Jerry Reed, who died yesterday at a young age of 71, was best known for playing the Snowman in the Smokey and the Bandit films. (He was even the Bandit in the regrettable third film, that Burt Reynolds only cameo'd in, and an ailing Jackie Gleason's dialogue was entirely dubbed by Mel Blanc.) But I have very fonder memories of Reed's many appearances on Hee Haw, and even more his role in the 1979 comedy Hot Stuff, where he played a Miami police detective who goes undercover (along with Suzanne Pleshette, The Electric Company's Luis Avalos, and director Dom Deluise) to bust the cities many fencers and thieves.
It was lighthearted and corny and features a scene of a stoned Dom Leluise laughing for what seems like 10 minutes. There's also veteran comic Pat McCormick doing a seemingly improvised routine involving tangerines. HBO used to show this every other day in the early '80s and I'm pretty sure I saw it about 30 times between '82 and '85. I haven't seen it in at least 15 years, apart from the first five minutes which are on YouTube (including his country-soul themesong). Not on DVD, dammit! I'll miss ya, Jerry:
Hairy legged guitar picker.
A big hunk of Jerry Reed for you.
Posted by: Tom Thompson | Wednesday, September 10, 2008 at 04:22 PM