Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Celebrating the life and work of Levon Helm...

Sometimes you get bad news after the fact. And sometimes you find out before the fact that something bad is soon to happen. And that's the case this week, with the announcement that musician and actor Levon Helm is "in the last stages" of his longtime fight with cancer. The announcement was made by his family on his website yesterday.

This is a sad, sad thing. Not only has he had a hand in making some of the best music of the last half of the 20th century with The Band, Levon Helm is also an actor of immense likability. Lots of people have been posting examples of his musical performances, for good reason. But, today, I'd like to share one of my favorites of his performances as an actor. This scene from The Right Stuff features Levon Helm as Jack Ridley alongside Sam Shepard as Chuck Yeager. Helm also provides the narration.

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