Derby Dead Pool

FONTENAY OF OLD Longtime Miss France showrunner Geneviéve de Fontenay has died aged 90. She was a longtime familiar face at the pageant with her trademark monochrome brimmed hat. In recent years she often found herself in hot water for “outspoken” (read – bigoted) comments about racial minorities and the LGBT community, and just this […]

HE KNEW HE’D GO FROM BAGS TO DITCHES! Maestro of the Great American Songbook and Lady Gaga’s partner in crime, Tony Bennett has died aged 96. His death closes a chapter on music history as the last true star remaining of the pre-“Rock Around the Clock” era where crooners commandeered the airwaves. Off the endorsements […]

UNBEARABLY LIGHT OBIT Czech literary heavyweight Milan Kundera had a vaguely scintillating history with deadpooling in recent years. Droller Coaster tipped in 2018 that a famous writer was seriously ill – the mystery scribe was Kundera, seriously ill with heart failure. His ticker ticked on for yonks, even forging through a death hoax in 2020. […]

MALCOLM GETS PANNED Film critic Derek Malcolm has died aged 91. In his youth he showed enthusiasm for both cinema and horse racing, and the latter coloured his early career more prominently as an amateur jockey and horse racing columnist for The Guardian. He stuck with The Guardian when taking up the film critic’s mantle, […]

MINISTER WITHOUT PULSE Dependable character actor John Nettleton has died aged 94. He was best remembered as the conniving bespectacled minister Sir Arnold Robinson in still-timely Yes Minister, who returns in Yes Prime Minister as President of the Campaign for Freedom of Information. Nettleton’s commanding gravitas combined with his comedic timing made him a natural […]

CRUMBLE GETS A CLWYD 2023 has been a lean year at Crumble headquarters. Their ability to bring eclectic unique obits to the forefront is second-to-none in the DDP, but most Crumble deaths this year have been yesteryear 2021/22 picks he didn’t reup for this go around. Thus, fascinating as they are, I couldn’t write about […]

DEADELWEISS Crooner Vince Hill has died aged 89. He was a minor soldier in the traditional pop army who managed to find footing on the UK charts well into the 60s. His repertoire mostly included Tin Pan Alley standards and Eurovision, and made his biggest chart impact with “Edelweiss” from The Sound of Music. It […]

YAKKY DOODLE DEADDY Ventriloquist and voice actor Jimmy Weldon’s main claim to fame was voicing Yakky Doodle, a motherless Donald Duck soundalike on The Yogi Bear Show who outsmarted a fox that parodied Shelley Berman and an alligator that parodied Alfred Hitchcock (both voiced by Daws Butler). Indeed, Weldon’s career largely existed because he could […]

ROMPEVIDAS Prolific Spanish cartoonist Francisco Ibáñez Talavera has died aged 87. His comic books were a bedrock of Spanish culture, especially the bumbling spy duo of Mortadelo y Filemón. Other creations included the eclectic ensemble of apartment inhabitants 13, Rue del Percebe and the Mr. Magoo-esque Rompetechos. He was still inking strips until shortly before […]

INTERN MILAN Spanish football great Luis Suárez has died aged 88. “El Arquitecto” (“The Architect”) became the first Spanish player to win the Ballon d’Or in 1960, and was noted for an elegant playstyle that helped take his country to their first European Championship in 1964. On the club level he first gained notice playing […]