Joe Tiller obit

Legendary Purdue football coach Joe Tiller, 74, dies

He was not on the list.

The Big Ten lost one of its most innovative, influential and beloved coaches with the passing of Purdue's Joe Tiller, who was 74.

Tiller forever changed the face of Big Ten football upon being hired at Purdue in 1997, showing a wide-open offense could be a success in the black-and-blue Big Ten. And in doing so, Tiller reversed the fortunes of Purdue during a 12-year run that included 10 bowl trips and the school's first Rose Bowl since the 1966 season.

Tiller left West Lafayette as the school's all-time winningest coach, passing Jack Mollenkopf by going 87-62 overall and 53-43 in the Big Ten from 1997-2008. While Tiller's prowess as a coach was formidable, he was an even better person who I enjoyed getting to know over the years.

I'll never forget first sitting in his office in the winter of 1998. I was in West Lafayette to do a story on his magical 9-3 debut in 1997. I soon discovered: No one told stories like Tiller. He just had a knack. We all know people like that. So, I'm asking Tiller if recruiting is getting easier for him since he led the Boilermakers to a bowl win in his first season after the school hadn't been to the postseason since 1984. He leans back in his chair ?

"In recruiting, most kids had a real phone number and a chump phone number," Tiller said. "We aren't getting the chump line too often anymore."

There was an "Everyman" quality about Tiller whose personality was perfect for slow-paced West Lafayette and conservative Purdue. His house in West Lafayette was nice-but modest. No gated community or five-car garage. Nope. Tiller bought his milk and bread just down the street at Marsh supermarket, cut his lawn and just may even borrow your chainsaw. And Tiller went to church every day. He made it easy by living a short walk from Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church on Sacramento Drive in West Lafayette.

Tiller had a presence about his. He was a big man, a former offensive lineman at Montana State who filled a room. I first encountered Tiller when he was the Boilermakers' defensive coordinator-that's right, defensive coordinator-while I was at Purdue from 1983-86. The guy was intimidating for a student assistant in the school's sports information department who was looking for a quote for program feature stories I wrote on guys like Rod Woodson, Fred Strickland, Cris Dishman and Kevin Sumlin.

But as the years past, and he circled back into my life as Purdue's head coach, Tiller softened-at least a little bit. But he still was intimidating. I recall being in his office on another occasion and watching him rip into a misbehaving player. It made me slump in the chair.

On my last visit with Tiller as Purdue coach prior to the 2008 season, he had something we wanted to show me. Tiller reached over to a shelf in his office and showed me the plans for his house in Wyoming. Man, was he proud. Tiller beamed as he unfurled the papers and showed me the layout. He had dreamed and yearned for this for years.

"Just me and the trout," Tiller said. "They don't tell me what play I should have called on third-and-five."

And then there were the calls. When you looked at your phone and saw it was Tiller, you knew it wasn't going to be a short conversation. Tiller told stories of Purdue fans who would stop by his cabin and visit. "You should see these people, Tom," Tiller would say. "They look at my Purdue memorabilia and almost cry."

Tiller loved to talk-about pretty much anything-but especially his love of the West. Tiller fell in love with Big Sky county as a player at Montana State-and then as an assistant and later head coach of Wyoming. Now, he was living among the coyotes, wolves and bears. And, he loved it. Tiller was living his dream. How many of us can say that?

The last time I heard from Tiller was via a phone call about a year ago.

"Do you know how much snow we got out here last winter?" Tiller asked, waiting for me to say: "How much?"

I asked him about what he thought of Purdue's chances in the coming the season. He didn't seem too interested, relating he had lost desire to follow the team as his connections to the school faded. Understandable.

I could go on about Tiller's football resume. Yes, it was impressive. The Big Ten never had seen an offense like the one Tiller brought with him from the plains of Wyoming to take over for Jim Colletto. Tiller introduced a wide-open offensive style to the button-upped Big Ten. Some analysts affectionately called Tiller's spread attack "basketball on grass." And many of those same analysts doubted such an offense could be successful in the Big Ten. Boy, were they wrong.

A big key to Tiller's success: He built some fine staffs in West Lafayette, hiring the likes of Brock Spack, Kevin Sumlin, Jim Chaney, Greg Olson, Mark Hagan, Danny Hope, Terrell Williams, Ted Gilmore, Bill Legg, Bob DeBesse, Randy Melvin, Gary Emanuel and Scott Downing, among others. Those assistants played a large role in Purdue's rise to relevancy, as the program produced talented quarterbacks who went on to the NFL in Drew Brees, Kyle Orton and Curtis Painter.

And the program developed defensive talent under Tiller, cultivating a reputation as the "den of defensive ends," as future pros like Rosevelt Colvin, Akin Ayodele, Chike Okeafor, Ray Edwards, Rob Ninkovich, Cliff Avril, Shaun Phillips, Ryan Kerrigan and Anthony Spencer went on to success in the NFL.

But Brees, of course, was the prized pupil. Whenever you asked Tiller about the two-time Heisman finalist, he got a bit excited. Why not? Brees is a Big Ten icon who delivered Tiller to the Rose Bowl in the 2000 season.

Can you believe that? Purdue? In the Rose Bowl? Yep.

As Tiller liked to say about himself: "Not bad for a guy from a dead-end street in Toledo."

I am gonna miss Joe Tiller.

 

Frank Hamblen obit

Frank Hamblen was a revered NBA basketball coach

Terre Haute native coached for teams that won 7 NBA titles; Dies at age 70

 

He was not on the list.

Frank Hamblen, 1965 Garfield High School graduate and former National Basketball Association head coach and assistant coach, died of a heart attack Saturday morning in the Del Mar, California, community near San Diego, family members have reported to the Tribune-Star. He was 70.

A sophomore reserve guard on Garfield's last IHSAA State Tournament Final Four basketball team in 1963, Hamblen went on to play two more seasons with the Purple Eagles and was the school's third all-time leading scorer behind future NBA players Terry Dischinger and Clyde Lovellette and is a member of the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame.

He than played at Syracuse University, where was later named a Letterwinner of Distinction.

Ray Goddard was Hamblen's coach in Babe Ruth League baseball in Terre Haute nearly 60 years ago, and said Saturday he and co-coach Charlie Hall had spotted the flaw that may have kept Hamblen from playing in the NBA.

"[Hall and I] were 19; he was 13," Goddard said. "We told him he ran like a dry creek, and that followed him all the way to the NBA."

Even at 13, Hamblen was exhibiting some of the traits that eventually made him a successful coach, Goddard continued.

"He was a very astute guy," Goddard said. "He picked up everything.

"Great guy. Great player — a real good shooter — and a great teammate ... and a hell of a coach," Goddard concluded.

Although he had brief stints as head coach with the Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Lakers, Hamblen was probably best known for his work as Phil Jackson's top assistant with the Lakers. He was also an assistant with the Bucks, the Chicago Bulls (during Michael Jordan's second string of championships in 1997 and 1998) and the Sacramento Kings. In all he helped coach teams to 7 NBA championships.

"Frank Hamblen was a great coach and a good friend," Lakers coach Luke Walton, who was a rookie player in the organization when Hamblen coached, said in a statement by the Lakers. "He was not only beloved by everyone in the Lakers organization but by those in the NBA community as well."

"He was my assistant coach in Chicago, a good friend and great coach. He will be missed," Warriors coach Steve Kerr said before Golden State's first preseason game in Oakland. "He was just a good coach, good guy. I would see him in San Diego summertime. ... He was funny, he was a great basketball mind. I still remember when Frank came to the Bulls we had basically the whole team back and the first day of camp Michael Jordan said, 'Our motivation this year is to get a ring for Frank.' He was new that year. He said, 'Everybody else in this room has a ring but Frank doesn't have one so we're going to get you one this year' and we did — thanks to me and Michael."

In a 42-year coaching career in the NBA and ABA, Hamblen served as Milwaukee's top assistant from 1987-96 and worked as assistant coach for the Kansas City/Sacramento Kings (1977-87), Denver Rockets (1972-1977) and San Diego/Houston Rockets (1969-72).

As news spread of Hamblen's death, some of his former players reached out via Twitter, including a Hall of Famer and a future Hall of Famer.

"Just learned of Frank Hamblen’s passing and it’s tough to find the words. He was a great man, one of my favorites," Tweeted former Bull Scottie Pippen.

"Thank u Coach Frank for your deep understanding of the game, your patience and for challenging me to defend at the highest level. I will miss u," noted Kobe Bryant.

Hamblen served as an interim head coach for two different teams – the Milwaukee Bucks in 1991–1992 and the Los Angeles Lakers in 2005. He also has served as an assistant coach on six NBA teams (Kansas City/Sacramento Kings, Milwaukee Bucks, Chicago Bulls, Los Angeles Lakers), often alongside Phil Jackson. Hamblen has been an assistant coach on seven championship teams, two with Jackson's Bulls and five with Jackson's Lakers. Jackson retired after the 2010–11 season, and Hamblen's contract with the Lakers expired as well.

Career information

High school            Garfield (Terre Haute, Indiana)

College            Syracuse (1966–1969)

Coaching career   1969–2011

Career history

As coach:

1969–1972            San Diego/Houston Rockets (assistant)

1972–1977            Denver Rockets/Nuggets (assistant)

1977–1987            Kansas City/Sacramento Kings (assistant)

1987–1996            Milwaukee Bucks (assistant)

1991–1992            Milwaukee Bucks (interim)

1996–1999            Chicago Bulls (assistant)

1999–2011            Los Angeles Lakers (assistant)

2005    Los Angeles Lakers (interim)

Career highlights and awards

7× NBA champion (1997, 1998, 2000–2002, 2009, 2010)

Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame (2007)

Monty Hall - # 167

Monty Hall, Co-Creator and Host of ‘Let’s Make a Deal,’ Dies at 96

He was number 167 on the list.


Monty Hall, the genial host and co-creator of “Let’s Make a Deal,” the game show on which contestants in outlandish costumes shriek and leap at the chance to see if they will win the big prize or the booby prize behind door No. 3, died at his home in Beverly Hills, Calif., on Saturday. He was 96.

A daughter, Joanna Gleason, confirmed his death. She said the cause was heart failure.

“Let’s Make a Deal” had its premiere in late 1963 and, with some interruptions, has been a television phenomenon ever since.

When Mr. Hall first roamed among the audience members who filled the “trading floor” in an NBC studio in Burbank, Calif., there was nothing zany about them.

“They came to the show in the first week in suits and dresses,” Mr. Hall told The Los Angeles Times in 2013.

Within weeks, however, things had changed.

By one account, the turning point came when a woman in the audience, vying for Mr. Hall’s attention with hopes of being chosen as a contestant, wore a bizarre-looking hat.

Mr. Hall recalled it somewhat differently in 2013: The game changer, he said, was a woman carrying a sign that said, “Roses are red, violets are blue, I came here to deal with you.”

Whatever it was that opened the floodgates, would-be deal makers were soon showing up wearing live-bird hats, Tom Sawyer costumes or boxes resembling refrigerators. Some simply waved signs pleading, “Pick Me.”

It was all for the chance to barter their way to a big prize. A woman might sell Mr. Hall the contents of her handbag for $150, and then agree to trade that $150 for whatever was behind a curtain, or in a big box, in the hope that it was something valuable — say, a $759 refrigerator-freezer stocked with $25 worth of cottage cheese and a $479 sewing machine.

She could then compound her glee by being smart enough not to trade it all back for the old purse and whatever amount of cash Mr. Hall had slipped into it — maybe a hefty amount or maybe a measly $27. If she went for the deal that turned out to be a loser, she was, in the language of the show, zonked.

At the end of the show, the two biggest winners were given a shot at the Big Deal. They could trade their winnings for whatever was behind one of three doors: a new car, perhaps, or $15,000 in cash, or, if they were not so lucky, something worth less than what they had traded. All the while, the affable, smooth-talking Mr. Hall gave no hint of where the treasure might lie.


“Monty had to be a very likable con man; he had to convince people to give up a bird in the hand for what’s in the box,” David Schwartz, the author, with Fred Wostbrock and Steve Ryan, of “The Encyclopedia of TV Game Shows,” said in an interview.


Mr. Hall had other responsibilities, too, Mr. Schwartz added: “He had to be a traffic cop, to get a decision out of the contestant without taking a long time. With his great ability to ad-lib, he knew how to keep the show moving.”


Mr. Hall kept “Let’s Make a Deal” moving for most of almost 5,000 broadcasts on NBC, on ABC and in syndication. The show ended its original daytime run in 1976 on ABC. A concurrent syndicated nighttime version lasted until the next year. It occasionally resurfaced over the next decades and, after being off the air for a while, was revived in October 2009 on CBS, with Wayne Brady as host. That version is still on the air.


“Let’s Make a Deal” became such a pop-culture phenomenon that it gave birth to a well-known brain-twister in probability, called “the Monty Hall Problem.” This thought experiment involves three doors, two goats and a coveted prize and leads to a counterintuitive solution.

The show itself could give rise to the unexpected. “You get some strange moments,” Mr. Hall said in 2009. He recalled the day that a contestant was zonked when he chose a curtain behind which he had hoped was a car.

“It was an elephant,” Mr. Hall continued. “It freaked — ran backstage, down a ramp and out into the streets of L.A. That’s probably the wildest moment.”



Mr. Hall had his proud moments as well. In 1973 he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 1988, Mr. Hall, who was born in Canada, was named to the Order of Canada by that country’s government in recognition of the millions he had raised for a host of charities. In 2013 he was presented with a lifetime achievement award at the Daytime Emmys.



Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on Aug. 25, 1921, Monte Halparin (he later changed the spelling of his first name and took the stage name Hall) was one of two sons of Maurice Halparin, a butcher, and the former Rose Rusen, a teacher.



He earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry and zoology from the University of Manitoba. But, smitten by applause while appearing in college musicals, he moved to Toronto and began working as an actor and singer. In 1955 he moved again, this time to New York, where he became a regular on “Monitor,” a mix of comedy, music, sports and news on NBC Radio.



Five years later, Mr. Hall moved to Hollywood to host “Video Village,” a CBS TV show on which contestants played the role of “tokens” on a human-size game board. He teamed with the writer and producer Stefan Hatos to create “Let’s Make a Deal” in 1963.



Mr. Hall is survived by a show-business family: two daughters, Joanna Gleason, a Tony Award-winning actress, and Sharon Hall, a television executive; a son, Richard, a producer who won an Emmy for “The Amazing Race”; a brother, Robert Hall, a lawyer; and five grandchildren. His wife of almost 70 years, the former Marilyn Plottel, an Emmy Award-winning television producer, died in June.



Mr. Hall remained involved in “Let’s Make a Deal” to the end, as an owner of the show and an occasional guest. Interviewed in 2013, he gave Mr. Brady, his successor as host, his seal of approval.



“He’s making it his show,” he said. “He’s learning the star of the show is the contestant and to make them feel at home, make them feel like they came to your party.”

Elizabeth Baur obit

Elizabeth Baur, Actress on 'Ironside,' Dies at 69

 

She was not on the list.

She portrayed Officer Fran Belding on the NBC crime series after starring on a CBS Western, 'Lancer.'

Elizabeth Baur, who helped Raymond Burr bring the bad guys to justice as Officer Fran Belding on the long-running NBC crime drama Ironside, has died. She was 69.

Baur died Sept. 30 in Los Angeles following a lengthy illness, publicist Paul Gendreau announced.

On Ironside, which starred Burr as a San Francisco police consultant who solves crimes from his wheelchair, Baur effectively stepped in for Barbara Anderson (as Eve Whitfield), who exited the show after the fourth season.

Belding's character was introduced when she helped Robert Ironside and his team nab the gamblers who had murdered her father. Baur went on to appear in 89 episodes over four seasons until the show's conclusion in 1975, then came back for the 1993 telefilm The Return of Ironside.

Earlier, Baur starred as Teresa O'Brien, the ward of a rancher (Andrew Duggan), for two seasons on the 1968-1970 CBS Western Lancer.

A native of Los Angeles, Baur began her career as a contract player at 20th Century Fox and appeared in the Tony Curtis film The Boston Strangler (1968). She then moved to Universal, where she continued her TV work until exiting the industry to raise her daughter, Lesley Worton, now a producer.

Baur also appeared on such shows as Batman, Daniel Boone, Room 222, Emergency!, Police Woman, Fantasy Island and Remington Steele.

Survivors also include her husband Steve and a first cousin, Cagney & Lacey star Sharon Gless.

 

Filmography

Film

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1968    The Boston Strangler            Harriet Fordin 

 

Television

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1968    Batman            Fourth Policewoman            Episode: "Nora Clavicle and the Ladies' Crime Club"

1968–1970            Lancer            Teresa O'Brien            51 episodes

1970    Daniel Boone  Virginia            Episode: "Noblesse Oblige"

The Young Rebels  Rachel            Episode: "The Infiltrator"

1971    Room 222            Meaghan            Episode: "Cheating"

Nanny and the Professor            Susan Baxter            Episode: "The Communication Gap"

1971–1975            Ironside          Fran Belding 89 episodes

1972    The Bold Ones: The New Doctors            Fran Belding            Episode: "Five Days in the Death of Sgt. Brown: Part II" (crossover appearance)

Emergency!            Sister Barbara            Episode: "Saddled"

1975            S.W.A.T.         Dr. Ellen Benton            Episode: "Silent Night, Deadly Night"

1977    ABC Weekend Specials            Annabel            Episode: "Valentine's Second Chance"

1978    Police Woman            Joslyn Westmore            Episode: "Flip of a Coin"

1981    Fantasy Island   Lucy Carson            Episode: "The Man from Yesterday/World's Most Desirable Woman"

1984            Remington Steele            Margie Kelsey            Episode: "Second Base Steele"

1993    The Return of Ironside            Fran Belding TV movie, (final film role)

Benjamin Whitrow obit

Benjamin Whitrow obituary

He was not on the list.


Benjamin Whitrow has never given a bad performance,” said Laurence Olivier, who employed the actor in his National Theatre company at the Old Vic for seven years in the late 1960s. By the same token, you might deduce that Olivier never thought of Whitrow, who has died aged 80, as a barnstormer.

And you would be right. Whitrow’s stock-in-trade was an avuncular, measured rationality, a superb stillness on the stage and the capacity, very occasionally, to take you by surprise with a controlled outburst, or a frozen stare. Tall and lean, with a beautiful speaking voice, Whitrow was a master craftsman and, as such, luxury goods as a supporting player.

He may be best remembered for his resolute and placatory Mr Bennet in the great BBC TV serial of Pride and Prejudice (1995), with Jennifer Ehle as Elizabeth and Colin Firth shooting to stardom as Mr Darcy; Whitrow was a quietly hilarious buffer to Alison Steadman’s chaotically bustling Mrs Bennet.

Either side of that landmark, he appeared in three episodes of The New Statesman (1990-92) as Paddy O’Rourke, a Labour shadow minister with a fake Irish accent on the trail of Rick Mayall’s blunderbuss Alan B’Stard MP; and as Squire Allworthy in a serial of Tom Jones in 1997, co-starring Max Beesley, Samantha Morton, Frances de la Tour and Brian Blessed. These roles conferred a sort of television royalty on him, but he was a class act wherever he worked.

He featured in first major productions of leading playwrights, often moving with them between stage to screen: Peter Nichols’s coruscating Passion Play at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1981, with Eileen Atkins and Billie Whitelaw; Michael Frayn’s Noises Off in 1983, shortly before appearing in Christopher Morahan’s movie Clockwise (1986), scripted by Frayn and starring John Cleese; David Hare’s Racing Demon at the National Theatre in 1991, just before making Louis Malle’s Damage (1992), scripted by Hare and starring Jeremy Irons and Juliette Binoche; and Tom Stoppard’s The Invention of Love (1997) at the NT, directed by Richard Eyre, in which he played Ruskin as a mentally cavorting Victorian aesthete.

Quiet and reserved as an actor, he was more forthright in his private life, though never into self-promotion. Public interest was aroused, however, when it emerged that, after separating from his wife, Catherine Cook, a nurse, whom he married in 1972, and with whom he remained on good termsfor the rest of his life, he had fathered the child of the actor Celia Imrie, who had no wish to marry him. The hoo-hah soon died down, and Angus Imrie, now 23, is better known for playing Josh in The Archers.

Benjamin was the second son of Philip Whitrow, a schoolmaster at St Edward’s school, Oxford, who had taught Olivier there as a boy in the 1920s, and Mary (nee Flanders). He grew up in Oxford and attended the Dragon school before boarding at Tonbridge and training at Rada. For his national service, he served with the King’s Dragoon Guards, partly in Malaysia (1956-58), and he made his stage debut at the Epire, Belfast, in 1959, playing Hector Hushabye in Shaw’s Heartbreak House. He then spent an eight-year apprenticeship in rep before joining Olivier at the Old Vic.

He first “walked on” in Congreve’s Love for Love, progressing through the ranks in Seneca’s Oedipus, directed by Peter Brook, The Merchant of Venice (Olivier as Shylock) and Beaumarchais’ The Marriage of Figaro, both directed by Jonathan Miller, and as Bensinger in Michael Blakemore’s notable revival of The Front Page by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur. In the 1980s he was a familiar face in the West End, perhaps most memorably as the exasperated and two-timing director, Lloyd Dallas, of the play within a play in Noises Off on its transfer from the Lyric, Hammersmith, to the Savoy, in 1983. In Anthony Minghella’s Made in Bangkok (1986) at the Aldwych he played scenes of exquisite tenderness with fellow tourist Felicity Kendal on day trips to the temples while others sampled the fleshpots.

His Falstaff in the Merry Wives of Windsor for the RSC at Stratford-upon-Avon in 1991 was surprisingly thin-voiced, underweight and joyless in its lechery, but he compensated in the same season with a fine Camillo in Adrian Noble’s magnificent version of The Winter’s Tale and, 10 years later, at the Barbican, he was an unforgettably hilarious Justice Shallow in tandem with Peter Copley’s equally senile, whistling, Silence in Henry IV, Part Two.

He toured in 2001 in Joe Orton’s What the Butler Saw with Michael Pennington and Jane Asher, and returned to Chichester with Penelope Keith in Richard Everett’s Entertaining Angels, as a ghostly vicar revisiting his wife who is preparing to live on her own. His last stage work was with the Tobacco Factory in Bristol, where in 2011 he played a great double of John of Gaunt and the first gardener in Richard II, and, in 2015, appeared in Sheridan’s The School for Scandal, for the third time in his career, as Crabtree; the first had been in John Gielgud’s 1962 Haymarket revival with Ralph Richardson, the second for Miller, at the National.

At home in south Wimbledon, London, Whitrow was a book collector who loved wild orchids, golf and bridge.



Select filmography

Cinema

1963: The Small World of Sammy Lee as Joan's Client (uncredited)

1963: West 11 as Minor Role (uncredited)

1979: Quadrophenia as Mr. Fulford, Jimmy's Boss

1982: Brimstone and Treacle as Businessman

1986: Clockwise as Headmaster #1

1987: Personal Services as Mr. Marsden

1988: Hawks as Mr. Granger

1988: On the Black Hill as Arkwright

1992: Damage as Civil Servant

1992: Chaplin as Station Master

1995: Restoration as Merivel's Father

1997: The Opium War as Lord Palmerston

1997: The Saint as Chairman at Oxford

1997: FairyTale: A True Story as Mr. Binley

1998: Jilting Joe as Arthur

2000: Chicken Run as Fowler (voice)

2006: Scenes of a Sexual Nature as Eddie Wright

2009: Bomber as Alistar

2017: Darkest Hour as Sir Samuel Hoare (final film role)



Television


Harry's Game as Davidson

Agatha Christie's Partners in Crime as Sir Arthur Merivale in episode 'Finessing the King'

The Queen's Sister as Cronin

The History of Tom Jones: A Foundling as Squire Allworthy

Bognor as Eric Gringe in 'Deadline'

Pride and Prejudice as Mr Bennet

The New Statesman as Paddy O'Rourke

Chancer as Robert Douglas

Play for Today as Josh

Tales Of The Unexpected What Have You Been Up To Lately, as Fergus Locke

Fireman Sam as Station Officer Steele

Toast of London as Ken Suggestion

Troilus and Cressida as Ulysses

The Merchant of Venice as the Duke of Venice (opposite Laurence Olivier as Shylock)[13]

The Sweeney as Det. Chief Supt. Braithwaite

Hay Fever as Richard Greatham

The Brontes of Haworth as Arthur Bell Nicholls

Rumpole of the Bailey as The Reverend Bill Britwell

Bergerac as B J Farrell

Man Down Series 2 episode 2 of Man Down as Tim

Midsomer Murders as Sir Malcolm Frazer in episode 'Secrets and Spies'

Inspector Morse as Brownlee in the episode 'The Daughters of Cain'

Hugh Hefner - # 166

Hugh Hefner’s Legacy of Despair: Dead at 91


He was number 166 on the list.

Hugh Hefner didn’t invent pornography, and it would no doubt be thriving today even if he hadn’t founded Playboy magazine those many years ago. After all, man is fallen, and somebody would have filled that depraved niche in American life. Hefner, however, played his part, and the part he played was immensely destructive to our nation’s cultural, moral, and spiritual fabric. Hefner mainstreamed porn, he put it in millions of homes, and he even glamorized it — recasting one of America’s most pathetic industries as the playground of the sophisticated rich. He then grew to a ripe old age, consorting with women young enough to be his granddaughters. He was America’s most famous dirty old man. And now he’s dead. May God have mercy on his soul. It’s hard to calculate the damage he did, but the cultural rubble is all around us. My generation is perhaps the first to grow up with easily accessible porn. Every one of us knew whose father had a Playboy subscription (only the scary pervs subscribed to Penthouse or Hustler), and their kids knew exactly where dad kept his stash. They’d sneak out old issues, bring them to school, and pass them around. Before teens could rent porn on tape, they could see porn on the page, and once they saw it, they were hooked.

The effects have lasted a lifetime. Boys grew up believing they were entitled to sex on demand, and the sex would always be amazing. They learned to grow bored of the “same old thing” and instead to seek new adventures. They learned that monogamy was confining, that promiscuity was liberating, and that women should always be hot. The normal female form was no longer enough. It had to be enhanced, sculpted, and waxed. Though that kind of reality can’t exist for the vast majority of men, that didn’t stop the desire. So, they did and do the pitiful thing — retreated to bathrooms and bedrooms and masturbated nonstop to the women they could never have and the life they’d never live. How many families have broken to pieces when a wife discovers her husband’s secret addiction and realizes that she’s not enough — that she’s never been enough — and he spends much of his life fantasizing about thousands of others? How many men have grown to hate themselves for their psychological dependence on the saddest of habits?

The testimonies from porn nation are devastating. “I watched so much porn that I can’t really enjoy sex with my wife.” “He wants me to be something I can’t. I’ll never be as good as the girl on the screen.” “I can’t imagine being content with just one woman. I’ve had sex with thousands in my mind.” To see men become addicted to porn is to watch character formation in reverse. Their integrity and fidelity unwind before your eyes. They lie habitually to cover the extent of their habit, even when their wives are allegedly “open” and sexually liberated. After all, if she knew how much he watched or exactly what he looked at, even she would be shocked. The screen alone is never enough, the wife is never enough, and the addict so often seeks mistresses, prostitutes, or both. Another family breaks. More lives fall into despair. To see a man become addicted to porn is to watch character formation in reverse. All this is known. Everyone has seen it happen in their churches, in their neighborhoods, and in their families. This cycle has likely happened to thousands of men who’ll read this column. And yet, the secular, progressive guardians of our public morality — you know, the people who think you’re a horrible person if you don’t recycle or if you use the wrong pronouns — all so often don’t just tolerate but celebrate the sexual “liberation” that is part and parcel of porn nation.

So many A-list celebrities spent time at the Playboy Mansion, especially at its peak, that there was a time when one could wonder who hadn’t embraced Hef or the magazine he made. Our president has. The evidence is on his office wall. These were the people setting the tone for American culture. These were the people mocking the values that kept families strong. These were the people who teaching a nation that fulfillment could be found in sex, and that the joy of sex was worth more than marriage itself. They were wrong, and the cultural harm done outweighs the cost of botched presidential elections, bad congressmen, or a judiciary riddled with knaves and fools. The cultural harm done is even now ripping kids from parents and husbands from wives. When I think of Hugh Hefner, yes I mourn, but I mourn because the bitter fruit of his life’s work has helped poison the families of people I know and love. He is gone, but his legacy lives on. And his is a legacy of despair.

Hollywood continued in its celebration of perversion by featuring Hefner in several films where he mostly played himself - such as Beverly Hills Cop 2.

His filmography:

The Playboy Club (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Pilot (2011) ... Hugh Hefner (voice)

2011 Hop

Voice at Playboy Mansion (voice)

2009 Miss March

Hugh Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

2008 The House Bunny

Hugh Hefner

2008 Shark (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- One Hit Wonder (2008) ... Hugh Hefner

2007 Family Guy (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Airport '07 (2007) ... Hugh Hefner (voice)

2006 Robot Chicken (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Drippy Pony (2006) ... Hugh Hefner (voice)

2005 Weezer: Beverly Hills (Video short)

Hugh Hefner (uncredited)

2005 Curb Your Enthusiasm (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- The Smoking Jacket (2005) ... Hugh Hefner

2005 Entourage (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Aquamansion (2005) ... Hugh Hefner

2004 The Bernie Mac Show (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- The Talk (2004) ... Hugh Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

2004 Comic Book: The Movie (Video)

Hugh Hefner

2003 Las Vegas (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner - Justice of the Peace

- Year of the Tiger (2003) ... Hugh Hefner - Justice of the Peace

2003 Nelly feat. Justin Timberlake: Work It (Video short)

Hugh Hefner

2001 Just Shoot Me! (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- At Long Last Allie (2001) ... Hugh Hefner

2000 Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV

President of the United States (uncredited)

2000 Sex and the City (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Sex and Another City (2000) ... Hugh Hefner

1999 V.I.P. (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Why 2 Kay (1999) ... Hugh Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1996 Roseanne (TV Series)

Hugh M. Hefner

- What a Day for a Daydream (1996) ... Hugh M. Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1993 Blossom (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- True Romance (1993) ... Hugh Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1993 The Larry Sanders Show (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Broadcast Nudes (1993) ... Hugh Hefner

1993 The Simpsons (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- Krusty Gets Kancelled (1993) ... Hugh Hefner (voice)

1982 Laverne & Shirley (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- The Playboy Show (1982) ... Hugh Hefner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1982 The Comeback Trail

Hugh Herner (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1981 History of the World: Part I

Entrepreneur - The Roman Empire

1974 The Odd Couple (TV Series)

Hugh Hefner

- One for the Bunny (1974) ... Hugh Hefner

1969 Get Smart (TV Series)

Control Agent in Elevator

- The Treasure of C. Errol Madre (1969) ... Control Agent in Elevator (uncredited)

1969 Romeo und Julia '70 (TV Mini-Series)

Hugh Hefner (1969) (as Hugh M. Hefner)

1968 Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (TV Series)

Guest Performer

- Episode #2.1 (1968) ... Guest Performer (uncredited)

1965 Burke's Law (TV Series)

Manager

- Who Killed the Grand Piano? (1965) ... Manager