I have a difficult time with them, and I get lectured a lot about it. But, but, WHY should I take the trouble? Life is full of riotous colors, beautiful and vibrant and wild, and some people think I should stop and watch black and white because supposedly it’s so much better? I’ll watch it occasionally but mostly I avoid it entirely.
I’m not going to lecture you, Mika, you know that.
Anyway, it’s not that black & white is a superior medium than color; it’s not, at least not innately. It’s that there were some incredible movies made before color film was the default. 95% of black & white movies are crap, of course, but the same is true of color movies and everything else.
(Wait, that’s not true. 99% of rap music is crap, not 95%)
I actually found a few rap songs I like. 
I’m fairly open-minded when it comes to music. I prefer reggae, if I have to choose, but nowadays I even listen to modern country (gasp).
But everyone has to be closed-minded about something, and black and white is one of those things I am. I could probably count the number of b&w movies I’ve seen on one hand, and one of those is Young Frankenstein.
Once again you present me with a statement I have to pretend I didn’t read. Do not mention Gene Wilder or his unholy creations to me again, or the elf dies.
You are weird. Kill the elf, I guess, cause I can’t promise I won’t mention it again!
H.P. Lovecraft. Poor dead, miserable, screwed-up H.P. Lovecraft.
Many.
Music
Harry Warren
George Gershwin
Cole Porter
Beethoven
Movies
Busby Berkeley
Jean Arthur
Charlie Chaplin
Buster Keaton
The Marx Brothers
Fred Astaire
Humphrey Bogart
S. Z. Sakal
William Powell
Fritz Lang
You would have been disappointed. Alice was monogamous, was NOT a groupie banger, didn’t wreck hotel rooms, didn’t do drugs (he did have a bad alcohol problem, but it didn’t make him party like a rock star). He genuinely shocked fans by preferring to watch TV after a show and play golf with The Establishment. He would not have ‘bedded’ you.
I came to this thread to post Billie’s name as well.
Also - even though I don’t like Country and Western music, Patsy Cline (Kline) has a voice that just makes me melt.
Also, Judy Garland (yes, I am Gay - how did you know?)
Edith Piaf was also amazing.
I was reading Heinlein in high school and found a mention of Maxfield Parrish. I went looking for his stuff and fell in love. Since he’s dead, he is well past his prime, and he’s not as popular as he was in the early 20th century. Only a few of his paintings get much play these days - Daybreak and Ecstasy are the most popular - but he has a very large body of work, and all of them have that luminous resonance that just about breaks my heart.
Buddy Holly.
I don’t understand the question - how could you not, especially if you’re including novelists and poets? Also, especially if you’re including mega-stars.
I would find it a little odd for someone to be a huge fan of an obscure artist whose peak of popularity wasn’t really all that high and had faded long before the person was born. But if the artist is still a household name then they’re still going to pick up fans.
Same here; she won the Oscar for *The Lion in Winter *when I was four.
Also, J.R.R. Tolkien; he died when I was eight, and I first read The Hobbit four years later.
Ovid
Well, let’s see… My favorite genres of music are folk and classical, so most of my favorite composers are rather decomposers (though there are still performers in their heyday, of course).
Most of my favorite authors are also dead. C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien died 14 and 4 years before my birth, respectively, so they certainly weren’t “active” when I was born, though I suppose it’s possible that they’re still at or near their peak appreciation levels, due to the recent movies. Robert A. Heinlein’s life overlapped with mine, but I wasn’t first introduced to his work until after his death, and most of the works he wrote in my lifetime were decidedly subpar. Isaac Asimov lasted a little longer, and didn’t have as precipitous a dropoff in quality, but I’d still say his best works were before my birth.
Movies and TV, on the other hand, I seem to have a mix of classics and more modern works. I think the best Star Trek was the original, for instance, but none of the Treks holds a candle to Babylon 5 or Firefly. And few films can compare with Forbidden Planet or the original The Day the Earth Stood Still, but then again, few can also compare to The Princess Bride or 12 Monkeys.
In music:
Rogers & Hammerstein
Irving Berlin
Dinah Shore
In movies:
Celeste Holm
Gregory Peck
Robert Donat
In books:
Dorothy Sayers
Charlotte Bronte
Charles Dickens
In paintings:
Gustave Caillebotte
Albert Sisley
Amadeo Modigliani
In poetry:
W.B. Yeats
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
In drama:
Oscar Wilde
Oliver Goldsmith
William Shakespeare
I think it would be harder to make an equivalent list of beloved living artists. There’s a much smaller group to choose from.
In Maxfield Parrish territory, Alphonse Mucha. I have prints of the art-nouveau four seasons ladies on my walls. Art nouveau, and art deco, too, were the high points of design IMO.
Jack Lord from the original Five-O
The (sadly, not) Immortal Sam Cooke.
Live, at the Harlem Square Club is considered one of the greatest soul albums ever. Deservedly so, great performance and his charisma really comes through.