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John Belushi

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John Belushi
File:Belushi05.JPG
Born
John Adam Belushi

John Adam Belushi (January 24, 1949 – March 5, 1982) was an Emmy Award-winning American comedian, actor and musician, notable for his work on Saturday Night Live, National Lampoon's Animal House and The Blues Brothers.

Biography

Early life

Belushi was born in Chicago, Illinois to Agnes B. Samaras, a first-generation Albanian American,[1] and Adam Belushi, an Albanian immigrant and restaurant operator[2] who left his native village, Qytezë, in 1934 at the age of fifteen.[3] Belushi was raised in the Albanian Orthodox religion[4] and grew up outside Chicago in Wheaton, Illinois, where he was a middle linebacker for the Wheaton Central High School football team, and attended the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and the College of DuPage near Chicago. Belushi's younger brother James Belushi is also an actor and comedian. John met his future wife, Judy, while a sophomore in high school, and they stayed together until his death.

Career

Early years

Belushi's first big break as a comedian occurred in 1971, when he joined The Second City comedy troupe in Chicago, Illinois. Thanks to his uncanny caricature of singer Joe Cocker's intense and jerky stage presence, he participated in National Lampoon's Lemmings stage show in 1972 (which also featured future Saturday Night Live performers Chevy Chase, Gilda Radner, Bill Murray and Christopher Guest). From 1973 to 1975, the National Lampoon aired The Radio Hour, a half-hour comedy program syndicated across the country on approximately 600 stations. When original director Michael O'Donoghue quit in 1974, Belushi took over the reins until the show was canceled. Other players on the show included future SNL regulars Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, Brian Doyle-Murray and Chevy Chase. Belushi married Judy Jacklin, an associate producer of The Radio Hour. A number of comic segments first performed on The Radio Hour would be translated into SNL sketches in the show's early seasons.

1975-1979

Belushi achieved national fame for his work on Saturday Night Live, which he joined as an original cast member in 1975. Between seasons of the show, he made one of his best-known movies, Animal House. As several Belushi biographies have noted, on John's 30th birthday (in 1979), he had the number one film in the U.S., (Animal House), the number one album in the U.S. (The Blues Brothers: Briefcase Full of Blues) and Saturday Night Live was the highest-rated late night television program. In the toga party scene in the basement of the frat in Animal House, the uncredited coed dancing with Bluto (Belushi) is his wife. While filming Animal House, Belushi made an appearance at Ithaca College in 1976. When introduced, he came onstage with a chainsaw and cut up the podium. When asked who his favorite host on Saturday Night Live was up to that point, he named comic Robert Klein.

During his run on SNL, Belushi starred in a short film by SNL writer Tom Schiller called "Don't Look Back In Anger", where he plays himself as an old man visiting the graves of his former castmembers (including Chevy Chase, who had been off the show at the time the film was shown) and reveals that the reason he's still alive is because he's a dancer. He then proceeds to dance on the other cast members' graves. Ironically, Belushi was the first SNL cast member to die. He left Saturday Night Live in 1979 to pursue a film career. Belushi would make four more movies in his career, and three of them, 1941, Neighbors, and most notably The Blues Brothers were made with fellow SNL alumnus Dan Aykroyd.

Other movie projects

At the time of his death, Belushi was pursuing several movie projects, including Noble Rot, an adaptation of a script by former The Mary Tyler Moore Show writer/producer Jay Sandrich entitled Sweet Deception. (The term refers to the benevolent form of a fungus that, as "grey rot", can destroy crops of grapes.) Belushi was working with former Saturday Night Live colleague Don Novello, (known for his character Father Guido Sarducci), on rewriting the script. In addition, Belushi was also considering the lead roles in The Joy Of Sex, a comic adaptation of the Dr. Alex Comfort sex manual, as well as a part in a Louis Malle movie, Moon Over Miami. These projects were abandoned in the wake of his death. Moreover, the roles of Dr. Peter Venkman in Ghostbusters and Emmett Fitz-Hume in Spies Like Us were written (by Aykroyd) with Belushi in mind. The roles wound up being played by Belushi's former SNL castmates Bill Murray and Chevy Chase, respectively. Aykroyd used to joke that the green ghost Slimer in Ghostbusters was "the ghost of John Belushi", given that he had a similar party animal personality. In an interview with the drummer from Fear Spit Stix, Stix explained Belushi hadn't been on SNL for years, but "for the show that we were on, he did make an appearance. In the beginning, he's at the urinal and he turns around to the camera, 'Live! From New York!' That was a favor he did for us because during rehearsal some of our crowd — bused-in slamdancers — tripped over a cable or something, and the union people didn't want any dancers. So as a trade-off, he went up to Grant Tinker's office for us and said, 'I'll make an appearance on the show if the dancers stay.' John was such a generous guy".[5]

The Blues Brothers

Since the early-mid 1990s, The Blues Brothers band has re-united, and played on. They are sometimes joined by Dan Aykroyd on vocals, other times by various sound alike singers. John's brother Jim Belushi toured with the band for a short time, and even recorded the album Blues Brothers & Friends: LIVE! From Chicago's H.O.B with Dan Aykroyd but he did not appear in Blues Brothers 2000 (1998). It's rumoured he was approached to play not the role of Mighty Mack (played by John Goodman) but the role of the local Sheriff Chamberlain (the part played by Joe Morton). Jim would later reunite with Aykroyd to record yet another album, not as the Blues Brothers but as themselves: 'BELUSHI / AYKROYD -"Have Love Will Travel (Big Men-Big Music)"'.

Trademarks

Belushi often played comically intense, volatile, obnoxious and sloppy characters, and was known for his expressive eyes and the solitary raised eyebrow. In many movies, he would raise one eyebrow for comic effect. On Saturday Night Live, he often did a running act during Weekend Update in which he would give an editorial commentary that starts calmly, but increases in emotional intensity until he is finally screaming and flailing around like a maniac. He gave a speech about the way things could have been, should have been, and then turns it on its ear by saying, "Buuuut nnnnnOOOOOO!" continuing on how horrid things had turned out instead.

Personal life

The "College" sweatshirt Belushi wore in National Lampoon's Animal House was purchased in Carbondale, when his brother, Jim, was a student at Southern Illinois University.[6]

According to writer/actor Tim Kazurinsky in the book Live From New York, mentor and close friend Belushi was instrumental in getting fellow Second City alumni Kazurinsky onto Saturday Night Live in 1981. But during his run on the show, Kazurinsky became very stressed out by the demands of the show (Dick Ebersol was now the executive producer of the show and the show was very unlike the hedonistic manner in which Lorne Michaels produced the show when Belushi was a cast member). He later called Belushi and said that he needed a ride to the airport because he was quitting the show and moving back to Chicago. Belushi and his wife picked him up but refused to bring him to the airport, at which Belushi told Kazurinsky that the show's atmosphere can get bad, but that he still had access to major broadcasting airwaves. Instead, Belushi took the performer to a psychiatrist whom he saw for a year, while staying with the show during his run.

Belushi was good friends with fellow SNL player Dan Aykroyd, whom Belushi recruited for SNL. They met in a Toronto speakeasy called The 505 that Aykroyd frequented, and immediately hit it off. During a discussion they had about Aykroyd possibly joining SNL, Aykroyd put on a blues record, sparking a fascination Belushi would develop with the blues. Dan educated John on the finer points of blues music, which led to the creation of their popular Blues Brothers characters. Belushi and his friend Dan Aykroyd were slated to present the first ever Visual Effects Award at the Academy Awards in 1982, but John died a few weeks prior to the event. Though devastated by John's death, Aykroyd presented the award alone, commenting on the stage "My partner would have loved to have been here to present this award, given that he was something of a visual effect himself."

Death

Belushi was known for his drug usage, and it eventually cost him his life. On March 5, 1982 Belushi, age 33, was found at his room at Bungalow #3 of the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, California. The cause of death was a Speedball, an injection of cocaine and heroin. On the night of his death, he was accompanied by friends Robin Williams and Robert De Niro (at the height of their own drug exploits),[7] who later left the premises, leaving Belushi in the company of Cathy Smith. His death was investigated by forensic pathologist Dr. Ryan Norris among others, and while the findings were disputed, it was officially ruled a drug-related accident.

The case was reopened two months later, when Smith, a former groupie for The Band and an ex-girlfriend of Gordon Lightfoot,[8] admitted in an interview with the National Enquirer that she had been with Belushi the night of his death and had given him the fatal speedball shot. After the appearance of the article "I Killed Belushi" in the Enquirer edition of June 29, 1982, the case was reopened. Smith was extradited from Toronto, arrested and charged with first-degree murder. A plea bargain arrangement reduced the charges to involuntary manslaughter, and she served 18 months in prison.

Tribute

Belushi's life is detailed in the 1985 biography Wired: The Short Life and Fast Times of John Belushi by Bob Woodward. Many friends and relatives of Belushi, including his wife Judy, Dan Aykroyd and Jim Belushi, agreed to be interviewed at length for the book, but later felt the final product was exploitative and not representative of the John Belushi they knew. The book was later adapted into a feature film in which Belushi was played by Michael Chiklis. Belushi's friends and family boycotted the film, which proved to be critical and caused the movie to be a box-office flop.

Belushi is interred in Abel's Hill Cemetery on Martha's Vineyard Chilmark, Massachusetts. His tombstone reads "I may be gone, but Rock and Roll lives on." His gravestone is not above his body. It was moved after operators of the cemetery had found many signs of vandalism and rowdiness where his body lies. The Grateful Dead song "West L.A. Fadeaway" is about Belushi's death. Belushi was a good friend to the band, especially Jerry Garcia. He even performed with them on occasion in the late 1970s. Belushi was portrayed by actors Eric Siegel in Gilda Radner: It's Always Something, Tyler Labine in Behind the Camera: The Unauthorized Story of Mork & Mindy (which also features his friendship with Robin Williams), and Michael Chiklis in Wired.

His widow later remarried and is now Judith Belushi Pisano. Her biography (with co-biographer Tanner Colby) of John, Belushi: A Biography is a collection of first-person interviews and photographs, and was published in 2005. On April Fools' Day 2004, 22 years after his death, Belushi was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, after a ten years lobby by James Belushi and Judith Belushi Pisano. Among those present at the ceremony were Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen and Tom Arnold. In 2006 Discovery Channel aired the "John Belushi" episode of Final 24, a documentary following Belushi in the last 24 hours leading to his death.

Filmography

Recurring characters on SNL

  • Samurai Futaba
  • Captain Ned, one of Miles Cowperthwaite's cronies
  • 'Joliet' Jake Blues, from the Blues Brothers
  • Jeff Widette, from the Widettes
  • Kevin (from The Mall sketches)
  • Kuldorth (from The Coneheads)
  • Larry Farber (one half of the Farber couple [the wife, Bobbi, was played by Gilda Radner])
  • Lowell Brock, from the H&L Brock commercials
  • Matt Cooper, from the Land Shark sketches
  • Pete, from the Olympia Cafe
  • Steve Beshekas (who was in real life a good friend of Belushi's since childhood)

Celebrity impersonations on SNL

References

  1. ^ http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Live/bios/John_Belushi.shtml
  2. ^ http://www.filmreference.com/film/41/John-Belushi.html
  3. ^ http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E00E2DD153BF931A35755C0A962948260
  4. ^ http://www.adherents.com/people/pb/John_Belushi.html
  5. ^ http://markprindle.com/stix-i.htm
  6. ^ http://www.thesouthern.com/articles/2006/05/08/top/16234773.txt
  7. ^ http://www.franksreelreviews.com/shorttakes/morbid.htm#belushi
  8. ^ http://www.corfid.com/gl/press/press04.htm
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