The Plane

Like a lot of people back in the 80s I enjoyed a good episode of Fantasy Island. It began to lose me when he began, with increasingly regularity, to do battle with hidden and malevolent forces, or at least that’s how I remember it. It could also have been that I became bored with a soap opera of a show whose co-star was a dwarf in a white three piece suit. A cursory bit of research on the show reveals that Mr. Roarke was more mysterious than I remembered, seems he may have been immortal and once bedded Cleopatra. I don’t know, I can think of better ways to spend immortality than reuniting Gavin MacLeod with his high school sweetheart or giving Bruno Kirby another chance at being a singer. All that is neither here nor there, so let’s move on.

Apparently, Herve Villechaize, who played Tattoo, was extremely difficult to work with, arguing with the producers and hitting on every woman who came on the set. He was finally fired when he demanded equal pay with Ricardo Montalban. Absurd! It was a move he much regretted and remained tortured by it his remaining days. According to the E! Hollywood True Story, and you don’t get more credible than that:

“for the remainder of his life practised an often nightly ritual of drinking in a darkened room while screaming obscenities at an episode of Fantasy Island playing on his television.”

And on that note, have a good weekend.