Comedy favorite dies
Source: Agencies |
November 30, 2010, Tuesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
DESPITE years spent playing sober commanders and serious captains, Leslie Nielsen insisted that he was always made for comedy. He proved it in his career's second act.
"Surely you can't be serious," an airline passenger says to Nielsen in "Airplane!" the 1980 hit that turned him from dramatic leading man to comic star. "I am serious," Nielsen replies. "And don't call me Shirley."
The line was probably his most famous - and a perfect distillation of his career.
Nielsen, the dramatic lead in "Forbidden Planet" and "The Poseidon Adventure" and the bumbling detective Frank Drebin in "The Naked Gun" comedies, died on Sunday in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He was 84.
Critics argued that when Nielsen went into comedy he was being cast against type, but Nielsen disagreed, saying comedy was what he intended to do all along.
"I've finally found my home - as Lieutenant Frank Drebin," he said in a 1988 interview.
Nielsen came to Hollywood in the mid-1950s after performing in 150 live television dramas in New York. With a craggily handsome face, blond hair and 1.88-meter height, he seemed ideal for a movie leading man.
His first film for MGM was auspicious - as the space ship commander in the science fiction classic "Forbidden Planet."
Behind the camera, the serious actor was a well-known prankster. That was an aspect of his personality never exploited, however, until "Airplane!" was released in 1980 and became a huge hit.
As the doctor aboard a plane in which the pilots, and some of the passengers, become ill, Nielsen says they must get to a hospital right away.
"A hospital? What is it?" a flight attendant asks, inquiring about the illness.
"It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now," Nielsen says.
It was the beginning of a whole new career in comedy.
"Surely you can't be serious," an airline passenger says to Nielsen in "Airplane!" the 1980 hit that turned him from dramatic leading man to comic star. "I am serious," Nielsen replies. "And don't call me Shirley."
The line was probably his most famous - and a perfect distillation of his career.
Nielsen, the dramatic lead in "Forbidden Planet" and "The Poseidon Adventure" and the bumbling detective Frank Drebin in "The Naked Gun" comedies, died on Sunday in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. He was 84.
Critics argued that when Nielsen went into comedy he was being cast against type, but Nielsen disagreed, saying comedy was what he intended to do all along.
"I've finally found my home - as Lieutenant Frank Drebin," he said in a 1988 interview.
Nielsen came to Hollywood in the mid-1950s after performing in 150 live television dramas in New York. With a craggily handsome face, blond hair and 1.88-meter height, he seemed ideal for a movie leading man.
His first film for MGM was auspicious - as the space ship commander in the science fiction classic "Forbidden Planet."
Behind the camera, the serious actor was a well-known prankster. That was an aspect of his personality never exploited, however, until "Airplane!" was released in 1980 and became a huge hit.
As the doctor aboard a plane in which the pilots, and some of the passengers, become ill, Nielsen says they must get to a hospital right away.
"A hospital? What is it?" a flight attendant asks, inquiring about the illness.
"It's a big building with patients, but that's not important right now," Nielsen says.
It was the beginning of a whole new career in comedy.
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