Gordon’s Not

Pat Hingle, one of the great, “Hey, it’s that guy,” guys in cinematic and television history, has died of myelodysplasia at the age of 84. He had a husky everyman look, and held almost as diverse a collection of pre-acting jobs - shoe salesman, playground attendant, rather unsuccessful purveyor of Bibles, farmhand, usher, waiter, file clerk at Bloomingdale’s – as he had cinematic roles, taking so many that he often watched his own films with fascination as he couldn’t remember the characters he’d played. Some may remember him as the egomaniacal, justice-obsessed judge who uses Clint Eastwood as a reluctant long arm of the law in Hang ‘Em High. Others recall Edward Roundfield, executor of Mortimer Brewster’s great uncle’s will in Brewster’s Millions. He stubbed out a cigar in Angelica Huston’s hand in The Grifters. As Gus O’Malley, he was the staff-abusing former owner of Cheers who sold Sam the bar. He owned Dennit Racing in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. He and Michael Gough were the only two actors to appear in all four of the pre-Christian Bale Batman films, playing Police Commissioner Gordon. He played the gay J. Edgar Hoover in the 1992 HBO film Citizen Cohn. But for me, he was Col. Potter’s old friend and fellow prankster Colonel Daniel Webster Tucker, who convinces the camp he’s a hard as nails general and baits them into a seemingly fatal prank.