Archive for the ‘RIP’ Category
R.I.P. George Carlin
I’ve just learned the sad news that George Carlin passed away. He was 71.
Carlin had a chat with my husband backstage at a concert once. George was performing at our college’s performing arts theater. George was waiting around for his showtime and my husband was doing some security, a boring job that amounted to keeping people from coming in a certain door. My husband had his homework in hand, a book of short stories.
George, who couldn’t have been nicer, signed a record for our mutual friend, talked to my husband about literature, and reccommended a book that my husband loved, the short stories of Breece D’J Pancake. This was, apparently, one of George Carlin’s favorite authors.
Everyone else might remember George Carlin from the seven words you can’t say on TV or from his movie roles in Dogma, Jersey Girl or Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Still others will remember Carlin as a counterculture icon with an ascerbic tongue, a witty pen, and a knack for knowing what’s funny.
Words can’t describe how much the pioneering comic will be missed among fans of movie, comedy, or the counterculture.
R.I.P. Sydney Pollack
Reports have surfaced that legendary actor and director Sydney Pollack has died after a nine month battle with cancer. Pollack was 73.
I remember Sydney Pollack from great films he directed like Tootsie, the Dustin Hoffman vehicle that was hilarious and touching at the same time. Pollack was also responsible for such award fodder as Out of Africa (starring Meryl Streep) and They Shoot Horses, Don’t They.
Youngsters will probably recognize Pollack not from his directing but from his acting. In his later years, Pollack became a sort of everyman character actor and appeared in many different projects ranging from Will and Grace to last year’s Michael Clayton.
