Thursday, July 26, 2007

Going to Bat for Guano

This Friday would have been the 91st birthday of Keenan Wynn, who, alas, passed away in 1986 and therefore did not quite live as long as the time it takes to say his whole full name: Francis Xavier Aloysius James Jeremiah Keenan Wynn. A character actor who appeared in everything, ranging form Nashville to Son of Flubber, he's probably best remembered as Colonel "Bat" Guano in Dr. Strangelove. He's the one with the hand-grenades flapping like misformed mammaries, trying to figure out what has happened at Burpleson Airforce Base and accusing Capt. Lionel Mandrake of leading a "mutiny of preverts" (now that's a mutiny on the bounty). When Mandrake makes him fire into a Coca-Cola vending machine to get change to call the president (pay phones are so quaint, aren't they?), he replies: "if you don't get the President of the United States on that phone, you know what's gonna happen to you? You're gonna have to answer to the Coca-Cola company." Then he gets sprayed in the face, so there's a money shot and everything, but that's capitalism for you, orgasming at the apocalypse.

It's all funnier in the movie.

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1 Comments:

Blogger Mike said...

I'm amazed he was only 37 in Strangelove. Seemed older.

3:32 AM  

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