SKIP HOMEIER

26 Jun

(5 October 1930 - 25 June 2017)

Born George Vincent Homeier, US actor Skip Homeier, who has died aged 86 of spinal myelopathy, started out as a child actor on radio from the age of six. His early films saw him playing wild teenagers but he managed the change from child to adult actor quite seamlessly and, if never a big star, worked steadily for some forty years. His first film was Tomorrow, the World! (1944) in which he played a Nazi youth. Wedded to genre films, Homeier was seen in many a Western, war and crime picture. A lot were minor films or B-movies but there were some goodies, too, such as Henry King’s The Gunfighter with Gregory Peck, Lewis Milestone’s Halls of Montezuma with Richard Widmark, Sealed Cargo with Dana Andrews, Sam Fuller’s Fixed Bayonets, Douglas Sirk’s Has Anybody Seen My Gal?, Black Widow with Ginger Rogers and The Tall T, Ten Wanted Men and Comanche Station, all with Randolph Scott. Television always figured in his career, too, especially in the 1970s. Skip’s last film was Quell and Co (1982). After that Homeier retired (aged 52), refusing all interviews and festival or convention invitations. He was married twice and had two children.

MICHAEL DARVELL

Michael Darvell

Michael Darvell trained as a librarian at Watford and in Surrey before joining Ealing Libraries where he became Music Librarian for the borough. He edited Masthead, the magazine of the University of North London School of Librarianship, The Surrealist, the staff magazine of Surrey County Library, and contributed to the Assistant Librarian and London Librarian professional journals. A freelance film reviewer since 1970, he has written for Film, Films Illustrated, Film Review, Movie Maker and Radio Times, as well as editing Montage, the London film societies magazine, for ten years. A change of career saw him joining What’s On in London as Features Editor and he eventually stepped into the shoes of the late F. Maurice Speed (founding father of Film Review annual) as the magazine’s Editor. From 2007 to 2015, he was co-editor of the Film Review annual with Mansel Stimpson. As well as writing about films, Michael has reviewed theatre for The Stage newspaper, and has written about music theatre and cabaret for the Classical Source and Musical Theatre Review websites. He is also a former restaurant critic for the ViewLondon website. Michael has been a member of the London Film Critics’ Circle since 2005.

SKIP HOMEIER

MICHAEL NYQVIST

STEPHEN FURST