#RIP Abe Vigoda

by Mouser The King Cat

It has now been confirmed. We think. Veteran character actor Abe Vigoda, the man who gained little fame until it looked like he had one foot in the grave, has finally passed away at the age of 94.  There is little to new say in the latest and final obituary, because reports of his demise have been floating around 30 years or so, well before Web browsers were invented.

From The Associated Press:

Vigoda worked in relative obscurity as a supporting actor in the New York theater and in television until Francis Ford Coppola cast him in the 1972 Oscar-winning "The Godfather."

Vigoda played Sal Tessio, an old friend of Vito Corleone's (Marlon Brando) who hopes to take over the family after Vito's death by killing his son Michael Corleone (Al Pacino). But Michael anticipates that Sal's suggestion for a "peace summit" among crime families is a setup and the escorts Sal thought were taking him to the meeting turn out to be his executioners.

"Tell Mike it was only business," Sal mutters to consigliere Tom Hagen, played by Robert Duvall, as he's led away.

Of course, Abe gained greater fame by playing DetectivePhil Fish in the TV series “Barney Miller,” which ran from 1975 to 1982, aperiod in which ABC rose from third place to become the No. 1 network.

Again, from The AP:

He liked to tell the story of how he won the role of Detective Fish. An exercise enthusiast, Vigoda had just returned from a five-mile jog when his agent called and told him to report immediately to the office of Danny Arnold, who was producing a pilot for a police station comedy.

Arnold remarked that Vigoda looked tired, and the actor explained about his jog. "You know, you look like you might have hemorrhoids," Arnold said. "What are you, a doctor or a producer?" Vigoda asked. He was cast on the spot.

A good decision, so good the network followed it with a bad one, plucking Abe out of the show into a spinoff, which was canceled after a year and a half. He returned to “Barney Miller” occasionally and took movie roles occasionally.

His extraordinary life can be summed up in a quote from asalesman who spoted him at Bloomingdale’s in 1997: "Youlook like Abe Vigoda. But you can't be Abe Vigoda because he's dead."