Do actors do this?

Gene Wilder

Actors say what seem like terribly unkind things to each other. Cloris Leachman told Corey Haim that his half smile was cute but he did it too much and said he should practice keeping his mouth closed---he always thought it was cute to always go around with his mouth open. Mia Farrow's mother told her she would be equally convincing as a Good Girl or a slut. And a local actress interviewed on Community Access TV said she was terribly hurt when she told her acting professor she was going to Hollywood and he suggested she look at Hollywood actresses because she looked nothing like them. There was a high school acting teacher who told a girl she walked funny so she worked for years to change the way she walked.

Charles Grodin wrote in one of his books that he was given the task of telling a young Gene Wilder that he was never going to make it as an actor and it was time to give it up.

Paul Peterson, when the Donna Reed Show went off the air, said he tried to continue working as an actor but Mickey Rooney finally come over to tell him it was a lost cause.

I was just driving home from the grocery store with NPR on listening to a woman tell how her closed-minded parents thought she should get a good job and live a normal life instead of pursuing her dream, whatever that was. But even if you're successful in some creative endeavor, it probably won't last long. Acting careers, for example, peter out. A lot of actors did very well for a time and wound up as realtors. Victor Mature had a TV repair shop. Tommy Kirk went into carpet cleaning.

You have some poor devils like Dustin Diamond who won't let go. He's 42, his life is going nowhere, but he doesn't have much alternative, especially now that he's an ex-convict.

Bob Denver, TV's Gilligan, starred on stage in Play It Again, Sam, taking over Woody Allen's role. Horshack is big on Broadway. There's nothing like that for Diamond. Maybe he could have done local TV commercials if hadn't been for the sex tape.

Poor devil looks terrible. He's grown a beard which is probably all he can do about it. He should try to maintain a neutral expression at all times, maybe try different wigs or hats. He needs to lose weight. Or maybe gain lots and lots of weight. I'm really not the one to give advice.