The boss' son (Long), who is in love with Babs, suggests that they get married in order to save Riley's job. Well, it's showing up and just being there is worth an awful lot. "The Life of Riley Quotes." So yeah, I do find that people who have dealt with their dying -- whether it was taking them to their chemotherapy or sitting those weeks through hospice care, or checking in those weeks through hospice care, because we can't always be physically present -- those people who were thoroughly engaged with this are thoroughly engaged with the rest of it. She must have money. Chester A. Riley: Nah what would a rich man want with money? You had your tonsils out. Chester A. Riley: You know, it's funny. I think of disbelief as a faith of its own kind. Do they get through it better? And I suppose this is the message at every graveside: They stay, we go, until we come to that point in which we are brought there, and we stay and they go. Chester A. Riley: Well, if you do, just holler. Stevenson's ne'er-do-well son Burt, meanwhile, is cornered at the picnic by a thug named Norman, who demands that he repay a $25,000 gambling debt. The stores are open. Dear j.b.: Well, for starters I can tell you that this interesting fellow (and Im certainly not disputing that) was not a Memphian, and his name wasnt really Digger ODell. And we suspect there'll be more Riley movies. Sign Up now to stay up to date with all of the latest news from TCM. Another time, firefighters rescued him after he apparently suffered a heart attack underground. Simon Vanderhopper: Well, you can't call it off! And I'm, along with the next guy, as interested in those cartoons as everyone else is. So Ive got only one inch to run around in.. Portrayed Chester A. Riley's neighbor Gillis on "The Life of Riley" for ABC Radio (1944-1945) and NBC Radio (1945-1951). Who were the other musicians in that performance? Actor Ted de Corsia's name appears as both "de Corsia" and "deCorsia" in the onscreen credits. Do you speak French? And I find that latter conversation much more compelling and much more difficult, because it's not as easy as dollars and cents. Maybe bigger. Peg Riley: Oh? It is a sadness and a shame that cremation, the fire in this context, is seen as an industrial process instead of an elemental one, in the way that earth is elemental. Both [are part of] this effort to say something about something unspeakable -- great love, great loss, great hope, great fear, great doubt, the fist we shake in God's face, asking him, "What did you have in mind here?". I just gave him a sedative. At weddings people are forever weeping at what is supposed to be a joyous event. Executives, who immediately began production on a television series, did not share Crowther's opinion, but because Bendix's movie contract barred him from doing television (a not uncommon ban in the early days of the medium when studios wanted to discourage audiences from staying home and watching TV), Jackie Gleason played Riley for one unsuccessful season in 1950. He had a very good sense of that. And are you a cremation or a burial man? For that matter, a popular plant nursery just outside of town on Highway 64 is called Digger ODells, but thats yet another Digger (real name: Dennis). What is your sense of what's driven and shaped that conversation, and what, if anything, has been missing from that public view of it all? Do you hear that, Peg? And so I think of widowed people who must go through that when they're folding a sweater or cleaning out a drawer or looking for the power drill that their husband used to use to fix this drawer or that one -- these little mundane reminders that life is changed utterly and yet utterly the same. The dirt on Herbert ODell Smith. [1] (Marx would get his own series Blue Ribbon Town instead.) Is he in some of of trouble or something? CONTINUES IN BG SINGERS: Riley, Riley, what a pal! Unknown. This is the way I like to remember William Bendix - playing a family man doing the best he can in a world that tends to be a bit too much for him, with children that tend to be a bit too much for him too. Acti-Sol Hen Manure is one popular product that has been used with success by experienced, This website uses cookies for functionality, analytics and advertising purposes as described in our. And when we talk about "the procession," what is the meaning of that? He would have figured that out, but I think for him the funeral, the procession, was part of the process. Its 32 inches across, 32 inches high, and six feet long. Chester A. Riley: I don't think you heard me, peg. Chester A. Riley: You know, Peg, I don't know what kind of wife she's gonna mae, but 40 years from now, somebody's gonna have a terrific mother-in-law. I've come to admire the earth, the wind and the fire. Chester A. Riley is back, with long-suffering wife Peg, trouble-prone kids Junior and Babs, moochy pal Gillis, and Digger O'Dell, The Friendly Undertaker in sixteen hilarious half-hour episodes. But, you know, we used to say to my father, who directed a fair few funerals, "What do you want done with you when you're dead?," and he'd say, "Well, you'll know what to do." This character was extremelly successfull, with many puns based on his profession. Im five-foot-eleven. When the film opened in New York at the Loew's Criterion theater in April 1949, Bosley Crowther, film critic for The New York Times turned his nose up at it writing, "As one whom domestic expediency occasionally compels to bear with the Friday night bull-bellowing of one Chester A. Riley on the radio, this reviewer can state with fair authority that no artistic advantage has been gained by making this same Mr. Riley and his family apparent on the screen." But I remember coming home after the mass and the burial and the luncheon, getting back to her house -- it was about 3:00-ish in the afternoon -- and thinking, "The trick-or-treaters are coming." And it works; it does work. One of my favorite characters from classic radio is Digby Digger ODell, the friendly undertaker portrayed by John Brown in THE LIFE OF RILEY. Jim Gillis: Yeah, well, he oughta shampoo more often - with kerosene! Then, his wife Peg receives a phone call from Sidney Monahan, a former flame from Brooklyn, their home town, and Riley impulsively invites him to dinner. Instead, Jackie Gleason starred, with Rosemary DeCamp replacing Paula Winslowe as wife Peg, Gloria Winters as daughter Barbara (Babs), Lanny Rees as son Chester Jr. (Junior), and Sid Tomack as Jim Gillis, Riley's manipulative best buddy and next-door neighbor. He liked the idea that the culture had sort of organized these wheels, in some way liturgically, in some ways socially. John Brown returned as the morbid, counseling undertaker Digby (Digger) O'Dell. Just as all appears lost, Riley learns from Burt that he has been promoted to a high-paying executive position. Procter and Gamble's new Radiant Creme Shampoo in the handy tube! And at least so far as my experience is concerned, the living who bear those burdens honorably are better off for it. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts 2023. We are less grounded than our grandparents were. The Milford location is one of six Lynch funeral homes in the state. Digby 'Digger' O'Dell: Why, I was just taking a stroll around the pond. And that's unfortunate. Why there ain't a day that goes by that I read the obituary columns! Humiliated, Riley vows to Peg that he will become more successful, and after six weeks of working overtime, he volunteers to host the company's Labor Day beach picnic. Chester A. Riley: Oh, you're gonna count my blood? Money is involved. To Riley's amazement, Stevenson reveals that he had already planned to promote him to foreman, beginning in January. Peg Riley: Maybe he's sick or something. Jeff and Babs's bliss is soon dampened when Miss Bogle reveals that she must sell the Rileys' house because of her own financial problems. "The Life of Riley Quotes." Dear t.r. It was just doing the next right thing. Some do. Also, in 1958, it hi His dramatic life story is so well-known that schoolchildren are taught to recite it for extra credit. I really think my people will know what to do when the time comes, and these are details I won't have to worry about. Digger O'Dell Buried For Good This Time. And the things we have to do in that period of two days or three days, that's also largely what you do for us, is that right? Crowther concluded, "[W]e suppose there are millions who will like this sort of truck. The supporting cast featured Paula Winslowe as Riley's wife, Peg, and as Riley's mother-in law; Brown as O'Dell and as Riley's co-worker Jim Gillis; Francis "Dink" Trout as Waldo Binney; Tommy Cook, Bobby Ellis and Scotty Beckett as Junior at various times during the show's run; Barbara Eiler as Riley's daughter, Babs; Shirley Mitchell as Honeybee Gillis; Hans Conried as Uncle Baxter; and Alan Reed as multiple characters, including Riley's boss (Mr. Stevenson) and Peg's father. He was Herbert ODell Smith, and he conducted this buried alive stunt, along with countless other feats of endurance, across the South. Not sure where the voice actor was inspired from, but Mancubus sounds exactly like Digger O'Dell, the friendly undertaker from the old Life of Rile Press J to jump to the feed. No one escaped Crowther's vitriol: Bendix was "an oaf," Lanny Rees, as son, Junior, looked "slightly frightening," Randall as Babs was "just another shapely blonde," and John Brown as Digger was "extremely disappointing in the flesh." He then is embarrassed in front of the Monahans when Junior appears with his full piggy bank, having been unable to open it, and during a struggle with the waiter, the bank falls to the ground and breaks. Gillis then forgives Riley, and Riley is satisfied that his family is happy once more. . I've really come to the point where I can see in a fire all that release; I can see the Holy Spirit in it, you know. But people will go home, and they will look at pictures of the dead; they'll look at movies of the dead; they'll quote the dead to one another; and they will weep and laugh and carry on. And this movement, emotionally, is mirrored by a physical movement. Does it make it easier? Chester A. Riley: Hello, Digger. [6][7], The NBC adaptation, also created by Irving Brecher, was a single-season That's why I came over here tonight. Henry Morgan voiced Riley's father in one episode. What is missing is the corpse: the thing itself, not the idea of the thing. The oblivion is the oblivion wherever it is. He later finds out it was an Indian girl who stood in for her and they are reunited at the end of the movie. When families come in and have their loved one cremated, do you talk to them about going with you to the crematorium? It gives me room to do either, all along this sort of emotional register. Riley, Riley, what a guy! FRONTLINE series home|wgbh|pbs, FRONTLINE is a registered trademark of wgbh educational foundation. She just cant help being money hungry.. Peg Riley: All this plotting and scheming you remind me of a girl I once knew. It was later reused by Benjamin J. Grimm of the Fantastic Four. It earned $1.6 million in the U.S. and Canada,[4] preventing him from starring in the TV series that began in the same year. Are social changes the reasons that we are more fearful and reluctant to deal with death in our everyday lives? But it's not just my job. O'Dell was a character hastily written into the long-running radio (and, later, television) show, "The Life of Riley," which had its debut on radio in 1944, while Americans were dying by the thousands in Europe and the Far East. I'll treat her just like she wasn't my wife. A great memorable quote from the The Life of Riley movie on Quotes.net - "It is I, Digger O'Dell, your friendly undertaker. Dr. Beamish: Not now, I'm afraid. Once he had to be pulled from his apartment after the dirt sides turned to mud and caved in after a thunderstorm. Isn't that awful? Web. Chester A. Riley: I got troubles, Digger. The open casket, it is something that's often mocked. The till still rings. The Brother immediately. Though other friends may fail you, I shall be the last to let you down." For some people it's not the open casket and the three-day wake and the roses and the limousines and the Panis Angelicus. I needed to read that piece because I'm disinclined -- when someone's sick, when someone's out of sorts, when someone's dead -- I'm disinclined to be around that. Did you hear me? So I'm interested in it. He always knew that the real traffic was between the living and the dead, and it is in managing that and emboldening the living to deal with their dead that you do them the most service. Barbara 'Babs' Riley: There's still Christmas. Bearing witness one way or another, that's a key ingredient. My mother died on the 27th of October and was buried on the 31st of October, so it was the Eve of All Saints. Everything is going on, and here we are. In many ways they're all replicated by this journey that we take between the living and the dead when someone dies, this procession. And I think this has to do with our notions about fire itself. Yeah, it's a mystery. All these things are part of the ongoing conversation that we here have. All the same, 100 percent of the people that have gone with us are grateful that we invited them to go. Even a criminal gets time off for good behavior. [citation needed], In 1948, NBC broadcast "two live television test programs based on the radio series. The Life of Riley, 1944 to 1951. At the end of that column, in my lackadaisical way weary from all that writing and typing I said I didn't know what happened to Digger after his misadventures in Memphis. Babs Riley: But Mother, this is the opportunity of my entire life! Gillis often gave Riley bad information that got him into trouble, whereas Digger gave him good information that "helped him out of a hole," as he might have put it. Babs: Well, I think he ought to get a fair trial. There's been a sort of national conversation about funerals over the years. He is best-known in Memphis for agreeing to be "buried alive" as a promotion that took place in September 1959 for Bluff City Buick. There's this wonderful essay that was written -- I have it framed in the hallway there; the woman's name, I think, is Sullivan who wrote it. series from October 4, 1949, to March 28, 1950. Bendix was able to return to the role on NBC from 1953 to 1958, where the program was consistently in the top 25. "It is I, Digger O'Dell, your friendly undertaker. Here in Milford we're around 40 percent, and there are places where it's 60 percent and places where it's 16 percent. It has always been a family-owned and -operated firm, founded by Thomas Lynch's father, Edward Joseph Lynch. And oftentimes I'm impressed by how people will wrap their existential concerns about a dying parent in the prearrangement conference. Not a day went by that I wasn't kept in after school. I've seen at the end of the day people walking upright away from graves, people walking upright away from fires, as if they were going to survive it. Aware that he can use his grandfather's trust money if he marries with the approval of his father, Burt decides to pursue the wholesome Babs. The Life of Riley (1949) co-starred Rosemary DeCamp, James Gleason, Beluah Bondi, Richard Long and John Brown as "Digger O'Dell" the friendly undertaker, a role that he also played on the radio program. And why do the rituals of a funeral matter? A daughter is no longer the daughter only or the son no longer the son only. Sponsors of the TV show included Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer (194950), Gulf Oil (195358) and Lever Brothers (195758). The last mention I can find of his exploits came from a 1979 newspaper published in the little town of Phenix City, Alabama, which reported that Digger was performing his 158th burial in the parking lot of Macks Mobile Homes there. Director Irving Brecher Writers Irving Brecher Groucho Marx (story) Stars William Bendix Rosemary DeCamp James Gleason See production, box office & company info Add to Watchlist 10 User reviews Photos 10 Top cast Edit Well, if it's such a gift, why did it cost you 25 dollars? [citation needed], Bendix and Rosemary DeCamp reprised the roles in an hour-long radio adaptation of the feature film that was presented on Lux Radio Theater on May 8, 1950. He'll never amount to anything. Will you care after your death if they take care of you in death as you did your dad? We'd just say, "Well, let's not think about that anymore." Still, as every grieving person knows, we have to reinvent the wheel in which we are now orphaned. When you grow up in funeral service, you always have a job. Digger: Every good undertaker has his ear to the ground - we pick up a lot of dirt that way. Jiffy peat pellets are a popular choice for starting tomatoes, but they can also be used for peppers. He's a boy who Chester A. Riley: He's a boy! home|introduction|watch online|stories & special video|to be an undertaker|join the discussion Peg Riley: Well, of all the revolting ideas! [after Riley discovers the man he accused of bank robbery is a policeman]. US. 1949. 1 And does the rise in cremation in America parallel changes in demographics? Gillis: Don't argue, because I hate family arguments. No word on whether anyone felt like carrying on the family tradition.
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