Home > Blogs > Sir Critic on Cinema > Archives > 2008 > June > 24 > Entry
What celebrity death hurt the most?
The “In Memoriam” segments in award shows are going to be brutal with the death of so many renowned entertainers recently. We’d already lost Heath Ledger, Anthony Minghella, Sydney Pollack and Ollie Johnston. Stan Winston, Cyd Charisse and now George Carlin have departed just this past week.
Some of these deaths were completely unexpected, others less so. Still, it always hurts when we lose a gifted artist, whether fate takes them too soon or natural causes take their course.
All these obituaries and tributes in the news lately got me thinking about the impact of a celebrity’s passing. The one that hurt me the most is an easy call.
Some people who know me as a Beatlemaniac may think it was the death of John Lennon. That was certainly a shock, but I was 10 at the time, and I wasn’t heavily into the Beatles before then. For better or worse, it was John’s death that got my Beatlemania going.
The death of George Harrison, too, was incredibly sad, but as much as I didn’t want to acknowledge it, it was well known cancer was getting the better of him.
No, the celebrity death that hit me the hardest was the untimely passing of Jim Henson in 1990, from a severe strep infection. That came like a cruel bolt from the blue, it happened so fast. I had seen him on The Arsenio Hall Show with Kermit only a week or so earlier.
It was already tragic enough that I and many others had lost a childhood idol. It hurt even more when we learned later that Jim’s life might had been saved if only he had gone to the hospital just a little earlier.
Worse still, the Muppets have never been the same. The only truly great Muppet projects after Jim’s death were the TV tribute to Henson and The Muppet Christmas Carol. A succession of increasingly uninspired movies and TV shows followed. I dearly hope the planned revival from the creators of Forgetting Sarah Marshall can restore their luster. Until then, thank goodness for the DVDs.
So which celebrity deaths hit you hard, whether the passing was expected or not? Celebrities who were in the movies would be preferred, but in the interest of broadening the comments, I’ll widen the net and let us all drown our sorrows together.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: Celebrities
Comments
By howard
June 25, 2008 7:51 AM | Link to this
I’d have too say John Wayne he was a mans man all his movies had good themes and he never used a lot of gore or foul language in them. He loved and believed in this country he stood by what he said and in what he believed.By SRCputt
June 24, 2008 3:38 PM | Link to this
The celebrity deaths that hurt me the most tend to be those that are still producing great work. So Jim Henson, a childhood hero, hit me hard. Siskel and Ebert basically taught me to love film, so Gene Siskel’s hit me hard too. Another childhood hero, Steve Allen, didn’t hit me as hard because he was essentially retired at the time. But to move to film artists, one name hit me harder, probably because he’s from my gerneration and died way too soon (and I love his work). That person would be River Phoenix.By ME
June 24, 2008 12:46 PM | Link to this
That’s easy for me, it was Jack Lemmon. To me Jack was the epitome an all around silly goof that could transform into a serious roll instantly. Jack was a fantastic duo with Walter Matthau. But a great leading man for director Billy Wilder. I love him most in the Apartment and Avanti. I know he’s not in the movies … But I must say the loss of Tim Russert is a great loss to me as a journalist … I was stunned and worry that no one will be out there asking the right questions of politicians like he did.