I saw Electra Glide a couple years ago on AMC.
It was pretty good. It was filmed a bit oddly. They used camera angles that emphasized Blake’s short stature. It contributed to the characters other problems.
Usually camera angles are used to disguise the height of actors. Baretta never seemed short. Tom Cruise plays action heroes.
It’s the movie I was going to mention, because once when I was talking about it to a friend I had a brain fart and called it Astroglide in Blue. LOL.
Tom Cruise is below average height. Blake was several inches shorter than Cruise.
89 is a shock!
Born Michael James Vijencio Gubitosi
I loved Baretta - and Mr. Blake made frequent appearances on the Johnny Carson show. The things that came out of his mouth! You never knew…
After his aquittal didn’t he say something like “Maybe I’m going to travel the west in a RV and shoot pool with a one armed Polish woman.”? Who even concieves of shit like that?
I don’t remember that, but he said a lot of unfiltered things, it seemed, on his frequent Johnny Carson appearances years earlier.
That’s why he was Mickey Gubitosi on the Little Rascals … or Our Gang. I don’t remember which version he was in.
My understanding is that the shorts were all titled Our Gang when they were originally produced, and released in theaters. The Little Rascals name was used when the older Our Gang shorts were repackaged for television broadcast, in part because Hal Roach had regained control of the films, but not the name. Meanwhile, MGM syndicated the newer Our Gang shorts for TV, using the Our Gang name.
Wikipedia says that Blake joined the series in 1939; it also says that the older shorts, which Roach had syndicated to TV as Little Rascals, were the ones from 1927-1938. So, the ones that Blake appeared in were, I think, branded on TV as Our Gang.
Thanks! I never really cared what the difference was, but this was interesting.
I’ll never forget when he met Orson Welles, and told him, “you make Wimpy look skimpy”. To which Welles replied, “I’m fat, and you’re ugly. But I can diet”.
OH, so that’s where that came from? I thought it was Winston Churchhill or Oscar Wilde.
No, just Michael James Gubitosi. Wikipedia is wrong. His book shows a copy of his birth certificate.
“Woim” is the last surviving member? Didn’t see that coming.
Rose apparently was raised quietly and protected from the paparazzi. But her mother’s death did shape her childhood.
per World Almanac and Book of Facts -2022
Maybe not “born”, maybe added to later.
The bird is still alive, right? They live to be like 150 years old. Unless Blake…you know?
Died at ~age 70, apparently - Blake outlived him. That might actually be about average for a Sulfur-crested in captivity, though they can get past the century mark.
He was actually bird-napped in 1990 from the San Diego Wild Animal Park, but was returned unharmed shortly thereafter. Insomuch as he was confiscated at an airport smuggled in a flight in from Hong Kong and purportedly originally spoke some Chinese, I imagine his true age may have been a little uncertain.