Gene Wilder has died

[jamesjazzguitar]

He was in Bonnie and Clyde????

 

Yes;  the gang hijack a car and Wilder is the driver along with his date.    It is the best comic moment in the film. 

[TCMModerator1]

Merged the 'RIP Gene Wilder' thread into this one.

[Janet0312]

So sad. I had just watched Young Frankenstein this past Saturday too.

[mr6666]

[Kid Dabb]

Quite a loss. 

 

R.I.P. Gene Wilder

[Patti Zee]

Gone from this physical place, but we will be able to hold on to his genius and introduce it to the generations to come. So be sure to watch his great films, laugh until you cry and celebrate his life. Young Frankenstein, here I come!

[MovieCollectorOH]

Alzheimers has affected some people close to me too.  Poor guy, RIP.

[JamesStewartFan95]

Here's my favorite scene from Stir Crazy with Gene and Richard Pryor. (NSFW)

 

 

[sewhite2000]

We are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.

[slaytonf]

The world is smaller today.  There are a few people whose existence I am grateful for.  Gene Wilder is one of them.

[Miss J]

Okay 2016, you can stop now. So sad Gene Wilder is gone but he’s no longer suffering. R.I.P.

 

The first movie I saw of Gene Wilder was Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I saw the movie with my Dad. He teased me a bit for crying at the end but I couldn’t help it. I was so happy for Charlie and he and his family were going to live a better life.

 

Gene Wilder’s “You lose” rant is still one of the funniest rants I’ve seen.

 

My Dad introduced me to Blazing Saddles and I was crying for a different reason. Lol. This year was the first time I saw Young Frankenstein. They really don’t make movies or have talents like that anymore.

[cinemafan]

My favorite, one of his first.

[slaytonf]

[Bogie56]

Gene was brilliant in Quackser Fortune Has a Cousin In the Bronx (1970) with Margot Kidder.  If TCM does a tribute it would be wonderful if they could get their hands on this film.  And Start the Revolution Without Me (also 1970) with Donald Sutherland.

I finally got around to watching the TCM, Alec Baldwin interview with Wilder a few weeks ago.  He appeared in relatively good health then and was very sharp.

[Arsan404]

Great comedic actor. Good night, Dr. Fronkensteen.

[darkblue]

It surprises me that he was 83.

 

Would've thought more like 73.

[Natalie Webb]

Thanks for the info. Gene was a guest programmer on June 17, 2014 and this is what TCM aired that evening:

 

GUEST PROGRAMMER GENE WILDER

8:00 p.m. Random Harvest (1942)

10:15 p.m. The Merry Widow (1934)

12:15 a.m. Witness for the Prosecution (1958)

2:30 a.m. Dark Victory (1939)

4:30 a.m. Role Model: Gene Wilder (2008)

 

I must've missed that, I would've loved to have seen it, I always liked Gene, he made me smile

[Natalie Webb]

Lerner and Loewe ended their brilliant career with a sweet musical version of the French classic The Little Prince by Saint Exupéry. The Little Prince is a book for everyone, children, adults and beginning French students.

 

The Little Prince becomes friends with a wild fox by taming (apprivoiser)

him. It's the sweetest story in the book.

 

Gene Wilder made this story come alive by acting as the tamed wild fox--

 

I can't think of any other actor who could have pulled that off so convincingly.

 

The Little Prince was a musical and Gene Wilder acted the part, while singing and dancing.

 

Many people remember him as a great comedian, but he was also an all-around old -fashioned type movie star who could do everything.

 

That kind of talent we don't see too much of anymore.

 

I must agree, as funny as he could be I believe Gene Wilder had a wonderful ability to do almost any type of character in any situation. You worded it perfectly, he could act in anything

[Natalie Webb]

Wilder was so entertaining, I was so sad to hear he had passed away because of such a terrible disease. Gene was funny, but a more complex funny than the average comedian. He had this perfect blend of being funny and lovable all at the same time. In several of his films, he used comedy and sadness together to form this very real character that you couldn't help but be intrigued by. Even in the midst of whimsical settings, his characters always had a realism to them and seemed believable; they were never two-dimensional. He seemed as if he really studied his characters and thought a lot about them before he played them. He was even able to make a crazy character like Willy Wonka likable and fun. His movies were a big part of my life, especially growing up. Gene Wilder will be fondly remembered.

[sewhite2000]

I'm all for a Gene Wilder Tribute Night, but I just noticed with considerable disappointment that Young Frankenstein and The Frisco Kid are already airing on September 27 as part of the Slapstick-themed month. This is TCM, not HBO. I'm not used to same movies airing twice in three days. If they can't get the rights to any other Wilder films at this time, I wish they would have at least spaced things out where those movies weren't being rebroadcast so soon.

[Sepiatone]

I think FOUR PAGES of forum tributes in so short a time speaks volumes about the love people have for this immensly talented man.

 

I must confess...

 

My first sight of Gene probably came when I went with a bunch of buddies to see BONNIE and CLYDE back when it came out.  But, I wasn't particularily attentive to his appearance, and didn't really commit his scenes to memory.  I suppose I really didn't pay him any mind or noticed him at all until he did one of my favorite sequences in Woody Allen's EVERYTHING YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT SEX  four years later or so.  Never saw WILLY WONKA until many years later, and THE PRODUCERS on a late show a couple of years earlier than that.  Nor BLAZING SADDLES until I caught it at a theater that showed older movies sometime in the late '70's-early '80's.

 

But he became one of my favorites once I kept up.  It's hard NOT to like that face or the personality he exhibited.  ANY comic actor could do MUCH worse than to be HALF as good as HE was.

 

Rest easy, dear Gene.

 

 

Sepiatone

[ElCid]

I'm all for a Gene Wilder Tribute Night, but I just noticed with considerable disappointment that Young Frankenstein and The Frisco Kid are already airing on September 27 as part of the Slapstick-themed month. This is TCM, not HBO. I'm not used to same movies airing twice in three days. If they can't get the rights to any other Wilder films at this time, I wish they would have at least spaced things out where those movies weren't being rebroadcast so soon.

This is why I think TCM should take more time to do the tributes.  And scheduel them for before they publish Now Playing Guide so they can be included in the Guide.

I'm a train buff, so I'm biased, but I think Silver Streak was one of his best.  It was a comedy, but somehow managed to be a fairly serious mystery/drama as well.

[im4cinema2]

Could TCM show the interview with Robert Osborne and Gene Wilder at the 92Y in NYC at all?

[EricJ]

Gene Wilder’s “You lose” rant is still one of the funniest rants I’ve seen.

 

 

Er, hahh?  It's not meant to be "funny":

Either--depending on what you believe--Wonka is genuinely disappointed that Charlie broke the rules and was his "last hope" (before Charlie does a good deed in a world gone mad), or it was deliberately the last part of the test, to see whether Charlie would get angry and break his word like Grandpa was "grownup" enough to, which, of course, our hero doesn't.

Among his other objections to the movie, Roald Dahl hated the idea that Wonka would actually be so angry at Charlie, but Wilder's hysteria works for drama as well as comedy.

 

And although Gene Wilder reunited with Zero Mostel for other projects, like "Rhinoceros", only a select generation of PBS watchers remembers Wilder and Mostel (and Joan Rivers, and John Hubley) for:

 

[slaytonf]

Another personal favorite of mine was Start the Revolution Without Me:

 

 

 

 

 

True, but Donald Sutherland has the best line in it.

 

His character in this movie provides the opportunity for noting an element of Mr. Wilder's persona so far unrecognized.  That of the Borderline personality disorder.  It invests his humor with an air of menace and danger that gives it a dimension different from other actors.  Even other actors who have that persona in their dramatic roles abandon it when they do comedy.  Something like adding a little salt to candy to act as counterpoint to the sweetness.