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Marianne Faithfull

Marianne Evelyn Gabriel Faithfull (born 29 December 1946) is an English rock singer. She achieved popularity in the 1960s with the release of her hit single "As Tears Go By" and became one of the lead female artists during the British Invasion in the United States.

Born in Hampstead, London, Faithfull began her career in 1964 after attending a party for the Rolling Stones, where she was discovered by Andrew Loog Oldham. Her debut album Marianne Faithfull (1965, released simultaneously with her album Come My Way), was a commercial success followed by a number of albums on Decca Records. From 1966 to 1970, she had a highly publicised romantic relationship with Mick Jagger. Her popularity was enhanced by her film roles, such as those in I'll Never Forget What's'isname (1967), The Girl on a Motorcycle (1968) and Hamlet (1969). However, her popularity was overshadowed by personal problems in the 1970s. During this time, she was anorexic, homeless and addicted to heroin.

Faithfull was noted for her distinctive voice; her melodic and high-registered vocals prevailed during her 1960s career, but these were altered by severe laryngitis coupled with persistent drug abuse during the 1970s, which left her voice permanently raspy, cracked and lower in pitch. This new sound was praised as "whisky soaked" by some critics and seen as having helped to capture the raw emotions expressed in Faithfull's music.

After a long commercial absence, Faithfull made a comeback with the 1979 release of her critically acclaimed album Broken English. The album was a commercial success and marked a resurgence of her musical career. Broken English earned Faithfull a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance and is often regarded as her "definitive recording". She followed this with a series of albums, including Dangerous Acquaintances (1981), A Child's Adventure (1983) and Strange Weather (1987). Faithfull wrote three books about her life: Faithfull: An Autobiography (1994), Memories, Dreams & Reflections (2007) and Marianne Faithfull: A Life on Record (2014).

Faithfull received the World Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2009 Women's World Awards, and she was made a Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the government of France.

Ancestry
Faithfull was born in Hampstead, London. Her half-brother is artist Simon Faithfull. Her father, Major Robert Glynn Faithfull, was a British intelligence officer and professor of Italian Literature at Bedford College of London University.

Faithfull's mother Eva was the daughter of Artur Wolfgang, Ritter von Sacher-Masoch, an Austro-Hungarian nobleman. Eva chose to style herself as Eva von Sacher-Masoch, Baroness Erisso. Eva had been a ballerina for the Max Reinhardt Company during her early years, and danced in productions of works by the German theatrical duo Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill.

Faithfull's mother had been born in Budapest and moved to Vienna in 1918. The family of Sacher-Masoch secretly opposed the Nazi regime in Vienna. Faithfull's father's intelligence work for the British Army brought him into contact with the family, and he thus met Eva. Faithfull's maternal grandfather had aristocratic roots in the Habsburg Dynasty, and Faithfull's maternal grandmother was Jewish.

Faithfull's maternal great-great-uncle was Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, whose erotic novel, Venus in Furs, spawned the word "masochism." In regard to her roots in the Austrian nobility, Faithfull appeared on the British television series Who Do You Think You Are? where it was discussed that the title used by family members was Ritter von Sacher-Masoch.

Childhood
Her family lived in Ormskirk, Lancashire, while her father completed a doctorate at Liverpool University. She spent some of her early life at the commune at Braziers Park, Oxfordshire, formed by John Norman Glaister, where her father, who was instrumental in its foundation, lived and participated. Her parents divorced when she was age 6, after which she moved with her mother to Milman Road in Reading. Her primary school was in Brixton. Living in reduced circumstances, Faithfull's girlhood was marred by bouts of tuberculosis. She was a charitably subsidised (bursaried) pupil at St Joseph's Roman Catholic Convent School, Reading, where she was, for a time, a weekly boarder. While at St Joseph's, she was a member of the Progress Theatre's student group.

1960s
Faithfull began her singing career in 1964, landing her first gigs as a folk music performer in coffeehouses. She soon began taking part in London's exploding social scene. In early 1964 she attended a Rolling Stones launch party with artist John Dunbar and met Andrew Loog Oldham, who 'discovered' her. "As Tears Go By", her first single, was written and composed by Jagger, Keith Richards, and Oldham, and became a chart success. (The Rolling Stones recorded their version one year later, which also became successful.) She then released a series of successful singles, including "This Little Bird", "Summer Nights", and "Come and Stay with Me". Faithfull married John Dunbar on 6 May 1965 in Cambridge with Peter Asher as the best man. The couple lived in a flat at 29 Lennox Gardens in Belgravia, London SW1. On 10 November 1965, she gave birth to their son Nicholas.

In 1966, she took Nicholas to stay with Brian Jones and Anita Pallenberg in London. During this period, Faithfull started smoking marijuana and became best friends with Pallenberg. She began a much-publicised relationship with Mick Jagger that same year and left her husband to live with him. The couple became a notorious part of the hip Swinging London scene. She is heard on The Beatles' song "Yellow Submarine". She was found wearing only a fur rug by police executing a drug search at Keith Richards's house in West Wittering, Sussex. In an interview 27 years later with A.M. Homes for Details, Faithfull discussed her wilder days and admitted that the drug bust fur rug incident had ravaged her personal life: "It destroyed me. To be a male drug addict and to act like that is always enhancing and glamorising. A woman in that situation becomes a slut and a bad mother." It was during this time that Faithfull lost three opportunities to appear in films. “I really thought I had blown my career.” In 1968, Faithfull, by now addicted to cocaine, gave birth to a stillborn daughter (whom she had named Corrina) while returning from Jagger's country house in Ireland. Faithfull's involvement in Jagger's life was reflected in some of the Rolling Stones's best known songs. "Sympathy for the Devil", featured on the 1968 album Beggars Banquet, partially was inspired by The Master and Margarita, written by Mikhail Bulgakov, a book that Faithfull introduced to Jagger. The song "You Can't Always Get What You Want" on the 1969 album Let It Bleed was supposedly written and composed about Faithfull; the songs "Wild Horses" and "I Got the Blues" on the 1971 album Sticky Fingers were allegedly influenced by Faithfull, and she co-wrote "Sister Morphine" (the writing credit for the song was the subject of a protracted legal battle that was resolved with Faithfull listed as co-author). In her autobiography, Faithfull said Jagger and Richards released it in their own names so that her agent did not collect all the royalties and proceeds from the song, especially as she was homeless and addicted to heroin at the time. In 1968, Faithfull appeared in The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus concert, giving a solo performance of "Something Better".

She is bisexual, and during the 1960s, she had relationships with both men and women.

1970s
Faithfull ended her relationship with Jagger in May 1970 after she started an affair with Anglo-Irish nobleman "Paddy" Rossmore, and she lost custody of her son in that same year, which led to her attempting suicide. Faithfull's personal life went into decline, and her career went into a tailspin. She made only a few appearances, including an October 1973 performance with David Bowie, singing Sonny & Cher's "I Got You Babe".

Faithfull lived on London's Soho streets for two years, suffering from heroin addiction and anorexia nervosa. Friends intervened and enrolled her in an NHS heroin-assisted treatment programme. She failed at controlling or stabilising her addiction at this time. In 1971, producer Mike Leander found her on the streets and made an attempt to revive her career, producing part of her album Rich Kid Blues. The album was shelved until 1985.

Severe laryngitis, coupled with persistent drug abuse during this period, permanently altered Faithfull's voice, leaving it cracked and lower in pitch. While the new sound was praised as "whisky soaked" by some critics, journalist John Jones of the Sunday Times wrote that she had "permanently vulgarised her voice". In 1975, she released the country-influenced record Dreamin' My Dreams, re-released in 1978 as Faithless with some new tracks added, which reached No.1 on the Irish Albums Chart. Faithfull moved into a squat without hot water or electricity in Chelsea with then-boyfriend Ben Brierly of the band the Vibrators. She later shared flats in Chelsea and Regent's Park with Henrietta Moraes.

In 1979, the same year she was arrested for marijuana possession in Norway, Faithfull's career returned full force with the album Broken English, her most critically hailed album. Partially influenced by the punk explosion and her marriage to Brierly in the same year, it ranged from the punk-pop sounds of the title track, which addressed terrorism in Europe (being dedicated to Ulrike Meinhof), to the punk-reggae rhythms of "Why D'Ya Do It?", a song with aggressive lyrics adapted from a poem by Heathcote Williams. The musical structure of this song is complex: On the surface hard rock, it has a tango in 4/4 time, with an opening electric guitar riff by Barry Reynolds in which beats 1 and 4 of each measure are accented on the up-beat, and beat 3 is accented on the down beat. Faithfull, in her autobiography, commented that her fluid yet rhythmic reading of Williams' lyric was "an early form of rap". Broken English was the album that revealed the full extent of Faithfull's alcohol and drug use and their effects on her singing voice, with the melodic vocals on her early records being replaced by a raucous, deep voice which helped capture the raw emotions expressed in the album's songs. A disastrous Feb. 1980 appearance on Saturday Night Live was blamed on too many rehearsals, but it was suspected that drugs had caused her vocal cords to seize up.

1980s
Faithfull began living in New York City after the release of Dangerous Acquaintances in 1981. The same year, she appeared as a vocalist on the single "Misplaced Love" by Rupert Hine, which charted in Australia. Despite her comeback, she was battling with addiction in the mid-1980s, at one point breaking her jaw tripping on a flight of stairs while under the influence. Rich Kid Blues (1985) was another collection of her early work combined with new recordings, a double record showcasing both the pop and rock 'n' roll facets of her output to date. In 1985, Faithfull performed "Ballad of the Soldier's Wife" on Hal Willner's tribute album Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill. Faithfull's restrained readings lent themselves to the material, and this collaboration informed several subsequent works.

In 1985, she was at the Hazelden Foundation Clinic in Minnesota for rehabilitation. She then received treatment at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts. While living at a hotel in nearby Cambridge, Massachusetts, Faithfull started an affair (while still married to Brierly) with a dual diagnosis (mentally ill and drug dependent) man, Howard Tose, who later committed suicide by jumping from a 14th floor window of the flat they shared. In 1987, Faithfull dedicated a "thank you" to Tose within the album package of Strange Weather, on the back sleeve: "To Howard Tose with love and thanks". Faithfull's divorce from Brierly was finalised that year. In 1995, she wrote and sang about Tose's death in "Flaming September" from the album A Secret Life.

In 1987, Faithfull ventured into jazz and blues on Strange Weather, also produced by Willner. The album became her most critically lauded album of the decade. Coming full circle, the renewed Faithfull cut another recording of "As Tears Go By" for Strange Weather, this time in a tighter, more gravelly voice. The singer confessed to a lingering irritation with her first hit. "I always childishly thought that was where my problems started, with that damn song," she told Jay Cocks in Time magazine, but she came to terms with it as well as with her past. In a 1987 interview with Rory O'Connor of Vogue, Faithfull declared "forty is the age to sing it, not seventeen." The album of covers was produced by Hal Willner after the two had spent numerous weekends listening to hundreds of songs from the annals of 20th-century music. They chose to record such diverse tracks as Bob Dylan's "I'll Keep It with Mine" and "Yesterdays", written by Broadway composers Jerome Kern and Otto Harbach. The work includes tunes first made notable by such blues luminaries as Billie Holiday and Bessie Smith; Tom Waits wrote the title track. In 1988, Faithfull married writer and actor Giorgio Della Terza, and they divorced in 1991.

1990s
When Roger Waters assembled an all-star cast of musicians to perform the rock opera The Wall live in Berlin in July 1990, Faithfull played the part of Pink's overprotective mother. Her musical career rebounded for the third time during the early 1990s with the live album Blazing Away, which featured Faithfull revisiting songs she had performed over the course of her career. Blazing Away was recorded at St. Ann's Cathedral in Brooklyn. The 13 selections include "Sister Morphine", a cover of Edith Piaf's "Les Prisons du Roy", and "Why D'Ya Do It?" from Broken English. Alanna Nash of Stereo Review commended the musicians whom Faithfull had chosen to back her—longtime guitarist Reynolds was joined by former Band member Garth Hudson and pianist Dr. John. Nash was impressed with the album's autobiographical tone, noting "Faithfull's gritty alto is a cracked and halting rasp, the voice of a woman who's been to hell and back on the excursion fare which, of course, she has." The reviewer extolled Faithfull as "one of the most challenging and artful of women artists," and Rolling Stone writer Fred Goodman asserted: "Blazing Away is a fine retrospective – proof that we can still expect great things from this greying, jaded contessa."

A Collection of Her Best Recordings was released in 1994 by Island Records to coincide with the release of the Faithfull autobiography; the two products originally shared the same cover art. It contained Faithfull's updated version of "As Tears Go By" from Strange Weather, several cuts from Broken English and A Child's Adventure and a song written by Patti Smith scheduled for inclusion on an Irish AIDS benefit album. This track, "Ghost Dance", suggested to Faithfull by a friend who later died of AIDS, was made with a trio of old friends: Stones' drummer Charlie Watts and guitarist Ron Wood backed Faithfull's vocals on the song, while Keith Richards coproduced it. The retrospective album featured one live track, "Times Square", from Blazing Away as well as the Faithfull original "She", penned with composer and arranger Angelo Badalamenti to be released the following year on A Secret Life, with additional songs co written with Badalamenti. Faithfull sang "Love Is Teasin," an Irish folk standard, with The Chieftains on their album The Long Black Veil, released in 1995. Faithfull sang a duet and recited text on the San Francisco band Oxbow's 1997 album Serenade in Red. Faithfull sang interlude vocals on Metallica's song "The Memory Remains" from their 1997 album Reload and appeared in the song's music video; the track reached No. 28 in the U.S. (No.3 on the U.S. Mainstream Rock chart) and No.13 in the UK.

As her fascination with the music of Weimar-era Germany continued, Faithfull performed in The Threepenny Opera at the Gate Theatre, Dublin, playing Pirate Jenny. Her interpretation of the music led to a new album, Twentieth Century Blues (1996), which focused on the music of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht as well as Noël Coward, followed in 1998 by a recording of The Seven Deadly Sins, with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Dennis Russell Davies. A hugely successful concert and cabaret tour accompanied by Paul Trueblood at the piano, culminated in the filming, at the Montreal Jazz Festival, of the DVD Marianne Faithfull Sings Kurt Weill.

In 1998, Faithfull released A Perfect Stranger: The Island Anthology, a two-disc compilation that chronicled her years with Island Records. It featured tracks from her albums Broken English, Dangerous Acquaintances, A Child's Adventure, Strange Weather, Blazing Away, and A Secret Life, as well as several B sides and unreleased tracks.

Faithfull's 1999 DVD Dreaming My Dreams contained material about her childhood and parents, with historical video footage going back to 1964 and interviews with the artist and several friends who have known her since childhood. The documentary included sections on her relationship with John Dunbar and Mick Jagger, and brief interviews with Keith Richards. It concluded with footage from a 30-minute live concert, originally broadcast on PBS for the series Sessions at West 54th. The same year, she ranked 25th in VH1's 100 Greatest Women in Rock and Roll.

Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) wrote the song "Incarceration of a Flower Child" portraying Syd Barrett in 1968; it was never recorded by Pink Floyd. The song was recorded by Faithfull on her 1999 album Vagabond Ways.

2000s
Faithfull released several albums in the 2000s that received positive critical response, beginning with Vagabond Ways (1999), which was produced and recorded by Mark Howard. It included collaborations with Daniel Lanois, Emmylou Harris, Pink Floyd's Roger Waters, and writer (and friend) Frank McGuinness. Later that year she sang "Love Got Lost" on Joe Jackson's Night and Day II.

Her renaissance continued with Kissin Time, released in 2002. The album contained songs written with Blur, Beck, Billy Corgan, Jarvis Cocker, Dave Stewart, David Courts and the French pop singer Étienne Daho. On this record, she paid tribute to Nico (with "Song for Nico"), whose work she admired. The album included an autobiographical song she co-wrote with Cocker, called "Sliding Through Life on Charm".

In 2005, she released Before the Poison. The album was primarily a collaboration with PJ Harvey and Nick Cave, but Damon Albarn and Jon Brion also contributed. Before the Poison received mixed reviews from both Rolling Stone and Village Voice. In 2005 she recorded (and co-produced) "Lola R Forever", a cover of the Serge Gainsbourg song "Lola Rastaquouere" with Sly & Robbie for the tribute album Monsieur Gainsbourg Revisited. In 2007, Faithfull collaborated with the British singer-songwriter Patrick Wolf on the duet "Magpie" from his third album The Magic Position and wrote and recorded a new song for the French film Truands called "A Lean and Hungry Look" with Ulysse.

In March 2007 she returned to the stage with a touring show titled Songs of Innocence and Experience. Supported by a trio, the performance had a semi-acoustic feel and toured European theatres throughout the spring and summer. The show featured many songs she had not performed live before including "Something Better", the song she sang on The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus. The show included the Harry Nilsson song "Don't Forget Me", "Marathon Kiss" from Vagabond Ways, and a version of the traditional "Spike Driver Blues".

Articles published at that time hinted Faithfull was looking to retirement and was hoping that money from Songs of the Innocence and Experience would enable her to live in comfort. She said: "I'm not prepared to be 70 and absolutely broke. I realised last year that I have no safety net at all and I'm going to have to get one. So I need to change my attitude to life, which means I have to put away 10 per cent every year of my old age. I want to be in a position where I don't have to work. I should have thought about this a long time ago but I didn't." However, she still lived in her flat in Paris (located in one of the most expensive streets of the capital) and had a house in County Waterford, Ireland. Recording of Easy Come, Easy Go commenced in New York City on 6 December 2007; the album was produced by Hal Willner who had recorded Strange Weather in 1997. A version of Morrissey's "Dear God Please Help Me" from his 2006 album Ringleader of the Tormentors is one of the songs featured. In March 2009, she performed "The Crane Wife 3" on The Late Show. In late March, she began the Easy Come, Easy Go tour, which took her to France, Germany, Austria, New York City, Los Angeles and London.

On 3 May 2009, she was featured on CBS News Sunday Morning and interviewed by Anthony Mason in the "Sunday Profile" segment. Both in-studio and on-the-street (New York City) interview segments with Faithfull and Mason were interspersed with extensive biographical and musical footage.

In November, Faithfull was interviewed by Jennifer Davies on World Radio Switzerland, where she described the challenges of being stereotyped as a "mother, or the pure wife". Because of this, she insisted, it has been hard to maintain a long career as a female artist, which, she said, gave her empathy for Amy Winehouse when they met recently.

In 2010, she was honoured with the Icon of the Year award from Q magazine.

2010s
On 31 January 2011, Faithfull released her 18th studio album Horses and High Heels in mainland Europe with mixed reviews. The 13 track album contains four songs co-written by Faithfull; the rest are covers of mainly well known songs such as Dusty Springfield's "Goin' Back" and the Shangri-Las' "Past, Present, Future". A UK CD release was planned for 7 March 2011. Faithfull supported the album's release with an extensive European tour with a five-piece band, arriving in the UK on 24 May for a rare show at London's Barbican Centre, with an extra UK show at Leamington Spa on 26 May.

On 7 May 2011, she appeared on the Graham Norton Show. She reunited with Metallica in December 2011 for their 30th anniversary celebration at the Fillmore where she performed "The Memory Remains".

In 2012, Faithfull recorded a cover version of a Stevie Nicks track from the Fleetwood Mac album Tusk as part of a Fleetwood Mac tribute project. The track "Angel" was released on 14 August 2012 as part of the tribute album Just Tell Me That You Want Me.

On 22 June 2013, she made a sell-out concert appearance at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, with jazz musician Bill Frisell playing guitar, as a part of Meltdown Festival curated by Yoko Ono.

In September 2014, Faithfull released an album of all-new material, titled Give My Love to London. She started a 12-month 50th anniversary tour at the end of 2014.

During a webchat hosted by The Guardian on 1 February 2016, Faithfull revealed plans to release a live album from her 50th anniversary tour. She had ideas for a follow-up for Give My Love to London, but had no intention of recording new material for at least a year and a half.

Faithfull's album Negative Capability, was released in November 2018. It featured Rob Ellis, Warren Ellis, Nick Cave, Ed Harcourt, and Mark Lanegan.

2020s
A spoken word album titled She Walks in Beauty was released in May 2021. She is accompanied with musical arrangements by Warren Ellis, Brian Eno, Nick Cave and Vincent Segal. The album sees her recite the 19th-century British Romantic poets.

In 2023, Rolling Stone ranked Faithfull at number 173 on its list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time.

Achievements
In 1999, Faithfull ranked 25th on VH1's 100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll.

On 4 November 2007, the European Film Academy announced that Faithfull had received a nomination for Best Actress for her role as Maggie in Irina Palm.

On 5 March 2009, Faithfull received the World Arts Award for Lifetime Achievement at the 2009 Women's World Awards. "Marianne's contribution to the arts over a 45-year career including 18 studio albums as a singer, songwriter and interpreter, and numerous appearances on stage and screen is now being acknowledged with this special award." The award was presented in Vienna, with ceremonies televised in over 40 countries on 8 March 2009 as part of International Women's Day.

On 23 March 2011, Faithfull was awarded the Commandeur of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, one of France's highest cultural honours.

Awards and nominations
{| class="wikitable sortable plainrowheaders" ! scope="col" | Award ! scope="col" | Year ! scope="col" | Nominee(s) ! scope="col" | Category ! scope="col" | Result ! scope="col" class="unsortable"| Ref. !scope="row"|European Film Awards ! scope="row"|Grammy Awards ! scope="row"|Q Awards !scope="row"|Women's World Award
 * 2007
 * Irina Palm
 * Best Actress
 * Nominated
 * 1981
 * Broken English
 * Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
 * Nominated
 * 2009
 * Herself
 * Q Icon
 * Won
 * 2009
 * Herself
 * Lifetime Achievement Award
 * Won

Personal life
Faithfull has had three miscarriages and four abortions. The first abortion was in 1964, when she had become pregnant by Gene Pitney; the procedure was still illegal in the United Kingdom at the time and Faithfull has stated that she had a hard time dealing with the guilt. She began to feel better once her son was born the year after. Subsequent terminations were from her period of drug abuse as she did not wish for the children to be born as addicts.

Health
Faithfull's touring and work schedule has been repeatedly interrupted by health problems. In late 2004 she called off the European leg of a world tour, promoting Before The Poison after collapsing on stage in Milan, and was hospitalised for exhaustion. The tour resumed later and included a US leg in 2005. In September 2006, she again called off a concert tour, this time after she was diagnosed with breast cancer. The following month, she underwent surgery in France and no further treatment was necessary owing to the tumour having been caught at a very early stage. Less than two months after she declared having beaten the disease, Faithfull made her public statement of full recovery.

In October 2007, Faithfull said that she suffered from hepatitis C on the UK television programme This Morning and that she had first been diagnosed with the condition 12 years earlier. She discusses both the cancer and hepatitis diagnoses in further depth in her memoir Memories, Dreams and Reflections. On 27 May 2008, Faithfull released the following blog posting on her MySpace page, with the headline "Tour Dates Cancelled" and credited to FR Management – the company operated by her boyfriend/manager François Ravard: "Due to general mental, physical and nervous exhaustion doctors have ordered Marianne Faithfull to immediately cease all work activities and rehabilitate. The treatment and recovery should last around six months."

In August 2013, Faithfull was forced to cancel a string of concerts in the US and Lebanon following a back injury while on holiday in California.

On 30 May 2014, Faithfull suffered a broken hip after a fall while on holiday on the Greek island of Rhodes and underwent surgery. Afterwards, an infection developed at the site of the prosthesis, causing Faithfull to cancel or postpone parts of her 50th anniversary tour for additional surgery and rehabilitation.

On 4 April 2020, it was announced that Faithfull was in hospital in London receiving treatment for pneumonia after having tested positive for COVID-19. Her management company reported that she was "stable and responding to treatment". On 21 April she was discharged following a three-week hospitalisation. In a brief statement, Faithfull publicly thanked the hospital staff who "without a doubt" saved her life. She initially thought that she would not be able to sing again after the effects of the coronavirus on her lungs and continued to suffer memory loss because of it. However, she has since been working on her breathing and undertaking singing practice as a part of her recovery.

Discography
• Marianne Faithfull (1965)

• Come My Way (1965, UK only)

• Go Away from My World (1965, US only)

• North Country Maid (1966, UK only)

• Faithfull Forever (1966, US only)

• Love in a Mist (1967, UK only)

• Dreamin' My Dreams (1976, re-released with four new tracks added as Faithless in 1978)

• Broken English (1979)

• Dangerous Acquaintances (1981)

• A Child's Adventure (1983)

• Rich Kid Blues (1985, recorded in 1971)

• Strange Weather (1987)

• A Secret Life (1995)

• The Seven Deadly Sins (1998)

• Vagabond Ways (1999)

• Kissin Time (2002)

• Before the Poison (2005)

• Easy Come, Easy Go (2008)

• Horses and High Heels (2011)

• Give My Love to London (2014)

• Negative Capability (2018)

• She Walks in Beauty (2021)

Acting career
In addition to her music career, Faithfull has had a career as an actress in theatre, television and film.

Her first professional theatre appearance was in a 1967 stage adaptation of Chekhov's Three Sisters at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in which she played Irina, co-starring with Glenda Jackson and Avril Elgar. The previous year, she played herself in Jean-Luc Godard's film Made in U.S.A.. Faithfull featured in the 1967 film I'll Never Forget What's'isname. In the French television film Anna, Faithfull sang Serge Gainsbourg's "Hier ou Demain". 1968 found a fetishist portrayal, a black leather-clad motorcyclist in the French film La Motocyclette (English titles: The Girl on a Motorcycle and Naked Under Leather), and 1969 Kenneth Anger's Lucifer Rising, her role Lilith. In London 1969 at the Round House, Faithfull played Ophelia in Hamlet, later filmed as Hamlet.

Her stage work included Edward Bond's Early Morning at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in which she played a lesbian Florence Nightingale; The Collector at St Martin's Theatre in the West End; Mad Dog at Hampstead Theatre; A Patriot for Me by John Osborne, at the Palace Theatre; and the role of Lizzie Curry in N. Richard Nash's The Rainmaker, which toured the UK. Other film roles in the 1970s included Sophy Kwykwer in Stephen Weeks's Ghost Story (AKA Madhouse Mansion); and Helen Rochefort in Assault on Agathon.

Her television acting in the late 1960s and early 1970s included The Door of Opportunity (1970), adapted from W. Somerset Maugham's story, followed by August Strindberg's The Stronger (1971), and Terrible Jim Fitch (1971) by James Leo Herlihy.

In 1991, she played the role of Pirate Jenny in The Threepenny Opera at the Gate Theatre in Dublin. Later she performed Kurt Weill's "The Seven Deadly Sins" with the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, a CD of which was released in 1998.

She has played both God and the Devil. She appeared as God in two guest appearances in the British sitcom Absolutely Fabulous. In 2004 and 2005, she played the Devil in William Burroughs' and Tom Waits' musical The Black Rider, directed by Robert Wilson, which opened at London's Barbican Theatre.

In 2001, Faithfull appeared in C.S. Leigh's Far From China. She has appeared in Patrice Chéreau's Intimacy (2001), and in 2004, in Jose Hayot's Nord-Plage. Faithfull appeared as Empress Maria Theresa in Sofia Coppola's 2006 biopic Marie Antoinette. She starred in the film Irina Palm, released at the Berlinale film festival in 2007. Faithfull plays the central role of Maggie, a 60-year-old widow who becomes a sex worker to pay for medical treatment for her ill grandson.

Faithfull lent her voice to the 2008 film Evil Calls: The Raven, but it was recorded several years earlier when the project was titled Alone in the Dark. She has appeared in the 2008 feature documentary by Nik Sheehan on Brion Gysin and the dreamachine, titled FLicKeR.

In 2008, Faithfull toured readings of Shakespeare's sonnets, drawing on the "Dark Lady" sequence. Her accompanist was the cellist Vincent Ségal.

In 2011 and 2012, Faithfull had supporting roles in the films Faces in the Crowd and Belle du Seigneur.

Faithfull starred in a production of Kurt Weill's The Seven Deadly Sins at Landestheater Linz, Austria. The production ran from October 2012 to January 2013.

On 18 September 2013, Faithfull was featured in the genealogy documentary series Who Do You Think You Are?, tracing her family's roots, in particular her mother's side of the family in pre-World War II Austria.

Work as an author

 * Faithfull: An Autobiography, Marianne Faithfull (1994), Cooper Square Press
 * Memories, Dreams & Reflections, Marianne Faithfull (7 July 2008), Harper Perennial
 * Marianne Faithfull: A Life on Record, edited by Marianne Faithfull and Francois Ravard, Contribution by Will Self and Terry Southern, Introduction by Salman Rushdie (2014), Rizzoli

title: Marianne Faithfull


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Safeway (UK)

Safeway Limited is a British groceries brand, and former chain of supermarkets and convenience shops. The British Safeway was founded in 1962 by the American Safeway Inc., before being sold to Argyll Foods in 1987. It was later listed on the London Stock Exchange. It was purchased by Morrisons in March 2004. Most of its 479 shops were rebranded as Morrisons, with others being sold. Safeway-branded shops disappeared from the United Kingdom on 24 November 2005.

In November 2016, Morrisons revived the Safeway brand for a range of products, manufactured in the company's own factories, for distribution through UK independent retailers.

Early years
Safeway Food Stores was established in 1962 in the United Kingdom by the American supermarket chain Safeway, with seven supermarkets and a few smaller stores in Greater London, and its first purpose-built store was opened in Bedford in 1963. It brought many ideas from the US, including larger stores with wider aisles and delicatessens, and a much wider range of products. By 1987, it had 133 shops around the United Kingdom.

Acquisition by Argyll Foods
In 1987, Safeway Inc. put Safeway Food Stores up for sale. Argyll Foods eventually secured it for the sum of £681 million, with £600 million raised through a rights issue that was three times oversubscribed. The merger of Argyll and Safeway was hailed by commentators as one of the most successfully integrated retail combinations in the United Kingdom, bringing together Argyll's experienced management team, with a strong but somewhat underdeveloped retail brand.

Argyll then began converting the larger Presto supermarkets to the Safeway brand. The Presto name continued on smaller supermarkets in North East England and Scotland for several years and even enjoyed a brief revival in the early 1990s, when several new Presto shops began to open and a range of Presto own label products was introduced. The last new Presto shops opened in 1995. The revival was short lived, as in 1995, many smaller Presto shops were sold to a consortium of SPAR retailers.

Over the next few years, competitive pressures intensified. Pre tax profits fell by 13% during the year ended 30 April 1994, prompting a wide-ranging strategic review known as "Safeway 2000", led by the then chief executive, Colin Smith, with assistance from McKinsey Consulting. This involved the sale of the Lo-Cost chain to Co-operative Retail Services and the redesign of Safeway shops to appeal to the family shopper.

In July 1996, Argyll conducted a share buyback and renamed itself Safeway plc. During 1997, several Presto stores were converted to Safeways, and by the beginning of 1998, the final Presto shops were either converted or closed down. All shops traded simply as Safeway, regardless of size.

David Webster, who had taken over as chairman in 1997, after the retirement of Alistair Grant, decided to open merger talks with Asda. These talks were called off after a few weeks following a leak to a Sunday newspaper, and then briefly revived in the early months of 1998, before breaking down again.

The outcome, if the negotiations had been successful, would probably have been the disappearance of the Safeway name and the emergence of a stronger Asda, still focussing on discount prices, but with a bigger volume to support it. This might have achieved a more secure future for Safeway, than continuing the struggle to keep up with Tesco and Sainsbury's.

Safeway was the first of the large supermarket groups to introduce a loyalty card, which it launched in 1995 and called ABC (Added Bonus Card). As this was initially only introduced into selected shops on a trial basis, however, Tesco is able to claim the title for the first nationwide introduction of a loyalty card, with Clubcard.

Safeway, in 1999, started a rail container flow carrying goods to its far north shops, some as far as Inverness, Nairn, Elgin and Buckie. The train consisted of van wagons and containers. The train was operated by EWS.

"New Safeway"
By the early months of 1999, Safeway was coming under renewed criticism from investors. Its shares had under performed the food sector over the previous five years. It had been pushed back into fourth position by Asda and it did not have enough shops of adequate size to offer a comprehensive non-food range. In July 1999, Safeway announced the appointment of a new chief executive, Carlos Criado-Perez, who had held senior posts in Wal-Mart's international division.

The problem was how to distinguish Safeway from Tesco and Sainsbury's, and how to minimise its scale disadvantage. According to estimates made by the Competition Commission, Tesco was able to negotiate significantly lower prices from its suppliers than Safeway – averaging about 3% on big selling branded items.

Criado-Perez's response was to introduce selective deep discounting, the so-called high/low pricing formula, which was later branded as 'substantially discredited' by Morrisons management, making deep price cuts on a limited set of products for a limited period. Criado-Perez also abandoned Safeway's loyalty card, arguing that these cards were no longer an effective marketing tool. This project was branded 'New Safeway'.

The new approach to pricing was one of the four pillars of Safeway's strategy, the others being "Best for Fresh Foods", "Best for Customer Service" and "Best for Product Availability". Criado-Perez envisaged a five-year programme of developing the shops along these lines, to be completed by 2004.

In 2002, Safeway was the fourth largest supermarket chain by sales in the United Kingdom. However, it was growing more slowly than other large chains in the United Kingdom and this was reflected in a share price below the values of the group's assets, leading to the various takeover rumours that circulated during 2002, indicating the City was unconvinced with the Criado-Perez strategy.

Morrisons takeover
On 9 January 2003, the much smaller Morrisons, with around 119 shops largely located in the North of England, made a surprise offer to purchase the chain, offering 1.32 new shares of Morrisons for each share of Safeway, with the co-operation of the Safeway board. However, this served only to start a stampede of other potential buyers. Sainsbury's, Asda, KKR (the company which helped finance the sale of Safeway to Argyll in 1987), Trackdean Investments Limited (controlled by Philip Green, owner of BHS and Arcadia) and Tesco all said they were considering making offers.

They were all asked to make submissions to the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) for approval under the Fair Trading Act 1973. On 23 January, Safeway's board dropped its recommendation of the Morrisons offer. KKR later dropped its proposal. On 19 March, the remaining proposals except for Trackdean's (which was said to raise no competition issues) were referred to the Competition Commission by the Trade and Industry Secretary, Patricia Hewitt. The report of the Competition Commission was made public on 26 September.

A takeover of Safeway by Sainsbury's, Asda or Tesco was "expected to operate against the public interest, and should be prohibited". However, a takeover by Morrisons was held to be acceptable on the condition that 53 shops of the combined operation be sold, due to local competition issues. Patricia Hewitt accepted these recommendations.

Philip Green announced on 30 October that he was not proceeding with a takeover bid, on the basis that it was not clear whether approval could be obtained to sell off individual shops to other chains. On 15 December, Morrisons, the only remaining bidder, made a new offer of one share of Morrisons, plus sixty pence for each Safeway share, again with the co-operation of the Safeway board. On 11 February 2004, shareholders of both Wm Morrison and Safeway voted to approve the merger of the two companies, subject to the result of two High Court rulings later in the month.

Shop disposals
Originally, 52 shops were to be compulsorily divested after the takeover, but this was reduced to 50 after one shop in Sunderland burned down and the lease ended on another in Leeds city centre. John Lewis Partnership purchased 19 to be part of its Waitrose chain, while Sainsbury's purchased a further 14, and Tesco bought 10 in October 2004.

Unlike other operators, most notably Tesco, Sainsbury's and the Co-op, Morrisons had chosen not to move into the convenience shop sector. Further to this policy decision, it was announced in October 2004 that the 114 smaller shops of Safeway Compact were to be sold off to rival supermarket chain Somerfield, in a two part deal worth £260.2 million in total.

In Northern Ireland, Morrisons sold former Safeway shops to Asda. These included a shop in Bangor, which actually opened after the takeover by Morrisons, in June 2005.

Morrisons continued to sell and close shops not covered by the Competition Commission ruling, which it felt did not fit with the scale and layout of its format of Market Street. In total, 254 shops were sold off by October 2005, which left the chain with around 367 shops by November 2005. In all, seventy two shops were sold that were neither part of the original Competition Commission ruling nor part of the Safeway Compact portfolio.

One of the largest single purchases in 2005 was that of five shops by Waitrose in August. On 18 July 2005, a further six shops were sold to Waitrose, including the former Safeway shop in Hexham, Northumberland, which became the most northerly Waitrose branch in England.

In May 2005, Morrisons announced the termination of Safeway's joint-venture forecourt shop/petrol station format with BP. Under the deal, the premises were split 50/50 between the two companies. Five sites were subsequently sold on to BP, while Morrisons sold the rest of its sites to Somerfield and Tesco, which both maintain a presence in this market sector. Following the termination of the BP/Safeway deal, BP began to roll out Marks and Spencer food forecourt shops in their place from 2005, with the network expanding over subsequent years.

Morrisons also sold Safeway's Channel Islands shops, in Guernsey and Jersey, to CI Traders, where they continued to trade under the Safeway brand name, despite selling products from chains such as Iceland. In February 2011, CI Traders sold the Safeway shops on the Channel Islands to Waitrose and the Safeway brand disappeared from the Channel Islands.

On the Isle of Man, the Douglas shop was sold to Shoprite and the Ramsey shop was sold to the Co-op. The shop in Gibraltar was originally marketed for sale, but was then converted. In November 2005, plans were submitted for the extension and redevelopment of the shop, in order to introduce the full Morrisons format.

In September 2005, the company announced the closure of former Safeway depots in Kent, Bristol and Warrington, with the loss of around 2,500 jobs. The Kent depot was later sold to upmarket rival Waitrose, whilst the Warrington depot was sold to frozen food rival Iceland. Part of the Bristol depot was sold off to Gist. The shop conversion process was completed on 24 November 2005, when the last Safeway fascia disappeared from the United Kingdom.

Partial brand revival
In November 2016, Morrisons announced a revival of the Safeway brand, on food products that it manufactures for retailers. This was followed by McColl's signing an agreement to stock Safeway-branded products in its nationwide chain of small-format convenience stores in August 2017.

A trial of a branded Safeway Daily convenience store was unveiled at a petrol station forecourt in Derby during 2019, but the location did not retain the brand long term.

Slogans

 * "A little bit more" (used until the late 80s)
 * "Everything you want from a store and a little bit more" (late 80s-1991)
 * "Where good value comes naturally" (1991–1995)
 * "Lightening the load" (1995–1999)
 * "More reasons to shop at Morrisons & Safeway" (Morrisons acquisition, 2004–2005)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Safeway (UK)


text:
Morrisons

Wm Morrison Supermarkets Limited, trading as Morrisons, is the fifth largest supermarket chain in the United Kingdom. As of 2021, the company had 497 supermarkets across England, Wales and Scotland, and one in Gibraltar. The company is headquartered in Bradford, England.

Founded in 1899 by William Morrison, hence the abbreviation Wm Morrison, it began as an egg and butter stall in Rawson Market, Bradford. Until 2004, its store locations were focused in the North of England but, with the takeover of Safeway in that year, the company's presence increased significantly in the South of England, Wales and Scotland. As of February 2021, Morrisons employed 110,000 employees and served around 11 million customers each week.

The company was listed on the London Stock Exchange until it was acquired by private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) in October 2021. Many changes were made after the takeover, and the company was struggling financially.

Morrisons is the fifth largest supermarket in the United Kingdom by market share (8.8%), overtaken for fourth place by Aldi in September 2022.

Founding
The company was founded in June 1899 by William Morrison, who started the business as an egg and butter merchant in Rawson Market, Bradford, England, operating under the name of Wm Morrison Limited.

His son Ken Morrison took over the company in 1952, aged 21. In 1958, Morrisons opened a small shop in the city centre. It was the first self-service store in Bradford, the first store to have prices on its products, and it had three checkouts. The company opened its first supermarket, "Victoria", in the Girlington district of Bradford in 1961.

In 1967, Morrisons became a public limited company listed on the London Stock Exchange.

Safeway
In March 2004, Morrisons acquired Safeway, a British supermarket chain which owned 479 stores, giving Morrisons a larger presence in southern England. The company was purchased for £3.3 billion, comprising 1 new Morrisons share (enabling Safeway shareholders to have a 50% stake in the enlarged group and reducing the Morrison family's shareholding to 18%), plus 60 pence in cash (paid for by the divestment of 52 overlapping stores) for each Safeway share held. The acquisition quickly ran into difficulties caused in part by changing the accounting systems six weeks before the transaction was completed, leading to a series of profit warnings being issued by Morrisons, poor financial results and a reversion to manual systems.

The programme of store conversions from Safeway to Morrisons was the largest of its kind in British retail history, focusing initially on the retained stores which were freehold, over 25000 sqft with separate car parks. Within a few weeks, Safeway carrier bags were replaced by those of Morrisons, and Morrisons own-brand products began to appear in Safeway stores.

Originally 52 shops were to be compulsorily divested after the takeover. Two closed for other reasons, John Lewis Partnership purchased 19 to be part of its Waitrose chain, J Sainsbury plc purchased a further 14, and Tesco bought 10 in October 2004. At the time Morrisons chose not to move into the convenience store sector, although it later did so with its M Local stores. In accordance with this policy decision, 114 smaller 'Safeway Compact' stores were sold to rival supermarket chain Somerfield in 2004 in a two-part deal worth £260.2 million.

In Northern Ireland Morrisons sold the Safeway stores, and a store in Bangor that opened after the Morrisons takeover, to Asda.

Waitrose purchased five stores in 2005, followed by six more on 18 July 2006, including the former Safeway store in Hexham, Northumberland, which became England's most northerly Waitrose branch.

In May 2005, Morrisons announced the closure of Safeway and BP joint venture convenience store/petrol station. Under the deal, the premises had been split 50/50 between the two companies.

Morrisons also sold Safeway's Channel Islands stores, in Guernsey and Jersey, to CI Traders where the stores continued to trade as Safeway, although the products they sold carried the brand names of chains such as Iceland. In 2011, Sandpiper CI/CI Traders sold the Channel Island Safeway stores to Waitrose, and the Safeway brand disappeared from the Channel Islands. On the Isle of Man, the Douglas store was sold to Shoprite and the Ramsey store was sold to The Co-operative Food. The Gibraltar store was originally offered for sale, but was ultimately converted. In November 2006, plans were submitted for the extension and redevelopment of the store to introduce the full Morrisons format. In September 2005, the company announced the closure of former Safeway depots in Kent, Bristol and Warrington with the loss of 2,500 jobs. The Kent depot was later sold to upmarket rival Waitrose, and the Warrington one to frozen food rival Iceland. Part of the Bristol depot was sold to Gist. The store conversion process was completed on 24 November 2005 when the final Safeway fascia disappeared from the UK.

Morrison family step down
Following the acquisition of Safeway, Morrisons encountered a number of difficulties. The company had issued five profits warnings since the acquisition, and it was felt that Morrisons' "northern" format did not work as well in the south. To reinvigorate its new national image, Morrisons appointed Dutchman Marc Bolland, the chief operating officer of Heineken, as its new Chief Executive.

On 13 March 2008, Sir Ken Morrison retired as chairman after 55 years at the company, and was made Honorary President.

Expansion and partnerships
When the Co-operative Group completed its takeover of the Somerfield supermarket chain in March 2009, it was required to sell a number of stores by the Competition Commission. Morrisons purchased 35 stores from the combined group, mostly trading under the Somerfield name. These new stores were the first of more than 100 identified by Morrisons for expansion into smaller supermarkets, with the aim of having a store within 15 minutes of every UK home. Marc Bolland departed to become the CEO of Marks & Spencer in December 2009, and Dalton Philips was appointed as his replacement in January 2010.

In 2010, Morrisons signed a deal with budget retailer Peacocks, the first concession store opened as part of a refurbishment at the retailer's store in Idle, Bradford. The Peacocks section was rolled out into other stores before launching its own children's-wear brand 'Nutmeg' into 85 stores on 21 March 2013.

The first Morrisons M local store opened in Ilkley, Yorkshire, in 2011. All M Local stores were later rebranded as the short-lived "My Local" chain in 2015.

In December 2012, a television advertising campaign which showed a dog being given pieces of Christmas pudding was criticised by the British Veterinary Association and the Kennel Club, as raisins are harmful to dogs. Morrisons said that veterinarian advice they received said that there would be minimal risk.

In May 2013, Morrisons formed a partnership with Ocado to use its technology systems and distribution infrastructure to help launch its own online service.

Restructuring
Richard Pennycook, who had joined Morrisons in October 2005, was replaced as Chief Financial Officer at Morrisons in June 2013 by Trevor Strain, previously Finance Director Corporate.

In February 2014, it emerged that younger members of the founding Morrison family, who own 10% of the company and who are thought to include two of Honorary President Sir Ken Morrison's children, William Morrison Junior and Andrea Shelley, along with Sir Ken Morrison's niece and her husband, Susan and Nigel Pritchard, had approached a number of private equity firms about taking the company private. They were said to be unhappy about the company's financial performance, and Dalton Philips's corporate strategy.

Following a new three-year corporate strategy revealed in March 2014 aimed at recovering sales and market share, at Morrisons Annual General Meeting in June 2014 Morrisons former chairman Sir Ken Morrison criticised Dalton Philips's approach. Morrison's nephew Chris Blundell, who controls most of the remaining family stake in the supermarket, agreed, telling told the board it needed rescuing, and welcomed the decision by chairman Sir Ian Gibson to leave the business in June 2015.

In June 2014, Morrisons announced that plans had been put in place to cut 2,600 jobs as a result of changes to its management structure. Morrisons stated that it had trialled the new structure and believed that better performance was achieved via these methods. These cuts would primarily affect department manager and supervisory positions. Morrisons claimed they would create 1,000 jobs in Morrisons M local convenience stores and 3,000 in new supermarkets. Following this, Morrisons sold its distribution centre in Kent to a real estate investment company for £97.8 million. The depot in Kemsley was to be immediately leased back to the supermarket chain on a 25-year agreement, for a rent of £5.4 million per annum.

Following a 3.1% drop in like-for-like sales in the Christmas 2014 trading period, Sir Ian Gibson stood down six months early and was replaced by former Tesco chief financial officer Andrew Higginson at the end of January 2015. On 25 February 2015, Morrisons named former Tesco director David Potts as its new chief executive. Dalton Philips and five other executives also left the company in March 2015.

Morrisons also announced the closure of ten loss-making stores (eight former Netto UK stores and two former Somerfield stores, bought under Philips's leadership) in Cramlington, Accrington, Ravensthorpe, Bransholme (Hull), Telford, West Bromwich, Wallasey (Seacombe), Newton le Willows, Rugby and Crawley. In addition, six unprofitable convenience stores would close, and the roll-out of the convenience store chain would be slowed, as a batch of 40 sites would no longer be bought. In June 2015, Morrisons cut the price of 200 'everyday items' by up to 33% The store chain's like-for-like sales had fallen by 2.9% in the first three months of 2015, after falling 2.6% in the last three months of 2014. The company responded by deciding to 'simplify' its head office in Bradford at the cost of 720 jobs.

In September 2015, Morrisons announced the sale of its 140 M Local stores to Mike Greene and Greybull Capital, to be re-branded My Local, for £25 million and that it planned to close 11 supermarkets, with a reported 900 jobs lost. In January 2016 Morrisons bosses announced that a further 7 stores would be closing to help optimise their existing assets and address areas of underperformance.

Following a well-publicised crash in UK milk prices in November 2015, Morrisons launched a variety milk labelled 'For Farmers', with a large Union Jack on the label, claiming an extra 23p per 4-pint bottle would to be given to farmers – 10p per litre. Following complaints, Morrisons admitted that the extra money was actually paid to the supplier of the milk, Arla Foods, to be divided among several countries, with only a fifth of the 23p going to UK farmers. Morrisons later changed the scheme in 2017 such that the total additional payment went directly to a selected group of 300 British farmers. A smaller group of 50 farmers were tasked with supplying the range, with additional welfare standards applied to the production of the milk.

From March 2020, the company aimed to cut down 3,000 management roles, and created 7,000 shop-floor jobs as part of its restructuring plan.

In December 2020, Morrisons was criticised for retaining Paula Vennells on its board, despite her role as CEO of the Post Office during the subpostmasters' scandal and criticism of her leadership there as "both cruel and incompetent" by a Conservative peer and various MPs. Vennells eventually left her role as a non-executive director on 26 April 2021.

On 16 August 2021, a worker led a protest against the company for raising deformed birds at four of its intensive farms. The Independent reported that campaigners from Open Cages, Animal Equality UK and The Humane League UK were urging Morrisons to sign the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC), banning the use of fast-growing breeds susceptible to lameness and heart attacks, and giving birds  natural light and more space. The company responded that they cared about animal welfare, required suppliers to maintain standards, and had asked for a full investigation.

CD&R takeover
In June 2021, Morrisons rejected a £5.5 billion takeover bid from private equity firm Clayton, Dubilier & Rice (CD&R) believing it "significantly undervalued" the company.

In July 2021 a bid to take over Morrisons, led by US private equity firm, Fortress Investment Group and backed by the Canada Pension Plan and Koch Industries, valuing the company at £6.3 billion ($8.7 billion), was made. This bid was provisionally accepted by the board, subject to shareholder approval on 3 July 2021. Following the Fortress bid, Apollo Global were considering a bid, leading to speculation of a bidding war, but Apollo Global withdrew and supported the Fortress bid. On 6 August 2021, the Fortress-led consortium increased its offer to £6.7 billion ($9.29 billion) after Silchester International Investors, Morrisons largest shareholder, said the previous offer was too low. The Morrisons board once again recommended the deal to shareholders. However, on 19 August 2021 an improved offer of £7 billion from CD&R was recommended by the board of Morrisons to shareholders; the board dropped its recommendation for Fortress's offer.

In October 2021 the £7 billion CD&R bid was accepted; the takeover was approved by the High Court on 26 October 2021.

In May 2022, Morrisons purchased McColl's in a pre-packaged insolvency arrangement with its administrator.

In February 2023, 16 months after the CD&R takeover of the 124-year-old chain, it was reported as having "fallen into a hole that just keeps getting deeper".

The chain's underlying profits had dropped by 15% to £828 million in the year ending 30 October; sales dropped by 4.2% despite prices increasing sharply—implying an even greater loss in volume of sales—for a pre-tax loss of £33 million. Morrisons' net debt obligations had been £3.2bn before the CD&R takeover, and had increased to £7.5 billion. A former senior Morrisons executive said "[CD&R] paid too much and now they have to claw that back". Unlike any other UK supermarket, Morrisons has a manufacturing arm including abattoirs, vegetable packing houses and fish processing plants comprising a vertically integrated supply chain. An industry insider suggested that this may be sold, which would mean a complete change of course for the company.

In September 2023, it was announced that Rami Baitiéh was to succeed David Potts as Chief Executive. Baitiéh officially took over on 6 November 2023.

Financial performance
The financial results have been as follows:

Current operations
In July 2020, Morrisons had 497 superstores in the United Kingdom, including those it retained following its purchase of Safeway plc. Until 2004, Morrisons superstores were largely concentrated in the English Midlands and the North of England, but had expanded southwards, beginning with a store at Erith, Greater London, which opened in 1998.

In April 2021, Morrisons said that it will stop selling plastic bags and will remove them from its stores and will replace them with paper bags as a move to cut the plastic use.

Store formats
Most Morrisons superstores have produce in Market Street. Packaged meat is near or next to the butcher's counter, the delicatessen with cheese fridge nearby, and a rotisserie counter named Oven Fresh.

Convenience stores
Following the failure of the supermarket's M Local stores, Morrisons returned to the convenience market in 2016 with a new chain of five trial forecourt stores under the Morrisons Daily brand in partnership with Motor Fuel Group. Soon after in 2017, this trial ended with the stores closed and a new partnership was formed with Rontec to open 40 stores across the company's forecourts. In 2019, Morrisons Daily stores operated by MPK Garages and Essar began to trade under a similar deal.

In 2018, Morrisons agreed on a franchise and wholesale supply deal with SandpiperCI to operate 43 Morrisons Daily convenience stores in the Channel Islands, which were previously operated under the Nisa brand. By 2022, SandpiperCI had converted 19 of their stores in the Channel Islands to the Morrisons Daily format, including the former Benest's of Millbrook store at Lisbon House.

A partnership agreement in 2021 saw Morrisons and McColl's committing to the conversion of 300 existing McColl's convenience stores into Morrisons Daily stores over the next three years, following a successful trial of 30 conversions in the months prior. This extension is of a deal, first struck in 2017, which sees Morrisons acting as McColl's sole supplier until at least 2027, with the supermarket currently supplying over 1,200 of their stores.

Morrisons revived the Safeway brand in 2016 for use in stores of its wholesale customers and in Morrisons Daily stores, along with two MPK Garages forecourt stores which operate with Safeway Daily branding.

Online retail
In 2012, the group launched its first retail website called "Morrisons Cellar" selling wine from around the world.

Unlike its competitors, Morrisons did not offer online shopping for many years. In May 2013 Morrisons announced a partnership with Ocado to use its technology systems and distribution infrastructure to help launch its own online service. Morrisons also signed a deal with Amazon to supply products for their Prime Pantry.

Market share
Morrisons' UK market share declined steadily since 2019; in September 2022 it was 9.1% – behind Tesco (26.9%), Sainsbury's (14.6%), Asda (14.1%), comparable with Aldi (9.3%), and ahead of Lidl (7.1%).

According to CACI, as of 2006, Morrisons had market dominance in 10 postcode areas, mostly in its home borough of Yorkshire; SY (Shrewsbury), LD (Llandrindod Wells), WS (Walsall), TS (Teesside), TD (Hawick), BD (Bradford), HG (Harrogate), LS (Leeds), WF (Wakefield) and HD (Huddersfield).

Vertical integration
Morrisons produce more than half of its products in-house.

Home-delivery service
Morrisons now offer a home delivery service, as do most UK supermarkets.

In June 2020, at an early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom Morrisons, introduced a home delivery program with telephone ordering for elderly and vulnerable people, limited to those residing within 10 miles of a Morrisons shop. Morrison's Doorstep Delivery continued to be available, with some changes (in particular, a limit of three items per order to prevent stockpiling was dropped), after pandemic restrictions were removed.

Petrol stations
Morrisons operate 339 petrol stations across the UK (as of 2022), offering Petrol & Diesel at all sites and LPG Autogas at selected sites. Most petrol stations are located in the car park area within selected stores, but there are also a number of standalone petrol stations operated by either Morrisons Daily or Morrisons Select.

Over the years, Morrisons petrol stations underwent several different re-brands and colour schemes. These were:

Fuel cards
For many years until 2014, Morrisons petrol stations provided a loyalty card scheme known as the Miles card. Each member earned 10 points whenever they purchased a litre of fuel, along with a £5 shopping voucher if they bought a total of 500 litres or more. This was replaced by the Match & More card in 2014, followed by the More card in 2016 and My Morrisons in 2021, later rebranded as Morrisons More with deals such as Fiver, where purchases give customers points, 5000 points being worth £5 in 2023.

Morrisons also offer the fuelGenie fuel card scheme.

Kiddicare
In 2011, Morrisons bought children's retailer Kiddicare for £70 million to give it the knowledge to sell clothing and homewares online. In 2012 10 former Best Buy stores from the Carphone Warehouse were acquired to expand Kiddicare into retail stores. Kiddicare was sold to the Endless private equity firm for £2 million in July 2014, and sold on to Worldstores two months later for an undisclosed sum.

FreshDirect
Morrisons purchased a 10% stake in New York-based online grocer FreshDirect for £31 million in 2011. After having sent a team to New York to learn from the business ahead of the predicted launch in 2013, Morrisons began a home delivery initiative in January 2014. In March 2014 Morrisons CEO Dalton Phillips announced the company had agreed to sell its stake in FreshDirect due to financial difficulties the company was facing and, as it had set up its own online shopping site, it no longer needed FreshDirect. The sale was completed in August 2016 for £45 million.

Convenience stores
The company operated a number of smaller stores called "Morrisons M Local" in major places such as Birmingham, Manchester, Cardiff and Bristol. These stores had a similar format to small Tesco Express and Sainsbury's Local stores, but included a wider range of ready-to-eat hot food such as pastries, coffee, rotisserie, porridge and also a salad bar. Items were supplied from nearby superstores and shoppers could also order foods, including fresh meat and fish.

A distribution centre in Feltham, West London was acquired to provide a distribution network to the stores in London and the South East where there are relatively few Morrisons superstores.

Around 70 stores were opened by the end of 2013, boosted by the purchase of 7 Jessops and 49 Blockbuster stores from administrators. On 26 February 2013, a further six HMV stores were acquired from administrators. The M Local chain was sold to a private equity group in 2015 and rebranded My Local, but entered administration itself less than a year later.

Logos and slogans
On 15 March 2007, Morrisons unveiled what they proclaimed as a "more modern brand image", which was rolled out to all stores, vehicles and distribution sites. This kept the main 'Morrisons' signage and colour scheme, while replacing the familiar 'M' logo. The low price in-house brand, Bettabuy, was also changed to a 'more modern' brand called Morrisons Value, which was again rebranded to M Savers in January 2012. The change saw the replacement of the old yellow and black logo, with the 'More Reasons To Shop at Morrisons' strap line replaced with 'Fresh Choice For You'. In 2010 this was replaced by 'Eat Fresh. Pay Less'. This was later changed again in 2013 to 'More Of What Matters'. It also involved the replacement of external signage, with the previous Morrisons signs being retained alongside the new logo, as well as changes to product packaging, point of sale, advertising, staff uniforms (replacing the old blue ties and bows with green ones) and distribution vehicles. The rationale behind the decision was the need for Morrisons to attract a wider national customer base, capitalising on its expanded geographical spread following the acquisition of Safeway.

In 2015, Morrisons released a new logo and slogan 'Morrisons Makes It' to try and draw on the brand's heritage, with the new logo being installed on all store signs as well as new uniforms and new in-store looks.

In May 2023, Morrisons launched a new advertising campaign which saw the old 'More Reasons to Shop at Morrisons' slogan and jingle being revived.

Loyalty card
The Match & More card, introduced in 2014, price matched the chain's customers' comparable grocery shopping in store and online with Aldi, Lidl, Tesco, Sainsbury's and Asda. If a customer spent £15 or more and could have paid less for their comparable groceries, Morrisons automatically gave them the difference in points on their card at the checkout. For 1p difference in the cost of shopping, customers got 10 Match points—and for £1 difference they got 1,000 points. The difference was calculated at the checkout on national brands and comparable own label products and fresh food, even those that are on promotion elsewhere. In 2016 the Match & More loyalty cards were rebranded as the "More" loyalty card and all customers were issued a new card in line with the rebranding. The loyalty scheme was rebranded once again in May 2021 as "My Morrisons", in line with the company dropping the points collection feature. The Morrisons More loyalty scheme was reintroduced on 22 May 2023, replacing My Morrisons. This latest change to their loyalty card format - the fourth in less than ten years - to the original Match & More scheme announced in 2014.

Product ranges
Morrisons stocks thousands of lines sold under their own brands. These include Morrisons Savers, formerly M Savers, an economy brand including items ranging from food and drink to toiletries, in 2015 the UK's fastest-growing grocery brand.

Tommy's Afternoon Tea Box
Morrisons launched a special 'Tommy's Afternoon Tea Box' to support shoppers wishing to mark the end of World War Two anniversary on 2 September 2020. The boxes benefitted the Tommy Tea initiative through the Royal British Legion Industries (RBLI), with £1 on every box heading to the charity, as well as an additional £10,000 provided by the company.

Distribution

In 2005, Morrisons purchased part of the collapsed Rathbones Bakeries, which supplied Morrisons bread, for £15.5 million.

In 2007, Morrisons opened a new Distribution Centre in Swindon and announced that it had bought a new site on Junction 23 of the M5 in Bridgwater in Somerset, for redevelopment as a fresh produce packing facility.

In 2011, Morrisons opened a new 767,500 sq/foot distribution centre in Bridgwater as part of the £11 million redevelopment project. This project also created 1,200 new jobs. Following the opening of the new distribution centre the Swindon depot was no longer required, and it was closed in December 2011.

title: Morrisons


text:
Sal Mineo

Salvatore Mineo Jr. (January 10, 1939 – February 12, 1976) was an American actor. He was best known for his role as John "Plato" Crawford in the drama film Rebel Without a Cause (1955), which earned him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor at age 17, making him the fifth-youngest nominee in the category.

Mineo also starred in films such as Crime in the Streets, Giant (both 1956), Exodus (1960), for which he won a Golden Globe and received a second Academy Award nomination, The Longest Day (1962), John Ford's final western Cheyenne Autumn (1964) and Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971).

Early life and education
Mineo was born in The Bronx, New York City, the son of coffin makers Josephine (née Alvisi; 1913–1989) and Salvatore Mineo Sr (1913–1972). He was of Sicilian descent; his father was born in Italy and his mother, of Italian origin, was born in the United States. Mineo's sister Sarina (b. 1943), brothers Michael (1937–1984) and Victor (1935–2015) were also actors. He attended the Quintano School for Young Professionals and was one of the few Italian-American actors of his era to keep their surname, saying he was proud of his heritage and identity.

Child actor
Mineo's mother enrolled him in dancing and acting school at an early age. He had his first stage appearance in Tennessee Williams's play The Rose Tattoo (1951). He also played the young prince opposite Yul Brynner in the stage musical The King and I. Brynner took the opportunity to help Mineo better himself as an actor.

On May 8, 1954, Mineo portrayed the Page (lip-synching to the voice of mezzo-soprano Carol Jones) in the NBC Opera Theatre's production of Richard Strauss's Salome (in English translation), set to Oscar Wilde's play. Elaine Malbin performed the title role, and Peter Herman Adler conducted Kirk Browning's production.

As a teenager, Mineo appeared on ABC's musical quiz program Jukebox Jury. Mineo made several television appearances before making his screen debut in the Joseph Pevney film Six Bridges to Cross (1955). He beat out Clint Eastwood for the role. Mineo also successfully auditioned for a part in The Private War of Major Benson (1955), as a cadet colonel opposite Charlton Heston.

Rebel Without a Cause and stardom
Mineo's breakthrough as an actor came in Rebel Without a Cause (1955), in which he played John "Plato" Crawford, a sensitive teenager smitten with main character Jim Stark (played by James Dean). Mineo's performance resulted in an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor and he became the fifth-youngest nominee in the category, at the age of 17. Mineo's biographer Paul Jeffers recounted that Mineo received thousands of letters from young female fans, was mobbed by them at public appearances, and further wrote: "He dated the most beautiful women in Hollywood and New York City."

In Giant (1956), Mineo played Angel Obregon II, a Mexican boy killed in World War II. Many of his subsequent roles were variations of his role in Rebel Without a Cause, and he was typecast as a troubled teen. In the Disney adventure Tonka (1958), for instance, Mineo starred as a young Sioux named White Bull who traps and domesticates a clear-eyed, spirited wild horse named Tonka that becomes the famous Comanche, the lone survivor of Custer's Last Stand. By the late 1950s, Mineo was a major celebrity. He was sometimes referred to as the "Switchblade Kid", a nickname he earned from his role as a criminal in the movie Crime in the Streets (1956).

In 1957, Mineo made a brief foray into pop music by recording a handful of songs and an album. Two of his singles reached the Top 40 in the United States' Billboard Hot 100. The more popular of the two, "Start Movin' (In My Direction)", reached No. 9 on Billboard's pop chart. It sold over one million copies and was awarded a gold disc. He starred as drummer Gene Krupa in the movie The Gene Krupa Story (1959), directed by Don Weis with Susan Kohner, James Darren, and Susan Oliver. He appeared as the celebrity guest challenger on the June 30, 1957, episode of What's My Line?

Mineo made an effort to break his typecasting. In addition to his roles as a Native American brave in Tonka (1958), and a Mexican boy in Giant (1956), he played a Jewish Holocaust survivor in Exodus (1960); for his work in Exodus, he won a Golden Globe Award and received his second Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

Career shift
By the early 1960s, Mineo was becoming too old to play the type of role that had made him famous, and rumors of his homosexuality led to his being considered inappropriate for leading roles. For example, he auditioned for David Lean's film Lawrence of Arabia (1962) but was not hired. Mineo appeared in The Longest Day (1962), in which he played a private killed by a German after the landing in Sainte-Mère-Église. Mineo was baffled by his sudden loss of popularity, later saying: "One minute it seemed I had more movie offers than I could handle; the next, no one wanted me."

Mineo was the model for Harold Stevenson's painting The New Adam (1963). Now in the Guggenheim Museum's permanent collection, the painting is considered "one of the great American nudes". Mineo also appeared on the Season 2 episode of The Patty Duke Show: "Patty Meets a Celebrity" (1964).

Mineo's role as a stalker in Who Killed Teddy Bear (1965), which co-starred Juliet Prowse, did not seem to help his career. Although his performance was praised by critics, he found himself typecast again—this time as a deranged criminal. The high point of this period was his portrayal of Uriah in The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965). Mineo guest-starred in an episode of the TV series Combat! in 1966, playing the role of a GI wanted for murder. He did two more appearances on the same show, including appearing in an installment with Fernando Lamas.

In 1969, Mineo returned to the stage to direct a Los Angeles production of the gay-themed play Fortune and Men's Eyes (1967), featuring then-unknown Don Johnson as Smitty and Mineo as Rocky. The production received positive reviews, although its expanded prison rape scene was criticized as excessive and gratuitous. Mineo's last role in a motion picture was a small part in the film Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971); he played the chimpanzee Dr. Milo.

In December 1972, Mineo stage-directed the Gian Carlo Menotti short opera The Medium in Detroit. Muriel Costa-Greenspon portrayed the title character, Madame Flora, and Mineo played the mute, Toby. In 1975, Mineo appeared as Rachman Habib, the assistant to a murderous consular head (portrayed by Hector Elizondo) of a Middle Eastern country, in the Columbo episode "A Case of Immunity," on NBC-TV. One of his last roles was a guest spot on the TV series S.W.A.T. (1975), in which he portrayed a cult leader similar to Charles Manson.

By 1976, Mineo's career had begun to turn around. While playing the role of a bisexual burglar in a series of stage performances of the comedy P.S. Your Cat Is Dead in San Francisco, Mineo received substantial publicity from many positive reviews; he moved to Los Angeles along with the play.

Personal life
In a 1972 interview with Boze Hadleigh, Mineo confirmed his bisexuality. Mineo met English-born actress Jill Haworth on the set of the film Exodus in 1960, in which they portrayed young lovers. Mineo and Haworth were in an on-and-off relationship for many years. They were engaged to be married at one point. According to Mineo biographer Michael Gregg Michaud, Haworth cancelled the engagement after she caught Mineo engaging in sexual relations with a man. The two remained very close friends until Mineo's death. Mineo expressed disapproval of Haworth's brief relationship with television producer Aaron Spelling, who was 22 years older than she. One night, when Mineo found Haworth and Spelling at a private Beverly Hills nightclub, he punched Spelling in the face, yelling, "Do you know how old she is? What are you doing with her at your age?" At the time of his death, he was in a six-year relationship with actor and retired acting coach Courtney Burr III.

Death

On the night of February 12, 1976, Mineo returned home from a rehearsal for the play P.S. Your Cat Is Dead at 10:00 pm. After parking his car in the carport below his West Hollywood apartment, he was stabbed in the heart by a mugger. Mineo was found lying and bleeding profusely in the parking alley by his neighbor Raymond Evans, who had heard his cries for help, but Mineo was only able to walk a few steps, after which he collapsed immediately and was pronounced dead at the age of 37 due to massive hemorrhage.

Lionel Ray Williams, a young pizza delivery man with a long criminal record, was convicted and sentenced in March 1979 to 57 years in prison for killing Mineo and also for committing ten robberies. Although considerable confusion existed as to what witnesses had seen in the dark the night Mineo was murdered, Williams claimed to have had no idea who Mineo was. Corrections officers later said they had overheard Williams admitting to the stabbing. Williams' wife later confirmed that on the night Mineo died, he had come home with blood on his shirt. After several years of speculation about the motives for the murder, the police investigation concluded that it was a random robbery. Williams was paroled in 1990 after serving 12 years.

A funeral for Mineo was held at Most Holy Trinity Church, Mamaroneck, on February 17, 1976, and was attended by 250 mourners. Mineo was buried at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, New York.

title: Sal Mineo


text:
Talk:Fourth wall

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Tabhernandez.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 21:44, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Cleanup
I've made an attempt to clean up this article, removing non-notable, irrelevant, and strained usages, and clarifying its nature as a performance convention. It didn't make much sense to have "breaking the fourth wall" sent elsewhere, when it's an integral part of this performance convention (its temporary suspension). The idea that modernist theatre is best understood in terms of a series of assults on the fourth wall is a bit silly, so I've removed it. It's the conventions of illusionism, Naturalism, and psychological realism more generally that are inverted/challenged, etc.

Appropriate topics for expansion of the article would include discussions of the autonomy of drama and its challenges (which is a better framework that simply "audience address" for modernism). Something about the history of drama, provided it's indicated very clearly that such an application is anachronistic and a-historical (locus and platea in early modern English theatre, for example). It would also be appropriate to talk about Stanislavski's public solitude and circles of attention. The convention in cinema (and by extension drama on television) would need to be established clearly as well (maybe acting for camera books provide a source for that, as well as the more obvious film studies). The temporary suspension of the fourth wall in comedy is so frequent that we only really need a few examples for the point to be made. Examples in serious drama would be far more pertinent, since they are more rare.

I was shocked and appalled, as they say, that this utter bullshit--"Breaking the fourth wall should not be confused with the aside or the soliloquy, dramatic devices often used by playwrights where characters on stage are delivering inner monologues, giving the audience insight into their thoughts"--had remained in the article for four and a half years, after being added by anonymous IPs on 30 Jan 2012 and 4 Feb 2012, without anyone removing it. They'd hidden behind a footnote with a source nobody checked. This page receives somewhere in the region of 2,000 hits a day. So, we've been misinforming an awful lot of people (or, at least, showing them why Wikipedia can't always be trusted, let's hope).  • DP •  {huh?} 05:06, 6 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Sorry, but why is this “utter bullshit” ? I'll admit to have only a cursory knowledge of these topics, but that sentence seems to make perfect sense, and I don't think that it could be used as a natural fertilizer.--Abolibibelot (talk) 16:41, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Examples
Princess Bride has a framing story, and an authorial conceit where the author claims experiences he never had and the existence of an original version of the book that never existed. It might be meta but I can't think of any example of it actually breaking the fourth wall, nor did I find it in the footnoted article. Unless I get a prompt "yes it does" from someone I'll cut it. Also, I'll add the locked room speech in John Dickson Carr's The Hollow Man (Carr novel). David Bofinger (talk) 22:19, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

 * Alfie (1966 film) - Michael Caine -- probably the most famous example of talking to the audience throughout the film. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.11.50.245 (talk) 14:44, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

 * The Big Short, House of Cards — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2a02:120b:2c44:c240:6813:a5ed:9ad0:7a85 (talk) 11:19, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

 * Princess Bride and House of Cards are already cited. I see no evidence of The Big Short or The Hollow Man (Carr novel) breaking the fourth wall. I inserted Alfie — Anita5192 (talk) 19:00, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

 * Moonlighting_(TV_series) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wfoj3 (talk • contribs) 00:02, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

Sub Headline Addition of Literature
I plan to add a sub headline for the fourth wall in Literature. While Theater, Television, Video Games are all listed, there is an absence currently of valuable info and how this topic has been used and relates to literature throughout history. Tabhernandez (talk) 19:32, 12 February 2018 (UTC)

"Literally"
"In the Mel Brooks film Blazing Saddles (1974), the characters literally break the fourth wall." This is a great one: The "fourth wall" is, of course, a metaphor. How do you literally break a metaphorical wall? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2a01:c23:706c:7600:b0be:153e:6abc:12d4 (talk) 13:29, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

 * They have obviously broken a real wall literally and the fourth wall figuratively.—Anita5192 (talk) 17:50, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Too many examples
This article has become a repository for drive-by editors to insert yet another example. I don't believe we need more than two or three examples in each section unless the text specifically warrants them and I am inclined to delete the multitude of examples beyond that, per Overlistification and What Wikipedia is not. I would like to know what other editors think.—Anita5192 (talk) 21:27, 11 December 2019 (UTC)

Not only that, but the examples aren’t even the best ones. For example, characters that give a “knowing glance” are in, but Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is not. Nsayer (talk) 22:59, 27 July 2021 (UTC)

I third this - this is my first comment on Wikipedia in years. Way too many examples especially given they're in paragraph form. I even checked to see if I was on the wrong website cause it reminded me so much of TVTropes.com or whatever it's called. 71.197.66.101 (talk) 08:45, 4 November 2023 (UTC)

Fifth Wall
"Fifth Wall" redirects here but there is no mention on the page. Perhaps it would be good to add a blurb about what the term means? Allanlw 14:49, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

 * Those two locutions means the same. Back in the theater days, only three walls were visible on stage, so the fourth wall was conceptual. With the advent of movie making in which all four walls were visible, the fourth wall made little sense as a phrase and people didn't get it right away, so some people started using "fifth wall" instead. 96.127.219.24 (talk) 10:12, 27 April 2022 (UTC)

Monty Python troupe?
Just checking if it's meant to be the "troupe" of comedians, rather than the "trope" of breaking the fourth wall:

"...live-action sketch comedy of Monty Python's Flying Circus, which the trope also brought to their feature films"

I'm either being picky or just missing the point of the sentence 73.77.229.97 (talk) 22:59, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

 * Good catch. I changed it to 'troupe', because it's probably a typo. Another possible correction would be "which trope the troupe also brought to their feature films". Sounds a bit stilted, though.  signed, Willondon (talk)  15:43, 3 April 2022 (UTC)

Can mockumentaries really break the fourth wall?
I was bold and removed the whole paragraph on The Office. I was inspired by the section above, commenting that there were too many examples, and not even the best ones. I didn't have open access to the source (a book), so I wasn't able to see in what context the book discussed the show (it did have a whole chapter on it). Can mockmentaries really break the fourth wall? Seems to me the conceit of a fourth wall isn't there to begin with. Subjects being filmed and interviewed in a documentary know that they're not in an isolated world, unaware of observers. signed, Willondon (talk) 15:59, 3 April 2022 (UTC)
 * The book has enough pages at Google Books preview to see that they tie the fourth wall to the series, so it is fully appropriate. --M asem (t) 16:09, 3 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, the Google Books preview wouldn't let me see it, though I did see that there was a whole chapter on the show. I guess if they think documentary-style has a fourth wall, they're the experts.  signed, Willondon (talk)  16:18, 3 April 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Fourth wall


text:
Peter and Gordon

Peter and Gordon were a British pop duo, composed of Peter Asher (b. 1944) and Gordon Waller (1945–2009), who achieved international fame in 1964 with their first single, the million-selling single "A World Without Love". The duo had several subsequent hits in America in the British Invasion era including "I Go to Pieces", "Lady Godiva", "Woman", "True Love Ways" and "Nobody I Know".

History
Peter Asher and his sister Jane were child actors in the 1950s. They played siblings in a 1955 episode of the television series The Adventures of Robin Hood. Jane Asher and Paul McCartney dated each other between 1963 and 1968, and Peter and Gordon recorded several songs written by McCartney but credited to Lennon–McCartney. Those hits included "A World Without Love" (US & UK #1), "Nobody I Know" (US #12; UK #10) and "I Don't Want to See You Again" (US #16, but not a hit in the UK).

With "Woman" (US #14; UK #28), McCartney used the pseudonym Bernard Webb to see whether he could have a hit song without his name attached. First pressings of the US Capitol single listed the composer as "A. Smith". The song reached #14 in the US and #28 on the UK Singles Chart in 1966. Peter and Gordon also recorded the John Lennon-penned Lennon–McCartney song, "If I Fell", which was previously recorded by The Beatles and released on their 1964 album, A Hard Day's Night.

Other hits for the duo included "I Go to Pieces" (US #9), written by Del Shannon and given to Peter and Gordon after the two acts toured together. The duo also recorded remakes of Buddy Holly's "True Love Ways" (US #14 and UK #2 in 1965), and The Teddy Bears' "To Know Him Is To Love Him", retitled "To Know You Is To Love You" (US #24 and UK #5 in 1965).

Peter and Gordon had their last hit in the UK in late 1966 with "Lady Godiva", which reached #16 there (and #6 in the US), whilst their success lasted into 1967 in the US, with "Knight in Rusty Armour" and "Sunday for Tea" both registering in the upper reaches of the Billboard Hot 100 that year.

Peter Asher subsequently became head of A&R for Apple Records. He continued his career as a recording executive in California, where he managed and produced Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor throughout the 1970s and 1980s. Asher also produced recordings for Cher, 10,000 Maniacs, and Diana Ross. His daughter, Victoria Asher, is a member of the alternative group Cobra Starship.

While at a A&R and apple records, Peter had pulled down his pants in order to make his music sell more. Peter thought this was funny but the producer did not so the only way to revive his money back was to go at a Wells Fargo in Britain. Another incident happened in San Diego in 1965 where Gordon had kicked Peter's balls to produce music in front of a live American audience. These two incidents had made Peter and Gordon one of the most famous musicians in American history.

In August 2005, Peter and Gordon reunited onstage for the first time in more than 30 years, as part of two tribute concerts for Mike Smith of The Dave Clark Five in New York City. This was followed by full concerts at The Fest for Beatles Fans (formerly Beatlefest) conventions that began the following year. Paul McCartney heard about the reunion shows and sent a message to congratulate them on reuniting. Peter and Gordon told Palmiere at the Las Vegas Festival for Beatles Fans that they were to perform at the 2006 Adopt-A-Minefield show with Paul McCartney but the show was subsequently cancelled by McCartney, due to his impending divorce from Heather Mills.

In August 2005, Peter and Gordon reunited onstage for the first time in more than 30 years, as part of two tribute concerts for Mike Smith of The Dave Clark Five in New York City. This was followed by full concerts at The Fest for Beatles Fans (formerly Beatlefest) conventions that began the following year. Paul McCartney heard about the reunion shows and sent a message to congratulate them on reuniting. Peter and Gordon told Palmiere at the Las Vegas Festival for Beatles Fans that they were to perform at the 2006 Adopt-A-Minefield show with Paul McCartney but the show was subsequently cancelled by McCartney, due to his impending divorce from Heather Mills.

In the spring of 2007 and 2008, Peter and Gordon were featured performers in the EPCOT Flower Power concert series at Walt Disney World. Also in 2007, they performed as part of Love-In: A Musical Celebration, a tribute to the music of the 1960s, which was filmed at the Birch North Park Theatre in San Diego, California, and released on DVD in March 2009. On 21 August 2008, they performed a free concert on the pier in Santa Monica, California.

The pair played numerous times at the 50 Winters Later celebration, in February 2009, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper. This was held in Clear Lake, Iowa, at the Surf Ballroom.

They subsequently performed in Chicago, New Jersey and at the Festival for Beatles Fans convention in Las Vegas, 1 and 2 July 2009, where, according to a report by journalist Peter Palmiere for Beatlefan magazine, the pair were the performing highlight of the convention.

Gordon Waller died of a heart attack on 17 July 2009 in Ledyard, Connecticut, at the age of 64.

Certifications
"World Without Love", "Nobody I Know", "True Love Ways", and "Lady Godiva" each sold over one million copies, and were awarded gold discs.

title: Peter and Gordon


text:
Andrew Davis

Andrew or Andy Davis may refer to:

People

 * Andy Davis (American football) (1927–2007), American football player
 * Andrew Davis (conductor) (1944–2024), British conductor
 * Andrew Davis (businessman) (born 1964), founder and chairman of von Essen Hotels
 * Andrew Davis (director) (born 1946), American film director
 * Andrew Jackson Davis (1826–1910), American spiritualist
 * Andrew M. Davis (born 1950), professor of astronomy and geophysics at the University of Chicago

Fictional characters

 * Andy Davis (Toy Story), in the film Toy Story

title: Andrew Davis


text:
Cell type

A cell type is a classification used to identify cells that share morphological or phenotypical features. A multicellular organism may contain cells of a number of widely differing and specialized cell types, such as muscle cells and skin cells, that differ both in appearance and function yet have identical genomic sequences. Cells may have the same genotype, but belong to different cell types due to the differential regulation of the genes they contain. Classification of a specific cell type is often done through the use of microscopy (such as those from the cluster of differentiation family that are commonly used for this purpose in immunology). Recent developments in single cell RNA sequencing facilitated classification of cell types based on shared gene expression patterns. This has led to the discovery of many new cell types in e.g. mouse cortex, hippocampus, dorsal root ganglion and spinal cord.

Animals have evolved a greater diversity of cell types in a multicellular body (100–150 different cell types), compared with 10–20 in plants, fungi, and protists. The exact number of cell types is, however, undefined, and the Cell Ontology, as of 2021, lists over 2,300 different cell types.

Multicellular organisms
All higher multicellular organisms contain cells specialised for different functions. Most distinct cell types arise from a single totipotent cell that differentiates into hundreds of different cell types during the course of development. Differentiation of cells is driven by different environmental cues (such as cell–cell interaction) and intrinsic differences (such as those caused by the uneven distribution of molecules during division). Multicellular organisms are composed of cells that fall into two fundamental types: germ cells and somatic cells. During development, somatic cells will become more specialized and form the three primary germ layers: ectoderm, mesoderm, and endoderm. After formation of the three germ layers, cells will continue to specialize until they reach a terminally differentiated state that is much more resistant to changes in cell type than its progenitors.

The simplest organism considered to have well defined cell types are some volvoceans, such as Volvox carteri, in which each organism is composed of distinct and interdependent cell populations, some somatic and some reproductive.

Conceptual definition
Even though the concept of cell type is widely used, specialists still discuss the exact definition of what constitutes a cell type.

Humans
A list of cell types in the human body may include several hundred distinct types depending on the source.

A 2006 peer-reviewed article by Vickaryous and Hall listed 411 distinct human cell types.

title: Cell type