'80s teen flick director John Hughes dies in NYC:

By HILLEL ITALIE, AP National Writer Hillel Italie, Ap National Writer – 22 mins ago

NEW YORK – Writer-director John Hughes, Hollywood's youth impresario of the 1980s and '90s who captured the teen and preteen market with such favorites as "Home Alone," "The Breakfast Club" and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," died Thursday, a spokeswoman said. He was 59.

Hughes died of a heart attack during a morning walk in Manhattan, Michelle Bega said. He was in New York to visit family.

Jake Bloom, Hughes' longtime attorney, said he was "deeply saddened and in shock" to learn of the director's death.

A native of Lansing, Mich., who later moved to suburban Chicago and set much of his work there, Hughes rose from ad writer to comedy writer to silver screen champ with his affectionate and idealized portraits of teens, whether the romantic and sexual insecurity of "Sixteen Candles," or the J.D. Salinger-esque rebellion against conformity in "The Breakfast Club."

Hughes' ensemble comedies helped make stars out of Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy and many other young performers. He also scripted the phenomenally popular "Home Alone," which made little-known Macaulay Culkin a sensation as the 8-year-old accidentally abandoned by his vacationing family, and wrote or directed such hits as "National Lampoon's Vacation," "Pretty in Pink," "Planes, Trains & Automobiles" and "Uncle Buck."

"I was a fan of both his work and a fan of him as a person," Culkin said. "The world has lost not only a quintessential filmmaker whose influence will be felt for generations, but a great and decent man."

Devin Ratray, best known for playing Culkin's older brother Buzz McCallister in the "Home Alone" films, said he remained close to Hughes over the years.

"He changed my life forever," Ratray said. "Nineteen years later, people from all over the world contact me telling me how much 'Home Alone' meant to them, their families, and their children."

Other actors who got early breaks from Hughes included John Cusack ("Sixteen Candles"), Judd Nelson ("The Breakfast Club"), Steve Carell ("Curly Sue") and Lili Taylor ("She's Having a Baby").

Actor Matthew Broderick worked with Hughes in 1986 when he played the title character in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."

"I am truly shocked and saddened by the news about my old friend John Hughes. He was a wonderful, very talented guy and my heart goes out to his family," Broderick said.

Ben Stein, who played the monotone economics teacher calling the roll and repeatedly saying "Bueller? Bueller? Bueller?", said Hughes was a towering talent.

"He made a better connection with young people than anyone in Hollywood had ever made before or since," Stein said on Fox Business Network. "It's incredibly sad. He was a wonderful man, a genius, a poet. I don't think anyone has come close to him as being the poet of the youth of America in the postwar period. He was to them what Shakespeare was to the Elizabethan Age.

"You had a regular guy — just an ordinary guy. If you met him, you would never guess he was a big Hollywood power."

As Hughes advanced into middle age, his commercial touch faded and, in Salinger style, he increasingly withdrew from public life. His last directing credit was in 1991, for "Curly Sue," and he wrote just a handful of scripts over the past decade. He was rarely interviewed or photographed.

Associated Press writer Amy Westfeldt, Entertainment Writer Douglas J. Rowe and Drama Writer Michael Kuchwara contributed to this report from New York. AP writer Solvej Schou contributed from Los Angeles.

Man Killed By His Own Tattoo:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

John Chillingworth, of Bungay, Suffolk, was given the tattoo on his right calf by his girlfriend as a birthday present.

By the time he arrived home at about 3.30pm, he told his girlfriend, 22-year-old Amy Hahs, that the tattoo was stinging, the inquest in Lowestoft heard on Friday.

His leg was swollen and red within two days and a scab formed. Mr. Chillingworth had trouble sleeping because of the pain.

He visited his GP, who cleaned and dressed the wound and gave Mr. Chillingworth painkillers and antihistamines.

Yet 10 days after the tattoo session, Miss Hahs returned home from work to find Mr. Chillingworth lying slumped on the sitting room sofa. He was pronounced dead when paramedics arrived shortly afterwards.

A post mortem examination found that Mr. Chillingworth died due to a blood clot in one of his lungs. It had come from a deep vein thrombosis in his right calf.

Peter Dean, the Suffolk coroner, said it was not clear whether the DVT had been related to the tattoo, or whether it developed due to Mr. Chillingworth being inactive due to the pain.

Mr Dean, who said that the tattooist had followed all necessary hygiene procedures, recorded a narrative verdict of a pulmonary embolism following a tattooing.



Tattoo: The Deadly Killer