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June 1: Pat Boone, 90
A wholesome pop culture icon for roughly seven decades, Pat Boone has excelled in the worlds of music (33 singles on the Billboard Hot 100), film (Journey to the Center of the Earth, State Fair) and television (his own variety show), eventually becoming a fixture on contemporary Christian radio and cable programs. In 1997, Boone played very against type when he released a heavy metal album called In a Metal Mood: No More Mr. Nice Guy and appeared on the American Music Awards shirtless with fake tattoos and a leather vest! Last year he teamed up with fellow former teen idol Ann-Margret for a song on her album Born To Be Wild.
June 1: Alanis Morissette, 50
A songwriter before age 10, the Ottawa-born singer got her start on kids’ TV and in dance pop, but her 1995 album Jagged Little Pill changed not only her life but the sound of rock in the decades that followed. With hit singles like “You Oughta Know” and “Ironic,” the album earned her four Grammys and sold more than 16 million copies in the U.S. alone. Over the years she has also tried her hand at acting (she played God in Dogma) and adapted Jagged Little Pill into a Tony- and Grammy-winning Broadway musical. Most recently she has been voicing a surreal version of herself in the Alaska-set Fox animated sitcom The Great North: She’s the imaginary friend of the main character and appears in the sky as aurora borealis.
June 2: Dennis Haysbert, 70
Perhaps best known for his Golden Globe–nominated role as President David Palmer on the show 24, Dennis Haysbert has appeared in critically acclaimed films like Far From Heaven and crowd-pleasers like Major League. In 2003, he kicked off his run as the voice of Allstate Insurance, and he’s continued to excel across genres: Last year he appeared in the action thriller Sniper G.R.I.T. — Global Response and Intelligence Team, the inspired-by-a-true-story Flamin’ Hot (about the origins of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos) and the boundary-breaking Peacock docu-dramedy Paul T. Goldman.
June 4: Michelle Phillips, 80
As one-quarter of the Mamas and the Papas, the California-born singer-songwriter racked up six Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hits, including “Monday, Monday” and “California Dreamin’,” and the group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1998. Following the band’s breakup in 1969, she turned to acting, earning a Golden Globe nomination for most promising newcomer in Dillinger and later starring in Knots Landing. She recently told Rolling Stone that she’d be open to acting again but said, “The most important thing is my children and my grandchildren. The rest is my past.”
June 5: Ken Follett, 75
Best known for his spy novels and historical fiction, Welsh author Ken Follett has proven that history is anything but dry, selling more than 192 million copies of his 37 books and counting. He’s perhaps best known for his 1989 epic The Pillars of the Earth, which traces the construction of a cathedral in the fictional English town of Kingsbridge in the 12th century; it was later adapted into a sprawling miniseries starring Eddie Redmayne and Donald Sutherland. Last year he returned to Kingsbridge for the fifth book in the series, The Armour of Light, which is set in the 1790s during a period of revolution and enlightenment.
June 6: Harvey Fierstein, 70
Harvey Fierstein turns 70 on June 6, 2024.
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The Brooklyn-born Broadway legend took the Great White Way by storm in the early 1980s, when his Torch Song Trilogy, a semi-autobiographical play about gay family life, won two Tony Awards. He later took home two more trophies for writing the book for La Cage aux Folles and playing Edna Turnblad in 2003’s Hairspray. He recently released his memoir, I Was Better Last Night, in which he details his decades as a cultural icon and gay rights activist, and he took part in another boundary-breaking project when he appeared in Billy Eichner’s Bros, the first gay romantic comedy from a major studio.
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