Althouse: "Can I touch your beard?"

September 30, 2024

"Can I touch your beard?"

36 comments:

Political Junkie said...: I think Alice is the only movie of his I saw. Did not realize he was a graduate of Army Ranger school. Bravo!; 9/30/24, 5:16 AM
Big Mike said...: Does anyone know whether he and his family ever reconciled? I know that his parents pushed him into a military career, and his family famously disowned him when he left the army to work as a songwriter — and janitor — in Nashville.

He left an estate supposedly worth $50 million, which is pretty good for a former janitor.; 9/30/24, 5:20 AM
Big Mike said...: And a helicopter pilot.; 9/30/24, 5:22 AM
Marcus Bressler said...: I enjoyed his vast array of work. Smart man. Rest in Peace; 9/30/24, 5:35 AM
Kit Carson said...: Pat Garret and Billy the Kid, with incredible music by Bob Dylan, was awesome, as was Convoy, Heaven's Gate, and that underrated gem Rollover, where the global financial system collapses and Jane Fonda compares being bedded by Kristofferson to the Sack Of Carthage.; 9/30/24, 5:39 AM
rehajm said...: I was young when semi-tough and that string of cornball movies came out. He. was making the talk show rounds. My mom crushed on him. Later did I discover the body of songwriting- wow.

The interesting ones are leaving and we’re stuck with the ones we cannot make leave…; 9/30/24, 5:54 AM
rehajm said...: Great for a janitor, yes but given the body of work seems a bit light when writers are entitled to mechanical, performance and sync royalties paid out for every time a song is used; 9/30/24, 6:03 AM
Jorg Jorgensen said...: Amazingly, Ellen Burstyn is still alive and well in NYC; 9/30/24, 6:03 AM
Eva Marie said...: Great songwriter RIP
This was also interesting:
“Singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson, known for writing the hit song “Me and Bobby McGee,” had been falsely diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Instead, the country star was actually suffering from a tick-borne illness known as lyme disease.
Speaking to the LymeTimes in the Fall of 2016, his wife Lisa Meyers explained, “About 12 years ago he was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, which looking back, should have been the first indication that a test for Lyme was warranted.
“But we suspect he's been infected with Lyme anywhere from fourteen to thirty years because he used to have these chronic muscle spasms, which is a common symptom. We were in LA at the time, in Malibu, and I just don't think doctors were looking for it or aware of it there then. But now we know it's everywhere. There are signs on my local playground that say beware of ticks.”; 9/30/24, 6:08 AM
wendybar said...: When I took a helicopter ride in Maui in 1990, our helicopter pilot was the spitting image of Kris. I sometimes wonder if it WERE him doing something he loved.; 9/30/24, 6:08 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "When I took a helicopter ride in Maui in 1990, our helicopter pilot was the spitting image of Kris. I sometimes wonder if it WERE him doing something he loved."

I encourage you to believe that it was.

I was once having dinner — back in the 1970s — with a guy who, I realized later, looked like Bruce Springsteen. The young woman who rushed up to hug him and tell him she loved all his music has gone through the rest of her life believing she encountered Bruce Springsteen. No one can take that away from her. For us, it was funny.

And here's where I always add that when people asked my father for his autograph, he signed "Frank Sinatra" for them.; 9/30/24, 6:20 AM
Temujin said...: Love that your father signed his autograph as Frank Sinatra. I'm guessing he had that look.

Kristofferson was one of those people who lived such a full life it's hard for me to get my head around it. There are these people out there who seem to do everything, and are good at all of it. Makes me feel downright lazy by comparison.
He was talented, smart, good looking, and curious. Sometimes you wonder how one person gets all of that while others get so little of it. Gene pools matter, I guess.; 9/30/24, 6:30 AM
wendybar said...: Heh!! Your Father had a keen sense of humor!!; 9/30/24, 6:41 AM
William said...: It's hard to picture him as being old, much less old and dead, but there it is......He was a genuine tier one movie star, but his songwriting was the stuff of legends and will endure. Very few people are given the choice of going on tour or starring in a movie, and, of that select few, none are qualified helicopter pilots. What a terrific life.; 9/30/24, 7:18 AM
Old and slow said...: "He was talented, smart, good looking, and curious."

Just imagine what it must be like to be Tom Jones...; 9/30/24, 7:18 AM
lonejustice said...: What an interesting life he lived:

"Kristofferson studied literature at California's Pomona College, where he became a Rhodes Scholar. He carried on his literature studies at Oxford's Merton College, where he continued boxing. Upon graduating from college, he joined the U.S. Army.

Joining the Army in 1960, Kristofferson earned his Ranger tab before becoming a helicopter pilot. Kristofferson was offered the prestigious position of teaching literature at West Point in 1965, but turned it down and left the Army. It was a move that caused his family, full of veterans, to disown him. His first wife divorced him four years later."

Not very many successful songwriters, musicians, and actors have such a varied background. He was one of a kind.; 9/30/24, 7:20 AM
rehajm said...: That’s great- haha; 9/30/24, 7:24 AM
Dave Begley said...: And a Rhodes Scholar.; 9/30/24, 7:37 AM
Dave Begley said...: Kris was living in Nashville and worked as a janitor at a record company. He rented a helicopter and landed it on Johnny Cash’s lawn. It was a Sunday, Johnny was home and Kris delivered some of his songs to him.; 9/30/24, 7:40 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Love that your father signed his autograph as Frank Sinatra. I'm guessing he had that look."

They looked most alike when they were both young, in the 1940s and 50s. As they aged, there was more difference. My father always had thick wavy hair.; 9/30/24, 7:42 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Both Toby and Kris have said that story is not true: https://savingcountrymusic.com/toby-keith-vs-keith-kristofferson-or-not/; 9/30/24, 7:57 AM
Maynard said...: I mostly remember Kris' music career as a member of The Highwaymen. I was never a country music fan until I found those guys. Waylon was my favorite, but Kris was clearly an excellent song writer.; 9/30/24, 8:59 AM
Amadeus 48 said...: I had forgotten how beautiful Ellen Burstyn was in that movie. Cheekbones and a square face do it every time.; 9/30/24, 9:21 AM
Aggie said...: I'd forgotten that movie was directed by Martin Scorsese. This scene was a good one too, it sticks in my mind. Diane Ladd's character was brilliant.; 9/30/24, 9:28 AM
Iman said...: The world was his oyster in the early to mid-70s.; 9/30/24, 9:30 AM
john mosby said...: In a parallel universe, Colonel Kristofferson won the Vietnam War by leading a massive helicopter assault on COSVN, the semi-mythical Viet Cong headquarters. After his acquittal in a kangaroo war-crimes court-martial ordered by President McGovern, now-General Kristofferson won the very short WW3 with unauthorized preemptive strikes on Soviet assembly areas, while simultaneously broadcasting to each Warsaw Pact state the works of their national poets, sparking a gigantic mutiny in the Eastern bloc armies.

President Kristofferson was nominated by both parties in the 1992 campaign and took office by unanimous acclamation. His first act was to facilitate the BinLaden Group’s Eastern Europe reconstruction contract, which assisted Saudi Arabia’s transition out of a petroleum rentier economy.

After retiring from public life in 2001, Kristofferson joined Dead & Co and toured with them for many years, finally passing away on stage at KabulFest.

JSM; 9/30/24, 10:57 AM
john mosby said...: Footnote to alternative history: during WW3, a young KGB colonel refused to release the codes for Soviet tactical nukes, thus frustrating the Kremlin’s attempt to bring about Armageddon. Putin would later be awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Nobel Peace Prize (the same year Kristofferson received it for literature). A young Kenyan waiter in the room cited Kristofferson as his inspiration for….being the best waiter he could be. An old Minnesota Jewish dude switched off his TV in frustration.; 9/30/24, 11:05 AM
Big Mike said...: I’m inclined to believe that it didn’t happen because (1) it has Kristofferson talking about receiving a check for killing an enemy, which simply doesn’t happen — soldiers get the same pay whether they’re in near-daily fire fights or doing scut work for some colonel in the Pentagon — and (2) Kristofferson never saw a day of combat. In fact, Kristofferson specifically requested an assignment to Vietnam, but got orders to teach literature at West Point instead.; 9/30/24, 11:17 AM
john mosby said...: Big Mike, that’s when the timestreams forked! In the parallel universe, he got his orders and stayed in, for the first of 4 tours in VN.

JSM; 9/30/24, 11:34 AM
Lynn said...: Fun fact: Kristofferson wrote Me and Bobby McGee while living in a duplex off West End Avenue in Nashville in the 1960s. On the other side of the duplex lived Mac Gayden, who was writing Everlasting Love at the same time. (Credit to Brian Mansfield on Instagram for this info.); 9/30/24, 11:35 AM
john mosby said...: Colonel Kristofferson was widely assumed to be the model for Colonel Kilgore in Jerry Lewis’s feel-good movie “Nervous in the Nam,” released in the flurry of films and TV specials celebrating our victory. The iconic scene of the sky blackened with helicopters playing the Circus March as they destroy VC bunkers has been widely lampooned, but was specifically mentioned in Lewis’s Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur citation.

JSM; 9/30/24, 11:40 AM
Zavier Onasses said...: What a guy!. What can ya say? So long, and thanks for all the songs.; 9/30/24, 12:21 PM
Big Mike said...: Correction: Combat pay is a bonus paid to military service personnel who are serving in regions that are designated hazardous zones while soldiers stationed stateside do not receive that. However combat pay is paid out whether the soldier actually kills someone or is in a designated combat zone but is never fired upon.; 9/30/24, 2:04 PM
rehajm said...: Mel!! Boy he milked that character...

...every seat is taken, not a single person waiting...how perfect, martin...; 9/30/24, 3:00 PM
Sweetie said...: Don't know if this is truth or legend but KK wrote 'Why Me (Lord)' after going thru a rough period in Nashville. He was feeling lost and talked to his agent who said that Johnny Cash and many others were going to this church and it had helped them (Cash had been on heroin). So he went to the church, was moved by the preacher and had gone to the front of the church when the preacher invited parishioners to do so. That night he starting writing Why Me.

The best part, maybe the legend part, is that he gave the songwriting royalties for Why Me to his agent in thanks for his advice. Wikipedia just says he went with Connie Smith, a country singer who later married Marty Stuart, who later became Johnny Cash's long time guitarist. In case the royalty story is not true I'll add a cute Connie and Marty story. Connie is a bit older than Marty. The first time Marty saw Connie she was already a star and Marty was a child virtuoso on the mandolin but hadn't yet played the Grand Ole Opry. So Marty's parents took him to the GOO when he's about 10 or 11 to see the variety style show and Connie comes out to sing and when it's over Marty tells his parents 'I'm going to marry that girl someday' and a dozen or so years later it happened. And they're still married.; 9/30/24, 5:38 PM
Ampersand said...: Rehajm. Mechanicals are paid when physical recordings are produced. Not as common as it once was. Not too many people buying records and CDs. Sync licenses are for uses where the sound is synchronized to action, as in films and advertising. Nice money, but hit and miss. Performance royalties are now mostly streaming, and with the microscopic streaming royalty rates, it's pretty puny stuff.
The big money is in live performances these days.; 9/30/24, 6:15 PM