R.I.P. Bill Paxton and Judge Wapner

[giantsfan2016]

Posting on Marc's behalf again.

Actor Bill Paxton from movies such as Titanic and Twister passed away from complications of surgery at age 61.

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2017/02/26/actor-bill-paxton-dead-at-61.html

Judge Wapner the original judge on People's Court has passed away at age 97. I'm much younger than Marc and  Iwasn't even born when Wapner was the judge of People's Court.

http://www.wfsb.com/story/34608279/joseph-wapner-star-of-the-peoples-court-dead-at-97

I think someone needs to check on Betty White and Ozzy Osbourne.

P.S. Marc will be taking over his account again on Monday or Tuesday.

[TheFugitive]

A high-school classmate of mine had parents who owned a bakery.
They were sued by a bride who was unhappy with her wedding cake.
They ended up on People's Court where Judge Wapner ruled in their favor.

(You had a beautiful wedding day, and the cake tasted good.....so you weren't injured!)

He will be ever-immortalized in the movie Rain Man.   RIP.

[BillyGr]

As hard as it may be to believe now, the People's Court was unusual when it debuted just since nothing like that had been done before.

There were plenty of court based shows, but they were all scripted, and most court cases weren't allowed to have television coverage as happens many places now (if you see older true stories, that's why you'll usually see sketches of the courtroom).
This was basically the first time with real people with real cases (though one wonders sometimes why they thought they had one, like the cake described below) willing to be on TV and shown to people all over the country.

[TheFugitive]

The gimmick with Peoples Court was that producers for the show would approach litigants with a case pending in small claims court and offer them a better deal.

In exchange for dropping their cases and agreeing to have Judge Wapner decide on their show, they each got a cash payment that was in excess of what the maximum amount was that a small claims court could award.

That way even if you lost your case you still came out ahead financially.