GD Spradlin RIP

http://xfinity.comcast.net/articles/entertainment-movies/20110726/US.Obit.Spradlin/

I never saw the Godfather, but I enjoyed his work in North Dallas Forty, One on One, Tank, the Lords of Discpline and Canadian Bacon.
He did a great job playing asshole authority figures, the coaches in North Dallas Forty and One on One, General Bentley Durrell in the Lords of Discpline, etc. Makes me wonder if he was like that in real life or not.
I remember in one episode of Dragnet, he played an ex-con trying to get back into prison because he wanted to get back on the prison baseball team.

 

The scene with him and John Cazale in the brothel in The Godfather Part II is one of my favorite scenes in the series.

Also was good in his brief appearance in Apocalypse Now.

 

Oh, and coach, about the scholarship? All the way with a red-hot poker.



He was me before I was me.

Sincerely, Chelcie Ross



Can I be you after you're done being you?

Sincerely, Bill Paxton

 

Very good actor. RIP.

Oh, BTW smallpotatoes, you owe it to yourself to watch "The Godfather" sometime. I thought it was Duvall with him in the brothel scene, but could be mistaken.

 

Watch The Godfather and Part II. Part III, Fredo's Revenge, is optional.

 

He's not in The Godfather, is he? Just Godfather II, where he mangles The Don's name at the Lake Tahoe fundraiser:

"Vye-toe Corlee-onn."

 

Very intentionally, since minutes later in his private powwow with Michael, he rolls out the name "Corleone" with perfect Sicilian inflection.

He was trying to maintain the public fiction that he really didn't know the Corleone Family all that well. Plausible deniability.

Spradlin was a lawyer, rancher and oilman before getting into acting in his middle 40s.

 

I remember hearing it like this: Corrr-leee-ohhh-nayyy. Jeez, seems like a lot of character actors have died in the past couple years, no?

 

Wait, you're right. There was the one scene on Lake Tahoe. He refers to 'Vye-toe.' I'm thinking of the other scene where Michael speaks with the senator in the office. Was that the scene where he mangles it as 'Cor-lee-ohhh-nay.'?

 

By the way "I never saw The Godfather, but I enjoyed his work in ... Canadian Bacon" may be one of the most unintentionally funny things ever written on this site.

As a matter of fact, that's going in my sig ...

 

Don't forget Tank.