tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61156448175161923602024-02-19T05:03:08.078-08:00It's That One Guy Who Was In That Other ThingG.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-78370572468392146692013-09-09T02:17:00.004-07:002013-09-09T02:17:53.828-07:00I'm not using this blog anymore!All the content from here, plus newer That One Guys and other fascinating content is now to be found at<br />
<a href="http://thatoneguywhowasinthatotherthing.tumblr.com/">http://thatoneguywhowasinthatotherthing.tumblr.com/</a> <br /><3 <3 <3G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-79198737145132858162013-02-05T16:14:00.000-08:002013-02-05T18:14:35.086-08:00Nicky Katt.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB2Y5LTtOm6-kK_LJgfDZfl7-rloCsTNYUJwuDYzBoBYbPO9R8I5Xnumnpf1rC8-6uwnHCPitvoEhMA3dWXq47aW7d1hec-zFLPodh6udbqHViJEtShzsO9gpShIlzv0yl2ctxQEggTfk/s1600/katt.bmp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB2Y5LTtOm6-kK_LJgfDZfl7-rloCsTNYUJwuDYzBoBYbPO9R8I5Xnumnpf1rC8-6uwnHCPitvoEhMA3dWXq47aW7d1hec-zFLPodh6udbqHViJEtShzsO9gpShIlzv0yl2ctxQEggTfk/s320/katt.bmp.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
b. May 11th, 1970<br />
<br />
Nicky Katt! His official website claims that he is "a kohl-eyed actor who has oozed a steady stream of low-key testosterone through a series of films..." Gross!<br />
Nicky Katt! A career of playing police officers, SWAT officers, detectives, businessmen, bullies, thugs and other manly roles! Including Hitler, in <i>Full Frontal! </i>And also an "ill fated, racist child rapist, in <i>A Time To Kill</i>", according to wikipedia, which is a film I'm pretty sure I've seen but don't remember anything about!<br />
Nicky Katt! I first noticed your angry shirtless antics in <i>Dazed and Confused</i>, where you beat up Adam Goldberg! And then in <i>SubUrbia</i> where you wore a sexy muscle t-shirt and were really mean to Giovanni Ribisi! And then in <i>Insomnia</i>, where you told that "What has two thumbs and likes blowjobs? THIS guy" joke, and I had never heard it before and thought it was so meatheadedly stupid that I laughed more than the joke warranted! And then in <i>The Burbs</i>, where you are only a child but were even then playing hulking bullies!<br />
Nicky Katt! Internet fans who love you say that you ride around LA on a Harley in a WW2 helmet! They also miss seeing you in more film roles, writing things on Myspace like "<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.901961); color: #262626; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 18px;">We all carry around baggage and wounds and weaknesses, but you know what, we keep going. We don't give up. Even if it means we can only be a day player, we do it." </span>You are so manly your website is illustrated with bald eagles! Nicky Katt! You are pretty great.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-30400676426804801742013-01-21T01:28:00.001-08:002013-01-21T01:28:48.187-08:00Raven Goodwin.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNtHESqKmvMfcAX8ltJUAEpJE4HsfJmv9UzllmwjKKyshh3-JuFupmPQdT_SOiadwNp3N95rq63uoUzjP4lNbGEDbkE-Aiu9ntgtwgaoMt2o7pAziY2FNi77bNypWnoARrokETbVok3D8/s1600/Goodwin.bmp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNtHESqKmvMfcAX8ltJUAEpJE4HsfJmv9UzllmwjKKyshh3-JuFupmPQdT_SOiadwNp3N95rq63uoUzjP4lNbGEDbkE-Aiu9ntgtwgaoMt2o7pAziY2FNi77bNypWnoARrokETbVok3D8/s400/Goodwin.bmp.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
b. June 24th, 1992<br />
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Raven Goodwin was such a lovely child actor - well, lovely is perhaps the wrong word, because she often played children who were prickly or had difficult problems to deal with, or both. She did this most impressively in <i>Lovely and Amazing</i>, playing Brenda Blethyn's daughter. It's a really good film, if you want an evening dealing with some pretty stressful characters and situations (Goodwin is a ten-year-old who likes to pretend she's drowned when at the pool. And that's sorta one of the lighter aspects.)<br />
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Actually, a lot of Goodwin's most memorable roles involve lending a serious emotional centre to the films and TV shows she appears in. ABC's <i>Huge</i>, for my money one of the best teen shows since <i>Freaks and Geeks, </i>is this great series which takes place in a fat camp. Goodwin plays the shy, thoughtful moral conscience of the show, (in contrast with Nikki Blonsky's impulsive whirlwind of a lead). The episode where she organises a camp-wide LARP is a particular highlight. It's a sin and a shame this only lasted one season.<br />
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Goodwin's adorable role as a "perky little teen" in an episode of <i>30 Rock, </i>and her regular appearances on TV shows like the Disney channel's <i>Good Luck Charlie</i>, which seem to be the bread and butter of her career, show that she's a great comedic actress too, even in indifferent material. Her list of roles is depressingly small though. Is it because she's big? Because she's a woman of colour? Because she's doing other things than acting? I hope it's the last one, because she's too good to not be in more.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-22972488137724726202012-12-29T17:06:00.000-08:002012-12-29T17:08:39.476-08:00Tommy Noonan<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnW-eh5S6fJ4qTI_P-zSDSLVw0ZTLKakh3Ebr338mJQgVqX2QRTQDC8_WT2_sHFWFu3wIko90DiJZJsOyMFuy-y1-fwBnvtCMtEAGVdIC_jVwgzJbo1jGFfZh1eNJEpLMq7LPu8-ZeLYA/s1600/Noonan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnW-eh5S6fJ4qTI_P-zSDSLVw0ZTLKakh3Ebr338mJQgVqX2QRTQDC8_WT2_sHFWFu3wIko90DiJZJsOyMFuy-y1-fwBnvtCMtEAGVdIC_jVwgzJbo1jGFfZh1eNJEpLMq7LPu8-ZeLYA/s400/Noonan.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
b.29th April 1921;<br />
d.24th April 1968<br />
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The not-that-great 1955 heist film <i>Violent Saturday </i>had pretty much only two highlights for me - one was seeing Ernest Borgnine, playing an Amish farmer, of all things, finally get angry enough to go against his pacifist code and plunge a pitchfork through Lee Marvin's chest, and the other was seeing Tommy Noonan in a weird, meandering subplot about a shy banker who is a peeping tom. When the pretty nurse he's been spying on finds out he's been following her home and looking through her window, she laughs and says she'll remember to draw her curtains from now on. You see that attitude in popular culture a lot - that if the guy being a creeper is a bashful nerd then it's treated as sort of harmless. It's messed up!<br />
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Noonan played shy nerds often - he's possibly best known for his part in Howard Hawks' <i>Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, </i>where he's Mr. Augustus Esmond, the fiance of Marilyn Monroe's character. He plays Mr. Esmond as a nervous fool, with hesitant vocal tics that feel like they're modeled on the ones Cary Grant used in Hawks' <i>Bringing Up Baby. </i>Another notable role was as Judy Garland's pianist buddy in the George Cukor musical melodrama <i>A Star is Born, </i>which I haven't seen (though it sounds neat).<br />
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Primarily, Noonan was a comedian - half of the comedy duo Noonan and Marshall, with Peter Marshall. They appeared on TV a bunch in the 1950s, including on the Ed Sullivan show. A lot of the film work Noonan did was in comedies which sound <i>awful</i> but which have great titles: <i>What, No Cigarettes?</i>; <i>How to be Very, Very Popular</i>; <i>Ding Dong Williams</i>; the painfully dismal sounding <i>Cottonpickin' Chickenpickers. </i>Later in his life he wrote, directed and starred in softcore sex comedies, including <i>3 Nuts in Search of a Bolt, </i>which starred Mamie van Dooren - the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpdYTyAKw7M">trailer</a> promises that "You'll wheeeee with glee at Mamie's uninhibited love stuff!"<br />
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Tommy Noonan's brother was the actor John Ireland, who was in <i>Spartacus, All The King's Men, </i>and <i>My Darling Clementine, </i>among about a million other things. He is unrelated and not to be confused with the awesome actor Tom Noonan, star of <i>Manhunter</i>, <i>Heat </i>and <i>Robocop 2. </i><br />
<br />G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-70615960417158928662012-12-20T16:23:00.001-08:002013-02-05T16:15:19.466-08:00Mark Williams<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhogbau-54k1QEhFPNlYkk-C-tzNbndUgrL4MhQJl9io0YpkiELfP9Kozb1U9jwnAaMKga2hegL24N9KpXzBciaYLkmgPhb_3RQVJBrWVfXvAmgdo_FH02wv8S9rtoB7RMZA4YWs0dGr2I/s1600/Top.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhogbau-54k1QEhFPNlYkk-C-tzNbndUgrL4MhQJl9io0YpkiELfP9Kozb1U9jwnAaMKga2hegL24N9KpXzBciaYLkmgPhb_3RQVJBrWVfXvAmgdo_FH02wv8S9rtoB7RMZA4YWs0dGr2I/s400/Top.bmp" width="400" /></a></div>
b. August 22, 1959.<br />
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Mark Williams is one of those British actors who shows up in absolutely everything in small roles - probably most recognisable as Arthur Weasley (Ron's dad) in the Harry Potter movies, though for Dr. Who fans he's Rory's dad, and Red Dwarf nerds he's Lister's buddy Olaf.<br />
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Aside from those, Williams often appears in TV comedy, most famously in 'The Fast Show', some just <i>awful </i>children's films (the horrible live action adaptations of <i>The Borrowers</i> and<br />
<i>101 Dalmatians</i>; <i>Agent Cody Banks 2</i>), and period piece dramas, from the awesome (<i>Tristram Shandy: a Cock and Bull Story</i>) to the forgettable (<i>Albert Nobbs</i>). He also presents documentary shows, such as the excellently titled 'Mark Williams' Big Bangs', about the history of explosives. Even when he's in something terrible like the nigh-blasphemous BBC adaptation of 'Gormenghast', he's really enjoyable to watch. He's not handsome and has no chin but his manner makes me think he's sweet and funny, even when playing decidedly unsweet characters. The decidedly unsweet character Deggsy, in Steve Coogan's throughly underrated show 'Saxondale', appears in only one episode, but it is one of my favourite Mark Williams roles - he's an old, leering roadie who is limping with gout but insists on partying like he isn't falling apart at the seams.<br />
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I found a lot of fascinating claims about Mark Williams on the internet, but that's partly because there are billions of people named Mark Williams - I know two personally - and I'm really sad to say that this guy is not the Mark Williams who is married to pornstar Linsey Dawn McKenzie, star of <i>Maximum Insertion </i>who has appeared on shows like 'The Weakest Link' and 'I'm Famous and Frightened!' (her husband Mark Williams is a former soccer player), nor is he the Mark Williams who wrote <i>The Mindful Way Through Depression: Freeing Yourself From Chronic Unhappiness. </i>Darn it.<br />
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If you want to write to Mark Williams, you could try this address:<br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">Mark Williams,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">c/o Caroline Dawson Associates,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">2nd Floor,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">125, Gloucester Road,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">London</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">SW7 4TE</span><br />
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Some people have done so, but beware!<br />
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<b style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Post subject:</b><span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10px;"> Mark Williams success</span><span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;">I sent a letter and SAE to Mark on: 11th August 2011, and today I recieved this signed and personalized photo back from him, altogether i think the personaliztion is a sec. </span><img alt=":cry:" src="http://www.fanmail.biz/mboard/images/smilies/icon_cry.gif" style="background-color: #ececec; border: none; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" title="Crying or Very sad" /><span style="background-color: #ececec; color: #323d4f; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Trebuchet MS', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.200000762939453px;"> </span><br />
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<br />G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-89912632867777096802012-10-18T16:19:00.000-07:002012-10-18T16:23:43.793-07:00Jeremie Renier<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdFzaPisT_2cl-m6ncVSLpDwn-3K-FpiBSLdGIKWjCQK9X22yACs9x04uTjwzhuWPUFjXn0Ak-L1_oZEUmSZzfHev_m31qMn_UczWQLcZcuvzy19sf02a4o1RmmZw4z9rBRUMsYkCMiBU/s1600/Renier.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdFzaPisT_2cl-m6ncVSLpDwn-3K-FpiBSLdGIKWjCQK9X22yACs9x04uTjwzhuWPUFjXn0Ak-L1_oZEUmSZzfHev_m31qMn_UczWQLcZcuvzy19sf02a4o1RmmZw4z9rBRUMsYkCMiBU/s400/Renier.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
b. January 6th, 1981.<br />
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Ok so it has been a while (again) since I’ve written
anything here, but I still enjoy recognising character actors, and then finding
out trivia about them, and as long as that’s a thing in my life then I may well
keep adding little bits here and there when I can. </div>
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Almost all the actors and actresses I’ve written about here
so far have been from the USA, (except Eric Blore, who was British but mostly
starred in American movies, and Art Hindle who is Canadian) so I’m going to try
and write about a few from other places. The one difficult thing I’ve found
with this is that the whole feeling of discovery or recognition of a non-star
which I’ve been using as criterion for this blog is often compromised the
minute you start talking about stars of non-English language films: I mean, I
get a sweet flash of “oh shit, it’s that one girl from <i>The Host </i>and <i>Linda Linda
Linda</i>!” whenever I see Doona Bae crop up in anything, but in South Korea
she’s a HUGE star, so huge that it’s a bit ridiculous to be pointing her out in
the introductory way I do in these posts. It’d be like, Hey everyone, have you
also heard of this one actress called Meryl Streep possibly? </div>
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So, that’s my rationale for not including more non-English
speaking actors. However, I really really like this one: though he’s probably
one of the biggest, most easily recognised Belgian film stars, I’m going to
include him because he still has ‘That One Guy’ status in English language
films. Jeremie Renier.</div>
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I first saw Renier in some films by the amazing, amazing
Belgian directing team Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne – first <i>L’Enfant </i>(2005), then going back through
their catalogue, <i>La Promesse</i> (1996),
which Renier starred in when he was only 16, followed by <i>Lorna’s Silence </i>(2008), and the slightly disappointing <i>The Kid With A Bike</i> (2011). The
Dardennes tend to make understated, thoughtful films about blue collar work (or
the struggle to find and hold on to it) and often concern characters who are
forced into making difficult ethical decisions. In most of his roles in their
films, Renier plays likeable flakes who make terrible life choices: in <i>L’Enfant </i>he and his girlfriend are
homeless so he sells their baby; in <i>La
Promesse</i> he hides the death of an illegal immigrant from the immigrant’s
wife in an effort to ease her pain; in <i>The
Kid with a Bike</i> he’s a responsibility-shy father who lets his son down when
he’s most needed. On paper, these characters sound like jerks, and I guess
onscreen they are as well, though they aren’t stupid jerks – they always seem
be able to <i>see</i> paths they could take
that would lead them to more ethical behaviour towards others, but a
combination of their life situations and incredible passivity keep them from
taking those paths.</div>
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Renier is also, it would appear, the go – to guy for
slick big-budget English language films when they need a generic cute Belgian
or French guy. He crops up in the egregious <i>In
Bruges</i>, and as a wounded soldier in <i>Atonement</i>.
He’s the rough hewn vintner in <i>The
Vintner’s Luck.</i> He often shows up in the sort of lighthearted ‘arthouse’
films that middle class, middle aged white women seem to really like – <i>Potiche</i>, <i>Summer Hours</i>. <br />
It’s probably only because he’s in it, but I’m curious now about the recently released biopic Renier stars in – <i>Cloclo</i>, about the singer Claude Francois. I really hope it means I’ll get to see Renier recreate videos like this one: </div>
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I</div>
G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-74073453180191490712012-08-12T02:52:00.000-07:002012-08-12T03:05:36.508-07:00Higgins<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjurM8sQ97-cncG9wxL-vMsxk-fdzIs4V_O4XdqDY3NqG9KNrRJLmotQOQqkCusITkTrYO7752AOrNWNgU-MdxPwsLVv5xszYRKafRib0ju0rpcQgMKGQ3s3qFskhnJ8WjIj-sttLFs2yE/s1600/Top.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="287" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjurM8sQ97-cncG9wxL-vMsxk-fdzIs4V_O4XdqDY3NqG9KNrRJLmotQOQqkCusITkTrYO7752AOrNWNgU-MdxPwsLVv5xszYRKafRib0ju0rpcQgMKGQ3s3qFskhnJ8WjIj-sttLFs2yE/s400/Top.bmp" width="400" /></a></div>
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b. 12 December 1957<br />
d. 11 November 1975</div>
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At one point in the 1987 film <i>Benji the Hunted, </i><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2y1JJQoEZu0">a man shoots a cougar</a>. I was four when I saw
this, and this scene caused me to run screaming into the lobby: it remains one
of the more traumatic film-going experiences of my life. I didn’t revisit the <i>Benji </i>franchise until adulthood. </div>
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Director Joe Camp has made a career of churning out films
about Benji, a little dog who solves problems. Like Star Wars, the first three
are the only ones you really need to bother about: <i>Benji the Hunted</i> (1987); <i>For
the Love of Benji </i>(1977) and the first one, <i>Benji</i> (1974), starring Higgins in the title role. Joe Camp, as made
clear by his website, is a Christian, family-values-y type filmmaker, keen on ‘cleaning
up’ children’s entertainment. Nevertheless, my four-year-old experience rings
true to my adult reception of the film – while the films are charming and
wholesome, they’re also really, really distressing. In <i>Benji</i>, our hero lives in an abandoned house, which later becomes a
hideout for some bumbling thugs who have kidnapped two children. Just to let you
know that these are really bad guys, at one point one of them kicks Benji’s
little dog girlfriend across the room, breaking her leg. It’s a moment of
surprising violence that’s typical of the world of the Benji films, a
comforting, friendly place in which there is some dark and disturbing shit
lurking.</div>
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But anyway, Higgins. He gives an amazing performance in
this film, part of the credit for which must go to his incredible trainer,
Frank Inn. Inn found Higgins in a Berkeley animal shelter when he was a puppy
(Higgins, not Inn), and the two had a very close working relationship. Higgins
rose to fame as Dog in the TV series <i>Petticoat
Junction</i>, which he appeared on regularly from 1964 to 1970. He also had
appearances on <i>Greenacres </i>and <i>The Beverly Hillbillies.</i> Inn coached
Higgins in a range of tricks, many of them complex: the dog could climb
ladders; open boxes and pudding cups; sneeze, yawn, salute and cover his eyes
with his eyes with his paws on command. This lovely post at <a href="http://www.luckymojo.com/higgins-benji-dog.html">luckymojo.com</a> praises
his lack of “trainer eye” – he never appears to be looking offscreen for cues
from Inn. However, it is his range of facial expressions which really set
Higgins apart as an actor. The promotional material for <i>Benji </i>states he has “the most expressive face in dogdom”, and it’s
not a shallow boast. His performance is far more impressive than those of many
of his human co-stars.</div>
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After his TV roles, Higgins had been ‘retired’ from
showbusiness, but was brought out in his old age to star as Benji. He was 16
when the film was released, and died a year later. His daughter, Benjean, took
over the role in subsequent Benji films, and her appearance in <i>For the Love of Benji</i> also shows some
impressive canine acting chops. Joe Camp is still making Benji movies, and
doing good work in encouraging adopting animals from shelters, but I have to
say, the dogs he has playing Benji these days are nowhere near as appealing
looking as Higgins. Camp’s children are also involved in the film industry –
one son wrote and directed the Jennifer Aniston vehicle <i>Love Happens </i>(2009), and another has been a first assistant
director on many, many films, from <i>Barton
Fink </i>(1991) to <i>Brothers </i>(2009).</div>
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Frank Inn died in 2002. In his later life, he wrote<i> </i>several <a href="http://petticoat.topcities.com/frankinn.htm#my%20gift%20to%20jesus">poems</a> about Higgins, which are <i>terrible</i>, but in terms of the subject
matter, also very touching. When he died, Higgins’ ashes were interred with
him.</div>
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We all know that Polish film posters are awesome, yes? Here's the one for <i>Benji. </i>it's like he's sweating lovehearts!
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I've written about Benji elsewhere online, at <a href="http://werewolf.co.nz/2011/09/classics-lady-and-the-tramp-1955-and-benji-1974/">werewolf.co.nz</a></div>
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<br /></div>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-81030648015342362772011-08-22T03:19:00.000-07:002011-08-22T03:19:05.227-07:00Michael Shannon.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirRfK29rQKhXeVsUP-7UYkkxpEQwHdRgB1ZjDvNqyVrcoDzKWZQN5UV9TV32qZn74wf0uU3XO39CVi4-86os8wrH3rwYAkUuoLTpjK9tSjdmURLGxhuHdygJ9o3V4SCw-QVBhbi9D8IdA/s1600/shannon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirRfK29rQKhXeVsUP-7UYkkxpEQwHdRgB1ZjDvNqyVrcoDzKWZQN5UV9TV32qZn74wf0uU3XO39CVi4-86os8wrH3rwYAkUuoLTpjK9tSjdmURLGxhuHdygJ9o3V4SCw-QVBhbi9D8IdA/s400/shannon.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">b. <st1:date day="7" month="8" year="1974">August 7<sup>th</sup>, 1974</st1:date></div><div class="MsoNormal">When I started this blog, I wanted to focus on actors and actresses many people probably recognise, but whose name you might not necessarily know, and I decided a few months back that I’d like to do a post about Michael Shannon, because I think he’s just grand. I feel like right now he’s on that cusp though, perhaps not of becoming a huge star, but definitely of being a character actor who is a little more than “that guy who was in that other thing”, someone who gets third billing in the occasional summer action flick, and first billing in indie dramas, like a Giovanni Ribisi or Dermot Mulroney. </div><div class="MsoNormal">I first remember noticing <st1:place>Shannon</st1:place> in the late, great Sidney Lumet’s 2007 film <i>Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead</i>. (Possible Spoiler Warning) He plays the brother-in-law of a crook who died in a failed heist orchestrated by Ethan Hawke and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and generally has to lounge about and be threatening to Hawke. Man, that doesn’t really seem like an acting task you’d have to put much effort into, but <st1:place>Shannon</st1:place> almost walks away with the entire film, which in a cast of fairly strong hitters is no mean feat. My boyfriend and I were pausing the dvd after each scene he was in to exclaim “who <i>is</i> this guy?” and “We have to have seen him in something before, there is no way someone can be this good, this distinctive and strange, and not have showed up being awesome in something else.” </div><div class="MsoNormal">Checking ye olde IMDB confirmed that I had indeed seen him being awesome in something else- Jeff Nichols’ <i>Shotgun Stories</i>, a deceptively low-key independent tragedy of Shakespearian proportions about two families of half-brothers locked in a blood feud following the death of their father. <st1:place>Shannon</st1:place> plays the eldest brother with a mixture of quiet dignity and barely repressed rage. He also has apparently been in a million and one HUGE movies which completely passed me by – <st1:address><st1:street><i>Revolutionary Road</i></st1:street>,<i> </i><st1:city><i>Pearl</i></st1:city></st1:address><i> Harbour</i>, <i>Vanilla Sky</i>. He’s set to play General Zod in the next <i>Superman </i>movie.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">So, when <i>Take Shelter</i>,<i> </i>the next film directed by Nichols, and also starring Michael Shannon, came around, I was pretty psyched to see it. It was during the film festival in <st1:city><st1:place>Wellington</st1:place></st1:city>, I had my ticket for <st1:time hour="21" minute="0">9pm</st1:time> on a Friday night (<i>nerd!</i>), front row centre, and oh my I was not prepared for this film, or this performance. Shannon plays a loving father and husband, with a good blue-collar job in Ohio, who starts having violent nightmares, leading to paranoid delusions, leading to both trying to seek psychiatric care and to rapidly build a storm shelter in his back yard. Like in <i>Shotgun Stories</i>, <st1:place>Shannon</st1:place> plays a man who loves his family and is trying to do best by them, but in this case that requires asking for their help, and that’s a painfully difficult thing. There were moments in this film where I wasn’t just crying, I was shaking from feeling this character’s stress and fear so acutely. Shannon’s done his research – I was especially impressed by how, when he finally does tell his wife what is happening for him, his voice comes out thick and slurred, and his mouth moves like he’s having trouble forming the words. Times I’ve been in bad, bad depressions, I remember that happening, though I’d mostly forgotten it until I saw him do it. The film lags a little in the final five minutes, but that doesn’t take away much. I can’t wait for the dvd so I can watch it again, and I can’t wait to see <st1:place>Shannon</st1:place> in more. <span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><o:p></o:p></div>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-23908164668024609442011-08-07T22:07:00.000-07:002012-08-12T03:06:41.582-07:00Elizabeth Daily.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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b. September 11th, 1961.<br />
Elizabeth Daily, aka E.G. Daily, is probably best recognised as Dottie, the long-suffering wannabe girlfriend of Peewee Herman, in <i>Peewee's Big Adventure</i> (1985). This was my very favourite movie when I was ten, and I always felt sorry for Dottie, whose romantic interest in Peewee was rebuffed with all the sensitivity you could expect from an attention-deficit man-child. I had an early "oh my god, it's that girl from that other thing!" moment when I saw <i>Valley Girl</i> (1983) a few years later, where I believe she plays a character who is date-raped - the film is otherwise notable for being one of those teen movies which makes up and attempts to popularise its own slang, and for being the first film in which Nicolas Cage had a starring role.<br />
Daily appeared in several other films during the 80s, such as <i>Ladies and Gentlemen:The Fabulous Stains </i>and <i>Streets of Fire, </i>and also released several pop hits - her single "Say it, say it" made it to #1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart in 1986. Check out the hilarious Lolita-themed video clip: <br />
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Most of Daily's film and TV roles are now as a voice artist for cartoons - she replaced Christine Cavanaugh as the voice of the little pig Babe for <i>Babe 2: Pig in the City </i>(1998), and is the voice of Buttercup from the Powerpuff Girls, and Tommy Pickles in Rugrats. In terms of live action, she's appeared in recent years in <i>My Sister's Keeper </i>(2009) and in the Rob Zombie horror film <i>The Devil's Rejects </i>(2005), which is where this entry's picture comes from - that film is a veritable who's who of " It's that one guy" moments: almost every minor part is filled by classic horror movie character actors such as Michael Berryman, P.J Soles, Ken Foree, Danny Trejo.<br />
Daily also played Paris Hilton's mom in <i>National Lampoon's Pledge This! </i>(2006). On her website she shares this about the role:<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: white;"><b><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: white;"></span></span></b></span><br />
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<tr><td><span style="color: blue; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, Geneva, Swiss, SunSans-Regular; font-size: x-small;">The most ironic part of the whole thing is my x-husband Rick Salomon just happens to be the guy in the infamous x-rated tape with Paris and here I was playing her mom!! Crazy!!! We all ended up having a great time and the cast was awesome!</span></td></tr>
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I wonder if that was awkward, or strange, or anything.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-23329324874889065122011-07-24T18:10:00.000-07:002011-07-24T18:10:52.691-07:00Hey, sorry for the brief hiatus here at <i>It's that one guy who was in that other thing</i> - my computer died the death and I had to get a new one. I am excited that I have had traffic through this blog from people searching "james ransone masturbation"! Fabulous!G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-27701704105416669692011-07-24T18:07:00.000-07:002011-07-25T18:51:04.957-07:00Una Merkel<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6mFE4adG2q_AkAKLwX2BbfWiyN6dOzOKoCa4ktZUjuAtx8Ej5-7KC3rQHM7qYxa0ka3b6TwojmBC_ez5QCksf-ZqcIEucTn8BjhrVtVxHZfBKLmuMlYFz3arzhx39EGsyCqwk5LiqjT4/s1600/merkel.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6mFE4adG2q_AkAKLwX2BbfWiyN6dOzOKoCa4ktZUjuAtx8Ej5-7KC3rQHM7qYxa0ka3b6TwojmBC_ez5QCksf-ZqcIEucTn8BjhrVtVxHZfBKLmuMlYFz3arzhx39EGsyCqwk5LiqjT4/s400/merkel.bmp" width="391" /></a></div>b. December 10th. 1903<br />
d. January 2nd, 1986.<br />
<i>42nd Street</i> (1933) is one of my alltime favourite films, and I always especially liked the two wingwomen of going-out-youngster-coming-back-star Peggy (Ruby Keeler): 'Anytime' Annie (Ginger Rogers) and Lorraine (Una Merkel.) If you didn't know who either of them were, you would look at them and think, "Dang, both these women are amazing, and should be huge stars." One of them was, of course, but Una Merkel was always relegated to being the sassy best friend or the comic relief. Maybe it was her cartoonishly high voice, maybe something in her looks - IMDB somewhat bitchily notes "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">In her early years, before gaining a few pounds, she looked like Lillian Gish, but after</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0020620/" style="color: #136cb2;">Abraham Lincoln</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">(1930) her comic potential was discovered." </span>Because remember, fat women are funny, or something? Ugh. Anyway, Merkel's most notable roles, aside from <i>42nd Street</i>, were as W.C.Field's bratty teenage daughter in <i>The Bank Dick</i> (1940), and Lillibelle in the western <i>Destry Rides Again</i> (1940), where her character gets into a vicious catfight with Marlene Deitrich's. She was in many, many films in the 1930s and 40s, as she was on an MGM contract, but was often 'loaned out' to other studios. In the 1960s she reappeared as a character actor, usually playing people's mothers. She's in the original Haley Mills version of <i>The Parent Trap </i>(1961).<br />
Here is a nice memory that someone has edited into the Wikipedia entry for Merkel, flowing straight without a break after all the rather formal biographical information:<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"> "</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 19px;">Una Merkel spent a lot of time with her sister in Seven Mile, Ohio. I was a child and lived next door. This was in the early 1940's. Her sister's husband owned the grocery store in Seven Mile. Una was beautiful with long red hair. We spent a lot of time together swinging on the porch.</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333;">"</span></span> I feel so very touched that some old person thought to share this in an online encyclopedia. It kinda debunks the idea of the untouchable or or somehow ultra-human celebrity, if they will sit and swing on the porch with you.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-77150639162709631912011-06-28T18:16:00.000-07:002012-08-12T03:08:42.309-07:00James Ransone.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0IawtosDnFeGJBcjKEgzxvir-nO-t-cRG30jCtbL2TxblcuXrlzd3_Y3kQp0gPkIqchY29hUiuqwOOHyCFEqJOjm5OBRmGDDvgb6O22-z8ICildEXQRWbkKNg4n0z1yR8udNXtRb77Ck/s1600/ransone.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0IawtosDnFeGJBcjKEgzxvir-nO-t-cRG30jCtbL2TxblcuXrlzd3_Y3kQp0gPkIqchY29hUiuqwOOHyCFEqJOjm5OBRmGDDvgb6O22-z8ICildEXQRWbkKNg4n0z1yR8udNXtRb77Ck/s400/ransone.bmp" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="background-color: #cccccc;">b. 2nd June, 1979.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: #cccccc;">Last week with<span class="Apple-style-span"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;"><a href="http://thatoneguywhowasinthatotherthing.blogspot.com/2011/06/art-hindle.html"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;">Art Hindle</span></a> </span>I was talking about a guy whose overacting detracted from the quality of the films he was in, but James Ransone often acts 'big', overacts, appears borderline hysterical onscreen, and it works, dammit. You probably recognise the guy as Ziggy Sobotka in series two of <i>The Wire</i>, or as Corporal Josh Person in <i>Generation Kill. </i>He's also shown up in <i>Treme </i>and<i> Law and Order. </i></span><span class="Apple-style-span">I loved him as Ziggy - such a pathetic character, who wanted so hard to fit in and be one of the boys, but whose tantrums and idiocies got in his way. He was funny, but there was also a lot of frustration at not being able to be cool no matter how hard he tried that I really empathised with.<i> </i></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: #cccccc;"><i> </i>I first saw Ransone in John Waters' <i>A Dirty Shame, </i>where he plays a character aroused by dirt (he chews lovingly on a used tissue Tracy Ullman's character tosses to him), and since then have been rewarded with many "hey it's that one guy" moments. I got to see Larry Clark's <i>Ken Park</i> recently, which I liked, but I especially loved Ransone's psychotic character, Tate. The Scrabble game with his grandparents that devolves into triumphant screamed accusations of cheating is a particular highlight. The film also contains some fairly explicit masturbation and nudity courtesy of Ransone (I was going to include that as the picture for this week, but then I felt like a creeper.) I think he shows up nude quite a lot in general, and is also getting handsomer and handsomer with age. Hence the culty following he seems to be accruing: for more photos of the man than you can shake a stick at, check out this tumblr <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;"><a href="http://fuckyeahjamespjransone.tumblr.com/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;">Fuck Yeah, James PJ Ransone!</span></a> </span>It's just full of shirtless and broody.</span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;"><img alt="mcknatterton:
I can’t cook. I use a smoke alarm as a timer.
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<span style="background-color: blue;"></span>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-22771938929335249752011-06-24T22:06:00.000-07:002011-06-28T23:01:45.252-07:00Art Hindle.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9KpuACvphVnCWmIEYRv1vf0HyeUOvS5qI8BPu4ZDCvorXtGyMK344DOkrt_FTu9B5PBUE3Aj3vMbhE7fZ8MXobj7Cg6irnnSeZDH5Wl4HbBKIjZ1FewscwGcOcaofWuHgLc3o8QtVjq0/s1600/hindle.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9KpuACvphVnCWmIEYRv1vf0HyeUOvS5qI8BPu4ZDCvorXtGyMK344DOkrt_FTu9B5PBUE3Aj3vMbhE7fZ8MXobj7Cg6irnnSeZDH5Wl4HbBKIjZ1FewscwGcOcaofWuHgLc3o8QtVjq0/s400/hindle.bmp" width="400" /></a></div>b. July 21st , 1948.<br />
I do love horror movies, and one of my all time favourites is <i>The Brood</i> (d.David Cronenberg, 1979.) I've watched it many times but still find it pretty scary - it's about a father, Frank Carveth, whose wife is in an experimental psychiatric facility, where patients are trained to allow their emotional pain to manifest as physical afflictions. Whenever Carveth's wife feels hurt or wronged by someone, mysterious deformed children show up and bludgeon them to death. Like all good Cronenberg, the film makes you feel really disgusting about your own body, and aware of how vulnerable your mental health can be. There are some wonderful performances in this movie as well - Samantha Eggar as the disturbed Nola Carveth, a great child performance by Cindy Hinds as her daughter, an ice cold and creepy Oliver Reed as the psychiatrist. But what the film really needs to hold it all together is a well-played, grounded portrayal of Frank Carveth, who is one of the only sane and responsible characters in the film. The fascinating flaw of <i>The Brood</i> is that Art Hindle plays Carveth, well... kinda terribly. His eye rolling and scenery chewing and hammy yelling are particularly embarrassing next to the gravitas of Reed. I have a lot of affection for this frightening little movie, and I even have affection for Hindle's ridiculous performance, but a lot of the blame for why this isn't a <i>great </i>movie rests on his shoulders, in my opinion.<br />
Hindle is from Toronto, and was encouraged to pursue a career on the screen by his uncle, character actor Michael Kane (<i>not</i> Michael Caine, as the IMDB claims.) He's been in many, many films from 1971 to the present, most of them Canadian, and is best known for his roles in the TV series <i>Paradise Falls</i>, and the 1978 Phillip Kaufman version of <i>Invasion of the Body Snatchers</i>, in which his acting is serviceable but not outstanding. I first saw him in a horrible made for TV movie called <i>Liar, Liar </i>(1993) (not the Jim Carrey comedy.) It's about a father who is brutally sodomising his children, and when his eleven year old daughter reports the abuse, no one believes her. The father is played with much creepy intensity by Hindle. For some god-unknown reason we were shown this film in our Social Education class in highschool, leaving us all traumatised.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-17576800862385682152011-06-21T19:15:00.000-07:002011-06-28T23:00:41.539-07:00Ajay Naidu.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
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</div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLfY0IFYhB1u3eGIS_tP-cIJPF4T662E1UCbwGjuBpS7ZLyeHcPO8iS6n4pEho79-YHU5p6QlGYOEVCTPEQuMFRO1ITXCnB2BcJ-nFGfiSe6mzVuXkdmxl-6fANVlCLV_bZryQwfXym1w/s1600/naidu.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLfY0IFYhB1u3eGIS_tP-cIJPF4T662E1UCbwGjuBpS7ZLyeHcPO8iS6n4pEho79-YHU5p6QlGYOEVCTPEQuMFRO1ITXCnB2BcJ-nFGfiSe6mzVuXkdmxl-6fANVlCLV_bZryQwfXym1w/s400/naidu.bmp" width="400" /></a><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">b. February 12, 1972.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Ok, so you remember all those neat kids films about having some weird body swap or morph, like <i>Freaky Friday</i> and <i>Big</i> and <i>18 Again! </i>and <i>Like Father, Like Son</i>? Well for my money, the best of those is a little movie from 1988 called <i>Vice Versa</i>, starring Judge Reinhold and Fred Savage as a father and son who swap bodies. Aside from the hilarity of seeing Reinhold playing a nine year old boy in a man's body, the film also has a teenage Ajay Naidu, playing a mean kid who picks on Savage at school.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> You get a lot of "It's that one guy who was in that other thing" moments with Naidu, because for a time there it seemed like he was the only young, cute, Indian guy appearing in American movies (now, with Kal Penn and Aziz Ansari, there are three! Progress.) Which meant that, any time a film called for a humourously accented convenience store clerk (as in Richard Linklater's <i>SubUrbia</i>) or cab driver (as in episodes of <i>Monk</i> and <i>30 Rock</i>), it would be Naidu. And he's really distinctive and funny - much better than the comic stereotypes that those roles call for. He is probably most known for his role as Samir in the cult comedy <i>Office Space, </i>and for appearing in nearly all Darren Aronofsky's films to date (he has parts in <i>Pi</i>, <i>Requiem for a Dream</i>, and <i>The Wrestler.</i>)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> One thing that I've really enjoyed with writing these posts is seeing how fans react to these actors. Because they're not big stars people seem to feel they can address them directly, lay claim to them, be more familiar than they would be with the unreachable A-listers. Of course, this means on one hand, you get the crazy, like the bodyguard guy who was so fond of <a href="http://thatoneguywhowasinthatotherthing.blogspot.com/2011/06/linda-manz.html">Linda Manz</a> , but on the other hand you can get some really sweet interactions that you know probably made someone's day. On the discussion boards for Naidu on IMDB, several people have written things along the lines of <i>Hey Ajay, we were in highschool/college/the neighbourhood hometown together. We're so proud of your success.</i> And several times he's written back: <i>I remember you, you were friends with my sister. Big respect to you and your family, Ajay.</i> What a lovely guy. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">EDIT: Here's a link to a rather sweet piece about the building in which <i>Office Space</i> was shot.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://www.avclub.com/articles/austin-were-gonna-need-you-to-go-ahead-and-visit-t,57328/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: blue;">http://www.avclub.com/articles/austin-were-gonna-need-you-to-go-ahead-and-visit-t,57328/</span></a></div>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-24479310866605257582011-06-16T17:58:00.000-07:002011-06-28T22:59:35.230-07:00Linda Manz.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKcX94uEbhrrSCJntiBYBLXFcOGxcVvxRPBqTQIWZP749O4YiMh_RZcp8ts5qxb46pn04OLy1D1KzDG8dCkKLtwqJBJ6AoPX1OCbI66sr-G8WqXw4lJSPTvF9jSWxhn1F5Vh5EpNoPVyQ/s1600/manz.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKcX94uEbhrrSCJntiBYBLXFcOGxcVvxRPBqTQIWZP749O4YiMh_RZcp8ts5qxb46pn04OLy1D1KzDG8dCkKLtwqJBJ6AoPX1OCbI66sr-G8WqXw4lJSPTvF9jSWxhn1F5Vh5EpNoPVyQ/s400/manz.bmp" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">b. August 20th, 1961.<br />
I had originally planned to get this post done real quickly so I'd have several up in the first week, but this one has proven difficult to write, if only because I really, really admire Linda Manz, and hence the careful balance of filmographic trivia and fanatical raving that I was hoping for with this blog was already looking like it might get skewed in favour of the latter. So I'll get it out of the way straight up: Linda Manz is one of my favourite actors, despite only appearing in a handful of films. I think she's incredible. I promise I'll try and write this without just reiterating that every few sentences.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0cm;">When she was in her late teens, Manz landed her first starring role in Terence Malick's epically gorgeous <i>Days Of Heaven</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> (1978) Her performance in this film has the same rough-hewn combination of vulnerability and toughness that, to my mind, shines through strongest in her next big role as Cebe, in Dennis Hopper's 1981 film </span><i>Out of the Blue</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. </span> </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-style: normal;"> There have been a lot of films which articulate how fucking horrible it is being a teenager, a lot of stars who've conveyed it well - James Dean, Brando, Jake Gyllenhall in </span><i>Donnie Darko</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, Joseph Gordon-Levitt in </span><i>Brick... </i><span style="font-style: normal;">most of them are dudes. Teenage girls in films might have troubles, but they tend to have friends or family who support them in some way - they seldom seem as painfully lonely and isolated as their male counterparts. Linda Manz's angry, raw, frustrated portrayal of Cebe is as close as I got as a teenager to seeing a character who seemed as tightly-wound and alone as I felt (which is sorta ridiculous - I had supportive friends and family for Africa; but like everyone else I felt like I was the only one having an existential crisis.) Director Dennis Hopper, as Cebe's drunk ex-con father, gives one of the most unhinged, terrifying, fabulous performances of his career in this film, and I mean, that's a career of playing a whole lot of unhinged, terrifying characters. But Linda Manz wipes the fucking floor with him. Arhg, seriously, just watch the film. It is Pretty Good.</span></div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;">As well as <i>Days of Heaven </i>and <i>Out of the Blue</i>, Manz played Peewee in Phillip Kaufmann's <i>The Wanderers </i>(1979), but after that she pretty much disappeared from movies for a good while. She married Bobby Guthrie, who was the cameraman who put out Michael Jackson's hair when it caught fire during the filming of a Pepsi commercial in 1984. They have three sons. After about 17 years away from acting, Manz appeared in Harmony Korine's 1997 film <i>Gummo, </i> playing Solomon's mother. She does that eerie tap dance in front of a mirror. She also gifted Chloe Sevigny (Korine's then-girlfriend) the denim jacked with 'Elvis' sequinned on the back she wore as Cebe. Like I need another reason to be envious of Sevigny's wardrobe.</div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Before her role in <i>Gummo</i>, People magazine ran a 'where are they now' sort of piece on Manz. In it, casting director Barbara Claman (who discovered Manz for <i>Days of Heaven</i>) explained "Linda was a natural...she was wonderful at being. But there weren't a lot of jobs open for just being." It's a huge pity, because watching Manz 'just be' in a film is such a rewarding experience.</div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;">P.S: There is a fanpage for Linda Manz on facebook, and on its wall there is a post which is just....amazing. I'm going to copy and paste it in its entirety, for your edification and amusement: </div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;"> "<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">DO YOU NEED A BODY GUARD MS. LINDA MANZ. I AM AN EXCELLENT DETERENT AND WOULD NEVER CHARGE NOTHING. AN AVERAGE BODYGUARD COST AT LEAST $50,000.00-$75,000.00 PER YEAR FOR A CHEAP ONE. I AM 6ft 6in (78 inches) TALL AND NOT A LINKY STICK BOY. I AM 42 YEARS OLD & I KNOW WHAT I AM DOING. I ALSO HAD OTHER PEOPLE & FRIENDS SAY TO OTHER PEOPL</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;">E I AM THEIR BODYGUARD. THAT TOUCHED ME A LOT BUT DON'T MEAN NOTHING. I WOULD MUCH LOVE IT MORE TO BODYGUARD A CELEBRITY OR SIR PAUL McCARTNEY THAT I LIKE AND/OR LOVE. I WATCHED YOUR MOVIE "THE WANDERERS" WHEN I WAS A KID. YOU DONE AN EXCELLENT IN MY BOOK. I WOULD HAVE LOVED TO DATED YOU. I WAS BORN IN 1968 AND A 1980's KIND OF PERSON LIKE YOU ARE. I WOULD HAVE TAKEN YOU TO MY 1986 & 1987 HIGH SCHOOL PROM. I GRADUATED IN JUNE OF 1987. THERE IS NOT MANY I WOULD ASK BUT YOU I DEFINITELY WOULD. I JUST WISH I WASN'T OVER 1,800 MILES AWAY. YOU ARE MY TYPE & I DO LIKE YOU. NO LIE! YOU'RE THE BEST. I LOVE YOU PROBABLY MORE THAN RICHARD GERE. I MEAN IT! TAKE CARE."</span></span></div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;">I hope my obsessive fandom doesn't come across like this.</div><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;"><span class="text_exposed_show" style="display: inline;"><br />
</span></span></div>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-14337127553476132852011-06-14T02:38:00.000-07:002011-06-28T22:57:26.762-07:00Eric Blore.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKSbqeP3zXEz4FDqIHJBN60ajgqOx4ZCr7iCRBJW254anoSgWc08OauAui-1wa3AlkDGiGBouPxfudzmia7qDFMcrtCxGB0Chzj9n4STlPCz6CHyKNmdIGn7s0ygVjlfQwa0xnFOSnYcc/s1600/blore.bmp" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKSbqeP3zXEz4FDqIHJBN60ajgqOx4ZCr7iCRBJW254anoSgWc08OauAui-1wa3AlkDGiGBouPxfudzmia7qDFMcrtCxGB0Chzj9n4STlPCz6CHyKNmdIGn7s0ygVjlfQwa0xnFOSnYcc/s320/blore.bmp" width="320" /></a></div>b.23 December, 1887<br />
d. 2 March 1959.<br />
I went with my father to see <i>Top Hat</i> (1935) at the Embassy theatre in Wellington earlier this year. We were sitting there, enjoying watching Fred Astaire dancing about, when his character's valet came into the room (the room in the movie, not the room in the theatre). Dad grabbed my arm excitedly and whispered "Oh my god, it's that guy who was in <i>The Lady Eve</i>!" It was, and we spent the rest of the movie almost in tears of laughter whenever this guy came on the screen. Fred and Ginger are lovely in <i>Top Hat</i>, but Eric Blore steals every scene he's in.<br />
Blore made a career of playing butlers and valets and the like; he appeared in over eighty films, including several of the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers films for RKO, as well as Preston Sturges' <i>The Lady Eve</i> (1941) and <i>Sullivan's Travels </i>(1941). He has a fruity British voice and impeccable comic timing.<br />
Blore's IMDB bio includes this anecdote:<br />
"<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">as sometimes is the case when personalities move into obscurity, their deaths are prematurely announced. Such was with Blore when the New Yorker journalist</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0878985/" style="color: #136cb2;">Kenneth Tynan</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;"> </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 17px;">reported him as already passed on. Blore's lawyer raised a flurry, as did the editor of the New Yorker who claimed the periodical had never had to print a retraction. The night before the highly profiled retraction appeared, Blore indeed passed away. And the next morning the New Yorker was the only publication with the wrong information. It seems like Blore would have been particularly tickled with the irony of this last comedic bit in honor of his passing."</span><br />
I think Eric Blore is great, and I think he would've been a fun guy to have a gin and tonic with.<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 17px;"><br />
</span></span>G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6115644817516192360.post-45052179260010109812011-06-14T02:08:00.000-07:002011-06-14T02:08:28.842-07:00Welcome.Hi. In <i>It's That One Guy Who Was In That Other Thing </i>I aim to celebrate the actors who I've seen in a film, then seen in another film and had a nice moment of recognition. Maybe they were character actors who never made it big but kept on doing reliable but unheralded work; maybe they were supposed to be the next big thing but never made it; maybe they're still in the process of becoming the next big thing. Anyway, with all of them, something about them piqued my curiosity enough to make me want to think about them a while, look to see if I could find out more interesting things about them, and then share them with you. Maybe if you see them in a film, you'll get a happy moment of recognition too.G.C.Rhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06972504363805090052noreply@blogger.com1