A Face in the Ground
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Andy Griffith, best remembered for getting a blow job from Jerry Seinfeld’s TV mom in Play the Game, has died of a heart attack at the age of 86. The long-time screen heavy got his first major role in A Face in the Crowd as Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes, a hayseed entertainer with a sociopathic desire for fame – the Dr. Phil of his day. In two 1970s TV movies, he played ruthless executives who accidentally caused the deaths of others and tried to get away with it in Pray for the Wildcats and Savages; in the ripped from the 30-year-old headlines-based Murder in Coweta County, Griffith starred as a wealthy landowner who was tried, convicted and executed for killing a black man, about as likely in 1950 Georgia as a Wall Street banker being held accountable for anything today. In Crime of Innocence, he played a hanging judge who hands down harsh sentences to young offenders for their own good. John Ritter goes looking for his long-lost father in Gramps and finds Griffith, and learns that some things are better left unfound as dad is a violent psycho. Griffith later tried to take over the world as General Rancor in Spy Hard, one of the sadder Leslie Nielsen parody attempts, before rounding out his career as a randy widowed grampa boning his way through an old-folks home in Play the Game. And of course he also played a charming small town southern sheriff in his eponymous TV show and a charming small town southern lawyer in Matlock, blah, blah, blah, like you didn’t hear that a million times this week. Despite his North Carolina roots and deeply held religious beliefs, Griffith was a life-long Democrat, filming a commercial advocating for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that was withdrawn after he received death threats. Threatening Andy f’ing Griffith. Yeah, the Tea Party is ready to lead.
Griffith is the 3rd Mayberrian to get Mayberried this year, joining George “Goober” Lindsey and Frank Cady, who played the town drunk in the episode of Make Room for Daddy that begat The Andy Griffith Show. His death leaves only Jim Nabors (Gomer Pyle) and Betty Lynn (Barney Fife’s girlfriend Thelma Lou) alive among the adult cast members.
Mayberry, RIP
(An epitaphany shared with Ern and Monty)Or
A Face in the Shroud
(Kudos to Ern)Andy Griffith, best remembered for getting a blow job from Jerry Seinfeld’s TV mom in Play the Game, has died of a heart attack at the age of 86. The long-time screen heavy got his first major role in A Face in the Crowd as Larry "Lonesome" Rhodes, a hayseed entertainer with a sociopathic desire for fame – the Dr. Phil of his day. In two 1970s TV movies, he played ruthless executives who accidentally caused the deaths of others and tried to get away with it in Pray for the Wildcats and Savages; in the ripped from the 30-year-old headlines-based Murder in Coweta County, Griffith starred as a wealthy landowner who was tried, convicted and executed for killing a black man, about as likely in 1950 Georgia as a Wall Street banker being held accountable for anything today. In Crime of Innocence, he played a hanging judge who hands down harsh sentences to young offenders for their own good. John Ritter goes looking for his long-lost father in Gramps and finds Griffith, and learns that some things are better left unfound as dad is a violent psycho. Griffith later tried to take over the world as General Rancor in Spy Hard, one of the sadder Leslie Nielsen parody attempts, before rounding out his career as a randy widowed grampa boning his way through an old-folks home in Play the Game. And of course he also played a charming small town southern sheriff in his eponymous TV show and a charming small town southern lawyer in Matlock, blah, blah, blah, like you didn’t hear that a million times this week. Despite his North Carolina roots and deeply held religious beliefs, Griffith was a life-long Democrat, filming a commercial advocating for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that was withdrawn after he received death threats. Threatening Andy f’ing Griffith. Yeah, the Tea Party is ready to lead.
Griffith is the 3rd Mayberrian to get Mayberried this year, joining George “Goober” Lindsey and Frank Cady, who played the town drunk in the episode of Make Room for Daddy that begat The Andy Griffith Show. His death leaves only Jim Nabors (Gomer Pyle) and Betty Lynn (Barney Fife’s girlfriend Thelma Lou) alive among the adult cast members.
Labels: sitcom
posted by The Grim Reaper at 8:22 PM
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