Saturday, January 26, 2013

Statues of TV characters

I travelled to New York City by bus once. (It wasn't very comfortable, but on the way in through New Jersey I spotted some of the locations where they filmed THE SOPRANOS.) Outside the city's big bus depot they had a statue of Jackie Gleason as Ralph Kramden with the inscription "Bus driver.  Raccoon lodge treasurer.  Dreamer." Quite appealing.

They've erected several statues of TV characters around the US. (I think some company that airs classic shows has been sponsoring them.) There's Mary Richards waving her cap in Minneapolis, Fonzie in Milwaukee, Bob Newhart in Chicago, and Samantha in BEWITCHED in Salem, Massachusetts.  The last one, making a connection between a real-life tragedy and a TV comedy, strikes me as tasteless.  Even Canada has a statue of Al Waxman in KING OF KENSINGTON in Toronto's Kensington Park.

I've been thinking about all the other TV characters who could use statues.  The ones best suited are those identified with a particular city or neighborhood.  I can see J.J. in GOOD TIMES in Chicago's housing projects area, Freddy Prinze in CHICO AND THE MAN in a Hispanic section of Los Angeles, Archie Bunker (in his chair, with a cigar and can of beer) in New York's Bedford-Stuyvesant, Kotter and the Sweathogs in Bensonhurst, Crockett and Tubbs of MIAMI VICE in Miami, Sam Malone of CHEERS in Boston, Frasier in Seattle, WKRP's Dr. Johnny Fever in Cincinnati, even Dabney Coleman in BUFFALO BILL (with his distinctive hand wave) in Buffalo.  Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones in LONESOME DOVE could be erected anywhere on the Great Plains, perhaps at the National Cowboy Museum.

But why stop at TV?  I can see statues of movie characters too.  There could be Humphrey Bogart's Sam Spade of THE MALTESE FALCON in San Francisco, Judy Garland (with the posture of a trolley car passenger) in St. Louis, Marlon Brando in ON THE WATERFRONT on the Hoboken shore (I see him twenty feet tall, holding a longshoreman's hook), Al Pacino as Serpico in New York (perhaps in the neighborhood where Serpico was shot in the face?), Blanche Dubois in New Orleans, Gregory Peck in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD somewhere in Alabama...

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