And Then Gumby Died

De mortui nil nisi bonum.


I think it was first reported in the L.A. Times:

Dallas McKennon, an exuberant character actor and voice actor who helped enliven Gumby, Archie Andrews, Buzz Buzzard and many other animated characters, has died. He was 89.

It should mean something, but No! It won’t. No national day of mourning. No flags at half-staff, message from the Pope or weeping in the trailer-park. No solemn-voiced Katie Couric; no earnest Matt Lauer setting up a special fourth hour of the Today show; and no personal remembrance of “that very first interview I had with a much younger Gumby so many years ago” from Barbara Walters.

Mylar balloons? Candles and flowers placed at the feet of Sculpy replicas on make-shift shrines? No, none of it.

Not a peep from Eddie Murphy or the California Raisins.

Truth is I never much cared for his brand of claymation – it was crude, primitive, even inane. He had that annoying way of “skating” instead of running – he’d just strike a pose and kinda slide along the set. And his walk was too contrived – just as unconvincing as his facial expressions.

To sum it up, I guess I never really got the point of Gumby.

Still he was Gumby. Sad.

Don’t it always seem to go . . . .