Sender: Rare book and manuscripts <EXLIBRIS-L@LISTSERV.INDIANA.EDU>
At 06:21 AM 1/23/2008, you wrote:
Jerry Blaz wrote:
"I am friends with the original actor who played
the Nazi pigeon-fancier Max Liebkind who wrote
the show that Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder buy and
produce as "Springtime for Hitler." His name is
Kenneth Mars, and he is a tall man with a big
frame and a familiar face, who like many who have
been doing character roles remained more or less
anonymous, and most lately had an intermitant
role in the TV series "Malcolm in the
Middle." His part was played by Lew Ferrell in
the recent "musical" recapitulation of the 1968
film. Mars was a hoot in the original."
Kenneth Mars is not nearly so obscure as your diffiden posting makes
him seem. A look at http://imdb.com/name/nm0550318/ (Internet Movie
DataBase) shows 179 separate Film and TV roles, going back to 1962,
and extending to a film still in pre-production, some with multiple episodes.
Ed Pollack
There are just so many like him in the L.A. area. The paparazzi
don't chase after him. He comes and goes quietly without
fanfare. He is a working bloke who works comparatively occasionally,
but when he does work, he makes good money, and he has learned to
live modestly in a nice house in an upper middle-class
neighborhood. So his name doesn't appear on the real estate page
under the "hot property" column selling or buying a $35 million property.
I've known a lot of these character actors just from my being in my
used bookstore and my casual social contacts. It happens without my
having to be a "big-shot" which I decidedly am not. Gary Owens has
been one of my oldest customers; I recall him crawling around on my
livingroom floor looking over a collection of old joke magazines,
which was "raw material" for him. I even found myself sitting down
to dinner with Whoopi Goldberg who has had a really big name in
showbusiness for a long time. Since the studio system has broken
down, these actors are not kept in corrals or being monitored by the
studio constantly, and they're operating as ordinary people most of the time.
For many of the younger "stars," this lack of supervision can be
devastating. Too many of them are getting in trouble or worse.
Jerry
Jerry Blaz mybookiejoint.com
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