Lee Thompson

Lee Thompson may refer to:

J. Lee Thompson

John Lee Thompson (1 August 1914 – 30 August 2002), better known as J. Lee Thompson, was an English film director, active in England and Hollywood.

British films

Murder Without Crime was mostly ignored upon release. Thompson's first movie success was one he directed and co-wrote, The Yellow Balloon (1953), the story of a child who is blackmailed into helping a criminal after accidentally causing his friend's death. The Weak and the Wicked (1954), portrays the lives of women in prison and is based on memoirs by Joan Henry, who became Thompson's second wife.

Thompson earned a reputation in Britain for social dramas besides occasional comedies and musicals. He was also known for collaborating with top British actors. After the comedies For Better, For Worse (1954) starring Dirk Bogarde, As Long as They're Happy (1955), and An Alligator Named Daisy (1955) starring Donald Sinden, he returned to the theme of female prisoners in Yield to the Night (1956), an anti-capital punishment tale with Diana Dors as the condemned prisoner.

TMZ

TMZ is a celebrity news website that debuted on November 8, 2005. It was a collaboration between AOL and Telepictures Productions, a division of Warner Bros., until Time Warner divested AOL in 2009. The name TMZ stands for thirty-mile zone, the historic "studio zone" within a 30-mile (50 km) radius centered at the intersection of West Beverly Boulevard and North La Cienega Boulevard in Los Angeles, California.

TMZ's managing editor is Harvey Levin, a lawyer-turned-journalist who was previously a legal expert for the Los Angeles television station KCBS-TV. The site claims that it does not pay for stories or interviews; however, Levin has admitted that TMZ does "sometimes pay sources for leads on stories". Levin has stated that "everything is researched and vetted for accuracy." A companion television series, TMZ on TV, debuted on September 10, 2007.

Development

Seven months prior to the official launch of TMZ, America Online (AOL) had hinted that it was planning to launch a Hollywood and entertainment-centric news site that would be produced in conjunction with Telepictures Productions and had shown interest in launching a website featuring a focus mainly on celebrities. At the time of the launch, AOL confirmed that the site would primarily feature and consist of Hollywood gossip, including interviews, photos and video footage of celebrities and information pertaining to industry news on movies, television shows, etc. The site was described as "an effort to further feed the current American obsession with celebrities". Mike Shields of MediaWeek.com wrote, "the site also boasts of an expansive collection of archived star photos and videos", allowing fans to "trace changing hairlines and waistlines of their favorites performers over the years".

Charles Bronson

Charles Bronson (born Charles Dennis Buchinsky; November 3, 1921 – August 30, 2003) was an American film and television actor.

He starred in films such as Once Upon a Time in the West, The Magnificent Seven, The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, Rider on the Rain, The Mechanic, and the Death Wish series. He was often cast in the role of a police officer, gunfighter, or vigilante in revenge-oriented plot lines. He had long collaborations with film directors Michael Winner and J. Lee Thompson. In 1965, he was featured as Major Wolenski in Battle of the Bulge.

Early life and World War II service

Bronson was born Charles Dennis Buchinsky in Ehrenfeld in Cambria County in the coal region of the Allegheny Mountains north of Johnstown, Pennsylvania.

He was the 11th of 15 children born to a Lithuanian immigrant father and a Lithuanian-American mother. His father, Walter Bunchinski (who later adjusted his surname to Buchinsky to sound more "American"), hailed from the town of Druskininkai. Bronson's mother, Mary (née Valinsky), whose parents were from Lithuania, was born in the coal mining town of Tamaqua, Pennsylvania. He learned to speak English when he was a teenager; before that he spoke Lithuanian and Russian.

The White Buffalo

The White Buffalo is a 1977 western film starring Charles Bronson, Kim Novak, Jack Warden, Slim Pickens, and Will Sampson. The film is directed by J. Lee Thompson, who frequently teamed with Bronson. It was also the final film Bronson made for United Artists.

The movie marks the second collaboration between Bronson and director J. Lee Thompson (following 1976's St. Ives).

Plot

Wild Bill Hickok is haunted by his dreams of a giant white buffalo. So much that he travels the West to find the beast. Along the way, Hickok meets Crazy Horse, who is also searching the plains for the giant white buffalo, who has killed Crazy Horse's daughter. Hickok and Crazy Horse team up to kill the elusive buffalo.

Main cast