LEONARD COHEN

(21 September 1934 - 7 November 2016)

The Canadian singer-songwriter, philosopher-poet and novelist had little to do with the cinema, although he did appear in a few titles, but many (approaching some 250) films and television programmes have used his songs as part of their soundtracks. Cohen’s appearances as an actor were few and far between: just four odd shorts, playing a singer in The Ernie Game (a Canadian film from 1967) and a TV appearance on Miami Vice in 1986. However, his songs have been heard on everything from Altman’s McCabe and Mrs Miller and A Wedding to Pump Up the Volume and Natural Born Killers, and from Breaking the Waves and Shrek to EastEnders.

MICHAEL DARVELL