft''. The C-47 also earned the informal nickname ''Gooney Bird'' in the European theater of operations.

The USAF Strategic Air Command had C-47 Skytrains in service from 1946 through 1967.

The Pakistan Air Force used C-47 Dakota cargo planes which it used to transport supplies to the Pakistan Army soldiers fighting in the Indo-Pakistan War of 1947 against India.

Several C-47 variations were used in the Vietnam War by the United States Air Force, including three advanced electronic warfare variations which were sometimes called "Electric Gooneys" designated EC-47N, EC-47P, or EC-47Qs depending on the engine used. EC-47s were also operated by the Vietnamese, Laotian and Cambodian Air Forces. A gunship variation, utilizing three 7.62mm miniguns, designated AC-47 "Spooky" often nicknamed "Puff the Magic Dragon" was also deployed.

The Royal Canadian Air Force and later, the Canadian Armed Forces employed the C-47 for transportation, navigation and radar training, and search & rescue operations from the 1940s to the 1980s.

After World War II thousands of surplus C-47s were converted to civil airline use, some remaining in operation in 2010.

Variants

;C-47 :Initial military version of the DC-3 with seats for 27 troops, 965 built including 12 to the United States Navy as R4D-1, ;;C-47A ::C-47 with a 24-volt electrical system, 5,254 built including USN aircraft designated R4D-5. ;;RC-47A :: equipped for photographic reconnaissance and ELINT missions. ;;SC-47A ::C-47A equipped for Search Air Rescue; redesignated HC-47A in 1962. ;;VC-47A ::C-47A equipped for VIP transport role. ;;C-47B ::Powered by R-1830-90 engines with superchargers and extra fuel capacity to cover the China-Burma-India routes, 3,364 built. ;;VC-47B ::C-47B equipped for VIP transport role. ;;XC-47C ::C-47 tested with Edo Model 78 floats for possible use as a seaplane. ;;C-47D :C-47B with superchargers removed after the war. ;;AC-47D :Gunship aircraft with three side-firing .30 in (7.62 mm) Minigun machine guns. ;;EC-47D ::C-47D with equipment for the Airborne Early Warning role; prior to 1962 was designated AC-47D. ;;NC-47D ::C-47D modified for test roles ;;RC-47D ::C-47D equipped for photographic reconnaissance and ELINT missions. ;;SC-47D ::C-47D equipped for Search Air Rescue; redesignated HC-47D in 1962. ;;VC-47D ::C-47D equipped for VIP transport role. ;;C-47E :Modified cargo variant with space for 27–28 passengers or 18–24 litters. ;;C-47F ::YC-129 re-designated, Super DC-3 prototype for evaluation by USAF later passed to USN as XR4D-8. ;;C-47L/M ::C-47H/Js equipped for the support of American Legation United States Naval Attache (ALUSNA) and Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) missions. ;;EC-47N/P/Q ::C-47A and D aircraft modified for ELINT/ARDF mission. N and P differ in radio bands covered, while Q replaces analog equipment found on the N and P with a digital suite, redesigned antenna equipment and uprated engines. ;;C-47R ::One C-47M modified for high altitude work, specifically for missions in Ecuador. ;;C-47T ::Designation applied to aircraft modified to a Basler BT-67 standard. ;;C-47TP Turbo Dakota ::Refit with modern turboprop engines and fuselage stretch for the South African Air Force. ;C-53 Skytrooper :Troop transport version of the C-47. ;;XC-53A Skytrooper ::One aircraft with full-span slotted flaps and hot-air leading edge deicing. ;;C-53B Skytrooper ::Winterised version of C-53 with extra fuel capacity and separate navigator's station, eight built. ;;C-53C Skytrooper ::C-53 with larger port-side door, 17 built. ;;C-53D Skytrooper ::C-53C with 24V DC electrical system, 159 built. ;C-117A Skytrooper :C-47B with 24-seat airline-type interior for staff transport use, 16 built. ;;VC-117A ::Three redesignated C-117s used in the VIP role. ;;SC-117A ::One C-117C converted for air-sea rescue. ;;C-117B/VC-117B ::High-altitude superchargers removed, one built and conversions from C-117As all later VC-117B ;;C-117D ::USN/USMC R4D-8 redesignated ;;LC-117D ::USN/USMC R4D-8L redesignated ;;TC-117D ::USN/USMC R4D-8T redesignated ;;VC-117D ::USN R4D-8Z redesignated ;YC-129 :Super DC-3 prototype for evaluation by USAF redesignated C-47F and later passed to USN as XR4D-8. ;CC-129 :Canadian Forces designation for the C-47 (post-1970). ;XCG-17 :One C-47 tested as a 40-seat troop glider with engines removed and faired over. ;R4D-1 Skytrain :USN/USMC version of the C-47. ;;R4D-3 ::Twenty C-53Cs transferred to USN. ;;R4D-5 ::C-47A variant 24-volt electrical system replacing the 12-volt of the C-47; redesignated C-47H in 1962, 238 transferred from USAF. ;;R4D-5L ::R4D-5 for use in Antarctica. Redesignated LC-47H in 1962. ;;R4D-5Q ::R4D-5 for use as special ECM trainer. Redesignated EC-47H in 1962. ;;R4D-5R ::R4D-5 for use as a personnel transport for 21 passengers and as a trainer aircraft; redesignated TC-47H in 1962. ;;R4D-5S ::R4D-5 for use as a special ASW trainer; redesignated SC-47H in 1962. ;;R4D-5Z ::R4D-5 for use as a VIP transport; redesignated VC-47H in 1962. ;;R4D-6 ::157 C-47Bs transferred to USN; redesignated C-47J in 1962. ;;R4D-6L, Q, R, S, and Z ::Variants as the R4D-5 series; redesignated LC-47J, EC-47J, TC-47J, SC-47J, and VC-47J respectively in 1962. ;;R4D-7 ::44 TC-47Bs transferred from USAF for use as a navigational trainer; redesignated TC-47K in 1962. ;;R4D-8 ::R4D-5 and R4D-6 aircraft fitted with modified wings and re-designed tail surfaces; redesignated C-117D in 1962. ;;R4D-8L ::R4D-8 converted for Antarctic use, redesignated LC-117D in 1962. ;;R4D-8T ::R4D-8 converted as crew trainers, redesignated TC-117D in 1962. ;;R4D-8Z ::R4D-8 converted as a staff transport, redesignated VC-117D in 1962.

;Dakota I :RAF designation for the C-47 and R4D-1 ;Dakota III :RAF designation for the C-47A. ;Dakota IV :RAF designation for the C-47B.

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Accidents and incidents

Specifications (C-47B-DK)

{{aircraft specifications |plane or copter?=plane |jet or prop?=prop |ref=McDonnell Douglas Aircraft since 1920 |crew=3 |capacity=28 troops |payload main=6,000 lb |payload alt=2,700 kg |payload more= |length main=63 ft 9 in |length alt=19.43 m |span main=95 ft 6 in |span alt=29.41 m |height main=17 ft 0 in |height alt=5.18 m |area main=987 ft² |area alt=91.70 m² |empty weight main=18,135 lb |empty weight alt=8,226 kg |loaded weight main=26,000 lb |loaded weight alt=11,793 kg |max takeoff weight main=31,000 lb |max takeoff weight alt=14,061 kg |engine (prop)=Pratt & Whitney R-1830-90C Twin Wasp |type of prop=14-cylinder radial engines |number of props=2 |power main=1,200 hp |power alt=895 kW |max speed main=224 mph |max speed alt=195 kn, 360 km/h |max speed more=at 10,000 ft (3,050 m) |cruise speed main=160 mph |cruise speed alt=139 kn, 257 km/h |range main=1,600 mi |range alt=1,391 nmi, 2,575 km |ferry range main=3,600 mi |ferry range alt=3,130 nmi, 5,795 km |ceiling main=26,400 ft |ceiling alt=8,045 m |climb rate main= |climb rate alt= |loading main= |loading alt= |power/mass main= |power/mass alt= |more performance=*Climb to 10,000 ft (3,050 m): 9.5 min }}

See also

{{aircontent |related=

Douglas AC-47 Spooky

Douglas DC-3

Douglas XCG-17

Lisunov Li-2

Showa L2D

Basler BT-67

|similar aircraft=

Curtiss C-46 Commando

|lists=

List of military aircraft of the United States

List of military aircraft of the United States (naval)

|see also= }}

References

;Notes

;Bibliography

Donald, David. ''The Complete Encyclopedia of World Aircraft''. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1997. ISBN 0-7607-0592-5.

Flintham, Victor. ''Air Wars and Aircraft: A Detailed Record of Air Combat, 1945 to the Present''. New York: Facts on File, 1990. ISBN 0-81602-356-5.

Francillon, René J. ''McDonnell Douglas Aircraft Since 1920''. London: Putnam & Company Ltd., 1979. ISBN 0-370-00050-1.

Gradidge, Jennifer M. ''The Douglas DC-1, DC-2, DC-3 - The First Seventy Years'' (two volumes). Tonbridge, UK: Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd., 2006. ISBN 0-85130-332-3.

Pearcy, Arthur Jr. "Douglas R4D variants (US Navy's DC-3/C-47)". ''Aircraft in Profile, Volume 14''. Windsor, Berkshire, UK: Profile Publications Ltd., 1974, pp. 49–73. ISBN 0-35383-023-1.

Yenne, Bill. ''McDonnell Douglas: A Tale of Two Giants''. Greenwich, Connecticut: Bison Books, 1985. ISBN 0-517-44287-6.

External links

Manual: (1943) T.O. No. 01-40NC-1 Pilot's Flight Operating Instructions C-47 Airplane

The Assault Glider Trust

Warbird Alley: C-47 page

American Aeronautical Foundation, C-47B "Aluminum Mistress"

The SNAFU Special C-47A aircraft recovered and restored

C-047 Skytrain Category:Military aircraft of the Korean War C-047 Skytrain Category:Military aircraft of the Vietnam War Douglas C-47 Skytrain

ar:دوجلاس سي-47 سكاي ترين az:C-47 cs:Douglas C-47 Skytrain da:C-47 Skytrain de:Douglas DC-3#Douglas AC-47 Spooky el:C-47 Skytrain es:Douglas C-47 Skytrain fr:Douglas C-47 Skytrain it:Douglas C-47 Dakota/Skytrain li:C-47 Skytrain ja:C-47 (航空機) no:Douglas C-47 Skytrain pl:Douglas C-47 Skytrain pt:Douglas C-47 Skytrain ru:Douglas C-47 Skytrain simple:C-47 Skytrain sk:Douglas C-47 Skytrain sr:Даглас C-47/R4D Скајтрејн th:ซี-47 สกายเทรน tr:Douglas C-47 uk:Douglas C-47 Skytrain zh:C-47運輸機

Carl Douglas (born 10 May 1942) is a former Jamaican-born, UK-based, singer, best known for his song "Kung Fu Fighting", which hit number one in both the UK Singles Chart and the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 in 1974. The R.I.A.A. awarded gold disc status on 27 November, and it won a Grammy Award for Best Selling Single in 1974. It eventually went on to sell eleven million records worldwide, making it one of the best-selling singles of all time.

This homage to martial arts films has overshadowed the rest of the singer's career, resulting in his appearance on cover versions of the song. Douglas did release two other singles ("Blue Eyed Soul" and "Dance The Kung Fu", which was sampled by DJ Premier in his 2007 remix of Nike's 25th Air Force One anniversary single "Classic (Better Than I've Ever Been)", featuring Kanye West, Nas, KRS-One and Rakim ) but he has gone down in recording history as an example of a one hit wonder.

He was at one time managed by Eric Woolfson, later the primary songwriter behind The Alan Parsons Project.

In 1998, a re-recording of "Kung Fu Fighting", billed as Bus Stop featuring Carl Douglas, reached number 8 in the UK Singles Chart.

He now resides in Hamburg, Germany where he runs SMV (Schacht Musik Verlage), a publishing company that coordinates films, documentaries, and advertisements.

See also

Kung Fu Fighting

Biddu

List of artists who reached number one on the UK Singles Chart

List of artists who reached number one in the United States

List of artists who reached number one on the Australian singles chart

List of 1970s one-hit wonders in the United States

List of disco artists (A-E)

List of performers on Top of the Pops

References

External links

Official website

Fan site

Category:1942 births Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Jamaican male singers Category:Living people

de:Carl Douglas es:Carl Douglas fr:Carl Douglas ko:칼 더글라스 it:Carl Douglas hu:Carl Douglas ja:カール・ダグラス pl:Carl Douglas pt:Carl Douglas fi:Carl Douglas th:คาร์ล ดักลาส

Coordinates	9°02′37″N68°44′56″N
name	Douglas Adams
birth date	March 11, 1952
birth place	Cambridge, England
height	6 ft 5''
death date	May 11, 2001
death place	Santa Barbara, California, U.S.
resting place	Highgate Cemetery, London, England
religion	Atheist
occupation	Writer
genre	Science fiction, comedy, satire
influences	Monty Python, Robert Sheckley, Kurt Vonnegut, P. G. Wodehouse, Richard Dawkins
influenced	Richard Dawkins, Eoin Colfer
website	http://douglasadams.com/ }}

Douglas Noel Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an English writer and dramatist. He is best known as the author of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', which started life in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold over 15 million copies in his lifetime, a television series, several stage plays, comics, a computer game, and in 2005 a feature film. Adams's contribution to UK radio is commemorated in The Radio Academy's Hall of Fame.

Adams also wrote ''Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency'' (1987) and ''The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul'' (1988), and co-wrote ''The Meaning of Liff'' (1983), ''Last Chance to See'' (1990), and three stories for the television series ''Doctor Who''. A posthumous collection of his work, including an unfinished novel, was published as ''The Salmon of Doubt'' in 2002.

Adams became known as an advocate for environmental and conservation causes, and also as a lover of fast cars, cameras, and the Apple Macintosh. He was a staunch atheist, famously imagining a sentient puddle who wakes up one morning and thinks, "This is an interesting world I find myself in—an interesting hole I find myself in—fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!" Biologist Richard Dawkins dedicated his book, ''The God Delusion'' (2006), to Adams, writing on his death that, "[s]cience has lost a friend, literature has lost a luminary, the mountain gorilla and the black rhino have lost a gallant defender."

Early life

Adams was born on 11 March 1952 to Janet (née Donovan) and Christopher Douglas Adams in Cambridge, England. The following year Watson and Crick famously first modelled DNA in the city, leading Adams to later quip he was DNA in Cambridge months earlier. The family moved to East London a few months after his birth where his sister, Susan, was born three years later. His parents divorced in 1957; Douglas, Susan, and their mother moved to an RSPCA animal shelter in Brentwood, Essex, run by his maternal grandparents.

Adams's father married Mary Judith Stewart (born Judith Robertson) in July 1960, a marriage that produced a half-sister, Heather; his mother's 1964 remarriage to veterinarian Ron Thrift provided two more half-siblings, Jane and James Thrift.

Education

Adams attended Primrose Hill Primary School in Brentwood. At six, he passed the entrance exam for Brentwood School, an independent school whose alumni include Robin Day, Jack Straw, Noel Edmonds, and David Irving. Griff Rhys Jones was a year below him, and he was in the same class as Stuckist artist Charles Thomson. He attended the prep school from 1959 to 1964, then the main school until December 1970. His form master, Frank Halford, said of him: "Hundreds of boys have passed through the school but Douglas Adams really stood out from the crowd—literally. He was unnaturally tall and in his short trousers he looked a trifle self-conscious. "[T]he form-master wouldn't say 'Meet under the clock tower,' or 'Meet under the war memorial'," he joked, "but 'Meet under Adams'." Yet it was his ability to write first-class stories that really made him shine." Adams was six feet tall (1.83 m) by age 12 and finally stopped growing at 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m): He became the only student ever to be awarded a ten out of ten by Halford for creative writing, something he remembered for the rest of his life, particularly when facing writer's block.

Some of his earliest writing was published at the school, such as a report on its photography club in ''The Brentwoodian'' in 1962, or spoof reviews in the school magazine ''Broadsheet'', edited by Paul Neil Milne Johnstone, who later became a character in ''The Hitchhiker's Guide''. He also designed the cover of one issue of the ''Broadsheet'', and had a letter and short story published nationally in ''The Eagle'', the boys' comic, in 1965. On the strength of a bravura essay on religious poetry that discussed The Beatles and William Blake, he was awarded a place at St John's College, Cambridge to read English, going up in 1971, though in fact the reason he applied to Cambridge was to join the Footlights, an invitation-only student comedy club that has acted as a hothouse for some of the most notable comic talent in England. He was not elected immediately as he had hoped, and started to write and perform in revues with Will Adams (no relation) and Martin Smith, forming a group called "Adams-Smith-Adams," but through sheer doggedness managed to become a member of the Footlights by 1973. Despite doing very little work—he recalled having completed three essays in three years—he graduated in 1974 with a B.A. in English literature.

Career

Writing

After leaving university Adams moved back to London, determined to break into TV and radio as a writer. An edited version of the ''Footlights Revue'' appeared on BBC2 television in 1974. A version of the Revue performed live in London's West End led to Adams being discovered by Monty Python's Graham Chapman. The two formed a brief writing partnership, earning Adams a writing credit in episode 45 of ''Monty Python'' for a sketch called "Patient Abuse". He is one of only two people outside the original Python members to get a writing credit (the other being Neil Innes). The sketch plays on the idea of mind-boggling paper work in an emergency, a joke later incorporated into the Vogons' obsession with paperwork. Adams also contributed to a sketch on the album for ''Monty Python and the Holy Grail''.

Adams had two brief appearances in the fourth series of ''Monty Python's Flying Circus''. At the beginning of episode 42, "The Light Entertainment War", Adams is in a surgeon's mask (as Dr. Emile Koning, according to on-screen captions), pulling on gloves, while Michael Palin narrates a sketch that introduces one person after another but never actually gets started. At the beginning of episode 44, "Mr. Neutron", Adams is dressed in a "pepperpot" outfit and loads a missile on to a cart driven by Terry Jones, who is calling for scrap metal ("Any old iron..."). The two episodes were broadcast in November 1974. Adams and Chapman also attempted non-Python projects, including ''Out of the Trees''.

At this point Adams's career stalled; his writing style was unsuited to the current style of radio and TV comedy. To make ends meet he took a series of odd jobs, including as a hospital porter, barn builder, and chicken shed cleaner. He was employed as a bodyguard by a Qatari family, who had made their fortune in oil. Anecdotes about the job included that the family had once ordered one of everything from a hotel's menu, tried all the dishes, and sent out for hamburgers. Another story had to do with a prostitute sent to the floor Adams was guarding one evening. They acknowledged each other as she entered, and an hour later, when she left, she is said to have remarked, "At least you can read while you're on the job."

During this time Adams continued to write and submit sketches, though few were accepted. In 1976 his career had a brief improvement when he wrote and performed, to good review, ''Unpleasantness at Brodie's Close'' at the Edinburgh Fringe festival. But by Christmas work had dried up again, and a depressed Adams moved to live with his mother. The lack of writing work hit him hard and a low confidence would become a feature of Adams's life; "I have terrible periods of lack of confidence [..] I briefly did therapy, but after a while I realised it was like a farmer complaining about the weather. You can't fix the weather - you just have to get on with it".

Some of Adams's early radio work included sketches for ''The Burkiss Way'' in 1977 and ''The News Huddlines''. He also wrote, again with Graham Chapman, the 20 February 1977 episode of ''Doctor on the Go'', a sequel to the ''Doctor in the House'' television comedy series. After the first radio series of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide'' became successful, Adams was made a BBC radio producer, working on ''Week Ending'' and a pantomime called ''Black Cinderella Two Goes East''. He left the position after six months to become the script editor for ''Doctor Who''.

In 1979 Adams and John Lloyd wrote scripts for two half-hour episodes of ''Doctor Snuggles'': "The Remarkable Fidgety River" and "The Great Disappearing Mystery" (episodes seven and twelve). John Lloyd was also co-author of two episodes from the original ''Hitchhiker'' radio series ("Fit the Fifth" and "Fit the Sixth", also known as "Episode Five" and "Episode Six"), as well as ''The Meaning of Liff'' and ''The Deeper Meaning of Liff''. Lloyd and Adams also collaborated on an SF movie comedy project based on ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', which would have starred John Cleese as the UN Secretary General, and had a race of aliens beating humans in athletic competitions, but the humans winning in all of the "absurd" record categories. The latter never proceeded past a treatment.

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy''

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' was a concept for a science-fiction comedy radio series pitched by Adams and radio producer Simon Brett to BBC Radio 4 in 1977. Adams came up with an outline for a pilot episode, as well as a few other stories (reprinted in Neil Gaiman's book ''Don't Panic: The Official Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Companion'') that could potentially be used in the series. According to Adams, the idea for the title ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' occurred to him while he lay drunk in a field in Innsbruck, Austria, gazing at the stars, though he joked that the BBC would instead claim it was Spain "probably because it's easier to spell". He had been wandering the countryside while carrying a book called the ''Hitch-hiker's Guide to Europe'' when he ran into a town where everyone was either "deaf" and "dumb" or only spoke languages he could not understand. After wandering around and drinking for a while, he went to sleep in the middle of a field and was inspired by his inability to communicate with the townspeople. He later said that due to his constantly retelling this story of inspiration, he no longer had any memory of the moment of inspiration itself, and only remembered his retelling of that moment.

Despite the original outline, Adams was said to make up the stories as he wrote. He turned to John Lloyd for help with the final two episodes of the first series. Lloyd contributed bits from an unpublished science fiction book of his own, called ''GiGax''. Very little of Lloyd's material survived in later adaptations of ''Hitchhiker's'', such as the novels and the TV series. The TV series itself was based on the first six radio episodes, but sections contributed by Lloyd were largely re-written.

BBC Radio 4 broadcast the first radio series weekly in the UK in March and April 1978. Following the success of the first series, another episode was recorded and broadcast, which was commonly known as the Christmas Episode. A second series of five episodes was broadcast one per night, during the week of 21–25 January 1980.

While working on the radio series (and with simultaneous projects such as ''The Pirate Planet'') Adams developed problems keeping to writing deadlines that only got worse as he published novels. Adams was never a prolific writer and usually had to be forced by others to do any writing. This included being locked in a hotel suite with his editor for three weeks to ensure that ''So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish'' was completed. He was quoted as saying, "I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by." Despite the difficulty with deadlines, Adams wrote five novels in the series, published in 1979, 1980, 1982, 1984, and 1992.

The books formed the basis for other adaptations, such as three-part comic book adaptations for each of the first three books, an interactive text-adventure computer game, and a photo-illustrated edition, published in 1994. This latter edition featured a 42 Puzzle designed by Adams, which was later incorporated into paperback covers of the first four ''Hitchhiker's'' novels (the paperback for the fifth re-used the artwork from the hardback edition).

In 1980 Adams also began attempts to turn the first ''Hitchhiker's'' novel into a movie, making several trips to Los Angeles, and working with a number of Hollywood studios and potential producers. The next year, 1981, the radio series became the basis for a BBC television mini-series broadcast in six parts. When he died in 2001 in California, he had been trying again to get the movie project started with Disney, which had bought the rights in 1998. The screenplay finally got a posthumous re-write by Karey Kirkpatrick, was green-lit in September 2003, and the resulting movie was released in 2005.

Radio producer Dirk Maggs had consulted with Adams, first in 1993, and later in 1997 and 2000 about creating a third radio series, based on the third novel in the ''Hitchhiker's'' series. They also vaguely discussed the possibilities of radio adaptations of the final two novels in the five-book "trilogy". As with the movie, this project was only realised after Adams's death. The third series, ''The Tertiary Phase'', was broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in September 2004 and was subsequently released on audio CD. With the aid of a recording of his reading of ''Life, the Universe and Everything'' and editing, Adams can be heard playing the part of Agrajag posthumously. ''So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish'' and ''Mostly Harmless'' made up the fourth and fifth radio series, respectively (on radio they were titled ''The Quandary Phase'' and ''The Quintessential Phase'') and these were broadcast in May and June 2005, and also subsequently released on Audio CD. The last episode in the last series (with a new, "more upbeat" ending) concluded with, "The very final episode of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' by Douglas Adams is affectionately dedicated to its author."

More recently, the film makers at Smoov Filmz adapted the anecdote that Arthur Dent relates about biscuits in ''So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish'' into a short film called "Cookies". Adams also discussed the real-life incident that inspired the anecdote in a 2001 speech, reprinted in his posthumous collection ''The Salmon of Doubt''. He also told the story on the radio programme ''It Makes Me Laugh'' on 19 July 1981.

''Dirk Gently'' series

In between Adams's first trip to Madagascar with Mark Carwardine in 1985, and their series of travels that formed the basis for the radio series and non-fiction book ''Last Chance to See'', Adams wrote two other novels with a new cast of characters. ''Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency'' was first published in 1987, and was described by its author as "a kind of ghost-horror-detective-time-travel-romantic-comedy-epic, mainly concerned with mud, music and quantum mechanics."

A sequel novel, ''The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul'', was published a year later. This was an entirely original work, Adams's first since ''So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish.'' After the book tour, Adams set off on his round-the-world excursion which supplied him with the material for ''Last Chance to See''.

''Doctor Who''

Adams sent the script for the ''HHGG'' pilot radio programme to the ''Doctor Who'' production office in 1978, and was commissioned to write ''The Pirate Planet'' (see below). He had also previously attempted to submit a potential movie script, called "Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen," which later became his novel ''Life, the Universe and Everything'' (which in turn became the third ''Hitchhiker's Guide'' radio series). Adams then went on to serve as script editor on the show for its seventeenth season in 1979. Altogether, he wrote three ''Doctor Who'' serials starring Tom Baker as the Doctor:

''The Pirate Planet'' (the second serial in the "Key To Time" arc, in Season 16)

''City of Death'' (with producer Graham Williams, from an original storyline by writer David Fisher. It was transmitted under the pseudonym "David Agnew")

''Shada'' (only partially filmed and not broadcast due to industrial disputes)

The episodes authored by Adams are some of the few that have not been novelised as Adams would not allow anyone else to write them, and asked for a higher price than the publishers were willing to pay.

Adams was also known to allow in-jokes from ''The Hitchhiker's Guide'' to appear in the ''Doctor Who'' stories he wrote and other stories on which he served as Script Editor. Subsequent writers have also inserted ''Hitchhiker's'' references, even as recently as 2007. Conversely, at least one reference to ''Doctor Who'' was worked into a ''Hitchhiker's'' novel. In ''Life, the Universe and Everything'', two characters travel in time and land on the pitch at Lord's Cricket Ground. The reaction of the radio commentators to their sudden appearance is very similar to the reactions of commentators in a scene in the eighth episode of the 1965–66 story ''The Daleks' Master Plan'', which has the Doctor's TARDIS materialise on the pitch at Lord's.

Elements of ''Shada'' and ''City of Death'' were reused in Adams's later novel ''Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency'', in particular the character of Professor Chronotis. Big Finish Productions eventually remade ''Shada'' as an audio play starring Paul McGann as the Doctor. Accompanied by partially animated illustrations, it was webcast on the BBC website in 2003, and subsequently released as a two-CD set later that year. An omnibus edition of this version was broadcast on the digital radio station BBC7 on 10 December 2005.

Adams is credited with introducing a fan and later friend of his, the evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, to Dawkins's future wife, Lalla Ward, who had played the part of Romana in Doctor Who. Dawkins confirmed this in his eulogy of Adams.

When he was at school he wrote and performed a play called ''Doctor Which''.

Music

Adams played the guitar left-handed and had a collection of twenty-four left-handed guitars when he died in 2001 (having received his first guitar in 1964). He also studied piano in the 1960s with the same teacher as Paul Wickens, the pianist who plays in Paul McCartney's band (and composed the music for the 2004–2005 editions of the ''Hitchhiker's Guide'' radio series). The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Procol Harum all had important influence on Adams's work.

Pink Floyd

Adams included a direct reference to Pink Floyd in the original radio version of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', in which he describes the main characters surveying the landscape of an alien planet while Marvin, their android companion, hums Pink Floyd's "Shine on You Crazy Diamond". This was cut out of the CD version. Adams also compared the various noises that the kakapo makes to "Pink Floyd studio out-takes" in his nonfiction book on endangered species, ''Last Chance to See''.

Adams's official biography shares its name with the song "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd. Adams was friends with Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour and, on the occasion of Adams's 42nd birthday (the number 42 having special significance, being the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything and also Adams's age when his daughter Polly was born), he was invited to make a guest appearance at Pink Floyd's 28 October 1994 concert at Earls Court in London, playing guitar on the songs "Brain Damage" and "Eclipse". Adams chose the name for Pink Floyd's 1994 album, ''The Division Bell'', by picking the words from the lyrics to one of its tracks, namely "High Hopes". Gilmour also performed at Adams's memorial service following his death in 2001.

Procol Harum

Douglas Adams was a friend of Gary Brooker, the lead singer, pianist and songwriter of the progressive rock band Procol Harum. Adams is known to have invited Brooker to one of the many parties that Adams held at his house. On one such occasion Gary Brooker performed the full (4 verse) version of his hit song "A Whiter Shade of Pale". Brooker also performed at Adams's memorial service.

Adams also appeared on stage with Brooker to perform "In Held Twas in I" at Redhill when the band's lyricist Keith Reid was not available. On several other occasions he had been known to introduce Procol Harum at their gigs.

Adams also let it be known that while writing he would listen to music, and this would occasionally influence his work. On one occasion the title track from the Procol Harum album ''Grand Hotel'' was playing when... }}

Computer games and projects

Douglas Adams created an interactive fiction version of ''HHGG'' together with Steve Meretzky from Infocom in 1984. In 1986 he participated in a week-long brainstorming session with the Lucasfilm Games team for the game ''Labyrinth''. Later he was also involved in creating ''Bureaucracy'' (also by Infocom, but not based on any book; Adams wrote it as a parody of events in his own life). Adams was also responsible for the computer game ''Starship Titanic'', which was published in 1998 by Simon and Schuster. Terry Jones wrote the accompanying book, entitled ''Douglas Adams’s Starship Titanic'', since Adams was too busy with the computer game to do both. In April 1999, Adams initiated the h2g2 collaborative writing project, an experimental attempt at making ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' a reality, and at harnessing the collective brainpower of the internet community.

In 1990 Adams wrote and presented a television documentary programme ''Hyperland'' which featured Tom Baker as a "software agent" (similar to the "Assistants" used in several versions of Microsoft Office, derived from their failed "Bob" program), and interviews with Ted Nelson, which was essentially about the use of hypertext. Although Adams did not ''invent'' hypertext, he was an early adopter and advocate of it. This was the same year that Tim Berners-Lee used the idea of hypertext in his HTML.

Personal beliefs and activism

Atheism and views on religion

Adams described himself as a "radical atheist", adding ''radical'' for emphasis so he would not be asked if he meant agnostic. He told American Atheists that this made things easier, but most importantly it conveyed the fact that he really meant it. "I am convinced that there is not a god," he said. Despite this, he remained fascinated by religion because of its effect on human affairs. "I love to keep poking and prodding at it. I’ve thought about it so much over the years that that fascination is bound to spill over into my writing."

The evolutionary biologist and atheist Richard Dawkins in ''The God Delusion'' uses Adams' influence throughout to exemplify arguments for non-belief; Dawkins jokingly states that Adams is "possibly [my] only convert" to atheism. The book is dedicated to Adams, quoting him, "Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?"

Environmental activism

Adams was also an environmental activist who campaigned on behalf of a number of endangered species. This activism included the production of the non-fiction radio series ''Last Chance to See'', in which he and naturalist Mark Carwardine visited rare species such as the Kakapo and Baiji, and the publication of a tie-in book of the same name. In 1992 this was made into a CD-ROM combination of audio book, e-book and picture slide show.

Adams and Mark Carwardine contributed the 'Meeting a Gorilla' passage from ''Last Chance to See'' to the book ''The Great Ape Project''. This book, edited by Paola Cavalieri and Peter Singer launched a wider-scale project in 1993, which calls for the extension of moral equality to include all great apes, human and non-human.

In 1994 he participated in a climb of Mount Kilimanjaro while wearing a rhino suit for the British charity organisation ''Save the Rhino''. Many different people participated in the same climb and took turns wearing the rhino suit; Adams wore the suit while travelling to the mountain before the climb proper began. About £100,000 were raised through that event, benefiting schools in Kenya and a Black Rhinoceros preservation programme in Tanzania. Adams was also an active supporter of the ''Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund''. Since 2003, ''Save the Rhino'' has held an annual Douglas Adams Memorial Lecture around the time of his birthday to raise money for environmental campaigns. The lectures in the series are:

2003 Richard Dawkins – ''Queerer than we can suppose: the strangeness of science''

2004 Robert Swan – ''Mission Antarctica''

2005 Mark Carwardine – ''Last Chance to See... Just a bit more''

2006 Robert Winston – ''Is the Human an Endangered Species?''

2007 Richard Leakey – ''Wildlife Management in East Africa – Is there a future?''

2008 Steven Pinker – ''The Stuff of Thought, Language as a Window into Human Nature''

2009 Benedict Allen – ''Unbreakable''

2010 Marcus du Sautoy – ''42: the answer to life, the universe and prime numbers''

2011 Brian Cox – ''The Universe and Why We Should Explore It''

Technology

Adams was a serious fan of technology. Though he did not buy his first word processor until 1982, he had considered one as early as 1979. He was quoted as saying that until 1982, he had difficulties with "the impenetrable barrier of jargon. Words were flying backwards and forwards without concepts riding on their backs." In 1982 his first purchase was a 'Nexus'. In 1983, when he and Jane Belson went out to Los Angeles, he bought a DEC Rainbow. Upon their return to England, Adams bought an Apricot, then a BBC Micro and a Tandy 1000. In ''Last Chance to See'' Adams mentions his Cambridge Z88, which he had taken to Zaire on a quest to find the Northern White Rhinoceros.

Adams's posthumously published work, ''The Salmon of Doubt'', features multiple articles written by Douglas on the subject of technology, including reprints of articles that originally ran in ''MacUser'' magazine, and in ''The Independent on Sunday'' newspaper. In these Adams claims that one of the first computers he ever saw was a Commodore PET, and that his love affair with the Apple Macintosh first began after seeing one at Infocom's headquarters in Massachusetts in 1983.

As he wrote himself:

Adams was a Macintosh user from the time they first came out in 1984 until his death in 2001. He was the first person to buy a Mac in Europe (the second being Stephen Fry – though some accounts differ on this, saying Fry bought his Mac first. Fry himself claims he was second to Adams). Adams was also an "Apple Master", one of several celebrities whom Apple made into spokespeople for its products (other Apple Masters included John Cleese and Gregory Hines). Adams's contributions included a rock video that he created using the first version of iMovie with footage featuring his daughter Polly. The video was available on Adams's .Mac homepage. Adams even installed and started using the first release of Mac OS X in the weeks leading up to his death. His very last post to his own forum was in praise of Mac OS X and the possibilities of its Cocoa programming framework. He said it was ''"awesome..."'', which was also the last word he wrote on his site. Adams can also be seen in the ''Omnibus'' tribute included with the Region One/NTSC DVD release of the TV adaptation of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide'' using Mac OS X on his PowerBook G3.

Adams used e-mail extensively from the technology's infancy, adopting a very early version of e-mail to correspond with Steve Meretzky during the pair's collaboration on Infocom's version of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy''. While living in New Mexico in 1993 he set up another e-mail address and began posting to his own USENET newsgroup, alt.fan.douglas-adams, and occasionally, when his computer was acting up, to the comp.sys.mac hierarchy. Many of his posts are now archived through Google. Challenges to the authenticity of his messages later led Adams to set up a message forum on his own website to avoid the issue. Adams was also a keynote speaker for the April 2001 Embedded Systems Conference in San Francisco, one of the major technical conferences on embedded system engineering. In his keynote speech, he shared his vision of technology and how it should contribute in everyday – and every man's – life.

Personal life

Adams moved to Upper Street, Islington, in 1981 and to Duncan Terrace in Islington in the late 1980s.

In the early 1980s Adams had an affair with novelist Sally Emerson, who was separated from her husband at that time. Adams later dedicated his book ''Life, the Universe and Everything'' to Emerson. In 1981 Emerson returned to her husband, Peter Stothard, a contemporary of Adams's at Brentwood School, and later editor of ''The Times''. Adams was soon introduced by friends to Jane Belson, with whom he later became romantically involved. Belson was the "lady barrister" mentioned in the jacket-flap biography printed in his books during the mid-1980s ("He [Adams] lives in Islington with a lady barrister and an Apple Macintosh"). The two lived in Los Angeles together during 1983 while Adams worked on an early screenplay adaptation of ''Hitchhiker's''. When the deal fell through, they moved to London, and after several separations ("He is currently not certain where he lives, or with whom") and an aborted engagement, they married on 25 November 1991. Adams and Belson had one daughter together, Polly Jane Rocket Adams, born on 22 June 1994, shortly after Adams turned 42. In 1999 the family moved from London to Santa Barbara, California, where they lived until his death. Following the funeral, Jane Belson and Polly Adams returned to London.

Death

Adams died of a heart attack on 11 May 2001, aged 49, after resting from his regular workout at a private gym in Montecito, California. He had unknowingly suffered a gradual narrowing of the coronary arteries, which led at that moment to a myocardial infarction and a fatal cardiac arrhythmia. Adams had been due to deliver the commencement address at Harvey Mudd College on 13 May. His funeral was held on 16 May in Santa Barbara, California. His remains were subsequently cremated and the ashes placed in Highgate Cemetery in north London in June 2002.

A memorial service was held on 17 September 2001 at St. Martin-in-the-Fields Church, Trafalgar Square, London. This became the first church service of any kind broadcast live on the web by the BBC. Video clips of the service are still available on the BBC's website for download.

One of his last public appearances was a talk given at the University of California, Santa Barbara, ''Parrots, the universe and everything'', recorded days before his death. A full transcript of the talk is also available.

In May 2002 ''The Salmon of Doubt'' was published, containing many short stories, essays, and letters, as well as eulogies from Richard Dawkins, Stephen Fry (in the UK edition), Christopher Cerf (in the U.S. edition), and Terry Jones (in the U.S. paperback edition). It also includes eleven chapters of his long-awaited but unfinished novel, ''The Salmon of Doubt'', which was originally intended to become a new Dirk Gently novel, but might have later become the sixth ''Hitchhiker'' novel.

Other events after Adams's death included a webcast production of ''Shada'', allowing the complete story to be told, radio dramatisations of the final three books in the ''Hitchhiker's'' series, and the completion of the film adaptation of ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy''. The film, released in 2005, posthumously credits Adams as a producer, and several art design elements – most notably a head-shaped planet seen near the end of the film – incorporated Adams's features.

A 12-part radio series based on the Dirk Gently novels was announced in 2007, with annual transmissions starting in October of that year.

BBC Radio 4 also commissioned a third Dirk Gently radio series based on the incomplete chapters of ''The Salmon of Doubt'', and written by Kim Fuller; however, this has now been dropped in favour of a BBC TV series based on the two completed novels. A sixth ''Hitchhiker'' novel, ''And Another Thing...'', by ''Artemis Fowl'' author Eoin Colfer, was released on 12 October 2009 (the 30th anniversary of the first book), published with the full support of Adams's estate. A BBC Radio 4 ''Book at Bedtime'' adaptation and an audio book soon followed.

In 2011, over 3000 people took part a public vote to choose the subjects of People's Plaques in Islington. As a result, it was decided to erect a plaque in Adams's honour, on a date yet to be announced. Adams received 489 votes.

Works

''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' Episode 45, ''Party Political Broadcast on Behalf of the Liberal Party'' (1972)

''The Private Life of Genghis Khan'' (1975)

''The Pirate Planet'', a Doctor Who serial first broadcast in 1978

''City of Death'', a Doctor Who serial, cowritten with Graham Williams, based on a story by David Fisher, first broadcast October 1979

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' (1979)

''Shada'' (1979–1980), a Doctor Who serial

''The Restaurant at the End of the Universe'' (1980)

''Life, the Universe and Everything'' (1982)

''The Meaning of Liff'' (1983, with John Lloyd)

''So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish'' (1984)

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (computer game)'' (1984, with Steve Meretzky)

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Original Radio Scripts'' (1985, with Geoffrey Perkins)

''Young Zaphod Plays It Safe (short story)'' (1986)

''A Christmas Fairly Story'' (1986, with Terry Jones), and

''Supplement to The Meaning of Liff'' (1986, with John Lloyd and Stephen Fry), both part of

* ''The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book'' (1986, edited with Peter Fincham)

''Bureaucracy (computer game)'' (1987)

''Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency'' (1987)

''The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul'' (1988)

''Hyperland'' (TV documentary) (1990)

''The Deeper Meaning of Liff'' (1990, with John Lloyd)

''Last Chance to See'' (1990, with Mark Carwardine)

''Mostly Harmless'' (1992)

''The Illustrated Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'' (1994)

''Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic'' (1997), written by Terry Jones, based on an idea by Adams

''Starship Titanic'' (computer game) (1998)

''h2g2'' (internet project) (1999)

''The Internet: The Last Battleground of the 20th century'' (radio series) (2000)

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Future'' (radio series) (2001) final project for BBC Radio 4 before his death

''Parrots, the universe and everything'' (2001)

''The Salmon of Doubt'' (2002), unfinished novel manuscript (11 chapters), short stories, essays, and interviews (also available as an audiobook, read by Simon Jones)

''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (film)'' (2005)

Works about

Articles

Herbert, R. (1980). The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Book Review). Library Journal, 105(16), 1882.

Adams, J., & Brown, R. (1981). The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Book Review). School Library Journal, 27(5), 74.

Nickerson, S. L. (1982). The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Book). Library Journal, 107(4), 476.

Nickerson, S. L. (1982). Life, the Universe, and Everything (Book). Library Journal, 107(18), 2007.

Morner, C. (1982). The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Book Review). School Library Journal, 28(8), 87.

Morner, C. (1983). Life, the Universe and Everything (Book Review). School Library Journal, 29(6), 93.

Shorb, B. (1985). So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Book). School Library Journal, 31(6), 90.

The Long Dark Tea-Time Of The Soul (Book). (1989). Atlantic (02769077), 263(4), 99.

Hoffert, B., & Quinn, J. (1990). Last Chance To See (Book). Library Journal, 115(16), 77.

Reed, S. S., & Cook, I. I. (1991). Dances with kakapos. People, 35(19), 79.

Last Chance to See (Book). (1991). Science News, 139(8), 126.

Field, M. M., & Steinberg, S. S. (1991). Douglas Adams. Publishers Weekly, 238(6), 62.

Dieter, W. (1991). Last Chance to See (Book). Smithsonian, 22(3), 140.

Dykhuis, R. (1991). Last Chance To See (Book). Library Journal, 116(1), 140.

Beatty, J. (1991). Good Show (Book). Atlantic (02769077), 267(3), 131.

A guide to the future. (1992). Maclean's, 106(44), 51.

Zinsser, J. (1993). Audio reviews: Fiction. Publishers Weekly, 240(9), 24.

Taylor, B., & Annichiarico, M. (1993). Audio reviews. Library Journal, 118(2), 132.

Good reads. (1995). NetGuide, 2(4), 109.

Stone, B. (1998). The unsinkable starship. Newsweek, 131(15), 78.

Gaslin, G. (2001). Galaxy Quest. Entertainment Weekly, (599), 79.

So long, and thanks for all the fish. (2001). Economist, 359(8222), 79.

Geier, T., & Raftery, B. M. (2001). Legacy. Entertainment Weekly, (597), 11.

Passages. (2001). Maclean's, 114(21), 13.

Don't panic! Douglas Adams to keynote Embedded show. (2001). Embedded Systems Programming, 14(3), 10.

Ehrenman, G. (2001). World Wide Weird. InternetWeek, (862), 15.

Zaleski, J. (2002). The Salmon of Doubt (Book). Publishers Weekly, 249(15), 43.

Mort, J. (2002). The Salmon of Doubt (Book). Booklist, 98(16), 1386.

Lewis, D. L. (2002). Last Time Round The Galaxy. Quadrant Magazine, 46(9), 84.

Burns, A. (2002). The Salmon of Doubt (Book). Library Journal, 127(15), 111.

Burns, A., & Rhodes, B. (2002). The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Book). Library Journal, 127(19), 118.

Kaveney, R. (2002). A cheerful whale. TLS, (5173), 23.

Pearl, N., & Welch, R. (2003). The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy (Book). Library Journal, 128(11), 124.

Preying on composite materials. (2003). R&D; Magazine, 45(6), 44.

Webb, N. (2003). The Berkeley Hotel hostage. Bookseller, (5069), 25.

The author who toured the universe. (2003). Bookseller, (5060), 35.

Osmond, A. (2005). Only human. Sight & Sound, 15(5), 12-15.

Culture vulture. (2005). Times Educational Supplement, (4640), 19.

Maughan, S. (2005). Audio Bestsellers/Fiction. Publishers Weekly, 252(30), 17.

Hitchhiker At The Science Museum. (2005). In Britain, 14(10), 9.

Rea, A. (2005). The Adams asteroids. New Scientist, 185(2488), 31.

Most Improbable Adventure. (2005). Popular Mechanics, 182(5), 32.

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy: The Tertiary Phase. (2005). Publishers Weekly, 252(14), 21.

Bartelt, K. R. (2005). Wish You Were Here: The Official Biography of Douglas Adams. Library Journal, 130(4), 86.

Larsen, D. (2005). I was a teenage android. New Zealand Listener, 198(3390), 37-38.

Tanner, J. C. (2005). Simplicity: it's hard. Telecom Asia, 16(6), 6.

Nielsen Bookscan Charts. (2005). Bookseller, (5175), 18-21.

Buena Vista launches regional site to push Hitchhiker's movie. (2005). New Media Age, 9.

Shynola bring Beckland to life. (2005). Creative Review, 25(3), 24-26.

Carwardine, M. (2007, September 15). The baiji: So long and thanks for all the fish. New Scientist. pp. 50-53.

Czarniawska, B. (2008). Accounting and gender across times and places: An excursion into fiction. Accounting, Organizations & Society, 33(1), 33-47.

Pope, M. (2008). Life, the Universe, Religion and Science. Issues, (82), 31-34.

Bearne, S. (2008). BBC builds site to trail Last Chance To See TV series. New Media Age, 08.

Arrow to reissue Adams. (2008). Bookseller, (5352), 14.

Page, B. (2008). Colfer is new Hitchhiker. Bookseller, (5350), 7.

I've got a perfect puzzle for you. (2009). Bookseller, (5404), 42.

Mostly Harmless…. (2009). Bookseller, (5374), 46.

Penguin and PanMac hitch a ride together. (2009). Bookseller, (5373), 6.

Adams, Douglas. Britannica Biographies [serial online]. October 2010;:1

Douglas (Noël) Adams (1952–2001). Hutchinson's Biography Database [serial online]. July 2011;:1

My life in books. (2011). Times Educational Supplement, (4940), 27.

See also

Towel Day is celebrated by Douglas Adams's fans annually on 25 May

Notes

References

Adams, Douglas (1998). Is there an Artificial God?, speech at ''Digital Biota 2'', Cambridge, England, September 1998.

Adams, Douglas (2002). ''The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time'', Macmillan. ISBN 0-333-76657-1

Dawkins, Richard (2001). Lament for Douglas Adams, ''The Guardian'', 14 May 2001.

Dawkins, Richard (2003). "Eulogy for Douglas Adams," in ''A devil's chaplain: reflections on hope, lies, science, and love''. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Felch, Laura (2004). Don't Panic: Douglas Adams and the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Neil Gaiman, May 2004

Ray, Mohit K (2007). ''Atlantic Companion to Literature in English'', Atlantic Publishers and Distributors. ISBN 81-269-0832-7

Simpson, M. J. (2003). ''Hitchhiker: A Biography of Douglas Adams'', Justin, Charles and Co. ISBN 1-932112-17-0

Webb, Nick (2005a). ''Wish You Were Here: The Official Biography of Douglas Adams''. Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-47650-6

Webb, Nick (2005b). "Adams, Douglas Noël (1952–2001)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, January 2005, accessed 25 October 2005.

Further reading

Adams's official web site, established by him, and still operated by The Digital Village

Adams's .mac homepage

Douglas Adams Quotes

Douglas Adams speech at Digital Biota 2 (1998) (The audio of the speech)

Douglas Adams on Triple J Radio, Australia (1990)

Guardian Books "Author Page", with profile and links to further articles.

Douglas Adams & his Computer article about his Mac IIfx

BBC2 "Omnibus" tribute to Adams, presented by Kirsty Wark, 4 August 2001

Mueller, Rick and Greengrass, Joel (2002).''Life, The Universe and Douglas Adams'', documentary.

Simpson, M.J. (2001). ''The Pocket Essential Hitchhiker's Guide''. ISBN 1-903047-40-4. Updated April 2005 ISBN 1-904048-46-3

Parrots, the Universe and Everything, 90 min talk at University of California Santa Barbara, 2001

Category:1952 births Category:2001 deaths Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge Category:Atheism activists Category:Audio book narrators Category:BBC radio producers Category:British child writers Category:Burials at Highgate Cemetery Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:English atheists Category:English comedy writers Category:English humanists Category:English humorists Category:English novelists Category:English radio writers Category:English science fiction writers Category:English television writers Category:Infocom Category:Interactive fiction writers Category:Non-fiction environmental writers Category:Old Brentwoods Category:People from Cambridge Category:Usenet people Category:Monty Python

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Coordinates	9°02′37″N68°44′56″N
background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
instrument	Dobro
name	Jerry Douglas
landscape	Yes
born	May 28, 1956Warren, Ohio
genres	Americana, Bluegrass, Country, Jazz |
labels	E1 Music, Rounder, MCA, Sugar Hill, Koch
years active	1970s–present
website	Official website }}

Jerry Douglas (born Gerald Calvin Douglas, May 28, 1956 in Warren, Ohio) is an American record producer and resonator guitar player. Called "Dobro's matchless contemporary master," by ''The New York Times'', and lauded as "my favorite musician" by John Fogerty, Douglas is one of the world’s most renowned Dobro players.

Career

In addition to his twelve solo recordings, Douglas has played on more than 1600 albums. As a sideman, he has recorded with artists as diverse as Ray Charles, Phish, Dolly Parton, Paul Simon, Ricky Skaggs, Elvis Costello, and Johnny Mathis, as well as performing on the landmark O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack. He has been part of such notable groups as The Whites, J. D. Crowe and the New South, the Country Gentlemen, and Strength in Numbers.

As a producer, he has overseen albums by Alison Krauss, the Del McCoury Band, Maura O'Connell, Jesse Winchester and the Nashville Bluegrass Band. Along with Aly Bain, he serves as Music Director of the popular BBC Television series, "Transatlantic Sessions".

Since 1998, Douglas has been a key member of Alison Krauss and Union Station, touring extensively and playing on a series of platinum-selling albums. When not on the road with Alison Krauss and Union Station, Douglas tours with his band in support of his extensive body of work.

Awards

Douglas has received twelve Grammy Awards and has won the Country Music Association's 'Musician of the Year' award three times, in 2002, 2005 and 2007.

In 2004, the National Endowment for the Arts awarded Douglas a National Heritage Fellowship.

Douglas was named Artist in Residence for the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2008.

Douglas was honored at the 36th annual Telluride Bluegrass Festival in Colorado for his twenty-fifth consecutive year playing in and at the festival.

Discography

Solo recordings

Year	Album	Chart Positions			Label
		! width="60"	! width="60"	! width="60"
1979	''Fluxology''
1982	''Fluxedo''
1986	''Under the Wire''
	''Changing Channels''
''Everything Is Gonna Work Out Fine''				Rounder
1989	''Plant Early''				MCA
1992
1998	''Restless on the Farm''
2002
2005					Koch
2007	''Best of the Sugar Hill Years''				Sugar Hill
2008					Koch
2009	''Jerry Christmas''				E1

Other recordings

''Remembrances and Forecasts'' 1974 as The Country Gentlemen

''J.D. Crowe & The New South'' 1975 as J. D. Crowe & the New South

''Holiday In Japan'' 1975 as J. D. Crowe & the New South

''New South Live'' 1975 as J. D. Crowe & the New South

''Boone Creek'' 1977 as Boone Creek

''One Way Track'' 1977 as Boone Creek

''That Down Home Feeling'' 1977 as Buck White & Down Home Folks

''Buck and Family Live'' 1979 as Buck White & Down Home Folks

''More Pretty Girls Than One'' 1979 as Buck White & Down Home Folks

''Bluegrass Album Vol.3: California Connection'' 1983 as Bluegrass Album Band

''Snakes Alive'' 1984 as Dreadful Snakes

''Bluegrass Album Vol.4'' 1985 as Bluegrass Album Band

''Bluegrass Album Vol.5: Sweet Sunny South 1989 as Bluegrass Album Band

''The Telluride Sessions'' 1989 ''as Strength in Numbers''

''Will the Circle be Unbroken Vol. 2'' 1990 with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

''Skip, Hop & Wobble'' 1993 as Barenberg, Douglas & Meyer

''The Great Dobro Sessions'' 1994 as Jerry Douglas and various artists

''Far From Enough'' 1994 with Viktor Krauss

''Bluegrass Album Vol.6: Bluegrass Instrumentals'' 1996 as Bluegrass Album Band

''Bourbon & Rosewater'' 1996 as Bhatt, Douglas & Meyer

''Yonder'' 1996 with Peter Rowan

''O Brother, Where Art Thou?'' 2000 with Alison Krauss, The Whites, as Soggy Bottom Boys

''Deja Vu (All Over Again)'' 2004 with John Fogerty

''Secret, Profane, & Sugarcane'' 2009 with Elvis Costello and the Sugarcanes

With Alison Krauss or Alison Krauss and Union Station

''Forget About It'' 1999

''New Favorite'' 2001

''Live'' 2002

''Lonely Runs Both Ways'' 2004

''A Hundred Miles or More: A Collection'' 2007

Awards

Grammy awards

1983 Best Country Instrumental Performance - "Fireball" - with The New South

1994 Best Bluegrass Album - "The Great Dobro Sessions"

2001 Best Country Instrumental Performance - "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" with Earl Scruggs

2001 Album of the Year - "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?" - various artists

2001 Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group - "The Lucky One"- Alison Krauss + Union Station

2001 Best Bluegrass Album - "New Favorite" - Alison Krauss + Union Station

2003 Best Country Instrumental Performance - "Cluck Old Hen" - Alison Krauss + Union Station

2003 Best Bluegrass Album - "LIVE" - Alison Krauss + Union Station

2004 Best Country Instrumental Performance - "Earl's Breakdown" - Nitty Gritty Dirt Band Featuring Earl Scruggs, Randy Scruggs, Vassar Clements & Jerry Douglas

2006 Best Country Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal - "Restless" - Alison Krauss and Union Station

2006 Best Country Instrumental Performance - "Unionhouse Branch" - Alison Krauss and Union Station

2006 Best Country Album - "Lonely Runs Both Ways" - Alison Krauss and Union Station

CMA Awards

2002 Musician of the Year

2005 Musician of the Year

2007 Musician of the Year

IBMA (International Bluegrass Music Association) Awards

1990 Instrumental Performers of the Year — Dobro

1991 Instrumental Performers of the Year — Dobro

1992 Instrumental Album of the Year - ''Slide Rule'', Jerry Douglas

1992 Record Event of the Year - ''Slide Rule''

1992 Instrumental Performers of the Year — Dobro

1993 Instrumental Performers of the Year - Dobro

1994 Instrumental Album of the Year - ''Skip, Hop & Wobble''; Douglas, Barenberg & Meyer

1994 Instrumental Performers of the Year - Dobro

1995 Instrumental Album of the Year - ''The Great Dobro Sessions''; Mike Auldridge, Curtis Burch, Jerry Douglas, Josh Graves, Rob Ickes, Oswald Kirby, Stacy Phillips, Tut Taylor, Sally Van Meter, Gene Wooten

1995 Record Event of the Year - ''The Great Dobro Sessions''

1995 Instrumental Performers of the Year - Dobro

1997 Album of the Year - ''True Life Blues—The Songs of Bill Monroe''; Sam Bush, Vassar Clements, Mike Compton, Jerry Douglas, Stuart Duncan, Pat Enright, Greg Garing, Richard Greene, David Grier, David Grisman, John Hartford, Bobby Hicks, Kathy Kallick, Laurie Lewis, Mike Marshall, Del McCoury, Ronnie McCoury, Jim Nunally, Scott Nygaard, Mollie O'Brien, Tim O'Brien, Alan O'Bryant, Herb Pedersen, Todd Phillips, John Reischman, Peter Rowan, Craig Smith, Chris Thile, Tony Trischka, Roland White

1997 Record Event of the Year - ''True Life Blues—The Songs of Bill Monroe''

1997 Instrumental Album of the Year - ''Bluegrass Instrumentals, Volume 6''; The Bluegrass Album Band

2001 Instrumental Performers of the Year - Dobro

2002 Instrumental Performers of the Year - Dobro

2003 Album of the Year - ''Alison Krauss + Union Station Live'', Alison Krauss + Union Station featuring Jerry Douglas

2003 Record Event of the Year - ''Will The Circle Be Unbroken Vol. III''; Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Matraca Berg, Sam Bush, June Carter Cash, Johnny Cash, Vassar Clements, Iris DeMent, Rodney Dillard, Jerry Douglas, Glen Duncan, Vince Gill, Josh Graves, Jamie Hanna, Emmylou Harris, Taj Mahal, Jimmy Martin, Del McCoury, Robbie McCoury, Ronnie McCoury, Jonathan McEuen, The Nashville Bluegrass Band, Willie Nelson, Tom Petty, Tony Rice, Earl Scruggs, Randy Scruggs, Ricky Skaggs, Doc Watson, Richard Watson, Glenn Worf & Dwight Yoakam

National Endowment for the Arts

2004 National Heritage Fellowship

Country Music Hall of Fame

2008 Artist in Residence

References

Humphrey, Mark. (1998). "Jerry Douglas". In ''The Encyclopedia of Country Music''. Paul Kingsbury, Editor. New York: Oxford University Press. p. 151.

Notes

External links

Jerry Douglas Official site

Alison Krauss and Union Station featuring Jerry Douglas Official site

Folk Radio UK review of ''Jerry Christmas''

Category:1956 births Category:Living people Category:Alison Krauss & Union Station members Category:American country guitarists Category:American bluegrass guitarists Category:American male singers Category:National Heritage Fellowship winners Category:Slide guitarists Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Musicians from Ohio Category:Resonator guitarists Category:People from Warren, Ohio Category:The Country Gentlemen members Category:Weissenborn players

de:Jerry Douglas ja:ジェリー・ダグラス simple:Jerry Douglas fi:Jerry Douglas

Coordinates	9°02′37″N68°44′56″N
birth name	Michael Kirk Douglas
birth date	September 25, 1944
birth place	New Brunswick, New Jersey, United States
spouse	Diandra Luker (1977–2000)Catherine Zeta-Jones(2000–present)
occupation	Actor, producer
years active	1966–present
parents	Kirk Douglas, Diana Dill
relatives	Joel (brother)Peter (half-brother)Eric (half-brother, deceased)
children	Cameron DouglasDylan Michael DouglasCarys Zeta Douglas }}

Michael Kirk Douglas (born September 25, 1944) is an American actor and producer, primarily in movies and television. He has won three Golden Globes and two Academy Awards; first as producer of 1975's Best Picture, ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'', and as Best Actor in 1987 for his role in ''Wall Street''. Douglas received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2009. He is the eldest of actor Kirk Douglas's four sons.

Early life

Douglas was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, the first child of actor Kirk Douglas and Bermudian actress Diana Dill. His paternal grandparents, Harry Demsky (born Herschel Danielovitch) and Bryna Demsky (née Sanglel), were Jewish immigrants from Gomel in Belarus (at that time a part of the Russian Empire). His mother and maternal grandparents, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Melville Dill and Ruth Rapalje Neilson, were natives of Devonshire Parish, Bermuda. Thomas Dill served as Attorney General of Bermuda and was commanding officer of the Bermuda Militia Artillery. Douglas has a younger brother, Joel Douglas (born 1947), and two paternal half-brothers, Peter Douglas (born 1955) and Eric Douglas (1958–2004).

Education

Douglas attended The Choate prepatory school (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut. He received his B.A. in drama from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1968, where he was also the Honorary President of the UCSB Alumni Association. He studied acting with Wynn Handman at The American Place Theater in New York City.

Career

Early years

Douglas started his film career in the late 1960s and early 1970s, appearing in little known films like ''Hail, Hero!'' and ''Summertree''. His first significant role came in the TV series ''The Streets of San Francisco'' from 1972 to 1976, where he starred alongside Karl Malden. Douglas later said that Malden became a "mentor" and someone he "admired and loved deeply". After Douglas left the show, he had a long association with his mentor until Malden's death on July 1, 2009. In 2004, Douglas presented Malden with the Monte Cristo Award of the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center (named for the father of Bermuda-born Oona O'Neill) in Waterford, Connecticut, for the Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 1975, Douglas received from his father, Kirk Douglas, the rights to the novel ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest''. Michael went on to produce the film of the same name with Saul Zaentz. Kirk Douglas considered playing the starring role himself, having starred in an earlier stage version, but chose against it, considering himself too old. The lead role went instead to a young Jack Nicholson, who would go on to win the Academy Award for Best Actor. Douglas won the Award for Best Picture for producing the film.

After leaving ''Streets of San Francisco'' in 1976, Douglas played a hospital doctor in the medical thriller ''Coma'' (1978), and in 1979 he played the role of a troubled marathon runner in ''Running''. In 1979, he both produced and starred in ''The China Syndrome'', a dramatic film co-starring Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon about a nuclear power plant accident (the Three Mile Island accident took place 12 days after the film's release). The film was considered "one of the most intelligent Hollywood films of the 1970s."

Success in Hollywood

Douglas' acting career was propelled to fame when he produced and starred in the 1984 romantic adventure comedy ''Romancing the Stone''. It also helped launch Kathleen Turner to stardom, reintroduced Douglas as a capable leading man, and gave director Bob Zemeckis his first box-office success. It was followed a year later by a sequel, ''The Jewel of the Nile'', which he also produced.

The year 1987 saw Douglas star in the thriller ''Fatal Attraction'' with Glenn Close. That same year he played tycoon Gordon Gekko in Oliver Stone's ''Wall Street'' for which he received an Academy Award as Best Actor. He reprised his role as Gekko in the sequel ''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps'' in 2010, also directed by Stone.

Douglas again paired with Kathleen Turner for the 1989 film ''The War of the Roses'', which also starred Danny DeVito. In 1989, he starred in Ridley Scott's international police crime drama ''Black Rain'' opposite Andy García and Kate Capshaw. The film was shot in Osaka, Japan.

In 1992, Douglas had another successful starring role when he appeared alongside Sharon Stone in the film ''Basic Instinct''. The movie was a box office hit, and sparked controversy over its depictions of bisexuality and lesbianism. In 1994, Douglas and Demi Moore starred in the hit movie ''Disclosure'' focusing on the topic of sexual harassment with Douglas playing a man harassed by his new female boss. Other popular films he starred during these decade were ''Falling Down'', ''The American President'', ''The Ghost and the Darkness'', ''The Game'' (directed by David Fincher), and a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's classic - ''Dial M for Murder'' - titled ''A Perfect Murder''. In 1998, Douglas received the Crystal Globe award for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival.

In 2000, Douglas starred in Steven Soderbergh's critically acclaimed film ''Traffic'', opposite Benicio del Toro and future wife Catherine Zeta-Jones. That same year, he also received critical acclaim for his role in ''Wonder Boys'' as a professor and novelist suffering from writer's block. He was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Drama as well as several other awards from critics.

Types of roles

According to film historian and critic David Thomson, Douglas was capable of playing characters who were "weak, culpable, morally indolent, compromised, and greedy for illicit sensation without losing that basic probity or potential for ethical character that we require of a hero." Critic and author Rob Edelman points out similarities in many of Douglas's roles, writing that in some of his leading films, he personified the "contemporary, Caucasian middle-to-upper-class American male who finds himself the brunt of female anger because of real or imagined sexual slights."

These themes of male victimization are seen in films such as ''Fatal Attraction'' (1987), with Glenn Close, ''War of the Roses'' (1989), with Kathleen Turner, ''Basic Instinct'' (1992), Sharon Stone, ''Falling Down'' (1993), and ''Disclosure'' (1994), with Demi Moore. For his characters in films such as these, "any kind of sexual contact with someone other than his mate and the mother of his children is destined to come at a costly price." Edelman describes his characters as the "Everyman who must contend with, and be victimized by, these women and their raging, psychotic sexuality."

Conversely, Douglas also played powerful characters with dominating personalities equally well: as Gordon Gekko, in both versions of ''Wall Street'', he acted the role of a "greedy yuppie personification of the Me generation," convinced that "greed is good;" in ''Romancing the Stone'' and ''The Jewel of the Nile,'' he played an idealistic soldier of fortune; in ''The Star Chamber'' (1983), he was a court judge fed up with an inadequate legal system, leading him to become involved with a vigilante group; and in Black Rain (1989), he proved he could also play a Stallone-like action hero as a New York City cop.

Actor and producer

Having become recognized as both a successful producer and actor, he describes himself as "an actor first and a producer second." He has explained why he enjoys both functions:

"I love the fact that on one side, with acting, you can be a child — acting is wonderful for its innocence and the fun. . . On the other side, producing is fun for all the adult kinds of things you do. You deal in business, you deal with the creative forces. As an adult who continues to get older, you like the adult risks. It's flying without a net, taking chances and learning. I was never good in economics or business — had no business background, you know, and I like it."

He has also offered reasons why he has become successful in both acting and producing:

"I think I'm a chameleon. I think it's something that I possibly inherited early on as a child going back and forth between two families. I know that whether it's right or wrong, I have an ability to sort of fit into a lot of different situations and make people feel relatively comfortable in a wide range without giving up all my moral values. I think that same chameleonlike quality can transfer into films. I think if you can remember the reason you got involved with it in the first place and try to keep that impulsive, instinctive feeling even when you're being beaten down or exhausted or waylaid, you'll be successful."

Recent years

In 2003, Douglas starred in ''It Runs in the Family'', which featured three generations of his family (his parents, Kirk and Diana, as well as his own son, Cameron). The film, although a labor of love, was not successful, critically or at the box office. Douglas starred in the solid commercial action flick ''Don't Say a Word'', then the poorly received action-thriller ''The Sentinel'' in 2006. During that time, he also guest-appeared on the episode, "Fagel Attraction", of the popular television sitcom ''Will and Grace'', as a gay cop attracted to Will Truman (Eric McCormack); the performance earned Douglas an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Show.

Douglas was approached for ''Basic Instinct 2'', but he declined to participate in the project. He said:

"Yes, they asked me to do it a while ago, I thought we had done it very effectively; [Paul] Verhoeven is a pretty good director. I haven't seen the sequel. I've only done one sequel in my life, ''The Jewel of the Nile'', from ''Romancing The Stone.'' Besides, there were age issues, you know? Sharon still looks fabulous. The script was pretty good. Good for her, she's in her late-40s, and there are not a lot of parts around. The first one was probably the best picture of her career—it certainly made her career and she was great in it".

Future engagements

Douglas was set to star in ''Tragic Indifference'', a courtroom thriller based on a landmark liability case against Ford Motor Company, according to ''Variety''. Douglas will play the attorney who took Ford to court on behalf of a single mother from Texas who was paralyzed and nearly died after an accident. The trial exposed the automaker's indifference to flaws in its Sport Utility Vehicles (SUV). The movie will be based on Adam Penenberg's 2003 book of the same name. Douglas will play Attorney Tab Turner, who represented Donna Bailey after the Ford Explorer SUV she was riding in rolled over following a Firestone tire failure.

On December 17, 2007 it was announced that Douglas would announce the introduction to ''NBC Nightly News'', some two years after Howard Reig, the previous announcer, retired.

Personal life

Family

After filming ''Summertree'' (1971), he began dating Brenda Vaccaro. The relationship lasted for about six years.

In March 1977, 33 year old Douglas married 19 year old Diandra Luker, the daughter of an Austrian diplomat. They had one son, Cameron, born in 1978. In 1997 Diandra filed for divorce

Dating since March 1999, Douglas married Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones on November 18, 2000. They were both born on September 25, though 25 years apart. Zeta-Jones says that when they met in Deauville, France, Douglas used the line "I want to father your children ". They have two children, Dylan Michael (born August 8, 2000) and Carys Zeta (born April 20, 2003).

They planned on renewing their wedding vows in 2010 as part of their 10th wedding anniversary. The idea was hers, and came after Douglas was found to have advanced stages of cancer. One report notes that "Michael was in tears when she suggested it to him," and he sees it as a “wonderful expression of love.”

Douglas, the son of a Jewish father and an Anglican mother, has declared no religious affiliation.

Citizenship

Douglas is a U.S. citizen by birth in the United States and has Bermudian Status through his mother's birth in Bermuda.

Skiing accident and rehab

In 1980, Douglas was involved in a serious skiing accident which sidelined his acting career for three years. In September 1992, the same year ''Basic Instinct'' came out, he underwent treatment for alcoholism and drug addiction at Sierra Tucson Center.

Legal problems

In 1997, New York caddy James Parker sued Douglas for $25 million. Parker accused Douglas of hitting him in the groin with an errant golf ball, causing Parker to lose a testicle and his job. The case was later settled out of court.

Stalking

In 2004, Douglas and Zeta-Jones took legal action against stalker Dawnette Knight, who was accused of sending violent letters to the couple that contained graphic threats on Zeta-Jones' life. Testifying, Zeta-Jones said the threats left her so shaken she feared a nervous breakdown. Knight claimed she had been in love with Douglas and admitted to the offences, which took place between October 2003 and May 2004. She was sentenced to three years in prison.

Health problems

It was announced on August 16, 2010, that Douglas was suffering from throat cancer and will undergo chemotherapy and radiation treatment. On August 31, 2010 Douglas appeared on ''Late Show with David Letterman'' and confirmed that the cancer was at an advanced stage IV. Douglas attributed the cancer to a combination of stress, his previous alcohol abuse, and years of heavy smoking.

In November 2010, Douglas was put on a special weight gain diet by his doctors due to the excessive weight loss leaving him weak. On January 11, 2011, he said in an interview that the tumor was gone. He admitted that the illness and aggressive treatment had caused him to lose 32 lbs in weight. He will have to have monthly screenings because there is a very high chance that the cancer could return over the course of the next two to three years. Although Douglas has described the cancer as throat cancer, many doctors believe he was actually diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer.

Activism

Political activities

Douglas and Zeta-Jones hosted the annual Nobel Peace Prize concert in Oslo, Norway, on December 11, 2003. They acted as co-masters of ceremony in the concert celebrating the award given to Iranian human rights activist Shirin Ebadi. In 2006, Douglas was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters (D.Litt.) from the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.

He is an advocate of nuclear disarmament, a supporter of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and sits on the Board of Directors of the anti-war grantmaking foundation Ploughshares Fund. In 1998, he was appointed UN Messenger of Peace by Secretary-General Kofi Annan. He is a notable Democrat and has donated money to Barack Obama, Christopher Dodd, and Al Franken He has been a major supporter of gun control since John Lennon was murdered in 1980.

In 2006 he was a featured speaker in a public service campaign sponsored by a UN conference to focus attention on trade of illicit arms, especially of small arms and light weapons. Douglas made several appearances and offered his opinions: :"The conference is an opportunity for UN member states to build on the Program of Action and to encourage countries to strengthen their laws on the illicit trade, . . . an issue that affects us all . . .[and] while owning guns is a legal right in most countries, the illegal trade in guns continues to fuel conflict, crime and violence."

A few years earlier, in 2003, Douglas hosted a "powerful film" on child soldiers and the impact of combat on children in countries such as Sierra Leone. During the documentary film, Douglas interviewed children, and estimated that they were among 300,000 other children worldwide who have been conscripted or kidnapped and forced to fight. Of one such child he interviewed, Douglas stated, "After being kidnapped by a rebel group, he was tortured, drugged, and forced to commit atrocities." Douglas discussed his role as a Messenger Peace for the UN: :"I'm in an enviable position . . . When I talk about movies I can talk about messages of peace, and infuse them into the entertainment pages."

Humanitarian initiatives

In 2009 Douglas joined the project ''Soldiers of Peace'', a movie against all wars and for global peace.

Douglas lent his support for the campaign to release Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the Iranian woman, who after having been convicted of committing adultery, was given a sentence of death by stoning.

Filmography

+ Filmography
! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1966	''Cast a Giant Shadow''	Jeep driver
1969	''Hail, Hero!''	Carl Dixon
1970	''Adam at Six A.M.''	Adam Gaines
1971	''Summertree''	Jerry
1972	''Napoleon and Samantha''	Danny
1975			Won As ProducerAcademy Award for Best PictureBAFTA Award for Best FilmGolden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama
1978		Dr. Mark Bellows
1979		Michael Andropolis	Nominated — Genie Award for Best Performance by a Foreign Actor
1979	''''	Richard Adams	Also ProducerNominated - BAFTA Award for Best FilmNominated - Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Drama
1980		Ben Lewin
1983	''''	Superior Court Judge Steven R. Hardin
1984	''Romancing the Stone''	Jack Colton	Also ProducerGolden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
1985	''''	Zach
1985	''''	Jack Colton	Also Producer
1987	''Fatal Attraction''	Dan Gallagher	Nominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role
1987		Gordon Gekko	Academy Award for Best ActorDavid di Donatello
1989	''''	Oliver Rose	Nominated — [[Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
1989		Det. Sgt. Nick Conklin
1992	''Basic Instinct''	Nick Curran	Nominated — MTV Movie Award for Best PerformanceNominated — MTV Movie Award for Best On-Screen Duo shared with Sharon Stone
1992	''Shining Through''	Ed Leland
1992	''Oliver Stone: Inside Out''	Himself	Documentary
1993	''Falling Down''	William "D-Fens" Foster
1994		Tom Sanders
1995	''''		Nominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
1996	''''	Charles Remington	Also Executive Producer
1997	''''	Nicholas Van Orton
1998	''''	Steven Taylor
1999	''One Day in September''	Narrator	Documentary
1999	''Get Bruce''	Himself	Documentary
2000		Professor Grady Tripp	Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best ActorSatellite Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or ComedySEFCA Award for Best ActorNominated — BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading RoleNominated — Chicago Film Critics Association Award for Best ActorNominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Actor - Motion Picture DramaNominated — LVFCS Award for Best Actor (also for ''Traffic)''Nominated — London Film Critics Circle Award for Best ActorNominated — Online Film Critics Society Award for Best ActorNominated — Phoenix Film Critics Society Award for Best Actor
2000		Robert Wakefield
2001	''Don't Say a Word	Dr. Nathan R. Conrad
2001	''In Search of Peace''	Narrator	Documentary
2001	''One Night at McCool's''	Mr. Burmeister	Also Producer
2003	''''	Steve Tobias
2003		Alex Gromberg
2003	''Direct Order''	Narrator	Documentary
2003	''Tell Them Who You Are''	Himself	Documentary
2006	''You, Me and Dupree''	Mr. Thompson
2006	''''	Pete Garrison	Also Producer
2007	''King of California''	Charlie
2009	''Ghosts of Girlfriends Past''	Uncle Wayne
2009		Mark Hunter
2009		Ben Kalmen	Nominated — Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Actor
2010	''Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps''	Gordon Gekko	Nominated — Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture
2012		TBA	''Post-production''

References

External links

"The Films of Michael Douglas", video compilation of film clips, 5 minutes

Category:1944 births Category:20th-century actors Category:21st-century actors Category:Actors from New Jersey Category:American anti–nuclear weapons activists Category:American film actors Category:American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Category:American people of Bermudian descent Category:American people of British descent Category:American television actors Category:Best Actor Academy Award winners Category:Best Drama Actor Golden Globe (film) winners Category:California Democrats Category:Cecil B. DeMille Award Golden Globe winners Category:Choate Rosemary Hall alumni Category:Living people Category:Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture Screen Actors Guild Award winners Category:People from New Brunswick, New Jersey Category:People self-identifying as alcoholics Category:Producers who won the Best Picture Academy Award Category:United Nations Messengers of Peace Category:University of California, Santa Barbara alumni Category:Cancer survivors Category:People from Majorca

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