Success 2012: Danny DeVito, an American actor, comedian, director and producer. He won a Golden Globe and an Emmy for on the ABC and NBC television series Taxi

Daniel Michael "Danny" DeVito, Jr. (born November 17, 1944) is an American actor, comedian, director and producer. He first gained prominence for his portrayal of short statured dispatcher Louie De Palma on the ABC and NBC television series Taxi (1978–1983), for which he won a Golden Globe and an Emmy.
DeVito and his wife, Rhea Perlman, founded Jersey Films, a production company known for films such as Pulp Fiction, Garden State, and Freedom Writers. DeVito also owns Jersey Television, which produced the Comedy Central series Reno 911!. DeVito and Perlman also starred together in his 1996 film Matilda, based on Roald Dahl's children's novel. He currently stars as Frank Reynolds on the FX sitcom It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.
DeVito played Martini in the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, reprising his role from the 1971 off-Broadway play of the same name. He gained fame in 1978 playing Louie De Palma, the short but domineering dispatcher for the fictional Sunshine Cab Company, on the hit TV show Taxi. After Taxi ended, DeVito began a successful film career, starting with roles in 1983's Terms of Endearment, and as the comic rogue in the romantic adventure Romancing the Stone, starring Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner, and its 1985 sequel, The Jewel of the Nile. In 1986, DeVito starred in Ruthless People with Bette Midler and Judge Reinhold, and in 1987, he made his feature-directing debut with the dark comedy Throw Momma from the Train, in which he starred with Billy Crystal and Anne Ramsey. Two years later, DeVito reunited with Douglas and Turner in The War of the Roses, which he directed and in which he co-starred.
DeVito's work during this time includes Other People's Money with Gregory Peck, director Barry Levinson's Tin Men as a competitive rival salesman to Richard Dreyfuss' character, two co-starring vehicles with Arnold Schwarzenegger (the comedies Twins and Junior), and playing The Penguin as a deformed sociopath in director Tim Burton's Batman Returns
Although generally a comic actor, DeVito expanded into dramatic roles with The Rainmaker, Hoffa (1992), which he directed and in which he co-starred with Jack Nicholson, Jack the Bear (1993), L.A. Confidential, The Big Kahuna, and Heist (2001), as a gangster nemesis to Gene Hackman's character.
DeVito has an interest in documentaries: In 2006, he began a partnership with Morgan Freeman's company ClickStar, on which he hosts a documentary channel called Jersey Docs. He was also interviewed in the documentary Revenge of the Electric Car, about his interest in and ownership of electric vehicles.

Success 2012: Richard "Rick" Stein, an English chef, restaurateur and television presenter. He was nominated among the best 20 chefs in the world

Christopher Richard "Rick" Stein OBE (born 4 January 1947) is an English chef, restaurateur and television presenter. He is currently the head chef and co-owner of "Rick Stein at Bannisters" at Mollymook, New South Wales, Australia, owns four restaurants in Padstow, a fish and chip shop in Falmouth, Cornwall and has written or presented a number cookery books and television programmes.
Stein opened his first business in Padstow in 1974, and now specialises in fish cookery. His business operates four restaurants, a bistro, a cafe, a seafood delicatessen, patisserie shop, a gift shop and a cookery school.His impact on the local economy of Padstow is such that it has been nicknamed "Padstein" despite the phrase being openly disputed by Rick himself.
In 2009 Stein made his first acquisition in the nearby trading village of St Merryn, which is 3.5 miles from Padstow. When taking over the Cornish Arms public house, which is located on the outskirts of St Merryn, Stein's stated aim was to 'keep it a traditional Cornish pub'.
On 1 October 2009, Stein opened with his fiancee publicist Sarah Burns, "Rick Stein at Bannisters" in Mollymook, on the South Coast of New South Wales, Australia. Rick said at the time of opening, “Ever since a memorable weekend eating Pambula oysters and flathead in Merimbula in the sixties, I’ve had the image of the clean blue sea and sweet seafood of the South Coast fixed in my head so when I was introduced to Mollymook about six years ago I knew that one day I would open up a restaurant celebrating local fish and shellfish but keeping it really simple. Bannisters was the relaxed seaside hotel that I was looking for, so when they asked me if I’d be interested in cooking there I jumped at the opportunity.”

As well as running his business, Stein has become a popular television presenter on food. Gaining early exposure after appearing on Keith Floyd's 1984 series Floyd On Fish as a guest chef, he was noticed by the show's producer and was later offered the chance to present his own series – similar in vein to the "travelogue" style of cookery show pioneered by Floyd – on BBC television including Rick Stein's Taste of the Sea, Fruits of the Sea, Seafood Odyssey, Fresh Food, Seafood Lovers' Guide, Food Heroes, and in 2005 French Odyssey about a memorable journey down the canals of South Western France to the Mediterranean, Mediterranean Escapes. This starts where French Odyssey left off, and explores the Mediterranean coastline and islands in search of the best in the region's foods. Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey, travelling around Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia. His current television programme is about the cooking of Spain off the beaten track. Stein was often accompanied by his Jack Russell terrier, Chalky, who died in January 2007.
A book has accompanied each series, and his book English Seafood Cookery won the Glenfiddich Award for Food Book of the Year in 1989. Stein was awarded the OBE in the 2003 New Year Honours list for services to tourism in Cornwall.

Success 2012: Mario Vargas Llosa, Peruvian-Spanish writer, politician, journalist, essayist, and recipient of the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature

Jorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa, 1st Marquis of Vargas Llosa ( born March 28, 1936) is a Peruvian-Spanish writer, politician, journalist, essayist, and recipient of the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature. Vargas Llosa is one of Latin America's most significant novelists and essayists, and one of the leading authors of his generation. Some critics consider him to have had a larger international impact and worldwide audience than any other writer of the Latin American Boom.Upon announcing the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature, the Swedish Academy said it had been given to Vargas Llosa "for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual's resistance, revolt, and defeat".
Vargas Llosa rose to fame in the 1960s with novels such as The Time of the Hero (La ciudad y los perros, literally The City and the Dogs, 1963/1966), The Green House (La casa verde, 1965/1968), and the monumental Conversation in the Cathedral (Conversación en la catedral, 1969/1975). He writes prolifically across an array of literary genres, including literary criticism and journalism. His novels include comedies, murder mysteries, historical novels, and political thrillers. Several, such as Captain Pantoja and the Special Service (1973/1978) and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (1977/1982), have been adapted as feature films.
He is the person who, in 1990, "coined the phrase that circled the globe",declaring on Mexican television, "Mexico is the perfect dictatorship", a statement which became an adage during the following decade.
Many of Vargas Llosa's works are influenced by the writer's perception of Peruvian society and his own experiences as a native Peruvian. Increasingly, however, he has expanded his range, and tackled themes that arise from other parts of the world. Another change over the course of his career has been a shift from a style and approach associated with literary modernism, to a sometimes playful postmodernism.
Like many Latin American authors, Vargas Llosa has been politically active throughout his career; over the course of his life, he has gradually moved from the political left towards liberalism or neoliberalism, a definitively more conservative political position. While he initially supported the Cuban revolutionary government of Fidel Castro, Vargas Llosa later became disenchanted with the Cuban dictator and his authoritarian regime. He ran for the Peruvian presidency in 1990 with the center-right Frente Democrático (FREDEMO) coalition, advocating neoliberal reforms, but lost the election to Alberto Fujimori.
Vargas Llosa's style encompasses historical material as well as his own personal experiences. For example, in his first novel, The Time of the Hero, his own experiences at the Leoncio Prado military school informed his depiction of the corrupt social institution which mocked the moral standards it was supposed to uphold.Furthermore, the corruption of the book's school is a reflection of the corruption of Peruvian society at the time the novel was written. Vargas Llosa frequently uses his writing to challenge the inadequacies of society, such as demoralization and oppression by those in political power towards those who challenge this power. One of the main themes he has explored in his writing is the individual's struggle for freedom within an oppressive reality For example, his two-volume novel Conversation in the Cathedral is based on the tyrannical dictatorship of Peruvian President Manuel A. Odría.The protagonist, Santiago, rebels against the suffocating dictatorship by participating in the subversive activities of leftist political groups.  In addition to themes such as corruption and oppression, Vargas Llosa's second novel, The Green House, explores "a denunciation of Peru's basic institutions", dealing with issues of abuse and exploitation of the workers in the brothel by corrupt military officers. 
Many of Vargas Llosa's earlier novels were set in Peru, while in more recent work he has expanded to other regions of Latin America, such as Brazil and the Dominican Republic.  His responsibilities as a writer and lecturer have allowed him to travel frequently and led to settings for his novels in regions outside of Peru^. The War of the End of the World was his first major work set outside Peru.  Though the plot deals with historical events of the Canudos revolt against the Brazilian government, the novel is not based directly on historical fact; rather, its main inspiration is the non-fiction account of those events published by Brazilian writer Euclides da Cunha in 1902. The Feast of the Goat, based on the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo, takes place in the Dominican Republic;in preparation for this novel, Vargas Llosa undertook a comprehensive study of Dominican history. The novel was characteristically realist, and Vargas Llosa underscores that he "respected the basic facts, [. . .] I have not exaggerated", but at the same time he points out "It's a novel, not a history book, so I took many, many liberties."
One of Vargas Llosa's more recent novels, The Way to Paradise (El paraíso en la otra esquina), is set largely in France and Tahiti.Based on the biography of former social reformer Flora Tristan, it demonstrates how Flora and Paul Gauguin were unable to find paradise, but were still able to inspire followers to keep working towards a socialist utopia. Unfortunately, Vargas Llosa was not as successful in transforming these historical figures into fiction. Some critics, such as Barbara Mujica, argue that The Way to Paradise lacks the "audacity, energy, political vision, and narrative genius" that was present in his previous works.

Success 2012: "Ziggy" Marley, Jamaican musician and leader of the band Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers. He is the oldest son of famed reggae musician Bob Marley

David "Ziggy" Marley (born 17 October 1968, Trenchtown, Jamaica) is a Jamaican musician and leader of the band Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers. He is the oldest son of famed reggae musician Bob Marley. His father gave him the nickname "Ziggy" due to the soccer move of the same name, and it is a nickname for "a small joint".
In 1979, Ziggy and his siblings Cedella, Stephen, and Sharon made their recording debut with their father, "Children Playing in the Streets". The Melody Makers, as the group came to be known, played occasionally for several years, including at their father's funeral in 1981. Their debut LP was Play the Game Right, which was a very pop-oriented album, earning Ziggy some derision from critics. The band's label, EMI, wanted to market Ziggy as a solo act, and so the Melody Makers moved to Virgin Records, where they recorded Conscious Party (1988, produced by Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth). The album was critically and popularly successful, as was One Bright Day (1989) and Jahmekya (1991).
As the 1990s continued, the Melody Makers' sales slowly declined, beginning with Joy and Blues (1993) and continuing with Free Like We Want 2 B (1995).

Ziggy became politically active, working with the United Nations and creating a record label called Ghetto Youths Crew. A solo album, Dragonfly was released on 15 April 2003. On 2 July 2006, his second solo album, Love Is My Religion, was released on his independent record company Tuff Gong Worldwide. This album won a Grammy for best Reggae album and this was Ziggy's 4th Grammy win. On 5 May 2009, his third solo children's album Family Time, was released on his independent record company Tuff Gong Worldwide. Family Time features Family and Friends, Rita Marley, Cedella Marley, Judah Marley, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson, Jack Johnson, Toots Hibbert, Laurie Berkner, Elizabeth Mitchell and more. This album won a Grammy for "Best Musical Album for Children".
Some of his most popular singles include "True To Myself", "Drive", "People Get Ready", and his hit single "Tomorrow People", which reached #39 on the Billboard Hot 100.
In April 2011, Marley announced his fourth album, entitled Wild and Free would be released on 14 June. The title track, featuring Woody Harrelson, is available for free with the pre-order of Ziggy's first comic book, "Marijuanaman."

Success 2012: Anthony Bourdain, American chef, author and television personality. He was the host of Travel Channel's culinary and cultural adventure programs No Reservations and The Layover

Anthony Michael "Tony" Bourdain (born June 25, 1956) is an American chef, author and television personality. He is well known for his 2000 book Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, and was the host of Travel Channel's culinary and cultural adventure programs Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations and The Layover.
A 1978 graduate of the Culinary Institute of America and a veteran of numerous professional kitchens,^[Bourdain is currently a chef-at-large, whose home base is Brasserie Les Halles, New York where he was executive chef for many years.
In Kitchen Confidential, Bourdain describes how his love of food was kindled in France when he tried his first oyster on an oyster fisherman's boat as a youth while on a family vacation. Later, while attending Vassar College, he worked in the seafood restaurants of Provincetown, Massachusetts, which sparked his decision to pursue cooking as a career. Bourdain graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in 1978, and went on to run various restaurant kitchens in New York City – including the Supper Club, One Fifth Avenue, and Sullivan's – culminating in the position of executive chef at Brasserie Les Halles beginning in 1998. Brasserie Les Halles is based in Manhattan, with additional locations in Miami and, at the time of Bourdain's tenure, Washington, D.C. and Tokyo, Japan.

Because of Bourdain's liberal use of profanity and sexual references in his television show No Reservations, the network has placed viewer discretion advisories on each segment of each episode. In recent seasons, the advisories include animation that is related in some way to the episode.
Known for consuming exotic ethnic dishes, Bourdain has eaten sheep testicles in Morocco, ant eggs in Puebla, Mexico, a raw seal eyeball as part of a traditional Inuit seal hunt, and a whole cobra – beating heart, blood, bile, and meat – in Vietnam. According to Bourdain, the most disgusting thing he has ever eaten is a Chicken McNugget, though he has also declared that the unwashed warthog rectum he ate in Namibia and the fermented shark he ate in Iceland are among "the worst meals of [his] life."
He has been known for being an unrepentant drinker and smoker. In a nod to Bourdain's (at the time) two-pack-a-day cigarette habit, renowned chef Thomas Keller once served him a 20-course tasting menu which included a mid-meal "coffee and cigarette": a coffee custard infused with tobacco, together with a foie gras mousse.Bourdain stopped cigarette smoking in the summer of 2007 because of the birth of his daughter. He is also a former user of cocaine, heroin, and LSD. In Kitchen Confidential he writes of his experience in a trendy SoHo restaurant in 1981: "We were high all the time, sneaking off to the walk-in refrigerator at every opportunity to 'conceptualize.' Hardly a decision was made without drugs. Cannabis, methaqualone, cocaine, LSD, psilocybin mushrooms soaked in honey and used to sweeten tea, secobarbital, tuinal, amphetamine, codeine and, increasingly, heroin, which we'd send a Spanish-speaking busboy over to Alphabet City to get." In the same book, Bourdain frankly describes his former addiction, including how he once resorted to selling his record collection on the street in order to raise enough money to purchase drugs.
Bourdain is also noted for his put-downs of celebrity chefs, such as Paula Deen, Bobby Flay, Sandra Lee, and Rachael Ray, and appears to be irritated by both the overt commercialism of the celebrity cooking industry and its lack of culinary authenticity. He has voiced a "serious disdain for food demigods like Alan Richman, Alice Waters, and Alain Ducasse." Bourdain has recognized the irony of his transformation into a celebrity chef and has, to some extent, begun to qualify his insults. He has been consistently outspoken in his praise for chefs he admires, particularly Thomas Keller, Gordon Ramsay, Eric Ripert, Ferran Adrià, Fergus Henderson, Marco Pierre White, and Mario Batali. Bourdain has also spoken very highly of Julia Child, saying that she "influenced the way I grew up and my entire value system."
Bourdain is also known for his sarcastic comments about vegan and vegetarian activists, saying that their lifestyle is rude to the inhabitants of many countries he visits. Bourdain says he considers vegetarianism, except in the case of religious strictures as in India, a "First World luxury." He has clarified that he believes Americans eat too much meat, and admires vegetarians who allow themselves to put aside their vegetarianism when they travel in order to be respectful of their hosts.
Bourdain's taste in music is also a matter of public record. His book, The Nasty Bits, is dedicated to "Joey, Johnny, and Dee Dee" of the Ramones. Bourdain has declared fond appreciation for their music, as well that of other early punk bands such as The Stooges, Dead Boys, Television, The New York Dolls, and The Voidoids. Additionally, Bourdain writes in Kitchen Confidential that the playing of music by Billy Joel in his kitchen was grounds for immediate firing (coincidentally, Joel is a fan of his and has subsequently visited the restaurant). In the 2006 No Reservations episode in Sweden, Bourdain proclaimed that his all-time favorite album (his "desert island disc") is the groundbreaking punk record Fun House by The Stooges; he also made it clear that he despises the Swedish pop group ABBA. On his 2007 No Reservations Holiday Special episode, the rock band Queens of the Stone Age were the featured dinner guests, adding food-inspired holiday songs to the episode's soundtrack.

Success 2012: Giorgio Locatelli, one of the best Italian chefs in the UK. His Locanda Locatelli restaurant serves traditional Italian dishes and has won a Michelin star in 2003

Giorgio Locatelli is an Italian chef working in the United Kingdom.

Locatelli was brought up in Corgeno on the banks of Lake Comabbio, Italy. His uncle ran a restaurant, giving him an appreciation and understanding of food from an early age. After working for a short spell in local restaurants in North Italy and Switzerland, Locatelli came to England in 1986 to join the kitchens of Anton Edelmann at The Savoy. In 1990, Locatelli moved to Paris and worked at Restaurant Laurent and La Tour D’Argent.
On his return to London a couple of years later, Locatelli became head chef at Olivo, Eccleston Street, before opening Zafferano in February 1995.
Locatelli cooking at Zafferano quickly became the toast of London. He won "Best Italian Restaurant" at the London Carlton Restaurant Awards for two consecutive years and his first Michelin star in 1999.His cooking aims to highlight the natural flavours of quality produce, much of which he imports directly from Italy. He opened his second restaurant, Spighetta, on Blandford Street, in July 1997 and its sister restaurant Spiga, on Wardour Street, in March 2009.
Locatelli is considered by many to be one of the best Italian chefs in the UK. His Locanda Locatelli restaurant serves traditional Italian dishes. Locanda Locatelli has won a Michelin star in 2003 which has since been retained.
Locatelli has featured in three TV series: Pure Italian, 2002, aired on the UK Food channel, Tony and Giorgio, filmed with entrepreneur Tony Allan, shown on BBC2 and Sicily Unpacked, with art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon. Tony and Giorgio was accompanied by a tie-in book. His own cookery book, Made in Italy, was published in September 2006. Made in Italy has received the Best Food Book award at the Glenfiddich Food and Drink Awards 2007. A second book, Made in Sicily, was published in September 2011.
In 2002, on the 14th of February, Giorgio and his wife Plaxy, opened his first independent restaurant, Locanda Locatelli, in Seymour Street. The restaurant has been awarded a Michelin star in 2003, which has been retained eight times, in 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011.

Alexey Leonov, soviet/russian cosmonaut who, on 18 March 1965, became the first human to conduct a space walk

Alexey Arkhipovich Leonov (born 30 May 1934 in Listvyanka, Kemerovo Oblast, Soviet Union) is a retired Soviet/Russian cosmonaut and Air Force Major General who, on 18 March 1965, became the first human to conduct an extra-vehicular activity (EVA) also known as a space walk.
Leonov was one of the twenty Soviet Air Force pilots selected to be part of the first cosmonaut group in 1960. Like all the Soviet cosmonauts Leonov was a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. His walk in space was originally to have taken place on the Vostok 11 mission, but this was cancelled, and the historic event happened on the Voskhod 2 flight instead. He was outside the spacecraft for 12 minutes and nine seconds on 18 March 1965, connected to the craft by a 5.35 meter tether. At the end of the spacewalk, Leonov's spacesuit had inflated in the vacuum of space to the point where he could not re-enter the airlock. He opened a valve to allow some of the suit's pressure to bleed off, and was barely able to get back inside the capsule. Leonov had spent some eighteen months undergoing intensive weightlessness training for the mission.
 As of November 2011, Leonov is the last survivor of the five cosmonauts in the Voskhod program.
In 1968, Leonov was selected to be commander of a circumlunar Soyuz flight. However as all unmanned test flights of this project failed, and the Apollo 8 mission already given that step in the Space Race to the USA, the flight was canceled. He was also selected to be the first Soviet person to land on the Moon, aboard the LOK/N1 spacecraft. This project was also canceled. (Incidentally, the design required a risky spacewalk between lunar vehicles, something that contributed to his selection.) Leonov was to have been commander of the ill-fated 1971 Soyuz 11 mission to Salyut 1, the first manned space station, but his crew was replaced with the backup after the cosmonaut Valery Kubasov was suspected to have contracted tuberculosis.
Leonov was to have commanded the next mission to Salyut 1, but this was scrapped after the deaths of the Soyuz 11 crew members, and the space station was lost. The next two Salyuts (actually the military Almaz station) were lost at launch or failed soon after, and Leonov's crew stood by. By the time Salyut 4 reached orbit Leonov had been switched to a more prestigious project.
Leonov's second trip into space was similarly significant: he commanded the Soviet half of the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz mission -- Soyuz 19 -- the first joint space mission between the Soviet Union and the United States.
From 1976 to 1982, Leonov was the commander of the cosmonaut team ("Chief Cosmonaut"), and deputy director of the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, where he oversaw crew training. He also edited the cosmonaut newsletter Neptune. He retired in 1991.
Leonov is an accomplished artist whose published books include albums of his artistic works and works he did in collaboration with his friend Andrei Sokolov. Leonov has taken colored pencils and paper into space, where he has sketched the Earth and drawn portraits of the Apollo astronauts who flew with him during the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.^[1] Arthur C. Clarke wrote in his notes to 2010: Odyssey Two that, after a 1968 screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Leonov pointed out to him that the alignment of the Moon, Earth, and Sun shown in the opening is essentially the same as that in Leonov's 1967 painting Near the Moon, although the painting's diagonal framing of the scene was not replicated in the film. Clarke kept an autographed sketch of this painting—which Leonov made after the screening, hanging on his office wall.
In 2001, he was a vice president of Moscow-based Alfa Bank and an advisor to the first deputy of the Board.
In 2004, Leonov and former American astronaut David Scott began work on a dual biography / history of the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union. Titled Two Sides of the Moon: Our Story of the Cold War Space Race, it was published in 2006. Neil Armstrong and Tom Hanks both wrote introductions to the book.
Leonov was also a contributor to the 2007 book Into That Silent Sea by Colin Burgess and Francis French, which describes his life and career in space exploration.

Success 2012: José Carreras, spanish catalan tenor particularly known for his performances in the operas of Verdi and Puccini. He gained fame with a wider audience as one of The Three Tenors along with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti

Josep Maria Carreras i Coll (born 5 December 1946), better known as José Carreras, is a Spanish Catalan tenor particularly known for his performances in the operas of Verdi and Puccini^.Born in Barcelona, he made his debut on the opera stage at the age of 11 as Trujamán in Manuel de Falla's El retablo de Maese Pedro and went on to a career that encompassed over 60 roles on the stages of the world's leading opera houses and in the recording studio.
He gained fame with a wider audience as one of The Three Tenors along with Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti in a series of mass concerts that began in 1990 and continued until 2003.  Carreras is also known for his humanitarian work as the president of the José Carreras International Leukaemia Foundation (La Fundació Internacional Josep Carreras per a la Lluita contra la Leucèmia), which he established following his own recovery from the disease in 1988
 The 1990s continued to see Carreras performing on the operatic stage in Carmen and Fedora and making role debuts in Samson et Dalila (Peralada, 1990), Verdi's Stiffelio (London, 1993), and Wolf-Ferrari's Sly (Zurich, 1998). However, his opera performances became less frequent as he increasingly devoted himself to concerts and recitals. His final performance in a fully staged opera was on 12 July 2002 in Tokyo, where he reprised the title role in Sly, while his final operatic performances at the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the opera house where his career began, were in Samson et Dalila (March 2001).
In 1990 the first Three Tenors concert, took place in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome on the eve of the 1990 FIFA World Cup finals. It was originally conceived to raise money for Carreras's leukemia foundation and as a way for his colleagues, Plácido Domingo and Luciano Pavarotti, to welcome their "little brother" back to the world of opera. However, it and the subsequent Three Tenors concerts brought Carreras a fame that went far beyond the opera house.  It is estimated that over a billion people around the world watched the television broadcast of the 1994 Three Tenors concert in Los Angeles.  By 1999, the CD from the first Three Tenors concert in Rome had sold an estimated 13 million copies, making it the best-selling classical recording of all time. The early 1990s also saw Carreras serving as the Musical Director for the opening and closing ceremonies of 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, and performing in a worldwide concert tour in tribute to his first singing hero, Mario Lanza.
Carreras's recording and concert repertoire has now moved almost entirely into Neapolitan songs, the light classical genre, and 'easy-listening'. He has also increasingly performed and recorded with artists from outside the classical music world, such as Diana Ross, Edyta Górniak, Lluis Llach, Peter Maffay, Udo Jürgens, Klaus Meine, Charles Aznavour, Kim Styles, Sarah Brightman, Sissel Kyrkjebø, Debbie Harry, Majida El Roumi, and Giorgia Fumanti.
Following his own recovery from leukemia, Carreras sought both to repay the debt he owed to medical science and to improve the lives and care of other leukemia sufferers. On 14 July 1988, he established the José Carreras International Leukemia Foundation (Fundació Internacional Josep Carreras per a la Lluita contra la Leucèmia) in Barcelona.
The José Carreras International Leukaemia Foundation also has affiliates in the U.S., Switzerland, and Germany, with the German affiliate the most active of the three. Since 1995, Carreras has presented an annual live television benefit gala in Leipzig to raise funds for the foundation's work in Germany. Since its inception, the gala alone has raised well over €71 million. Carreras also performs at least 20 charity concerts a year in aid of his foundation and other medical related charities. He is an Honorary Member of the European Society for Medicine and the European Haematology Association, an Honorary Patron of the European Society for Medical Oncology, and a Goodwill Ambassador for UNESCO.

Carreras has received numerous awards and distinctions for both his artistic and humanitarian work. These include: Commander of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur (France); Gran Croce di Cavaliere and Grande Ufficiale della Repubblica Italiana; Grand Decoration for Services to the Republic of Austria; the Cruz de Oro del Orden Civil de la Solidaridad Social from Queen Sofia of Spain, The Prince of Asturias Prize, and the Bundesverdienstkreuz from the Federal Republic of Germany. On 23 February 2004, the Austrian Post Office issued a 1€ stamp to commemorate the 30th anniversary of his debut at the Vienna Staatsoper.
He has Honorary Doctorates from the University of Barcelona and Miguel Hernández University (Spain); Napier, Loughborough and Sheffield universities (United Kingdom); the Mendeleev Russian University of Chemistry and Technology (Russia); the University of Camerino (Italy); Rutgers University (United States); the University of Coimbra (Portugal); the National University of Music Bucharest (Romania); Philipps-Universität Marburg (Germany); the University of Pécs (Hungary) and most recently, Kyunghee University (Korea) and the University of Porto (Portugal).
In Spain the central plaza in Sant Joan d'Alacant bears his name, as do two theatres – the Auditori Josep Carreras in Vila-seca (near Tarragona) and The Teatro Josep Carreras in Fuenlabrada.

In its prime, Carreras's voice was considered one of the most beautiful tenor voices of the day. The Spanish critic, Fernando Fraga has described it as a lyric tenor with the generosity of a spinto, having "a noble timbre, richly coloured and sumptuously resonant". This is particularly true of the middle range of his voice. Fraga also noted, as has Carreras himself, that even in his youth the high notes of the tenor range were always somewhat problematic for him, and became more so as his career progressed. Like his idol, Giuseppe di Stefano, Carreras was also known for the beauty and expressiveness of his phrasing and for his passionate delivery. These qualities are perhaps best exemplified in his 1976 recording of Tosca with Montserrat Caballé in the title role and conducted by Sir Colin Davis. According to several critics  his assumption of the heavier spinto roles such as Andrea Chénier, Don José in Carmen, Don Carlo, and Alvaro in La forza del destino put a strain on his naturally lyric instrument which may have caused the voice to prematurely darken and lose some of its bloom. Nevertheless he produced some of his finest performances in those roles. The Daily Telegraph wrote of his 1984 Andrea Chénier at London's Royal Opera House: "Switching effortlessly from the lyric poet Rodolfo in La Bohème a few weeks ago to the heroic poet Chenier, the Spanish tenor's vocal artistry held us spellbound throughout." Of his 1985 performance in Andrea Chénier at La Scala (preserved on DVD), Carl Battaglia wrote in Opera News that Carreras dominated the opera "with formidable concentration and a cleverly refined vocal accent that imparts to this spinto role an overlay of intensity lacking in his essentially lyric tenor." However, Carl H. Hiller's review of the La Scala performance in Opera also noted that while in the quiet phrases of the score "he could display all the tonal mellowness of which this perhaps most beautiful tenor voice of our time is capable", he had difficulty with the high loud notes, which sounded strained and uneasily produced.Critic Peter G. Davis wrote of Carreras' choice to continue his career^.

Success 2012: TOMMY RAMONE, the last surviving member of the influential punk rock band THE RAMONES. In 1970, Tommy was an assistant engineer for the production of the Jimi Hendrix album Band of Gypsys

Tommy Ramone, also known as Thomas Erdelyi (born Erdélyi Tamás; January 29, 1952), is a Hungarian American record producer and musician. He was the drummer of the influential punk rock band the Ramones, the last surviving member of the original quartet.
Erdélyi was born in Budapest, Hungary, to Jewish parents who had survived the Holocaust by being hidden by neighbors, though many of his relatives were victims of the Nazis. He grew up in Forest Hills, a neighborhood of New York City's Queens borough. Tommy and guitarist John Cummings (later to be dubbed "Johnny Ramone") performed together in a mid-60's four-piece garage band called the Tangerine Puppets while in high school. In 1970, Erdelyi was an assistant engineer for the production of the Jimi Hendrix album Band of Gypsys.
When the Ramones first came together, with Johnny Ramone on guitar, Dee Dee Ramone on bass and Joey Ramone on drums, Erdelyi was supposed to be the manager, but was drafted as the band's drummer when Joey became the lead singer and found that he couldn't keep up with the Ramones' increasingly fast tempos. "Tommy Ramone, who was managing us, finally had to sit down behind the drums, because nobody else wanted to," Dee Dee later recalled.
He remained as drummer from 1974 to 1978, playing on and co-producing their first three albums, Ramones, Leave Home, and Rocket to Russia, as well as the live album It's Alive.
He was replaced on drums in 1978 by Marky Ramone, but handled band management and co-production for their fourth album, Road to Ruin; he later returned as producer for the eighth album, 1984's Too Tough to Die^.
Even though Tommy was an original member and co-producer for the Ramones, both Dee Dee and Johnny denied that he influenced the Ramones' sound.During interviews for the End of the Century: The Story of the Ramones, Dee Dee stated that Tommy was simply "at the right place at the right time". This seemingly contradicts an earlier interview in the same film in which Johnny Ramone states that Tommy was very important to the band.
Dee Dee, in his books, expressed resentment towards Tommy for having it "together" more than anyone else in the band, being able to cook himself dinner and organize his life in a much more functional manner, without the psychosis or addiction problems that Dee Dee himself suffered from. In comparison to everyone else in the band, Tommy was seemingly "normal", though there are accounts of him partying with the band and driving them around in his car in the early days. Tommy Ramone wrote "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" and the majority of "Blitzkrieg Bop" while bassist Dee Dee suggested the title. He and Ed Stasium played all the guitar solos on the albums he produced, as Johnny Ramone largely preferred playing rhythm guitar.
In the 1980s he produced the highly regarded Replacements album Tim, as well as Redd Kross's Neurotica.
On October 8, 2004, he played as a Ramone once again, when he joined C.J. Ramone, Daniel Rey, and Clem Burke (also known as Elvis Ramone) in the "Ramones Beat Down On Cancer" concert. In October 2007 in an interview to promote It's Alive 1974-1996 a double DVD of the band's greatest televised live performances he paid tribute to his deceased bandmates:

"They gave everything they could in every show. They weren't the type to phone it in, if you see what I mean."

Currently, Tommy and Claudia Tienan (formerly of underground band The Simplistics) are performing as a bluegrass-based folk duo called Uncle Monk. Says Tommy: "There are a lot of similarities between punk and old-time music. Both are home-brewed music as opposed to schooled, and both have an earthy energy. And anybody can pick up an instrument and start playing." He joined songwriter Chris Castle, Garth Hudson, Larry Campbell (musician) and the Womack Family Band in July 2011 at Levon Helm Studios for Castle's album Last Bird Home.