Sunday, March 25, 2007

Andy Candy

So about forty minutes ago, I'm in my friendly neighborhood CVS Pharmacy and a lady shopper comes up to me. She says her "favorite actor in the whole world" is over in the next aisle...and I guess she's so excited about it that she has to tell someone. So she tells me and naturally, I ask, "And who might that be?"

She says, "John Candy," and my immediate thought is just what yours would be in this situation: "I don't think so." As I'm thinking that, she's telling me how much she loved him in Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

Let's leave aside the question of how someone could be your "favorite actor in the whole world" and yet you're unaware they died thirteen years ago. Let's just focus on what I should do. Should I tell this young woman (she's about forty, I'd guess) that she didn't just spot John Candy in the Toothpaste Section, across from where they sell the Just For Men hair color? Or should I let her keep her little fantasy of having seen her fave in person? She'll probably find out one of these days...but is it my business to shatter her happiness?

Just then, she points to a gap in the aisles and says, "There he is," and I can see the person she thinks is John Candy. There, wearing a green t-shirt and shorts, is Andy Richter. "Do you think it would be okay if I went up to him and asked for an autograph?" she asks me.

I think to myself, "Hmm...I wonder if Andy Richter would enjoy being mistaken for John Candy. He might get a great anecdote out of it, one he could tell on his next talk show appearance. Or he might just feel insulted...I don't know." I decide to save the lady the embarrassment and I break it to her, as kindly as I can, that John Candy passed away some time ago.

She asks me, "Are you sure?"

I tell her I'm sure.

She turns and walks off, looking very sad indeed. I don't know if she's sad just because her "favorite actor in the whole world" is dead or if she's sad because she feels humiliated by her mistake. Either way, it sure doesn't feel like I've done this woman a favor. I should have let her go up and tell Andy Richter how good he was in Planes, Trains and Automobiles. If he was insulted, too bad. He could handle it.

• Posted at 5:59 PM · LINK

Remembering Ron

Here we see the cast of a great TV show named Barney Miller. The short guy in the center is Ron Carey who, as noted here, passed away in mid-January.

This afternoon, a bunch of his friends — and he had many — gathered at the Improv in Hollywood for a lovely memorial service. Among those who spoke were the two men on either side of him in the photo, Max Gail and Steve Landesberg. We also heard from Mel Brooks and from the team of Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, and others, plus there was a lovely tribute video edited by Chuck McCann.

(Forgive the abrupt change of topic but I seemed to have picked up Billy Connolly's disdain for sticking with a topic. People keep asking me about this. There are two Chuck McCanns in show business. There's the Chuck McCann who got famous hosting a kid's show in New York and who's now a busy character actor and cartoon voice actor and one of my best pals. There's also the Chuck McCann who's a film editor, whose credit you'll see on most of the Charlie Brown cartoons, among other places. Those are totally separate Chuck McCanns...but just to confuse you, the film I'm describing was edited by Chuck McCann the Actor. Back to Ron...)

The afternoon went long, as these things so often do. At the end of it, Anne Meara yelled out, "When we got here, I was still menstruating!" Everyone recalled Ron as a lovely, friendly guy who never missed a chance to help his friends and even some total strangers. Many recalled that before he was a successful character actor, Ron had quite a career as a stand-up comedian. Emcee Budd Friedman, who operates the Improv, remarked, "The thing about Ron — and I remember this with a lump in my throat — is that he was the first comedian I had to pay." That alone assures the guy his immortality.

• Posted at 4:30 PM · LINK

Today's Video Link

We pause now for a commercial...two of them, in fact. Both are for Kellogg's Corn Flakes and feature Cornelius, the rooster who for many years has been intermittently seen on boxes of the cereal. Kellogg's tried a couple of times to use Corny as a commercial spokescritter but he never quite caught on as a real character. For this series of spots, his voice was done by the legendary western actor, Andy Devine. For a time before that, Mr. Devine was associated with Kellogg's Corn Pops, doing their commercials and appearing on the box.

I don't know who the little kid is in these commercials, though he looks a little like Brandon Cruz, who starred with Bill Bixby in the seventies sitcom, The Courtship of Eddie's Father. Whoever he is, his voice in these spots has been dubbed by Dick Beals, whom we mention often in this weblog as we speak of old commercials and cartoons. In the second of the two ads, we have Paul Frees voicing a supporting character. I think Hanna-Barbera did the animation in both. Here they are...

• Posted at 12:40 AM · LINK

Political Theater Row

Yesterday, the House okayed a bill that would provide funds to continue the war in Iraq but with a mandatory timetable for withdrawal. I have no idea if that's a good idea or even if the representatives who voted for it all think it's a good idea. My omnipresent cynicism suspects the more immediate goal may be to force Bush to veto the bill, thereby taking even more responsibility for the war.

That was my suspicion when they passed it. I thought it was Political Theater, even though that precise term didn't pass through my noggin at the time they did it. I picked it up a little later when George W. Bush appeared in front of a microphone and accused the Democrats in Congress — though oddly not the three Republicans who voted for it and gave it a scintilla of non-partisan veneer — of "Political Theater."

And I thought, "Hey, he's right." If Bush knows about anything, it's Political Theater. In fact, he made this pronouncement from a lectern, flanked by members of the Armed Forces in uniform. Why were they there? They were props in a display of Political Theater staged to denounce someone else's Political Theater.

I think both sides are more interested in scoring points with voters than in doing what's right for our country and our soldiers. If the Democrats were primarily interested in doing the right thing, the bill wouldn't have been loaded down with irrelevant spending, thereby muddying its purpose and giving a few swing votes a chance to oppose it and claim they did so because of the pork. And if Bush were primarily interested in doing the right thing, he'd stop using our troops as window dressing and engage Congress on a bi-partisan basis...and I don't mean "bi-partisan" the way he always does, which is to demand they give in to him on everything.

The sense I get after following all the back-and-forth is that if we pull out of Iraq now or even soon, an awful lot of people are going to die...and if we stay there, an awful lot of people are going to die. And whichever way we go, we're going to have to listen to the side that didn't get their way blame all the deaths that occur on the side that did. So at the moment, it comes down to deciding which of two bad alternatives will do less damage and destruction. I'm not sure I trust either side to make that decision on the proper basis. Not as long as they're more interested in engaging in Political Theater.

• Posted at 12:24 AM · LINK

March 26, 2007 • Current • March 24, 2007