Celebrity Jukebox #133: Gene Hackman

The Reaper's been busy again.

If I'd had time, I'd have paid individual tribute to each of the following over the past couple of weeks...

Rick Buckler

The Jam - A Town Called Malice

Roberta Flack

Roberta Flack - Killing Me Softly With His Song

Michelle Trachtenberg

Buffy - Once More, With Feeling - Dawn's Ballet / What You Feel

Henry Kelly

Shed Seven - Going For Gold

The biggest name we've lost recently though is Gene Hackman, along with his wife and his dog. As I write, the true story of their tragic end has yet to be revealed, but I don't want to dwell on that. I just want to remember Lex Luthor, Popeye Doyle, Sheriff "Little" Bill Daggett, Captain Frank Ramsey and, best of all, the heroic sacrifice of the Reverend Frank Scott in The Poseidon Adventure.

On the television, a ship was sinking

It seemed so real, but it was just a movie

Made by Irwin Allen, boy, what a relief

And on the ship was Ernest Borgnine

Brave in the face of certain death

He played a cop on a pleasure cruise

Along with his wife, an ex-prostitute

Of course, Shelley Winters

She was on the ship

She was good, too, but she died

As did Gene Hackman, a preacher

Who gave his life so that others could live

He died shouting "How many more lives?"

Killdozer - Man Vs. Nature

I didn't need to dig far to find a song or two in tribute...

Celebrity Jukebox #24: Shelley Winters

Shelley Winters won two Oscars and was nominated twice more. She appeared in Pete's Dragon, Lolita, The Diary of Anne Frank, and Night of the Hunter, opposite inaugural Celebrity Jukeboxer, Robert Mitchum. But for me, she'll always be most famous as Belle in The Poseidon Adventure, saving Gene Hackman's life then dying of a heart attack. Tragedy. Shelley did her own stunts in that movie, though she never lost the weight she put on for the role. Double tragedy.

The Poseidon Adventure gets name-checked in both My Name Is Prince by TAFKAP, as he would soon decide to call himself... and Release Yo' Delf by Method Man. But it gets a full retelling from Killdozer...

On the television, a ship was sinking

It seemed so real, but it was just a movie

Made by Irwin Allen, boy, what a relief

And on the ship was Ernest Borgnine

Brave in the face of certain death

He played a cop on a pleasure cruise

Along with his wife, an ex-prostitute

Of course, Shelley Winters

She was on the ship

She was good, too, but she died

As did Gene Hackman, a preacher

Who gave his life so that others could live

He died shouting "How many more lives?"

Killdozer - Man Vs. Nature

(My bad. I missed that one from my Ernest Borgnine entry.)

Turns out Shelley also went to a watery grave in Night of the Hunter, as explained here by John Cale, Bob Neuwirth and guest vocalist Jenni Muldaur...

I wanna be buried in the bottom of the ocean, 

Like Shelley Winters in "The Night of the Hunter". 

My hair a'billowing, being kissed by the fishes, sushi

For Shabu. If fishes were wishes I'd have you. I'd have you...

John Cale - Ocean Club

And we've already covered this tune in the Mitchum entry...

Shelley Winters has a vision of

Righteousness from up above

She trades her children for the love

Of a preacher with a soul decay

Flop - Night of the Hunter

But today's winner... and OK, some might dispute this... comes from Merle Haggard. Seriously, I'm not buying this as an accident or a coincidence. Merle knew exactly what he was doing when he wrote this tune. Clearly he was a fan...