THE LAST WORD ON BOB HOPE: Jim Knipfel, on the Billboard:
Every other news organization in the country was reaching for the obits they’d prepared 15 years ago... I still think Hope died in 1997 when his contract with the devil was up, but his handlers kept it a secret until they could sneak his corpse past all the centennial brouhaha. Then they wait two more months to make it look convincing and "break the news." At least in George Burns’ case, they went ahead and announced he was dead the day after his 100th birthday.Posted by Stephen Silver at July 28, 2003 11:22 PM