Rest in Peace, Fred Gwynne There once was a man known as Gwynne Who caused us to chuckle and grin Both on film and TV In the land of the free And the era of Anthony Quinn He was born in The Empire State Where the Rangers and Islanders skate Off to Harvard he went Where his elbow got bent When he went to the pub with a mate While on staff at the Harvard Lampoon Fred drew many a clever cartoon Plus he acted in plays To much kudos and praise To that school he was clearly a boon After that he had many auditions For various Broadway renditions And he landed some parts With his talent and smarts On the stage he had no inhibitions Then the age of TV came around There were plenty of sitcoms abound Where the laughter was canned Fred was much in demand In a medium breaking new ground He co-starred in ‘Car 54’ Which by standards today was a bore All the plot lines were daft But enough of us laughed And the sponsors sold product galore When Car 54 was behind him Fred Gwynne got the role that defined him Herman Munster he played He was handsomely paid For reciting the lines they assigned him Only one year before he expired For a wonderful film he was hired With Marisa Tomei And Joe Pesci he’d play In a movie that never gets tired In My Cousin Vinny he killed In a role he so nicely fulfilled As a Dixieland judge Who bore Vinny a grudge ‘Til his ultimate witness was grilled Now it’s ten years ago to the day That this funny old guy passed away In his time on this Earth He regaled us with mirth And deserved every dime of his pay
Posted on: Wed, 03 Jul 2013 00:27:11 +0000