Hollywood comes alive

As a kid, Magnum PI, aka Thomas Magnum, checked a lot of boxes for me. Great location, Hawaii, check. A fast car, check. An interesting job as a private investigator, check.

I was a young teen, but I imagined it would be interesting to meet Magnum in real life. Oh, I knew that Tom Selleck was an actor. Still, I thought it would be cool to live and work on Hawaii. Did I have any idea of the cost of living on Hawaii or that not everyone drove a red Ferrari? Heck no, but I still thought it would be fun.

I’ve been thinking about the fictional TV shows and people I wanted to meet as a kid.

—Magnum was tops on that list, but he wasn’t the only one. I loved MASH too. For awhile, I thought it would be cool to be a doctor. Maybe even a nurse like the ones I saw on MASH. It was a dream until I took Chemistry. I realized that it was going to take everything I had to survive the year. Forget about college and Med School.

—I loved the tough, but fair nature of Lou Grant. Oh, not the Lou (Ed Asner) on the Mary Tyler Moore Show, but Lou in the spin-off Lou Grant. I’ve held most of the editors I’ve had up against Lou’s portrayal. Some have fared well against Lou. Some have fared not so well. None have had his same lovable, but gruff demeanor.

—When the movie Weird Science came out in the mid 80s, the nerd in me wanted to meet Gary (Anthony Michael Hall) and Wyatt (Ilan Mitchell-Smith). The movie was heavy on sex and stupid high school pranks, but I was on board. Yes, I had a thing for Kelly LeBrock’s character, the perfect woman that the two nerds created. Hormones were firing all over the place, but I loved that the nerds used their brains and good old science to solve their problems and well . . . get the girl. I so wanted to use my brain to fix the problems I faced.

—Of course, when I saw To Kill a Mocking Bird, I wanted to meet Gregory Peck’s Atticus Finch. Oh, black and white TV was a turn-off, but even I was smart enough stop talking and pay attention. Finch was level-headed, courageous, and compassionate. He didn’t seem like other adults I knew. He seemed like he would actually listen to you. Who didn’t want to hang with him?

Now if only it was possible!