Sukumizu

, short for , is a variant of swimwear intended for use by school students during swimming lessons in Japan. They can come in the form of either a one-piece or a two-piece swimsuit for girls, the latter of which corresponds to a sleeveless shirt for the upper torso. Boys, on the other hand, generally wear swim trunks. They are usually coloured in a dark blue hue, are closely fitting, and have typical seam lines that run laterally across the chest for girls. The material is generally a mixture of synthetic fibers such as nylon and polyester.
History.
The emerged in the late 1950s as both nylon and stretch fabrics became widely available, allowing for a stretchable and easy to dry swimsuit. Until this point, swimsuits consisted mainly of cotton and acetate fabrics. With the opening of the first factories able to produce swimsuits using the new material, a lucrative corner of the clothing market was created, in contrast with other types of garments which guaranteed a certain minimum turnover.
With the expectation of there always being new students requiring new swimsuits provided by the school, many manufacturers formed a direct relationship with schools, resulting in swimsuits being produced to a mostly standardised, easy to manufacture design and shape, expressly for the purpose of providing students with swimsuits to wear.
Earlier variations of the for girls are referred to as being the "old type" and "old old type", two similar varieties common during the time period from the late 1950s to the mid 1980s. Both styles, when viewed from the front, appeared to have separate top and bottom pieces, though both were sewn together as a one piece swimsuit. Newer variations of the swimsuit have retained these distinctive seam lines; however, the modern features a separate skirt and a different shape of the support, more attuned to the needs of the wearer.
Types.
Female.
Most swimsuits are one-piece suits, with distinctions between five different forms: the , , , , and .
Old type.
The old type, also known as the , is a one-piece suit with the part obscuring the pubic area connected from behind coming to the front with the surrounding fabric of the top covering the front piece seams; this results in a hole close to the belly button. The suit is sewn on the left and right sides. Due to elasticity, the body size is flexibly adapted and the inflowing of the chest can cause water leakage through the gap near the navel, which reduces water resistance. In the region of the buttocks, there is another seam, which often has the shape of an upside-down U, which causes significant visible wrinkles in the upper part. The rear shoulder area is also a U shape characterized as something resembling a deep neckline. The supports extend laterally and upwards at the shoulders, whereby a significant portion of the back is left uncovered. This gives the advantage where the length of the shoulder straps can be altered by offsetting the seams. This design was made with the assumption that students would grow in the meantime.
Old old type.
The old old type consisted of two garments, with the upper part resembling a skirt or a shirt, and the lower part modeled after bloomer shorts, which extends below the shoulders. Both sections are sewn on the inside, albeit not completely, so that it is possible to evert it to the level of the shoulders. To avoid accidental uncovering, the lining on the front side is connected to the lower piece. A seam at the lower end merges from the back portion directly obscuring the region surrounding the pubic area, giving a form of a skirt as seen from any direction.
New type.
Emerging around 1985, the skirt form has been removed, making the swimsuit appear more like a normal one-piece maillot. For this reason, it is also known as the . The typical front seams were left in place, however, and the shape of the shoulder straps have been revised, which forms a Y shape on the back. This changes the direction of the tensile load, so that the shoulder straps do not slip as easily, and gives swimmers more freedom of arm movement. It is made from improved stretching materials which are slightly thinner and have a smoother surface, which increases the wearer's comfort.
Competition type.
The competition type has its form beginning from the waist level with no longitudinal seam on the front, and is made of thinner material, with much narrower shoulder straps that are usually white and distinct from the main body of the swimsuit.
Spats type.
The spats type has great coverage of over the legs, hence its Japanese name, which refers to the English term "spats".
Appearance.
Colour.
 are generally supplied in a dark blue hue in the majority of cases. The dark colour prevents the swimsuit from becoming visually transparent when wet.
Nameplate.
A characteristic feature of is a name plate attached to the front of the swimsuit, placed over the chest area and allows the teacher to easily identify the students, which can be difficult due to bathing caps.
Use in media.
 are often used as a frequent trope in various Japanese media. It is often used as a running gag used for fan service or a comedic element in television series, animations and comics, and is a common ingredient in beach episodes. They are also often seen in gravure idol photoshoots and other adult entertainment media, often carrying a sexual connotation like the Japanese school uniform.


Giulio Cesare Martinengo

Giulio Cesare Martinengo (; – 10 July 1613) was an Italian composer and teacher of the late Renaissance and early Baroque Venetian School. He was the predecessor to Claudio Monteverdi at San Marco.
He probably came from Verona, and was the son of composer Gabriele Martinengo. Accounts giving his birthdate are conflicting: one from his mother claims he was born in 1564, but a document from the "house of the Accoliti" in Verona gives his age in 1583 as 15. He studied with his father in Verona, and in the 1590s he served at Verona Cathedral as a singer as well as a priest.
Martinengo is principally famous as the successor to Giovanni Croce, and predecessor to Claudio Monteverdi, to the post of "maestro di cappella" at San Marco in Venice, which was by far the most prestigious post in northern Italy. He was hired on 22 August 1609, at a pay of 200 ducats, after an audition, and on the recommendation of the Veronese. Martinengo's tenure was a failure; he was sick most of the time, and the standards of the choir and instrumentalists slipped badly, according to contemporary accounts. In addition, the establishment took on considerable debt and became disorganized and demoralized. Martinengo lacked the ability to manage the finances; according to the records of San Marco, he continually asked for advances on his salary, he was unable to pay the basilica's creditors, and on his death he still owed the treasurer his back salary for several months. He died only four years after his appointment, and the basilica authorities were much relieved to be able to hire Claudio Monteverdi, who restored the musical establishment at San Marco to the magnificence it had lost.
Little of Martinengo's music has survived. One motet, "Regnum mundi", is in the progressive concertato style, similar to contemporary works by Lodovico Grossi da Viadana. He also wrote three books of madrigals.


Pinball Dreams

Pinball Dreams is a pinball simulation video game developed by Digital Illusions and originally released for the Amiga in 1992. It spawned several sequels, including "Pinball Fantasies" and "Pinball Illusions". The MS-DOS port was digitally released by Rebellion Developments along with its sequel and "Pinball Mania" on February 22, 2011 on GOG.com with support for Microsoft Windows. It received an OS X build on April 23, 2013; and a Linux build on August 19, 2014.
Gameplay.
The game's four tables each had a theme, as do most real-life pinball & Panchinko machines. The version of Pinball Dreams bundled with the Amiga 1200 had a bug which rendered most of Beat Box's advanced features non-functional.
Development.
The ball moves according to reasonably realistic physics, and the game was restricted to using table elements which would also be possible to build in reality. Sound and music were realized with Module files, with this technology several music tracks could be included on the limited space of floppy disks.
Ports:
Reception.
"Pinball Dreams" was a commercial success, selling more than 650,000 copies in its debut year.
"Pinball Dreams" was overall received positive by press reviews. "Electronic Gaming Monthly" gave the Game Gear version a 5.8 out of 10, commenting that "Pinball never really worked well on portable systems and "Pinball Dreams" is no exception. The boards are huge, but the game is a little slow."
In 1993 "Computer Gaming World" criticized the PC version of "Pinball Dreams" as having "the worst physical model" of four reviewed games, and disliked the "jerk[y]" scrolling. The magazine said in June 1994 that "Pinball 2000" "is an average title at a better than average price". In 1996 the magazine ranked "Pinball Dreams" as the 119th best game of all time, stating, "Smooth scrolling and great ball physics made this Amiga game a wizard's choice." In 2011, Wirtualna Polska ranked it as the fourth best Amiga game.
Sequels and spin-offs.
"Pinball Dreams 2".
An alternate PC-only sequel, "Pinball Dreams 2", was released in 1995 by 21st Century Entertainment (like "Pinball Dreams") but was developed by Spidersoft.
It includes four tables:
Composer Andrew Barnabas did not have access to the game while writing its music, and was instead given only a list of song titles and a copy of the original "Pinball Dreams". He complained that "I couldn't even see what the game looked like. It was like composing in the dark."
"Pinball Mania".
"Pinball Mania" is a 1995 DOS game based on Pinball Dreams. While "Digital Illusions was not involved in the fourth title in 21st Century's pinball series" it was instead developed by Spidersoft. The game featured 4 tables: Kick Off, Jail Break, Tarantula, and Jackpot. PC Games (Germany) gave the game a 69 out of 100, while High Score gave it 3 out of 5. A Game Boy port was published by GameTek UK Ltd. Consoles Plus gave it 80 out of 100, while Total! (Germany) gave it 3 out of 6.
"Absolute Pinball".
"Absolute Pinball" is a 1996 DOS game based on Pinball Dreams. It was developed by Unique Development Studios AB and published by 21st Century Entertainment Ltd. on Sep 01, 1996. Joystick (French) gave it 80 out of 100, Coming Soon Magazine gave it 76 out of 100, PC Games (Germany) gave it 75 out of 100, PC Player (Denmark) gave it 70 out of 100, PC Player (Germany) gave it 3 Stars, High Score gave it 3 out of 5, PC Joker gave it 55 out of 100, and Power Play gave it 54 out of 100.
"Pinball Builder".
"Pinball Builder: A Construction Kit for Windows" is a Windows 3.x 1996 game developed by Spidersoft and published by 21st Century Entertainment. Based on the Pinball Dreams/Fantasies series, the game is a "pinball construction kit for Windows". Mobygames explains "This package was included in Encore's "Pinball Madness 2" collection in 1999." PC Player (Denmark) gave it 70 out of 100, Gamezilla gave it 58 out of 100, PC Games (Germany) gave it 53 out of 100, PC Player (Germany) gave it 2 Stars, Power Play gave it 34 out of 100, and High Score gave it 1 out of 5
"Total Pinball 3D".
"Total Pinball 3D" is a DOS game released in 1996 by 21st Century Entertainment and developed by Spidersoft.
A "Next Generation" reviewer criticized that the view of the table in 2D mode is too small due to it being restricted to one side of the screen, and concluded, "There is a lot of variety in play style, difficulty, and theme, and the graphics are sharp, but compared to the high level of detail and originality in recent titles, the tables here look bland. ... much better games like "Hyper 3-D Pinball" and "" now come to mind." He scored it two out of five stars. Coming Soon Magazine gave it 81 out of 100, PC Games (Germany) gave it 68 out of 100, GameSpot gave it 5.8 out of 10, Power Play gave it 42 out of 100, and PC Player (Germany) gave it 1 Stars.


Natalino Camilleri

Natalino Camilleri from the Nitero, Inc., Austin, TX was named Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in 2015 for "leadership in radio frequency integrated circuits and systems".
Early life.
Camilleri received the B.S.E.E. degree from the University of Malta and the M.S.E.E. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Texas at Austin.
Career.
He possesses over 20 years of experience in the development and creation of RF systems and integrated circuits. He is currently the President of RF & Wireless Design Services Inc., Cupertino, CA, a consulting company performing RFIC design.
Earlier in his career, he started up the Radio Product Line at Advanced Micro Devices, and was able to take some early product ideas and develop the award-winning chip set for digital spread-spectrum (DSS) cordless phones. He led the group through an acquisition by DSPG and was the President of RF Integrated Systems Inc.
He was instrumental in the development of the 900-MHz giga-range phones by Panasonic that use DSS chip sets. At AMD, he also developed integrated circuits (ICs) for wireless local-area network (WLAN) and GSM applications. Prior to his involvement with AMD, he was the Silicon RF Technology Manager at Motorola, where he developed leading-edge circuits for new technologies such as SiGe, BiCMOS, LDMOS, and CMOS.
He was instrumental in developing the LDMOS discrete technology and was the founding father for the LDMOS IC technology for Motorola. These products are now the premiere technology for Motorola’s RF business. He originally joined Motorola to start up the GaAs operation as the Design and Application Manager. He was instrumental in kicking off the early technology and IC products that later fueled GaAs RFIC business for Motorola.
Prior to Motorola, he was with HP-Avantek and Texas Instruments, where he was a Senior Member of the Technical Staff and developed ICs for microwave and millimeter-wave applications. He has authored or co-authored over 50 papers concerning RF technology. Camilleri has been on several IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (IEEE MTT-S) Technical Program Committees (TPCs) for 15 years and has held several positions on the RFIC Symposium Steering Committee.


Moritz Fuerst

Moritz Fuerst (March 1782 – 1840) was an American artist of Jewish-Slovak origin. He was born in Pezinok, near Bratislava, and died in Philadelphia.
Prior to immigrating, he was enlisted by the American consul at Livorno, Italy, in 1807, and came to the United States to work as an engraver. In 1808 he settled in Philadelphia, where he set up business as a seal and steel engraver and die-sinker. He was subsequently employed by the United States Mint in Philadelphia and soon received recognition as an early American medalist. Thirty-three of his patriotic commemoratives and portraits, including his best-known work which honored heroes of the War of 1812, are still issued by the U.S. Mint. He struck the official portraits of Presidents James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren. He also executed the first recorded American Jewish medal, to commemorate the death in 1816 of the patriot and religious leader Gershom Seixas.


Handel-C

Handel-C is a high-level programming language which targets low-level hardware, most commonly used in the programming of FPGAs. It is a rich subset of C, with non-standard extensions to control hardware instantiation with an emphasis on parallelism. Handel-C is to hardware design what the first high-level programming languages were to programming CPUs. Unlike many other design languages that target a specific architecture Handel-C can be compiled to a number of design languages and then synthesised to the corresponding hardware. This frees developers to concentrate on the programming task at hand rather than the idiosyncrasies of a specific design language and architecture.
Additional features.
The subset of C includes all common C language features necessary to describe complex algorithms. Like many embedded C compilers, floating point data types were omitted. Floating point arithmetic is supported through external libraries that are very efficient.
Parallel programs.
In order to facilitate a way to describe parallel behavior some of the CSP keywords are used, along with the general file structure of Occam.
For example:
par {
 ++c;
 a = d + e;
 b = d + e;
Channels.
Channels provide a mechanism for message passing between parallel threads. Channels can be defined as asynchronous or synchronous (with or without an inferred storage element respectively). A thread writing to a synchronous channel will be immediately blocked until the corresponding listening thread is ready to receive the message. Likewise the receiving thread will block on a read statement until the sending thread executes the next send. Thus they may be used as a means of synchronizing threads.
par {
 chan int a; // declare a synchronous channel
 int x;
 // begin sending thread
 seq (i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
 a ! i; // send the values 0 to 9 sequentially into the channel
 // begin receiving thread
 seq (j = 0; j < 10; j++) {
 a ? x; // perform a sequence of 10 reads from the channel into variable x
 delay; // introduce a delay of 1 clock cycle between successive reads
 // this has the effect of blocking the sending thread between writes
Asynchronous channels provide a specified amount of storage for data passing through them in the form of a FIFO. Whilst this FIFO neither full nor empty, both sending and receiving threads may proceed without being blocked. However, when the FIFO is empty, the receiving thread will block at the next read. When it is full, the sending thread will block at the next send. A channel with actors in differing clock domains is automatically asynchronous due to the need for at least one element of storage to mitigate metastability.
A thread may simultaneously wait on multiple channels, synchronous or asynchronous, acting upon the first one available given a specified order of priority or optionally executing an alternate path if none is ready.
Scope and variable sharing.
The scope of declarations are limited to the code blocks (codice_1) in which they were declared, the scope is hierarchical in nature as declarations are in scope within sub blocks.
For example:
int a;
void main(void)
 int b;
 /* "a" and "b" are within scope */
 int c;
 /* "a", "b" and "c" are within scope */
 {
 int d;
 /* "a", "b" and "d" are within scope */
Extensions to the C language.
In addition to the effects the standard semantics of C have on the timing of the program, the following keywords are reserved for describing the practicalities of the FPGA environment or for the language elements sourced from Occam:
Scheduling.
In Handel-C, assignment and the delay command take one cycle. All other operations are "free". This allows programmers to manually schedule tasks and create effective pipelines. By arranging loops in parallel with the correct delays, pipelines can massively increase data throughput, at the expense of increased hardware resource use.
History.
The historical roots of Handel-C are in a series of Oxford University Computing Laboratory hardware description languages developed by the hardware compilation group. Handel HDL evolved into Handel-C around early 1996. The technology developed at Oxford was spun off to mature as a cornerstone product for Embedded Solutions Limited (ESL) in 1996. ESL was renamed Celoxica in September 2000.
Handel-C was adopted by many University Hardware Research groups after its release by ESL, as a result was able to establish itself as a hardware design tool of choice within the academic community, especially in the United Kingdom.
In early 2008, Celoxica's ESL business was acquired by Agility, which developed and sold, among other products, ESL tools supporting Handel-C.
In early 2009, Agility ceased operations after failing to obtain further capital investments or credit
In January 2009, Mentor Graphics acquired Agility's C synthesis assets.
Other subset C HDL's that developed around the same time are Transmogrifier C in 1994 at University of Toronto (now the FpgaC open source project) and Streams-C at Los Alamos National Laboratory (now licensed to Impulse Accelerated Technologies under the name Impulse C)


Bernice Gordon

Bernice Gordon (January 11, 1914 – January 29, 2015) was an American constructor of crosswords. She created puzzles for many publications after beginning her career in the early 1950s, and holds the record as the oldest contributor to "The New York Times" crossword puzzle. A 1965 "Times" puzzle she wrote is credited as the first rebus puzzle, fitting an exclamation point into a single square. She celebrated her 100th birthday in 2014, just a few weeks after the 100th anniversary of the crossword. Her last puzzle was published in the "Los Angeles Times" on December 2, 2014.
History of puzzling.
Having loved doing puzzles as a child, Gordon started creating her own puzzles for fun in the early 1950s, shortly after her first husband died. Soon after, she started submitting them to Margaret Farrar, the first puzzle editor of "The New York Times". Despite 6 or 7 quick rejections (due to "Too many abbreviations", unfamiliar words, etc.), her first puzzle was accepted by the Times in 1952, a weekday puzzle for which she was paid $5 or $10. According to current puzzle editor Will Shortz, this was the first of over 150 puzzles from her the NYTimes would subsequently print. In 1955, she was assigned the 'Sunday stumper'. This was the first of 9 Sunday puzzles she would author for the Times.
At age 95, she became the oldest known crossword puzzle writer for "The New York Times". She subsequently broke her own record by being published in the "Times" at age 96, 97, 98 99, and again at age 100. Gordon published thousands of puzzles during her 60+ year career, and continued to write new puzzles daily. She called herself a "cruciverbalist," and credited her productivity to chronic insomnia.
Personal life.
Gordon was born January 11, 1914, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1935. She married Benjamin Lanard, cofounder of commercial realty company Lanard & Axilbund, in 1935. They had two sons, Ben and Bruce Lanard. Gordon was widowed in 1947, then remarried and added a daughter, Amanda, to the family.
In addition to writing puzzles, Gordon was an abstract painter and a needlepoint artist, finding inspiration in the places she traveled to, from her European honeymoon to Spain, Russia, Singapore, China, India, South America, and her favorite country, Egypt. She used to live in Philadelphia's Rittenhouse Square. In January 2014, The Rittenhouse Square Flower Market for Children's Charities (RSFMCC) recognized its 100th-year anniversary with a joint birthday bash also celebrating Gordon's 100th birthday. "Times" puzzle editor Will Shortz attended Gordon's 100th birthday party in Philadelphia. Gordon had an extensive personal library of reference books. On January 29, 2015, Gordon died of heart failure at the age of 101.
Notable puzzles.
Use of symbols and signs.
On Sunday, May 30, 1965, Gordon made puzzle history by introducing a convention-busting puzzle with answers including 'COWBOYS&INDIANS', 'CARMEN MIR&A', and 'SC&INAVIA', using ampersand signs in place of letters. This is now a common convention in crossword puzzles. Margaret Farrar initially rejected the puzzle with ten ampersands in it, calling it "trickery", but six months later decided to print it. The puzzle response was overwhelming, both evoking praise for originality, and anger from those who felt tricked. Gordon was also the first to include symbols in her answers, including answers like JIMMY*TER and BI*BONATE, where * had to be substituted for the letters 'CAR'.
Happy Hooker.
Gordon once created an X-rated puzzle for the Happy Hooker, aka Xaviera Hollander, a writer and former call girl with a bestselling memoir in the 1970s. Hollander became a family friend after getting to know Gordon's son, Ben Lanard, in Europe. Hollander had to provide the clues and dirty words for Gordon to incorporate.
Collaborations.
Norman Wizer.
Norman S. Wizer of Malvern, Pennsylvania (deceased August 12, 2013), also a veteran crossword puzzle writer, was one of Gordon's closest friends. The two collaborated often and co-authored puzzles in multiple publications, winning a best puzzle award for their contribution to the "Mega Crossword Puzzle Book" from Simon & Schuster.
David Steinberg.
David Steinberg, who at 14 was the second youngest puzzle constructor to be printed in "The New York Times", paired up with Gordon, then the oldest living "Times" constructor, on June 26, 2013, to create an age difference-themed puzzle. At the time the puzzle was published, Steinberg was 16, Gordon was 99. Will Shortz introduced Steinberg to Gordon initially.
They collaborated remotely and exchanged more than 70 emails.


Bibi Russell

Bibi Russell is a Bangladeshi fashion designer and former international model.
Career.
Russell was born in 1950 in Chittagong, Bangladesh to Mokhlessur Rahman and Shamsun Nahar. She grew up in Dhaka studying in Kamrunnessa Govt Girls High School and Later College of Home Economics, Azimpur, Dhaka. She earned a graduate degree in fashion from London College of Fashion in 1975. In the next five years, she worked as a model for different magazines including Vogue, Cosmopolitan and Harper's Bazaar. She also worked as a fashion model in fashion shows until 1994, working with Yves Saint Laurent, Kenzo, Karl Lagerfeld and Giorgio Armani. Returning to Bangladesh in 1994, Russell opened a fashion house named Bibi Productions, which fused indigenous Bengali cultural elements into her design. As of 2004, her company employed 35,000 weavers in rural Bangladesh.
Fashion shows.
With UNESCO support, Bibi Russell organized her first European fashion show (pioneering event by an South Asian female) in Paris in 1996. She also organized fashion show, "The Colours of Bangladesh", in Spain in 1997. In 2016, she participated in India at India Runway Week seventh edition where she presented her latest collection on Rajasthan khadi. Bibi's collection was celebrated by the Indian fashion industry. Recently (in year 2016 & 18), she showcased her collection for the opening show at the third biggest fashion week of India, Indian Federation for Fashion Development's India Runway Week Season 7.


Fil Barlow

Fil Barlow (born 1963) is an Australian artist, cartoonist, writer, production designer currently based in Los Angeles. Barlow is the creator of the "Zooniverse" comic book published in 1986-87.
Biography.
Barlow was born on 8 April 1963 in Adelaide, South Australia. In 1965 his family moved to Balwyn North, Victoria. He pursued drawing at an early age, self publishing his first comic book, "Fudsey", at age of 10, and the next year had his comic "Zeroy" serialized over four weeks in a Sunday paper called "The Observer". Barlow began his professional cartooning career with "Australian Scout Magazine" at the age of sixteen, two years later he became a regular contributor to Melbourne based "Inkspots Magazine". Minotaur Books proprietor, Colin Paraskevas, published Barlow's "Zooniverse" comic internationally in a joint venture with Eclipse Comics between 1986 and 1987.
Richard Raynis, then producer at DIC offered Barlow the character design supervisor position on ', which he worked on from 1987 to 1989. Barlow returned to Australia, moving to the Gold Coast, Queensland in 1992 creating the comic "Rex Vectar", which was serialized in "Megazone Magazine" in 1992 and ran until 1994, he also established his own publishing and animation production house, "Zoonimedia". In mid-1994 he moved to Brisbane, with Helen Maier one of the artists associated with Kinetic Comics. In 1996 Barlow returned to Los Angeles with Maier, establishing an animation production house, Artopia. Through his company Barlow has worked as a character design supervisor and lead character designer at Columbia Tristar, working on "Extreme Ghostbusters", ', the 3D series "", "Max Steel", "Heavy Gear" and Adam Sandler's feature "Eight Crazy Nights".
From 2001 onwards Barlow has worked independently as character and production designer on "Tutenstein", "Igor" and the co-creation with Helen Maier of the game "Spectrobes" for Disney.
In 2010 Barlow returned to Melbourne Australia to focus solely on "Zooniverse". Barlow began submitting "Zoon" related animations each month to the web site "Loop De Loop", and established a new company Zoonitoons with Maier and in 2012 they began republishing his "Zooniverse" and "Rex Vectar" comics. In 2014 the couple began collaborating on for Image Comics.


Hiragino

Hiragino () is a typeface family designed by and is sold by SCREEN Graphics Solutions Co., Ltd. (part of SCREEN Holdings, formally Dainippon Screen Mfg.) to professionals since 1993. It is one of the built-in fonts in macOS and iOS. This series includes not only Japanese Mincho (serif), Kaku Gothic (sans-serif), Maru Gothic (round sans-serif), semi-cursive script and kana typefaces, but also a sans-serif typeface for Simplified Chinese.
The typeface family is named after the place name Hiragino () in Kyoto, Japan.
JIYUKOBO.
JIYUKOBO Ltd. is a corporation founded by type designers Tsutomu Suzuki, Osamu Torinoumi, and Keiichi Katada, who formerly worked for the phototypesetting corporation Shaken (), in Tokyo in 1989. Suzuki served as the president, but after his death in 1998, Torinoumi took his place.


Thea Porter

Dorothea Noelle Naomi "Thea" Porter (24 December 1927 – 24 July 2000) was a British artist, fashion designer and retailer who in the 1960s brought opulent Middle East fashions to London.
Early life.
She was born Dorothea Noelle Naomi Seale, on 24 December 1927, in Jerusalem, and raised in Damascus. She was the daughter of Morris S. Seale, the Arabist and theologian, who was a Christian missionary in Syria, and his French wife, who was also a missionary. Her brother was the journalist Patrick Seale, and her sister Barbara "Bobbie" Seale married the yacht designer Beecher Moore.
Porter was educated at the "Lycée Français" in Damascus, Fernhill Manor, then for a short time studying French and Old English at Royal Holloway College, London, before being expelled.
Following her studies in England, she worked in the library of the British embassy in Beirut, where she met her future husband, Robert Porter. Together they travelled to Jordan and Iran, and had holidays in France and Italy. She studied painting during the day, and "went to nightclubs every night and had millions of clothes." In June 1961 Porter had her first solo painting exhibition at the Alecco Saab Gallery, Beirut.
Career.
After she separated from her husband, Porter moved to London in May 1964. Her first job was in interior design, working for Elizabeth Eaton. She opened her first shop, an interior decorating business offering imported cushions, fabrics and hangings called "Thea Porter Decorations Ltd", in Soho at 8 Greek Street on 27 July 1966. She realised that rather than just cutting up her imported kaftans to use the fabric for cushion covers, they were fashionable in their own right, and began making up her own in mixed fabrics and antique trimmings.
From 1967, she expanded internationally; her first wholesale client was Henri Bendel in New York in 1968.
Her customers, some of whom also became her friends, included Baby Jane Holzer, Lauren Bacall, Talitha Getty, Bianca Jagger, Mick Jagger, Inaara Aga Khan, Jutta Laing (the wife of R D Laing), Pamela, Lady Harlech, Veronique Peck, Princess Margaret, Edna O'Brien, Sharon Tate, Elizabeth Taylor, and Pete Townshend.
In 1971, Porter opened a store in New York financed by Michael Butler, the producer of the hit Broadway musical "Hair". It closed after six months, but she continued to sell very successfully at high-end boutiques across the United States; Giorgio Beverly Hills sold approximately $300,000 worth of Thea Porter designs per year in the mid-1970s. On 1 April 1977 she opened a store in Paris, on the ; this closed in 1979. "Thea Porter Decorations Ltd" went into receivership in February 1981; she subsequently worked from ateliers on Avery Row and Beauchamp Place. In 1986 Porter had a short business partnership with Princess Dina of Jordan in a smaller shop, Arabesque, on Motcomb Street. Zandra Rhodes has stated, "Sadly, one didn't hear of her after that". In her obituary, "The Guardian" noted that Porter had little interest in marketing and was generally poor at business.
Personal life.
In 1952, she married Robert "Bob" Porter, an economist with the British Embassy in Beirut. They divorced in 1964 or 1967. They had one daughter, Venetia.
In 1994 she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and died in London on 24 July 2000.


Carrivick Sisters

The Carrivick Sisters are twins Laura and Charlotte Carrivick from South Devon, England, who perform as a musical duo. They combine original songs, based on old stories, legends and folklore from their local area, with American bluegrass and old time music.
The Carrivick Sisters have been performing as a duo since 2006 and turned professional in 2007. They were finalists for the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award in 2010.
Their 2013 album "Over the Edge" featured Blair Dunlop on harmony vocals and, like their previous album "From the Fields", was produced by Josh Rusby (brother of folk singer Kate Rusby).


Costume Designers Guild Awards 2008

11th CDG Awards

February 17, 2009
Contemporary:

Slumdog Millionaire
Fantasy:

The Dark Knight
Period:

The Duchess
The 11th Costume Designers Guild Awards, honouring the best costume designs in film and television for 2008, will be given on February 17, 2009. The nominees were announced on January 13, 2009.
Nominees.
Film.
 Contemporary Film:
 Fantasy Film:
 Period Film:
Television.
 Contemporary Series:
 Fantasy or Period Series:
 Miniseries or Television Film:


Dave J. Browne

Dave J. Browne is a game designer who has worked primarily on role-playing games.
Career.
Dave Browne and Don Turnbull wrote the early TSR UK adventures U1-U3 (1981-1983), which added to the Greyhawk setting. He also wrote the adventure "Beyond the Crystal Cave" (1983) with Tom Kirby and Graeme Morris.


Flag of Weihaiwei

The flag of Weihaiwei was the flag used by the British leased territory of Weihaiwei, during British rule between 1903 and 1930. The flag consisted of a British blue ensign with a pair of Mandarin ducks on it.
History.
In 1898, the Empire of China leased the port of Weihaiwei () to the British Empire for 25 years. During the first few years, there was no individual flag for Weihaiwei. However, the Commissioners of Weihaiwei in Liu-kung Tao () used a Union Jack combined with a badge of a Chinese imperial dragon on a yellow background. In 1902, the new civil Commissioner for Weihaiwei James Stewart Lockhart wrote to the Colonial Office requesting a new flag for the territory as he felt that it was inappropriate to use a Chinese national symbol on a British flag and suggested using Mandarin ducks instead. (The Flag of the Qing dynasty at the time was a dragon on a yellow background).
He wrote to them stating:
"The design of the flag hitherto used by the Commissioner of this Dependency is a dragon on the Union Jack and is in my opinion quite unsuitable. I have therefore to request that the Crown Agents may be instructed to have made for the use of the Commissioner two new flags, the device of the Mandarin Duck being substituted for the Dragon, which is as you are aware the national emblem of China and not appropriate in the case of a British Dependency".
Following the letter, King Edward VII approved the change of design of the flag for both the Commissioner's flag and the blue ensign in 1903. He also provided for the flag to be used for merchant shipping as the merchant ensign. In 1930, when the lease did expire following negotiations with the Republic of China, it was the British flag that was lowered at the handover ceremony and not the flag of Weihaiwei.
Design.
The flag was designed as a British blue ensign defaced with a badge of two Mandarin ducks. The ducks consist of a male in the foreground and a female in the background drinking from a stream while standing on a reed-covered bank.
Mandarin ducks were chosen to replace the Chinese imperial dragon on the flag, in keeping with the British colonial tradition of selecting animals on colonial flags that reflected the ubiquity of the local wildlife within the respective territories.


Slip-on shoe

Slip-ons are typically low, lace-less shoes. The style which is most commonly seen, known as a loafer or slippers in American culture, has a moccasin construction. One of the first designs was introduced in London by Wildsmith Shoes, called the Wildsmith Loafer. They began as casual shoes, but have increased in popularity to the point of being worn in America with business suits. Another design was introduced as Aurlandskoen (the Aurland Shoe) in Norway (early 20th century). They are worn in many situations in a variety of colors and designs, often featuring tassels on the front, or metal decorations (the 'Gucci' loafer).
A less casual, earlier type of slip-on is made with side goring (sometimes called a "dress loafer"). Made in the same shape as lace-up Oxfords, but lacking the laces, these shoes have elasticated inserts on the side which allow the shoe to be easily removed but remain snug when worn. This cut has its greatest popularity in Britain.
Loafers.
History.
A bespoke shoe company based in London that was established in 1847 developed the first loafer as a country house shoe for the landed gentry and the royal family. The "Wildsmith Loafer" made by Raymond Lewis Wildsmith of Wildsmith Shoes, was designed for King George VI as a casual house shoe. The shoe has subsequently been marketed and sold by other London shoe firms and dubbed "the Harrow".
Shoemaker Nils Gregoriusson Tveranger (1874–1953) in Aurland, Norway, introduced his first design around 1908. Tveranger obtained protection for the design. N. Tveranger obtained a diploma at the Bergen exhibition in 1910 for his "Aurland shoe". The first Aurland shoes were also made with laces and a decorative upper side similar to the brogue shoe. Colors were initially natural until approximately 1960 when they were also painted black. At age 13 Tveranger went to North America where he learned the craft of shoemaking and returned to Norway age 20. Around 1930, Tveranger introduced a new design called the "Aurland moccasin", later renamed the "Aurland shoe". This design resembles the moccasins used by the Iroquois as well as the design of moccasin-like shoes traditionally worn by locals in Aurland. These traditional shoes resembled slippers and were useful outdoor in fine weather. In 1936 the local shoe handcraft in Aurland was described as a "very old industry" and shoes were sold in large numbers to foreign visitors. A 1953 catalog listed about 10 shoe factories in the small village of Aurland. When exported the USA the Aurland shoes were called "Norwegian Moccasins". The Norwegians began exporting them to the rest of Europe, where they were taken up by visiting Americans, and championed by the American "Esquire" magazine. Some photographs included with the "Esquire" feature were of Norwegian farmers in a cattle loafing area. The Spaulding family in New Hampshire started making shoes based on this design in the early 1930s, naming them "loafers", a general term for slip-on shoes which is still in use in America. In 1934, G.H. Bass (a bootmaker in Wilton, Maine) started making loafers under the name "Weejuns" (sounding like Nor"wegians"). The distinctive addition was a strip of leather across the saddle with a diamond cut-out. Initially only worn in the summer at home, the shoe grew in popularity in America to become a significant part of men's casual shoe wardrobe; in Europe the style has never reached the same degree of ubiquity.
The term penny loafer has uncertain beginnings. One explanation is when American prep school students in the 1950s, wishing to make a fashion statement, took to inserting a penny into the diamond-shaped slit on their Weejuns. Another theory is that two pennies could be slipped into the slit, enough money to make an emergency phone call in the 1930s. This, however, is an urban legend, as pay phone calls in the USA have never been less than five cents, nor have the pay phones ever accepted pennies. Either way, the name "penny loafer" came to be applied to this style of slip-on and has since stuck. The practice continues, especially among those who remain committed to a classic and refined but still scholarly appearance, such as lawyers.
In the mid-1950s, further continental influences brought a more elegant image to light, lower-cut slip-ons, which moved from purely casual use to being paired with suits in the 1960s (but still only in America). In 1966, Italian designer Gucci made the further step of adding a metal strap across the front in the shape of a horse's snaffle bit. These "Gucci loafers" (now a general term referring to shoes of this style by any manufacturer) also spread over the Atlantic and were worn by 1970s businessmen, becoming almost a Wall Street uniform, reaching widespread use by the 1980s.
At the start of the twenty-first century, a revival of penny loafers, whose popularity had peaked during the mid to late 1960s and again during the early 1980s to early 1990s, occurred, with the shoe appearing in a more rugged version, closer to the original concept, as either moccasins, or espadrilles, both of these styles being very low or flat without heels. This resurgence was most noticeable at college campuses across America.
Another variation on the basic style is the tassel loafer, which emerged in the 1950s. Again, though casual, their gradual acceptance among the American East Coast prep school culture as equivalent to brogues (wingtips), has led to them being worn there with suits, where they gained an association with business and legal classes.
Use.
In the United States and some European countries, such as Italy, the loafer enjoys general use as a casual and informal shoe worn for work and leisure, though lace-ups are still preferred for more formal situations. The general popularity of brown over black extends to loafers, sometimes using exotic leathers such as suede and cordovan. Since the early 1980s, socks have been optional while wearing loafers.
Though originally men's shoes, some styles of loafers, such as casual tassel and penny loafers, are also worn by women. Women's loafers tend to have shorter toes and are worn with a variety of outfits from shorts, jeans, slacks, and capris to dresses and skirts.
Gored shoes.
In an evolution entirely different than the loafer, Chelsea boots were invented by J. Sparkes Hall for Queen Victoria in 1836. The stretchable rubber produces a comfortable shoe combining the convenience of laceless shoes with the profile of lace-ups. Its feminine image was soon lost, and was dubbed "Congress gaiter" and "Boston boot" in America. Rare even in Britain, its country of origin, it is still the only style of slip-on worn with a suit in some of the highly conservative working environments in the City of London. With such a background, their use mimics that of Oxfords, so they are worn in brown with broguing as a country shoe, or in plainer, black styles with suits.


Nikhil Baran Sengupta

Nikhil Baran Sengupta (13 December 1943 – 18 February 2014) was a Hindi, Bengali, and Oriya art director, actor, painter and production designer. He made his debut as an art-director with "Gapa hele be Sata" (1975). His contribution to the success of films such as Janani (1984), Sahari Bagha (1985), Maa O Mamata, Suna Chadhei (1987), Jugantar, Tahader Katha, Bagh Bahadur (1989) and Mr. and Mrs. Iyer (2002) had always been acknowledged but less talked about.
In his 40 years of career span in the film industry, he was instrumental in encouraging young talents from Orissa to take center stage. In 1994, he was awarded as the Best Art Director for "Janani" and in 2009, he was awarded the Guru Kelu Charan award in the lifetime achievement category.
Early life.
Sengupta grew up in Cuttack, the former capital and the largest city of the state of Odisha, India. He did his early schooling at the Ranihat Schooil in Cuttack, and later went to the Ravenshaw University, but his heart was with the world of art, which took him to Kolkata to study art at the Government College of Art & Craft.
Upon completion of his studies in 1969, he worked with a number of advertising firms, as a visualiser and as an illustrator for several magazines. He delved into painting and had a few exhibitions of his works. However, once he got into the film industry, he did not have any time to look back.
Career.
A pioneer for the Oriya film industry, Nikhil da has the enviable distinction of working for more than 100 films in three languages – Oriya, Bengali and Hindi – and with 35 directors. He is lone member of the Oriya film industry to work with stalwarts like Aparna Sen, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Manmohan Desai, Amol Palekar, Prasant Nanda, Biplab Roy Choudhury, Nitai Palit, Govind Tej and Raju Mishra.
Winner of three State Awards for art direction – Hakim Baboo, Janani and Hisab Nikas – his distinct debut came with Oriya film industry's first color film Gapa Helebi Sata.
The jury of Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Award in recognition of his services and eminence has great pleasure in nominating Shri Nikhil Baran Sengupta for the award in the category of “ Eminent Person" in Cinema for the year 2008.
Personal life.
Nikhil Da was married to Bijoya Sengupta. They had two sons- Neel Sengupta and Biman Sengupta. Whenever he had time from his shoots, Nikhil da loved to paint with water colours at his leisure. He died 18 February 2014 aged 70.


RHEM

RHEM is an adventure game from Knut Müller and Got Game Entertainment. It is distributed as a Macromedia Director file. The player explores a barren, maze-like landscape of water ponds, walkways, and brick buildings with the aid of a partial map. The game has several puzzles involving machines and symbols. There are three sequels, called ', ' and "".
"RHEM", like "Myst", is made up of a series of static images.
The object of the game is to locate four pieces of a letter, which must be pieced together.
Plot.
The player enters the city of RHEM on a railway car. The car goes into a dead-end station with a rotatable track. The player is unable to leave because the track is not yet rotated. While the player is on his way to the switch to rotate the station track, a previous prisoner of RHEM beats the player to the switch he was after and leaves in the player's railway car. The player must then wander the city of Rhem in search of a second railway station.
Each of the quarters of the letter is located in a different area not shown on the map provided in the game's package.
Production.
According to Müller, the following development tools are used to develop "RHEM"
Graphics:
Sound:
Scripting:
Reception.
"RHEM" received "mixed" reviews according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. Robert Gerbino of GameZone praised its similarity to "Myst" in terms of its puzzles but criticized the graphics and repetitive gameplay.


Stunt Driver

Stunt Driver is a polygonal racing game released for MS-DOS in 1990. It has a feature set similar to Brøderbund's "Stunts" published the same year, including a track editor, and both games have much in common with "Hard Drivin', the Atari Games" 3D stunt driving simulator released in February 1989.
"Stunt Driver" allows the user to create a racetrack from components such as draw-bridges, banked curves, oil slicks, water hazards, and loops, then race on them alone, against computer-controlled opponents, or against another user via a modem or null-modem connection. It allows viewing and editing of replays using different cameras, another feature shared with "Stunts".
Reception.
"Computer Gaming World" praised "Stunt Driver"s game play and performance, sound card audio, and extensive customization options, and stated that it was a good computer counterpart to Atari's "Hard Drivin"' arcade game.


Barrage (video game)

Barrage is a video game developed by American studio Mango Grits and published by Activision for Microsoft Windows in 1998. Published by Zoo in the territory of Japan.
Reception.
The game received mixed reviews according to the review aggregation website GameRankings. "Next Generation" said, "As a generic shooter, "Barrage" is fun, but it won't win any awards. It is, however, relatively inexpensive at $29.99, and that may be its saving grace."


The Journeyman Project (video game)

The Journeyman Project is a time travel adventure computer game developed by Presto Studios.
Gameplay.
The game features a first-person perspective. The protagonist sees a display, a rectangle shaped visor (acting as a monocle for Agent 5). This user interface helps to reduce the movie size and maintain relatively high frame rates. Controls work as four interface buttons located below the screen. They move Agent 5 forward and backward, and rotate Agent 5 left and right.
The Journeyman Project was billed as interactive movie adventure game, where the player is presented with several clues and puzzles that must be solved in order to move on or finish the level. Items that the player finds can be helpful or harmful as he attempts to explore his surroundings. The most important of these items are the seven bio-chips, which enhance the player-character's abilities in various ways. The game's user interface stores the bio-chips in a special "bio-chip panel", which serves as a "quick-menu" for activating and deactivating the various chips.
Story.
The game takes place in the distant future, after the Earth has been united into a peaceful global community. A scientist has discovered the technology of time travel but because of its dangerous nature, the prototype machine, "Pegasus", has been placed under government control and further attempts at traveling through time or developing time travel technology are forbidden by law.
The game begins as humanity welcomes the first alien delegation to visit the planet, and prepares to answer positively to an invitation to join the interplanetary "Symbiotry of Peaceful Beings". During the induction ceremony, the government-operated Temporal Security Agency (TSA), which was established to enforce prohibitions on time travel and safeguard the timeline, detects three temporal disturbances that have altered history; the Agency mobilizes Agent 5 to correct the disruptions, which have altered the timeline so that the Symbiotry never extended its invitation.
Upon retrieving a cache of unaltered historical data from the distant past, Agent 5 discovers that the anachronisms are related to Earth's first contact with the Symbiotry; ten years prior, the aliens had extended their offer, and planned to return in one decade to receive Earth's answer. An unknown party has altered the timeline to prevent contact with the Symbiotry, either through preventing them from reaching Earth or changing humanity's reaction to the aliens' arrival.
The disruptions occurred during three key events in Earth's recent past:
After preventing the robots' missions and collecting evidence from each time period, Agent 5 discovers that the person responsible for the disruptions is Dr. Elliot Sinclair, the inventor of the Pegasus time machine. He fears that the aliens are a malevolent force rather than a peaceful race, and is doing everything in his power to make Earth an unsuitable candidate for joining the aliens.
In all three scenarios, the player has two ways to neutralize the robots—one "peaceful" and one "aggressive"—which will affect the player's overall score. The player also gains bio-chips from each robot when he completes each scenario successfully.
After correcting the anachronisms created by Dr. Sinclair, Agent 5 learns that the doctor decided to take matters into his own hands and assassinate the alien delegate sent to receive Earth's answer. Agent 5 finds Dr. Sinclair hiding on top of an apartment building and holding a rifle, ready to fire on the delegate as soon as he arrives. After a brief scuffle, Agent 5 arrests Dr. Sinclair, allowing history to take its proper course.
Development.
"The Journeyman Project" was completed in 1992 and released in early 1993 after 2 years of development. The game impressed the gaming press with its use of high quality rendered environments, stylistic artwork and digital audio.
Due to performance difficulties, the game was re-released in 1994 as "Journeyman Project Turbo!", with an updated executable that drastically decreased loading times and improved animation quality.
Two sequels (' and ') were released in subsequent years, and a fourth game was in the design stage before Presto Studios closed in November 2002; it was eventually shelved in favor of work on ".
A redesign of the game, with the subtitle of ", was released for the Power Macintosh; it featured updated graphics, enhanced and updated sounds and puzzles, and improved video technology. Plans to release it on multiple platforms were cancelled. In April 2014 the game was released on Windows through GOG.com.
Reception.
"The Journeyman Project" sold 150,000 copies, and spawned the "Journeyman Project" series, which together sold roughly 500,000 units by July 1996. The game was self-published and retailed for $90, with a per-sale profit of $40–50 for Presto Studios. It had been developed on $70,000.
"Computer Gaming World" in July 1993 called "The Journeyman Project" "visually stunning" and its world "believably fantastic". The magazine stated that the game was "as tough as they come" and recommended built-in hints, but concluded that "It is all the more rewarding after puzzling past each conundrum". In April 1994 the magazine said that the game had "wonderfully rendered 3D worlds" with "Solid acting by real pros", concluding that it was "Definitely a game with which to wow the neighbors".
"MacUser" named "The Journeyman Project: Turbo" one of the top 50 CD-ROMs of 1995.
Derek Pearcy reviewed "The Journeyman Project" in "Pyramid" #2 (July/Aug., 1993), and stated that "This game - this environment - is the finest experience available on the Macintosh platform. While maybe not the intellectual challenge that other programs might offer, it is the clarity of vision and attention to detail that should take this game out of the store and into your home ."
Releases and bug fixes.
The game suffered from performance problems and slow animations due to its early reliance on Macromedia Director. These problems were mostly overcome with the version 2.0 release and retitled as "The Journeyman Project Turbo!" under the publisher Sanctuary Woods in 1994.


Cobalt WASD

Cobalt WASD is an action video game developed by Oxeye Game Studio and published by Mojang released on 30 November 2017 for Microsoft Windows.
Gameplay.
The player plays as either a "Metalface" or a "Protobot". The Metalfaces try to defend the bomb-sites, while the Protobots try to attack and plant a bomb. When the Protobots plant the bomb, the Metalfaces must try to defuse the bomb before it explodes. The Protobots win when they kill all of the Metalfaces, and the Metalfaces win then they defuse the bomb. At the end of each round, players can choose to buy armor, weapons, or vehicles. While the game mainly focuses on the online multiplayer game mode, there is a mode where the player can play against offline bots.
History.
"Cobalt WASD" is a separate stand-alone spin-off of "Cobalt". The developers saw that the original game was too complex for some players and its higher price point discouraged some players, so they wanted to make a completely different game. They decided to make a spin-off of "Cobalt", focusing on just one game mode.
Reception.
"Cobalt WASD" has been called a "very funny and competitive multiplayer game" and a "2D version of "Call of Duty"'s Search and Destroy game mode".


Petra Ecclestone

Petra Ecclestone (born 19 December 1988) is a British heiress, model, fashion designer and socialite.
Early life.
Ecclestone was born in London as the younger daughter of former Armani model Slavica Ecclestone (née Radić) and English Formula One billionaire Bernie Ecclestone. She has an older sister, Tamara Jane, and an older paternal half-sister, Deborah.
She attended Trevor-Roberts School, then Francis Holland School, and Benenden School
She contracted viral meningitis at the age of 14, and told the media that it "changed her life forever". She said "I no longer take my health for granted ... I’m now a health freak and a hypochondriac. I’m obsessed with cleanliness, I eat healthily and take my vitamins." She has since become an ambassador for the Meningitis Trust.
Fashion career.
Growing up, she wanted to be a fashion designer. She decided to make menswear because it is a "bigger niche" and because "womenswear was too saturated".
At the age of 19, she created the menswear label FORM, which was sold into retailers including Harrods from October 2008. In April 2009 it was announced that Petra had signed a contract with the Croatian clothing manufacturer Siscia.
Personal life.
As well as English, she speaks Croatian fluently and understands French and Italian.
On 27 August 2011, Ecclestone married businessman James Stunt.
She gave birth to their first child, daughter Lavinia Stunt, in February 2013. In April 2015 she gave birth to twin boys, James Robert Fredrick Stunt Jr and Andrew Kulbir Stunt. They divorced in 2017, and she reverted to her maiden name.
Residences.
Her mansion, The Manor, was the former residence of Candy and Aaron Spelling, and is the largest house in Los Angeles County. According to a 2012 article in the "Wall Street Journal", she had first viewed several other properties, including a 36,000-square-foot property on Sunset Boulevard, priced at $49.5 million. The real estate broker Rick Hilton said: "I showed her several properties but they weren't grand enough." In 2014, Ecclestone put The Manor back on the market with a price tag of $150 million. However, she reportedly turned down an offer that met her price in December 2015. The Manor was relisted for sale in October 2016 with an asking price of $200 million. In June 2019, it sold to an anonymous buyer for $119.7 million, the highest sale price in Californian history.
She also owns a residence in Chelsea, London that she bought in 2010 for $90 million. The owner of the construction company that worked on the building, Sayed Bukhari, said in the "Wall Street Journal" article that she had already been offered more than $125 million for the four-story home.


Arthur Max

Arthur Max (born May 1, 1946) is an American production designer. He has been nominated for three Academy Awards: once each for his Production Design work on "Gladiator" (2000), "American Gangster" (2007), and "The Martian" (2015). In addition to his Oscar nominations, Max won several other honors for his production design on the film, including the BAFTA, the National Board of Review prize and the Broadcast Film Critics honor. He also collected two "Excellence in Production Design" Awards from the Art Directors Guild, the first for Gladiator and the second for The Martian. He was previously nominated for "Black Hawk Down", "Robin Hood", "American Gangster", "Prometheus" and "Panic Room". After "The Martian (film), Max worked on All the Money in the World (2017) ', "The Counselor", "Kingdom of Heaven", "Robin Hood", "Black Hawk Down", and "Body of Lies". His first job as a Production Designer was Fincher's 1995 thriller, "Seven'. More recently he completed "The Last Vermeer (2019) " which was based on a true story of art forgery, set in Holland just after World War II , and his last project was the soon to be released " The Last Duel (2020)" . Currently he is working on " House of Gucci " on location in Italy marking his 14th project with Director Ridley Scott.
The native New Yorker began his career as a stage lighting designer in the music industry following graduation from New York University in the late 1960s. Those assignments included work at Bill Graham's famous music venue The Fillmore East in New York's East Village, and the historic Woodstock Festival of 1969. During the following decade, he designed concert lighting and festival stages for many rock and jazz artists. He was Pink Floyd's lighting designer during the bands' tours in the US and around the world in the early-1970s. After studying architecture in England (earning degrees in the early-1980s from the Polytechnic of Central London and the Royal College of Art), Max went on to do several architectural design projects in London including an award-winning lighting design for the stage of St John's Concert Hall, a former 18th Century church in the centre of Smith Square, Westminster, London.
He entered the British film industry as an assistant to several English production designers. First for Stuart Craig on Hugh Hudson's "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes" and "Cal" (both 1984), then for Ashetton Gorton on Hudson's "Revolution" the following year. He commenced his own production design career in TV commercials over a period of ten years from 1985 to 1995 (for such clients as Pepsi, Nike, Jeep, Coke and Levi's), which led to his ongoing associations with directors Scott and Fincher.


SteamWorld Tower Defense

SteamWorld Tower Defense is a tower defense video game by Swedish video game developer Image & Form. It was released digitally on Nintendo DSi in North America, Europe and Australia on July 5, 2010. It is the first game released in the "SteamWorld" series.
Gameplay.
In "SteamWorld Tower Defense" the player controls an army of steam-powered robots in a tower defense-style gameplay. The aim of the game is to take down wandering troops of human invaders in their attempt to steal gold from the robots' mining facilities. To clear a mission, the player must take down waves of human soldiers by building and strategically placing out attack robots with a range of abilities and weapons. It's possible to play the game on several difficulty levels.
Reception.
"SteamWorld Tower Defense" on Nintendo DSi has received favorable reviews from critics, with a current score of 71/100 on Metacritic.
Development.
On their YouTube channel, Image & Form revealed that "SteamWorld Tower Defense" is the hardest game the studio has created. Apparently, the game's lead developer is the only of Image & Form employees to finish the game.
The game is set before the events depicted in "SteamWorld Dig" and "SteamWorld Heist".


Hum Honorary Most Challenging Subject Award

The Hum Honorary Most Challenging Subject Award is given by the Board of Directors of the Hum Television Network and Entertainment Channel (HTNEC) to the Hum Television Network most challenging and most important
subjective based work. The recipients of this award are usually director's, producer's and writers of most promising work of Hum TV.
This is one of the Special Award given by the Channel directors to the work of exceptional achievements. All the categorized and organized special award is awarded annually during the ceremony.
Hum Honorary Most Challenging Subject Award incepted with the origin of first Awards, and it may not be awarded every year, it is one of the category that is only based on the special inaugurated work of the year, this award may have irregular wins.
Recipients.
Following is the listing of the recipients of Hum Honorary Most Challenging Subject Award:
2010s.
Note: "The † symbol indicates a posthumous awarded."


Lester W. Smith

Lester W. Smith is a game designer who has worked primarily on role-playing games.
Career.
Early work and GDW.
Lester Smith began his game-design career in 1984 with "Mind Duel", a science-fiction board game submission to "Space Gamer" magazine. In 1985, he joined the staff at Game Designers' Workshop. Marc Miller, Frank Chadwick, Lester Smith, and Timothy Brown of GDW designed the new game ' (1986) as an expansion of the original "Traveller" role-playing game. He designed the "Temple of the Beastmen" board game. Smith's game "Dark conspiracy" (1991) for GDW used the new "house system" created for the second edition of '. Smith designed the "Minion Hunter" board game.
TSR and Dragon Dice.
Smith later left GDW to work for TSR. He was hired by TSR in 1991, and contributed to the "AD&D" and "Amazing Engine" role-playing game lines. Smith and Wolfgang Baur co-designed the "Planes of Chaos" boxed set. He designed the Origins Award-winning "Dragon Dice". Smith designed "Chaos Progenitus" (1996), also marketed as "Demon Dice". Smith then worked for Imperium Games. Smith later worked for Ken Whitman's Archangel Entertainment, and then joined Don Perrin in the design of the "Sovereign Stone" roleplaying game. He has also done work for FASA, Flying Buffalo, West End Games, and others, acquiring two other Origins Awards in the process. Timothy Brown, James Ward, Smith, John Danovich, and Sean Everette founded the d20 company Fast Forward Entertainment.
Later work.
Smith worked as an educational writer and technologist for a Houghton Mifflin design house and for a time served as the president of the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets. As of today, Smith is officially retired. Since 2011, Smith has launched 13 successful funded campaigns on the crowdfunding platform kickstarter. These projects include books, role-playing games and card games that Smith has designed himself.
Personal life.
Lester Smith is an alumnus of Illinois State University. He married his wife Jennifer and they had four daughters together. In 2015, Smith and his wife moved to Loma, Nebraska to live closer to family.


Ultimate X match

The Ultimate X match is a type of professional wrestling match created by Impact Wrestling (formerly Total Nonstop Action Wrestling, TNA), mainly used in their X Division. It is considered the signature match of the X Division.
Match format.
Ultimate X is contested by three or more wrestlers of the X Division. Two cables, connected to metal structures rising from the four corners of the ring, cross 15 feet above the middle of the ring. Similar to a ladder match, an object (usually a championship belt or a large red "X") is suspended from where the cables cross. The winner is the first person to take possession of the hung object. After TNA made the transition to a hexagonal ring in June 2004, the cables were suspended from the four turnbuckles that were not perpendicular to the entrance ramp.
TNA official Don Callis received on-screen credit for the idea for the Ultimate X match. The tagline "No Limits and No Ladders" was added to the first match to emphasize the change. In this first match, bare steel wires, which were not secured in the center, were used above the ring, allowing them to bounce separately and causing the belt to tear off twice, requiring it to be reattached. In all future matches, standard ring cables were used, and the ropes were secured at their crossing. Matches are typically referred to by number ("Ultimate X1", "Ultimate X2", etc.). TNA has not noted the numeratical order by name, however. This has only been practiced by fans since X4. The Ultimate X match type is a match type in the TNA Impact! game, released in September 2008.
Rule nuances.
After Ultimate X4, in which Michael Shane and Kazarian pulled the championship belt down at the same time, it was ruled that if both combatants land on the mat while still holding the object, they are declared "co-winners".
During Ultimate X6, Chris Sabin and Petey Williams detached the belt at the same time when A.J. Styles jumped from the top rope to snatch the belt from them while they were still hanging from the ropes, taking sole possession and landing on the mat, winning the title.
During Ultimate X7, the belt was initially pulled down by A.J. Styles; however, Christopher Daniels hit Styles with his Angels Wings finisher and took the belt away from Styles, and was declared the winner because the referee was knocked out, and did not realize that Styles first detached the title.
During Ultimate X8, the object (the red "X") was partially detached, but both Chris Sabin and Michael Shane fell, and the X dropped, untouched, to the ground. Referee Mark "Slick" Johnson stopped anyone from taking it and had officials rehang it. When it fell later, it fell into the waiting arms of Petey Williams and he was declared the winner. The decision was held up, as this was not the planned finish, and a rematch was held (Ultimate X9) soon after.
Although Ultimate X matches are considered no-disqualification, interference and the use of weapons are rare. Wrestlers are not allowed to use a ladder as a way to grab the object, although technically they may use one as a weapon. In Ultimate X14, however, Team 3D got away with using a ladder because the referee was knocked out.
Variations.
Ultimate X4 was the first match of its kind to take place in a hexagonal ring.
Ultimate X7 used a variation of the rules, called the "Ultimate X Challenge". The match began under standard tag team rules, yet once a decision occurred, the wrestler who lost the decision was eliminated from the match. The remaining three competitors then wrestling under Three way dance rules to eliminate another competitor. The remaining two competitors then wrestled the Ultimate X match to determine the ultimate winner.
Ultimate X11 was the first tag team Ultimate X match. It was contested by two teams (for the NWA World Tag Team Championship) in a way similar to a Texas Tornado match with all four competitors attempting to obtain the object (one of the two title belts). The team of the wrestler that retrieves the belt won the match and the title.
Ultimate X12 was the first Ultimate X Gauntlet match. It began as a ten-man Gauntlet for the Gold, with entries at timed intervals and eliminations allowed. Elimination occurred when a competitor went over the top rope and hit the floor. After all 10 participants have entered, the wrestlers still eligible in the match attempted to obtain the object (the red "X") and win the match. This time, the normal Ultimate X structure was replaced with the Elevation X structure. The Elevation X structure has been used in all matches since Ultimate X17.
Ultimate X14 was the first six-man tag team Ultimate X match. It was held at Final Resolution 2008, pitting Team 3D and Johnny Devine against X Division Champion Jay Lethal and the Motor City Machine Guns. Team 3D broke an "unwritten rule" by using the ladder to retrieve the X Division Championship.
Ultimate X19 was the first non-televised Ultimate X match, taking place at a live event in London, England.
Ultimate X20 was the first Ultimate X match since Ultimate X3 to take place in a four sided ring.
Ultimate X21 was the first Ultimate X match to feature only two wrestlers and the first that could also be won via submission.
Elevation X.
Elevation X was a variant of Ultimate X that combined the standard match with a scaffold match. It took place only twice, in 2007 and 2008, both at Destination X. In the shape of giant X, the platforms were raised 15 feet above the ring. The two participants would start at the ground level, climb their way up, and finish the match there. The loser is the wrestler who falls from the scaffold into the ring below. After 2008, the match would no longer be contested due to safety concerns. Rhino has participated in and won both matches as he defeated AJ Styles the first year and James Storm in the second and final year of the match. After the match was scrapped, the scaffolds would be occasionally used for Ultimate X matches, especially when there was a high number of wrestlers in the match.


Numeric std

 numeric_std is a library package defined for VHDL. It provides arithmetic functions for vectors. Overrides of std_logic_vector are defined for signed and unsigned arithmetic. It defines numeric types and arithmetic functions for use with synthesis tools. Two numeric types are defined: UNSIGNED (represents UNSIGNED number in vector form) and SIGNED (represents a SIGNED number in vector form). The base element type is type STD_LOGIC. The leftmost bit is treated as the most significant bit. Signed vectors are represented in two's complement form. This package contains overloaded arithmetic operators on the SIGNED and UNSIGNED types. The package also contains useful type conversions functions.
It is typically included at the top of a design unit:
 library ieee;
 use ieee.std_logic_1164.all; -- standard unresolved logic UX01ZWLH-
 use ieee.numeric_std.all; -- for the signed, unsigned types and arithmetic ops
The alternative numeric package ieee.std_logic_arith should not be used for new designs. This package does not provide overrides for mixing signed and unsigned functions. This package includes definitions for the following (not all of which are synthesizable):
arithmetic operators.
"Note: the second argument of /, rem, or mod must be nonzero."
resize function.
"Note: when increasing the size of a signed vector the leftmost bits are filled with the sign bit, while truncation retains the sign bit along with the (n-1) rightmost bits. For an unsigned vector, a size increase fills the leftmost bits with zero, while truncation retains n rightmost bits."
conversion functions.
"Note: The latter two functions each require a second argument specifying the length of the resulting vector."
match function.
"Note: compares argument vectors element by element, but treats any bit with the value '-' as matching any other STD_ULOGIC value. Returns false if any argument bit is 'U', 'X', 'W', or 'Z'."
special translation function.
"Note: 'H' is translated to '1' and 'L' is translated to '0'; this function takes an optional second argument XMAP, which can be any of the std_logic values, but defaults to '0'. Any value besides 01LH in the input argument results in all bits being set to XMAP, with a warning issued."


Giuseppe Grandi

Giuseppe Grandi (1843–1894) was an Italian sculptor.
Life.
Grandi was born and died in Valganna. Taught by Vela at the Accademia di Brera, in 1866 he won the Canonica competition with a sculpture called "Ulisse" and began to work on a verist sculpture of Tabacchi at Turin. After his Turin period, he returned to Milan, where he joined the Lombard Scapigliatura school. He was a friend of Cremona and Ranzoni, and with them assumed a renewed anti-academist position and shared their common luministic research. Forgetting neoclassical smoothness and the lucidity of Romantic art, he sought the luministic effects of painting in sculpture.
One of his best-known works is the monument to Cesare Beccaria of 1871, along with the lesser-known "paggio di Lara" of 1873 and his "Maresciallo Ney" of 1874.
In 1881 his initial design won a public competition to create a monument to the "Five Days of Milan" in piazza di Porta Vittoria in Milan. For thirteen years he worked intensively at compositions, modelli, bronze casting, and even created a small menagerie of animals as live models for the work. For each of the Five Days he had many different and well-known models pose, but he died in 1894, before he could see his work inaugurated.
The city of Milan has renamed a piazza after him.


Geefwee Boedoe

Geefwee Boedoe (born in 1965 as Jeffrey Border) is an animator and illustrator. He won the 2004 Reuben Award for Book Illustration from the National Cartoonists Society. His animated short film "Let's Pollute" has been nominated for an Academy Award by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Biography.
Geefwee Boedoe, sometimes credited as Gee Fwee Boedoe, first worked as an animator for Disney and Pixar, collaborating on movies like "Monsters, Inc.", where he did the main title design, "Finding Nemo", "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" and "Beauty and the Beast". Some of his work was shown in a travelling Pixar exposition, and in the book "The Art of "Finding Nemo"".
He wrote and illustrated his first book, "Arrowville", published by Laura Geringer and HarperCollins, in 2004. It is a book for 4- to 8-year-olds in the vein of Dr. Seuss.
The book was selected as one of the 10 best illustrated children's books of 2004 by the New York Times Book Review, and won Boedoe the Reuben for Book Illustration.
Films.
Geefwee Boedoe's six-minute film "Let's Pollute" has been nominated for an Oscar for the Best Short Film, Animated category. This is the first Academy Award nomination for Boedoe.


Lloyd King (puzzle designer)

Lloyd King is a puzzle designer living in the UK.
King specialises in creating novel and unusual puzzles with "Aha!" answers. Most of his puzzles require lateral and "outside the box" thinking. Many lateral thinking puzzles are open ended, with numerous possible correct answers, but King strives to create puzzles with a single answer, which should become obvious with the illuminating "Aha!" moment on discovering the solution to a puzzle.
He has written a number of books, and his puzzles are often quoted and used as illustrative examples in works by other authors, including "Riddles of the Sphinx" by David J Bodycombe. King's puzzles have also appeared in the "Get Smart in a Week" creativity test on BBC1 in 2006, in "OMNI", "The Times", "The Independent", "GAMES" and various other publications, games and advertising.


Skip Mercier

G. W. "Skip" Mercier (July 20, 1954 – March 11, 2021) was an American costume, puppet, and set designer. He has designed for over 370 productions of theater, musical theater, opera, dance, film, and television. He is best known for his set and costume designs for "Juan Darien: A Carnival Mass" in which he received a Tony Award Nomination for Scenery and two Drama Desk Nominations for Scenic Design and Costume Design in 1997. He was a member of the faculty at the University of Washington School of Drama, where he taught scenic design and costume design to both graduate students and undergraduates.
Life.
Mercier was born in Methuen, Massachusetts on July 20, 1954, and was raised in nearby Haverhill. In 1980, Mercier graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of California, Berkeley with a BA in Dramatic Art and in 1983 received his MFA at the Yale School of Drama where he was named the Oenslager Scholar.
Starting in 1983, he became a Resident Designer for the O'Neill National Playwrights Conference until 2004 and has been the O'Neill National Theater Institute's design instructor for over 20 years. He is also a Resident Designer for the Vineyard Theater in New York City and Geva Theatre Center in Rochester. He currently works at the University of Washington School of Drama in Seattle as a senior design lecturer.
At the Vineyard Theater, he has received three Drama Desk Nominations for "Bed and Sofa" (1996) by Polly Pen and Laurence Klavan, "Dream True" (1999) by Tina Landau and Ricky Ian Gordon, and "Head of Passes" (2016) by Tarell McCraney. He also received the AUDELCO award for Outstanding Set Design and was regionally honored with the "Bay Area Critics Award" at Berkeley Repertory Theater for "Head of Passes" (2016).
His first Broadway production was "Juan Darien: A Carnival Mass" (1997) by Julie Taymor and Elliot Goldenthalat at the Vivian Beaumont where he received a Tony Award Nomination for Scenery and two additional Drama Desk Nominations for Scenic Design and Costume Design.
He has also designed sets for "Old Hats" (2013) by Bill Irwin and David Shiner, directed by Tina Landau, where he was nominated for the 2013 Henry Hewes Design Award. He has been nominated for the Henry Awards for Outstanding Scenic Award of Denver Theater Center's "Measure for Measure" directed by Kent Thompson in 2006, awarded the "Bay Area Critics Award" for Best Set Design of William Saroyan's "The Time of Your Life" (2004) directed by Tina Landau, and has also received a 2001 Jefferson Award Nomination for Best Set Design of Steppenwolf Theatre Company's "Ballad of Little Jo" (2000) directed by Tina Landau
He was the production designer for feature films "Southie" (1998) directed by John Shea and "Fool's Fire" (1992) directed by Julie Taymor, art director of the Amazon children's short "Didi Lightful" (2012), and assistant art director for the film "Big Blonde" (1980) directed by Kirk Browning.
He lived in both Seattle, Washington and Rowayton, Connecticut, with his family while continuing to create, collaborate, and educate others about his work as a theatrical designer. He was married to Robert Frazier, and had two children. Mercier died from pancreatic cancer at his home in Rowayton on March 11, 2021, at age 66.


Brian Mitchell and Joseph Nixon

Brian Mitchell and Joseph Nixon are a British comedy writing team. They were head sketch writers on BBC Radio 4's "Jo Caulfield Won’t Shut Up" and BBC1′s "Live and Kicking", and also wrote the TV comedy shows "Slightly Filthy" (LWT) and "The Ornate Johnsons’ Edwardian Spectacular" (BBC4). Yet their main work is in the theatre. Their plays include "Spy", "Moonlight over India", "Writ in Water", "Metronome", "Eurovision", "Seven Studies in Salesmanship", "The Opinion Makers", "Those Magnificent Men" and the multiple award-winning "Big Daddy Vs Giant Haystacks".
The author and illustrator Philip Reeve, a friend and collaborator, has written: 'Two of the best writers I know are friends of mine from my Brighton days; Brian Mitchell and Joseph Nixon. Their expertly wrought comedy sketches decorate many an Edinburgh Festival and improve a few otherwise lacklustre Radio 4 comedy shows, but to see them at their finest you need to seek out their plays.'
Each has also worked with other writers. Mitchell has co-written two musicals, "The Ministry of Biscuits", with Philip Reeve, and "Whaddya Know We're in Love" with Jerry Rulf. Nixon is co-author, with Ian Shaw, of "The Shark is Broken", a hit play of the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe.
The Ornate Johnsons.
Mitchell and Nixon met at primary school in a colliery village in Derbyshire, and started to write plays together when they were just fourteen years old. In 1988, Mitchell, a talented musician, moved to Brighton, to study composition at the University of Sussex. Nixon, following a degree in American Literature at the University of Essex, also moved to Brighton in the early 90s. It was in Brighton, in 1992, that they founded The Ornate Johnsons, a sketch troupe named after a character they had created in a Damon Runyonesque play set in 1920s USA. Mitchell told Time Out that their aim was 'to bring back energy, drama and extravagant performances to the world of sketch comedy; and to do stuff that wasn’t political or PC. People forget how oppressively right-on everything was around 1989. All the shows have tended to be a collection of loosely linked songs and sketches that make no point beyond raising a laugh.’
The original members of the Ornate Johnsons were Brian Mitchell, David Mounfield and Laurence Relton, and they first performed at the Marlborough Theatre Brighton, in January 1992. They were later joined, at various times, by Glen Richardson, Paul Putner, Louise Law (née Judkins), Beth Fitzgerald, Jo Neary and Clea Smith. Nixon, familiarly known as ‘the unseen Johnson’, does not perform, 'although he makes an occasional Terry Gilliam-like appearance in a show.'
For BBC Southern Counties, Matt McGuire reviewed an Ornate Johnsons show at Brighton Festival in 2007: 'The OJs did what they always do: deliver genuinely fantastic, original, playful, surreal and dynamic comedy sketches, including bribery on the Starship Enterprise; football commentators’ on the drama of a man stuffing a pie down his face in seconds; Only Fools And Horses, the opera; and a man who always finishes his girlfriend's sentences.'
In 2007, BBC4 broadcast the "Ornate Johnsons' Edwardian Spectacular", recorded at Wilton's Music Hall. This was followed by a two-week run at the London Arts Theatre, where audiences were 'invited to follow the troupe through the pages of Edwardian history and join The Pankhurst Sisters on Tour, marvel at the devilish magicks of Aleister Crowley and gasp at Charles Rennie Mackintosh – Superhero! This one-hour show brings together the great events and discoveries of the day – from the exploration of the Polar Regions, via Pavlov's dogs, to the sinking of The Titanic. Not even the Great Houdini can escape. And there's a man with a wooden arse.'
Three Short Plays about Shops and Love.
In 1994, Mitchell and Nixon gave up sketch comedy to write a dramatic trilogy: "Three Short Plays about Shops and Love". The first was "Moonlight over India", a romantic comedy, in the style of Guys and Dolls, set in a 1950s New York drug store. The store is run by Harry, an artist at the soda fountain, whose greatest creation, which he calls 'Moonlight over India' is a 'Triple Chocolate – white, milk AND plain – Double Fudge, Chopped Walnut, Four Scoop Sundae.' The central character, Ed the Bean, is a chocoholic whose girlfriend, Myrtle, thinks it's childish for a man to be interested in candy. Ed is saved from Myrtle by Lara, a tough dame who also loves chocolate. They find love by sharing a 'Moonlight over India'.
The second play was "The Bargain", a farce set in the 19th century Russia of Gogol and Chekhov. The central character is the pawnbroker, Riskin, a conceited, indecisive, half-wit who is planning a wedding proposal. Riskin lives with his disapproving mother, and the pair have a comic double act reminiscent of Galton and Simpson.
The plot has many comic twists and turns, commented on in soliloquy by Riskin: 'Oh, this is like the plot of some terrible novel! What's going on? Right – I must tackle this logically – I’m good at logic. Was it not I who recognised, in my early twenties, the important link between over-eating and obesity?'
The third play "Metronome", took its setting, Paris in the 1960s, from Nouvelle Vague cinema. But the style was that of Terence Rattigan, as a sophisticated English couple, in the act of breaking up, visit a music store where the man buys a piano. Much is left unsaid. The woman says, 'If I think about it, my one real regret is that I shall leave here without you and I ever having had what might be termed a 'blazing row'.' The man replies, 'I understand these sort of public histrionics are currently very fashionable, in the theatre, anyway. One only has to walk past the Royal Court to risk being struck on the back of the head by a flat-iron.'
The reference to the Royal Court was an acknowledgement of how unusual such plays were in the early 1990s, when British theatre was dominated by experimental companies, like Théâtre de Complicité, and the extreme 'In-yer-face theatre' of the Royal Court. Rattigan was deeply unfashionable in the 1990s. But the Rattigan revival of 2011 suggests that Mitchell and Nixon may have been ahead of their time.
The three plays are very different in style, yet they share similar themes. The central male characters are indecisive ineffectual dreamers. Ed the Bean and Riskin are both overgrown children. The women are practical, decisive, and adult, and it is their decisions which shape the course of events.
Although conceived as a trilogy, only the first two plays were originally staged together, at the Nightingale Theatre Brighton, transferring to Komedia, Brighton, in 1995. The plays were both directed by Nicholas Quirke, who also played Riskin. Peta Taylor played Riskin's mother. In "Moonlight over India" Ed and Lara were played by Simon Merrells and Beth Fitzgerald, and Harry, the drug store owner, was played by Ross-Gurney-Randall.
The complete trilogy was finally staged in May 2004 at the Sallis Benney Theatre, Brighton. The production, directed by Brian Mitchell, had Ian Shaw as Ed the Bean and Duncan Henderson as Riskin. The man and woman in "Metronome" were played by Duncan Henderson and Beth Fitzgerald.
"Moonlight over India" was revived again in May 2019, at the Brighton Latest Music Bar, with a cast of Ross Gurney-Randall, Ian Shaw, Joshua Crisp, Amy Sutton, Penny Scott-Andrews and Nick Bartlett.
Spy.
Mitchell and Nixon's next play, "Spy", was inspired by 1960s British spy films and TV series, including "The Ipcress File", James Bond, "The Saint", "The Prisoner" and "The Avengers", with one scene echoing Alain Resnais's "Last Year in Marienbad". The central characters are Stroud, another naive male, and Miss Eve, a femme fatale, who breaks into his office one day dressed like Miss Peel from The Avengers. She reveals to him that, for the previous fifteen years, he has been working for ‘the largest intelligence organization in Chingford.’
The play was originally performed at the Nightingale Theatre, Brighton, in 1995, with Mitchell as Stroud and Clea Smith as Miss Eve. Mitchell and Nixon revived and revised it, in 2006, for the East Anglian Pulse Festival, with Duncan Henderson and Beth Fitzgerald in the lead roles. Lynne Mortimer reviewed the production in the East Anglian Times: 'This was a fabulously convoluted story about a Chingford based intelligence organisation and it required any number of paralyzing, knock-out and truth inducing drugs to be administered in the course of the action...Duncan Henderson is magnificent as Stroud, the hapless employee who has spent 15 years trying to avoid being noticed because he doesn't actually do any work. One day, he finds another woman has taken the place of his indisposed secretary – a woman who has a habit of kissing him...Probably no one is who they appear to be and, just when the audience imagines it may have worked out what is going on, it is tossed a googly as one twist in the tale is succeeded by another and then another...There have been many imitators and spoofs of the spy story, but none I think as clever and laughter-provoking as this one'.
Those Magnificent Men.
In 2010, New Perspectives produced "Those Magnificent Men", Mitchell and Nixon's comedy about the first ever non-stop Transatlantic flight of Alcock and Brown. The play, directed by Daniel Buckroyd, originally had C.P.Hallam as Alcock and Richard Earl as Brown. Philip Reeve reviewed the play: 'Without ever being disrespectful to the real Alcock and Brown, they manage to turn their heroes into a classic British comedy duo in the tradition of Morecambe and Wise, with CP Hallam's Alcock the long-suffering straight man and Richard Earl's Brown the buffoon. And as if history and comedy were not enough, there are points where the characters step out of the action and era of the play to discuss the whole notion of biographical dramas, and shoot down in flames the recent trend for plays and films based on the lives of politicians, comedians and celebrities; works which twist the facts to make the story more interesting...This is a superb piece of theatre, beautifully written and engagingly acted, and it deserves to be widely seen. '
Julie Watterson, in The Stage, wrote, 'The production is full of laughter, pathos and ingenuity, with strong direction from Daniel Buckroyd and creative design by Helen Fownes-Davies, who uses basic trunks for a variety of clever purposes and facilitates the quirky construction of an amusingly credible version of the Vickers-Vimy-Roils aeroplane.'
When the play went to the 2011 Edinburgh Festival, Ian Shaw took over the role of Alcock.
In 2015, the play was revived with Mitchell in the role of Alcock and David Mounfield playing Brown. Richard Perry, reviewing a Leicester performance in the Western Park Gazette, said 'If you ever want to see the Charge of the Light Brigade performed in your living room, Brian Mitchell and David Mountfield (sic) could probably do it with sticks, a cushion and a flared nostril apiece...It's a very funny, hands on hips, chin jutting out into the sunset look at old fashioned British heroism and epic boys' own daring do in the face of insurmountable odds and near certain death.'
Big Daddy Vs Giant Haystacks.
Mitchell and Nixon's 2011 play, "Big Daddy Vs Giant Haystacks", is a comedy about the world of British wrestling, written for the actors Ross Gurney-Randall and David Mounfield. Gurney-Randall played Big Daddy, the 26 stone 9 lb wrestler famous for his feud with the 6 ft 11 inch tall Giant Haystacks, played by Mounfield.
The play was a big hit at the 2011 Brighton Festival, where it won a best actor award for Ross-Gurney Randall. At Buxton Festival, it won the Fringe Awards for Best Theatre Production and Best New Writing. In 2013, it went to the Assembly Rooms for the Edinburgh Festival, where Michael Coveney hailed it as 'a sharp and funny sketch show about the heyday (and Haystacks) of television wrestling, with some astute popular cultural referencing and more physical theatre than the entire dance programme at Summerhall (this year's seriously trending, and trendy, venue).'
Philip Reeve reviewed the play for "The Solitary Bee":'Actors Ross Gurney-Randall and David Mounfield don't just portray Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks, but an immense supporting cast of lesser wrestlers, managers, and TV executives; there are even walk-on parts for Paul McCartney, Frank Sinatra and Princess Margaret...It's all as funny as we've come to expect from Mitchell and Nixon, but it's never just funny: they have a deep sympathy for the people they write about. Ross Gurney Randall's Big Daddy is particularly impressive; reluctant at first, then half believing his own publicity; his unease at having to visit the bedsides of dying children as part of his brother's publicity schemes, and his grief and guilt about the death of an opponent, are exceptionally well-drawn; he's almost a tragic figure (albeit a 26 stone tragic figure in a spangly leotard)'
Scenes from the play were included in the recent BBC4 documentary ‘When Wrestling Was Golden’.
Seven Studies in Salesmanship.
In 2013, Mitchell and Nixon's "Seven Studies in Salesmanship" was staged at the Brighton and Buxton Festivals. The piece, featuring David Mounfield, Heather Urquhart, Jenny Rowe and Daniel Beales, was made up of seven short plays linked by the theme of selling. Graham Duff, writer of "Ideal" and "Hebburn", reviewed the Brighton show: 'Matching big laugh-out-loud gags with touching moments of genuine poignancy, "Seven Studies in Salesmanship" is a beautifully crafted portmanteau production. Much more than just a satire of selling techniques, the show also grapples with narcissism, betrayal and obsession. From urban romantic entanglements to sci-fi vignettes and skewed Roald Dahl-esque morality tales, these stories frequently take unexpected twists and turns.'
The Opinion Makers.
Mitchell and Nixon's "The Opinion Makers" is a musical comedy about a market research company in Swinging Sixties London. The play, directed by Daniel Buckroyd, opened in October 2013 at the Mercury Theatre, Colchester, with a cast including Mel Giedroyc, David Mounfield and Julie Atherton. The Mercury Theatre website, which describes the play as 'Mad Men meets Carry On', provides this synopsis: 'When the utterly incompetent team at Fernsby Market Research find themselves facing the stiffest challenge of their professional lives – to report what the British Public really think of world famous ‘Doctor Campbell's Lotion’ in readiness for a re-launch – there's only one thing for it; make it all up! After all, that's what market research companies do, isn’t it?'
The Colchester production received mixed reviews. Revived for the Brighton Festival in May 2014, with Mitchell himself directing, it was more successful, winning an Evening Argus Angel award. Tom Locke, reviewing it in the Argus, wrote, 'Whether there will be a wittier, better crafted or more entertaining show at the Fringe this year remains to be seen, but Brighton boys Brian Mitchell and Joseph Nixon have set the bar high...This performance was sold out and the reaction at the end was unanimous – a hit!'
Gilbert (No Sullivan).
In 2016, for the 180th anniversary of the birth of W. S. Gilbert, Mitchell and Nixon wrote a stage adaptation of some of the 'Tall Tales and Bonkers Ballads' he contributed to Punch and Fun magazines. "Gilbert (No Sullivan") includes three stories ("The Finger of Fate", "The Burglar's Story" and "Foggerty's Fairy") and two "Bab Ballads" ("Annie Protheroe" and "The Yarn of the Nancy Bell"). The show, performed by Mitchell and David Mounfield, toured in Autumn 2016. According to Louise Schweitzer, in the Argus, 'Mounfield and Mitchell romped with minimum props and maximum gusto through Gilbertiana...It was a very clever show from two enormously talented and very funny actors.'
Books and Journalism.
Mitchell and Nixon are the authors of two books in the Cheeky Guide series: "The Cheeky Guide to Student Life" and "The Cheeky Guide to Love". Both have also contributed to David Bramwell and Tim Bick's"The Cheeky Guide to Brighton", Nixon writing on 'Vegetarian Brighton' and Mitchell, a self-confessed 'lard lover', a 'Heartfelt Defence of the Greasy Spoon'. The guide to Brighton has gone through five editions, in which Mitchell has gradually documented the loss of the town's old fashioned caffs: 'I have felt like a latter-date Canute, trying to resist the tide of coffee chains, gastro pubs and juice bars.' In a typical review, of the Corner Cafe, Hove, Mitchell writes, 'I particularly recommend the homemade bacon pudding, which once moved my colleague David Mounfield to tears and has certainly brought me close to the condition known as Stendhal syndrome.'
Until 2015, Mitchell and Nixon wrote a regular column, Bare Cheek, in Brighton's Latest 7 listings magazine. Regular features include a surreal list of 'Fantabulous Facts About Hove' ('Hove library contains the only known copy of the Necronomicon in existence'; 'Due to some legislative anomaly, all court sessions in Hove are conducted in Jamaican patois'); Etiquette with Hetty Kwet; Edward de Bonehead's Lateral Thinking Puzzles; and 'Ask Uncle Nick', an agony column hosted by local resident, Nick Cave ('Strewth!').