Die-hard Chicago Cubs fans, hoping for their first World Series title in 100 years, now know they can at least be buried in a Wrigley Field look-alike when they do.
“Beyond the
Vines,” an internment location at Bohemian National Cemetery on the Windy
City’s Northwest Side, will provide “eternal skyboxes,” otherwise called urns
for those who have moved on from the deliriousness of Cubs mania.
A key factor
in the bereavement process, announced at the recent ground breaking ceremony,
will be an ivy-covered memorial wall--some 14 feet high and 35 feet long. Featured will be a stained glass window
created to remind observers of Wrigley’s green scoreboard. Prices range from $5,000 for the home run
burial with single, double and triple options costing less. Thus far, the subject of concession stands
has not been introduced. All this should attract the attention of filmmaker
Oliver Stone who has made much out of
less.
Word of the
Wrigley miniature brings to mind one of Hollywood’s largely forgotten films giving
one the kind of pause suggesting that, perhaps, memories of “The Loved One”
entered into the creation of “Beyond the Vines.”
“The Loved
One,” produced in 1965, is largely a send-up of the funeral business and, as it
was promoted, offers something to offend everyone. The film succeeds in no
small measure thanks to writers Terry Southern (“Dr. Strangelove”) and
Christopher Isherwood whose inspired lunacy was based upon Evelyn Waugh’s novel. Directed by Tony Richardson, “The Loved One”
explores bizarre marketing aspects of the funeral business with a remarkable
cast including Liberace as a creepy casket salesman, Rod Steiger as cosmetician
“Mr. Joyboy” and Jonathan Winters in twin roles. Winters plays the Blessed Reverend Wilbur
Glenworthy of Whispering Glades and his brother, Harry Glenworthy of Happier
Hunting Grounds Pet Cemetery.
There are secondary
targets in “The Loved One” including the Los Angeles British movie colony’s John
Gielgud, wickedly sardonic as Robert Morse’s uncle, providing biting insight. Robert Morley is corrosively condescending as
the colony’s leader and it is by way of Gielgud’s suicide that we learn of the
offensive practitioners of the death trade.
Whispering
Glades is a take-off on Forest Lawn, a Southern California institution where
countless film celebrities are buried. It
is owned by the Blessed Reverend who has better plans for his real estate: an
old-folks home with a dependable turnover. He also schemes to free up his land by sending Loved Ones into space for
eternal orbiting, a subject whose obvious progression is thankfully interred as
plot development.
Commercial
sham and vulgarity are the coinage of the Blessed Reverend’s realm with its
denizens offering Gladespeak--cleverly disguised jargon uttered in false reverential
fashion by mortuary minions including sleek women called “comforters” who
minister to the “waiting ones.” One of
the comforters provides love interest of a sort beyond the film’s title. Anjanette Comer, as Aimee Thanatogenos, is
decidedly dippy and falls in love with poet Morse (Dennis Barlow) who gives
every indication he would be deeply challenged by the slightest suggestion of sexual
aggressiveness on Comer’s part.
Steiger,
superb as “Joyboy,” the chief embalmer whose epicene flutter is beyond hideous,
has a mother (played by Ayllene Gibbons) with an eating disorder. I will not attempt to describe what she does
to the contents of a refrigerator.
“The Loved
One” came out of Waugh’s disappointing experiences in Hollywood where he had
been summoned to do a film treatment of his best-selling “Brideshead Revisited.”
People who should have known better
finally realized the book is about Catholicism (“Oh, I thought YOU read it”) and
Waugh was sent packing but not before compiling material for “The Loved One.”
It’s quite
likely inspiration for the film was the result not only of “The Loved One” but,
also, two non-fiction books about the mortuary business: Jessica Mitford’s
“American Way of Death” and “High Cost of Dying” by Ruth Mulvey Harmer. Both were published two years before
Richardson’s film was released to very mixed reviews.
With
Hollywood now cranking out re-make films seemingly eye blinks apart, “The Loved
One” in new drag should offer compelling opportunities 43 years later by way of
Chicago cemetery real estate providing fan fulfillment “Beyond the Vines.” It’s also a perfect title for a film about a
family torn asunder by split loyalty to Chicago major league baseball teams,
the Cubs and White Sox , who battle for World Series inclusion. A Cubs fan, one of two brothers, dies as a
result of being hit by a game winning home run ball while sitting in Wrigley’s
left field bleachers. This, as Alfred
Hitchcock would point out, is the McGuffin of the piece. The faux Wrigley Field burial ground, to the
redo what Whispering Glades is to “The Loved One,” is owned by Stetson Frickert;
we’ll bring back Jonathan Winters to play not only Stetson but Earl Avarice,
Cubs owner. The film, as with the
original, will give us two penetrating looks at society: the baseball business
and its new-found cousin: eternal peace for die-hard Cubs fans. And, yes, Woody Allen should play Baseball
Commissioner Bud Selig.
As a-former
Wrigley Bleacher Bum with sufficient awareness of mortal coil departures, I
feel eminently qualified to write “Beyond the Vines.” However, I’ll not reveal any more of my plot
for obvious reasons.
Ready when
you are, Mr. Stone.
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