Such a shame to hear about this earlier today. He was one of my favorites and it's now hard to think of any real old-school Hollywood royalty around anymore, save for his one-time co-star Kirk Douglas.
Of course he was a wonderful comic performer (Some Like It Hot is a cliche to reference, but it's still so funny, so much for "nobody's perfect"!), but he was a good straight actor as well, as Spartacus testifies.
I wasn't actually too blown away by his Oscar-nominated turn in The Defiant Ones, which I found too dated to be gripping, but if you ever get the chance to check out The Boston Strangler, that's an extremely good film in which he gives a brilliantly solid and quite terrifying performance.
The Great Race is another fave, along with the other road chase comedy he made later, a sequel to Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines, called Those Daring Young Men In Their Jaunty Jalopies, also known as Monte Carlo Or Bust. I reviewed the DVD of that here:
http://animatedviews.com/2008/those-dar ... o-or-bust/
It was also a pleasure, when we hosted a tribute to Roger Moore back at the Elstree Studios where he'd made The Saint, to have been among those who heard an audio message from Curtis, with whom he had starred with over at Pinewood on The Persuaders. I can't even begin to repeat some of the hilariously colorful language that played out over the speaker to his old co-star and friend!
So long, Stoney!
