# what have happend to these mega-stars **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 7, 2006, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853 "2006-09-07T23:42:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2006, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853/41 "2006-09-11T20:40:16Z")
[QUOTE=ddgryphon] Acting is a job, but it is also a calling. Ford was on the verge of giving that calling up and becoming a carpenter/contractor instead when he got his break. He carefully chose work that paid well, but paid in dividends of respect for his craft as well: “Witness” “Regarding Henry” “Mosquito Coast” among others. Hell, I’d love to see him do a remake of the Amazon Queen, but again, he feels he’s worth a particular amount and won’t compromise on that, because he doesn’t have to. Perhaps one day he’ll wake up and realize there’s some good roles he could do, if he were to not have to worry about money (which he clearly doesn’t have to do yet). I hope we see a return to Ford choosing roles over pay – he’s done it before, I believe he still has it in him to do it again. [/QUOTE] I was thinking of those same films. It was good solid work - and he did get an Oscar nod for Witness and Golden Globes nods for Witness and Mosquito Coast. But I think Regarding Henry hurt his ego - no awards nods. I wonder how different his career would have been had he continued on that path - but I think he is a guy who needs to have his ego fed - it isn’t about art for him. And when he steps outside his “type” his fans are disappointed. (African Queen. I think Ford is functionally a later day Bogie - right down to the awkward Sabrina role. I think Ford and Susan Sarandon would do one hell of an African Queen remake. But the original was so perfect, why bother.) ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2006, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853/42 "2006-09-12T00:32:37Z")
Ford has been in 6 huge hit movies: Star Wars Return of the Jedi Empire Strikes Back Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom Indiana Jones and Something or Other ( hated Kate Capshaw and Moo goo gai pan or whatever his name was.) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Six movies, two BIG FAT ROLES that are now a part of our language. He’s created freakin’ icons. The man has earned a right, IMHO, to coast for the rest of his life. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2006, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853/43 "2006-09-12T04:39:37Z")
[QUOTE=Charlie Tan] Well, it was released by Brooksfilms, so even though he was uncredited, I don’t think it’s a WAG to think that he had influence over the content. I seem to remember (but can’t back it up) Brooks being interviewed when it was released and making comments about chapperoning a drunk Errol Flynn, when Brooks just started out in tv. [/QUOTE] The quote in full, from the IMBD site: > [@](#): > > JH: How close was the movie My Favorite Year[1982] in capturing the atmosphere of Your Show Of Shows? > > MB: Pretty damn close. My company made it Brooksfilm and I made sure that we were telling the truth. I was locked in the Waldorf Towers with Errol Flynn and two red-headed, Cuban sisters. For three days I was trying to get them out of there and he was trying to get me drunk and in there. It was the craziest weekend of my life. I was 20 years old and just starting with The Show Of Shows. He was a tough guy to corrale and get to rehearsals. Max Liebman assigned me to him and said, “Get him into rehearsal! Make him learn his lines! Work with him on the sketch!” Errol Flynn was a raving maniac. All he wanted was booze and to fool around. He did learn the sketch. Actually, I whispered into his ear when he was asleep. I’d say all the lines and unconsciously, I knew it would get through to his head. > > Lost Issue Wednesday: Mel Brooks Interview (1997) > by Jeffrey K. Howard ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2006, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853/44 "2006-09-12T07:41:41Z")
Some of the incidents in _My Favorite Year_ are closer to the life of Woody Allen than to that of Mel Brooks. The main character in the film is described as being someone not long out of high school, already a college dropout, who’s suddently been hired as a writer for a big TV show. That describes Allen. It doesn’t describe Brooks, who’s somewhat older than Allen. Brooks was in World War II after graduating from high school. He then went on to work as a stand-up comedian for a few years before becoming a TV writer. Incidentally, that quote is clearly wrong about how old Brooks was when he worked for _Your Show of Shows_. The show didn’t even start until several years after he was 20. Brooks was already married and in his late twenties (and I think already had children) when he started working on the show. The subplot about the main character dating a woman who also works for the show also didn’t happen to Brooks. It didn’t happen to Allen either, who married a college student while working on the show. The only incident in the movie that was clearly derived from Brooks’s life was his having to take care of Errol Flynn for a weekend. Much of the rest of the film is simply fiction, of course. Flynn didn’t have occasion to defend the star of the show from a gangster. It’s apparently true that the movie gets the atmosphere of the TV show right. Describing the film as a quasi-autobiography strikes me as stretching it slightly. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2006, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853/45 "2006-09-12T17:23:18Z")
“So what are you so ashamed of?” _“Everything!”_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-have-happend-to-these-mega-stars/371853.md?page=2)