A Simple Death

Mary Ellis Bunim, who almost single-handedly dragged television to unfathomable lows by ushering in the era of “reality” TV, has died at the age of 57. The creator of MTV’s The Real World and the film The Real Cancun, her most recent offense was the use of the even less interesting Paris Hilton footage on the Fox crapfest The Simple Life. But while she was content to edit the lives of others, her own final days were done with the camera’s red light off. Her own death story could have mirrored the amazingly prescient 1980 German movie Deathwatch, where Harvey Keitel followed a dying woman to film her last days for a television program. In that film, as in Bunim’s own life, they learn too late that some things just don’t belong on television.

Elroy ‘Crazy Legs’ Hearse

Or
Badgers, We Don’t Need No Stinking Badgers
(Honorifics to Mark for the alternate epitaph)
NFL Hall of Famer and long-time fixture at the University of Wisconsin Elroy ‘Crazy Legs’ Hirsch died Wednesday at the age of 80. As a freshman at the University of Wisconsin, Hirsch was described as looking like a ''demented duck whose crazy legs were gyrating in six different directions all at the same time.'' Thankfully for posterity, ‘Crazy Legs’ rather than ‘Demented Duck’ was the nickname that stuck. In his lone season with the Badgers, he ran for 786 yards as the team finished 8-1-1, then bailed for the University of Michigan, but Wisconsites desperate for a link to greatness retired his Number 40 anyway. He returned in 1969 and served as athletic director for 18 years. After college, he starred for the Los Angeles Rams from 1949-1957 as part of the Rams' revolutionary "three-end" offense. His best season was 1951, when he led the NFL with 66 catches, 1,495 yards receiving and 17 touchdowns. He also took a shot at the silver screen, playing himself in the biography "Crazy Legs, All American," and went on to star in the movie "Unchained" in 1955 and "Zero Hour" in 1957. He also appeared in an episode of The Munsters as himself as Herman was showing off his athletic prowess.

Jelly Rolled

Joe Viterelli, a movie mob goon straight out of central casting, got whacked in January by an abdominal hemorrhage in Las Vegas. Proving the old axiom that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, I can't find an obit for him anywhere. Best known for playing Jelly in Analyze This and Analyze That, this role was a parody of the toughs he played in Bullets Over Broadway, The Firm, and Mobsters.

Paar for the Corpse

Props to Don for sharing my epitaphany
Or
Another Interruption 
 
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Six Feet Under Paar(Kudos for Greg)
Jack Paar, former host of the Tonight Show who brought intelligence and wit to late night television has died at the age of 85. Paar blended a unique combination of news and entertainment and politics, and the many highlights of his tenure included one of the first interviews by an American with Fidel Castro after the Cuban revolution, John F. Kennedy on the campaign trail, Robert F. Kennedy’s first interview after his brother’s assassination, recently-defeated presidential candidate Richard Nixon playing the piano and Cassius Clay singing, with piano accompaniment by Liberace. One of Paar’s most celebrated incidents came after NBC cut gag about a water closet, the ‘60s version of toilet humor, leading Paar to emotionally storm off the set in the middle of a show. He returned 5 weeks later after the network apologized. He strode on stage to thunderous applause, and as it ebbed, with perfect timing began, “As I was saying before I was interrupted." The one bright note is that at least Paar will no longer need to watch how far Jay Leno has lowered the standards for late night wit.

Props to Paar pickers newby Warren, ’03 bridesmaid Greg’s Team Quincy and perennial also-ran Joan-Marie. All of us who now are looking up in the standings at Joan-Marie should feel a deep, deep shame.

The return of the leaderboard:
1st Jennifer
1 hit, 20 points
2nd Warren
1 hit, 6.666667 points
(tie) Greg – Team Quincy
1 hit, 6.666667 points
(tie) Joan-Marie
1 hit, 6.666667 points
5th Everybody else

Editor Fails to Fake Own Death!!

Or
Actual Mortality Strikes for First Time!!
The man who brought us Bat Boy, saw Satan’s face in clouds, smoke, volcano eruptions and his morning pancakes, disclosed that 12 U.S. Senators were aliens, asserted that the Loch Ness Monster was being used by the military and confirmed that Elvis was alive, then had faked his own death, again, has died. Or has he? Eddie Clontz, long-time editor of the Weekly World News, allegedly died of kidney and liver complications at the age of 56. And really, with a name like that, what else could he have done but run a supermarket tabloid? Where are his miracle doctors who kept women’s heads alive for years in jars now? What happened to the mystery space vegetables that cure all disease? Why didn’t his alien friends give him a lift to someplace where diabetes has been cured? It’s enough to make one lose one's faith in the media.

Lie me Kangaroo Down, Sport

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Oh Captain, Bye Captain
Bob Keeshan, who delighted millions of children first as Clarabelle on the Howdy Doody Show, later as Captain Kangaroo, died last week at the age of 76. No cause of death was listed, but a number of ping pong balls were found near the body. A suspect, Bunny Rabbit, was interviewed, but said nothing. With his walrus mustache, Beatles haircut, and overlapeled jacket, he hardly cut a dashing figure, but he was a fixture on CBS for 30 years, as the longest running children’s show in network TV history, before continuing for another 6 years on PBS. Entering the medium in its infancy, Keeshan virtually invented how a television program can teach children without pandering or demeaning them. Mixing education with a dose of anarchy in the form of a carrot-stealing rabbit and knock-knock joke telling Mr. Moose, Keeshan laid the groundwork for such later programs as Mister Rogers, but without the latter’s signature creepiness. Over his career, he won 6 Emmys and 3 Peabody Awards, but the impact he had on children will be his greatest legacy and was his greatest reward.

Miller No Life

(Props to Monty for the header. If only he wasn’t such a cheap bastard. )
Ann Miller, a star of the Golden Age of Musicals, died of lung cancer at 81. She literally got a big break when Cyd Charisse broke a leg before starting Easter Parade, and Miller filled in opposite Fred Astaire. Later dance partners included Gene Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Red Skelton and Bob Fosse. Her last appearance was in Mulholland Drive, where she was the one chick who didn’t get naked. A pretty big whack-job, she believed she was once Queen Hathshepsut of Egypt. To honor her memory, or figure out who the hell she was, check out the movie tribute on Turner Classic Movies on January 27.

Dead End

Bernard Punsly, the last of cinema’s Dead End Kids, died last week at the age of 80. The on-screen hooligans, including Huntz Hall, Billy Halop, Bobby Jordan and Leo Gorcey, were sort of a juvenile delinquent version of Our Gang, and appeared in a number of films in the 1930s and ‘40s. The silver screen’s version of Moonlight Graham, Punsly appeared in 19 films, then retired to a career of medicine, practicing for 50 years in and around Los Angeles. Punsly and Hall represented the Kids when they were awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1994.

Whether ‘tis Noble in the mud who suffered the slings and arrows…

Veteran character actor Noble Willingham, who made a living out of crusty, cranky old westerners and was a living definition of "you’d know him if you saw him," died Saturday at the age of 73. Best known as the Master to Chuck Norris Grasshopper on Walker, Texas Ranger, Willingham also played Tim Allen’s boss Mr. Binford on Home Improvement, hired and fired Robin Williams in Good Morning, Vietnam and was as happy as a puppy dog with two peters when Billy Crystal brought in the herd in City Slickers. Before entering acting, Willingham was a high school economics teacher, and briefly left acting for an unsuccessful 2000 run at a seat in Congress.

Tusked away

A dark episode in U.S. history came to a close Sunday as Ernest Hendon, the last living "participant" in the Tuskegee syphilis study, died at the age of 96. From 1932 to 1972, the federal Public Health Service gave syphilis to 623 black men in Alabama to determine the disease’s affects on humans, and they didn’t even get to contract it the fun way. A lawsuit gave the survivors free health care, and $9 million to split among the survivors and their families, or less than $15,000 each. Apparently no smallpox blankets were available. Twenty-five years after the experiment ended, President Clinton issued a formal apology, one of the few he gave for something that actually wasn’t his fault.

All that Glitters is Not Goldsmith

Olivia Goldsmith, whose satirical novels, such as First Wives Club, touched on such themes as inner beauty and celebrating middle aged women, died at the age of 54 of complications suffered during from plastic surgery. In a reversal of ancient alchemists, we have seen Gold(smith) turned into iron(y).

Shade in Woolf's Clothing

Uta Hagen, who won a Tony playing Martha in the original stage version of Who's Afraid of Virgina Woolf?, died at age 84. One of Broadway's greatest stars, she won another Tony in 1950 for The Country Girl, and won a lifetime achievement Tony in 1999. That same year, she reprised her role as Martha in a benefit appearance dubbed one of the year's stage highlights. Any film career she may have aspired to was dashed by her appearance in Othello, co-starring Paul Robeson, whose left-leaning tendencies cast a doubt on his co-stars with the McCarthyites.

Superfly Away Home

Ron O'Neal, who showed that a 401k isn't the only way to plan for retirement as drug dealer Youngblood Priest in the blaxploitation flick Superfly, died of cancer at the age of 66. Somehow the idea of a rich retired drug dealer struck some as being the wrong message to send, and the sequel, Superfly TNT, flopped, returning O'Neal to the obscurity from which he came.

Dead Woman Walkabout

Molly Kelly, the Australian aborigine on whose life the independent film Rabbit-Proof Fence was based, died at age 87. In 1931, at the age of 13, Kelly was taken from her home to a government institution to work as a servant, as was the case with thousands of other members of the "lost generations," as part of Australia's forced assimilation policy that lasted until 1971. Kelly, her sister and a cousin escaped and followed the 1,000-mile long fence, constructed to control an explosion in rabbit population, to their home. Kelly's daughter, who was also taken by the government, wrote her mother's story after being reunited 20 years later.

Gone with the Wind

Alexandra Ripley, an author of historical fiction best known for one of the most unnecessary books of all time: Scarlett, the sequel to Gone With the Wind, has died at the age of 70. Frankly, I don’t give a damn, and neither does anyone else, as her death went unreported for more than 2 weeks. Believe it or not, Ripley was selected by the estate of Gone With the Wind author Margeret Mitchell, which apparently took a page of out of book on how to milk your famous relatives long after they’re able to stop you. Released to critical scorn in 1991, America’s book-buying sheep turned it into a bestseller. Befitting the 5th-rate novel, the TV miniseries based on the book starred Joanne Whalley-Kilmer and Timothy Dalton as Scarlett and Rhett.

Double Dog Dare

Or
Yinka Dinka Don’tYinka Dare, former George Washington University Colonial and New Jersey Net, died of a heart attack at the age of 32 on Friday. His passing is ironic, considering what a black hole he was on the court, recording just 4 assists in his 4 seasons with the Nets. After taking the Colonials to consecutive trips to the NCAA tournament, Dare was drafted #14 overall by the Nets in 1994, but he became one of the all-time first round draft pick busts and a symbol of that franchise's ineptitude. In his 4 seasons, totaling 110 games, Dare averaged just 2.1 points per game, which if you think about it, is only one more basket a game than I made.

Photo Finish

Celebrity fashion photographer Francesco Scavullo died Tuesday at his home in Manhattan. Working for nearly every major women's magazine over the last three decades, Scavullo helped feed America's obsession with impossible physical perfection, especially through his cover photos for Cosmopolitan. Among the "talent" he discovered in his career were Rene Russo, Farrah Fawcett and Brooke Shields. In 1981 he suffered his fourth nervous breakdown, as the life of taking pictures of gorgeous women and celebrities became too much to bear.

Screwed

Or
Ya Gotta Grieve
In the continuation of a rough stretch for the 1980 Phillies, former Phils great Tug McGraw died of brain cancer last night at the age of 59. (Watch your back, Del Unser.) The defining moment in the 121-year history of the Philadelphia Phillies was best described by Harry Kalas on October 21, 1980 at 11:29 p.m.: "65,000 on their feet, the Tugger needs one more," seconds before Tug struck out Willie Wilson to secure the lone championship in franchise history and leapt exultantly into Phillies lore. In another poignant moment in the closing ceremonies at Veterans Stadium, McGraw recreated that triumphant leap, which also served to underscore how far McGraw had come after nearly dying in spring training when two brain tumors were removed. He had been recovering, but another tumor was recently discovered. Following a 1974 trade with the New York Mets, McGraw brought his "Ya Gotta Believe" attitude and slogan from the 1973 pennant-winners, a diving screwball and a unique wit that endeared him to the Phillies faithful, and would make up for that whole abandoning his bastard son Tim until he was a famous millionaire thing.

Some selected quips:
Asked for a preference of grass or Astroturf: "I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf."

On how he'd spend his 1973 World Series share: "Ninety percent I'll spend on good times, women and Irish Whiskey. The other ten percent I'll probably waste."

On handling pressure situations: "Ten million years from now, when the sun burns out and the Earth is just a frozen iceball hurtling through space, nobody's going to care what Willie Stargell did with the bases loaded."

He also had a penchant for naming his fastballs:
the John Jameson (straight, like I drink it)
Cutty Sark (it sails)
Bo Derek (a nice little tail)
Peggy Lee ("Is that all there is?")

And in the world that we all care about, this is the first hit of the year, and congrats to newcomer Jen for drawing first blood.

What is Dead?

Would be the perfect answer to the clue "How you would describe former Jeopardy! writer Steven Dorfman." Dorfman, who joined Jeopardy! when it was relaunched in 1984 and was the most prolific writer in the show's history with more than 50,000 questions to his credit, died yesterday at the age of 48. He was a member of a team of writers who were awarded six Daytime Emmys for special-class writing. His eclectic interests and offbeat sense of humor led to the additions of such categories as Wacky Roman Emperors, Original Crayola Colors and Grub, Shrub or Beelzebub?