American Idol

I idolized my uncle! He had been born Stanley Ginsberg and grew up in Coney Island NY as a scrawny boy with a bowl shaped haircut in a house full of women.

I know nothing about his early years, save that he acquired the nickname "Skipper" from a neighborhood cop who had seen him shirtless. No hair on his skinny little chest. After a non-eventful stint in the Navy, he settled in West Hollywood CA, about 3,000 miles away from home. Some time between late adolescence and early manhood he changed his name to Jeffrey Weston. We called him Uncle Jeff. Sometimes Uncle Skip. 

Around our house it was a tradition that Christmas eve my sister and I would be allowed to choose one present from beneath our aluminum Christmas tree. We would open it that night, then be sent to bed. The next morning we would open the rest. Around ten o'clock every Christmas day my uncle would come by with his friend, Bill. Uncle Bill! They would bring a second round of gifts.

Uncle Bill worked in the film library of the Disney Studios. He got our family into the park on opening day of Disneyland. I remember acres and acres of dirt. Snow White's Castle was already built but very little else. And few rides. King Arthur's Carousel was active. Everyday people stood in line head to toe with celebrities of the day.  Maureen O'Hara and Jerry Colonna posed for pictures with parents and children.  The distraction prompted Jeff Chandler  to throw his children over the shoulders of the crowd to get them onto the merry-go-round without having to wait.  And the mayor, who was acting as Master of ceremonies, was intoxicated by 11 am.

My uncle was always my mentor. He took more interest in me than my parents ever did. That's not to denigrate their influence upon me, but he and I shared an artistic bent that my mother and father could never really appreciate. He was a very good looking guy. After the Navy, he worked for years as a male model for the covers of magazines such as True Confidences. He took acting classes at the Pasadena Playhouse and picked up some extra work in the movies. It was, no doubt, a hand to mouth existence but, with the help of contacts he made in the industry, he was able to become a film editor, a career that took him well into middle age. 

He led me into acting, not by the nose but by more circuitous means. He took acting classes at the Pasadena Playhouse and invited me to every performance he was in. He even introduced me to all his acting friends. One Thanksgiving day, the two of us sitting alone in the living room before dinner, we discussed acting exercises. He wanted me to mime licking an ice cream cone. When I was too embarrassed, he proceeded to demonstrate, holding the imaginary cone in his hand, extending his tongue, and licking up and around as if the ice cream were melting. Then he suggested I might be more comfortable directing. In retrospect, I never realized the erotic implications of his demonstration until writing it down just now. For it was also around that time that he came out of the closet to myself and my parents.  

When it was time for me to decide on a college, Uncle Jeff had some very concrete ideas. It should be far enough from home to have to live on campus. It should have a strong Theater Arts department. And it should offer a curriculum in Education so that I could get my teaching credential in order to have something "to fall back on" (his words). He got his wish. I was accepted to San Francisco State College- the only college I applied to. I lived away from home for seven years, obtained my degree in theater as a director, and taught high school drama for two years.

After several years of steady work with Alan Landsburg Productions, a TV documentary company, Uncle Jeff was able to buy a house. The production company was housed in Nichols Canyon in West Hollywood. The summer they relocated from there to a compound in the valley, I was on vacation and hired to assist with the move. The move lasted two weeks. I lasted two years, becoming my uncle's apprentice.

Jeff was a heavy smoker. And a heavy drinker. Kents and vodka. I had quit smoking while in college but started up again after just a few months of working with him. My brand? Kents, of course. If we were working overtime, exactly at 5 o'clock, no matter who was in the editing room, the glasses, the ice, and the vodka would come out. It was my duty to make Jeff's drink and take orders for anyone else. I was malleable. I began to drink with him. Vodka on the rocks became my drink of choice. But while Jeff could drink 2 or 3, then confidently drive home to dinner, I had to stop at one.

Through the ensuing years I married, moved to New York, raised a family. My career as a film editor lasted 25 years . By the time I saw Jeff again he was overweight, had lost most of his hair, had retired, bought a ranch in the Saugus- Newhall area of California, and opened a comic book/gaming store. When his older sister- my aunt- died, she left him and my mother quite a bit of money. He spent all of his inheritance trying to keep the ranch from the hands of the bank and the book store afloat. He borrowed approximately $50,000 from my parents and never paid it back. When my mother- his younger sister- suffered from Alzheimer's he refused to visit, stating "it's a waste of time. She won't know who I am"! When she died, my father refused to call him. My sister had to break the news. Still, he could not be bothered to make the 4 hour drive from his home to pay his respects. Several years later, he was in Las Vegas for some convention. He called my father to say he was out of money and needed a place to stay for the night. My dad hung up on him.

He eventually lost the ranch, the bookstore, and ended up living in a trailer on a friend's property. He died of a brain aneurysm alone and penniless and neither I nor my father know where he is even buried.

I idealized my uncle!