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Putting on the ritz
Published: 12/14/2006 8:34 PM
Last Modified: 12/14/2006 8:34 PM

Every time I hear a Neil Diamond song, I think about dirty popcorn.
Once upon a time my dad was in the military and we lived on an army base in Wertheim, Germany.
Our family took on a side job sweeping the movie theater aisles after the movies were over. Every night, someone (not sure who) put a Neil Diamond album on a turntable and played it over the theater sound system while we were cleaning.
So, sort of like one of Pavlov's pups, every time I hear "Song Sung Blue" I reflexively think of sticky, soda-stained floors and pushing piles of dirty popcorn with a broom.
Two good things (other than a lingering fondness for Neil Diamond songs) came out of this arrangement and one of them has to do with sports.
My first introduction to the NFL came in that theater because, back then, pro football highlights were occasionally shown in conjunction with the coming attractions. That was my introduction to the NFL team that first got me interested in sports and, if not for those highlights, maybe I would have gone on to an entirely different career as, perhaps, a monster hunter.
The other good thing about moonlighting at the theater was a fringe benefit. The movie changed almost every night and, as employees, we got in free. I saw just about every movie released during the year I was in Germany and, if I didn't like the movie, sometimes I went just to check out the coming attractions.
I saw "Jaws" three days in a row and, during the third viewing, I went just to watch others around me jump during the scary parts. I saw "Race With the Devil," the scariest movie ever starring a Winnebago, Peter Fonda and Loretta Swit. I saw "Death Race 2000," featuring Stallone before he was Stallone. I saw at least two "Walking Tall" sequels. And, of course, I saw "Young Frankenstein."
I loved scary movies. Mom hated them. She accompanied me to see "Young Frankenstein" even though she thought it was going to be a scary movie. (In sports lingo, this is called taking one for the team.) Of course it wasn't a scary movie. It's one of the funniest movies ever made and this whole blog came to mind because Peter Boyle passed away.
Rest in peace, Young Frankenstein's monster.



Reader Comments 2 Total
Bill (6 years ago)
Boyle played mostly bad guys in his earlier career and, I think, really got typecast as a heavy for quite some time. I think "Young Frankenstein" was his breakout role as a comic actor, which soon became his forte. I do believe he'd have enjoyed your blog entry for today, Mr. Tramel. As did I.
Jimmie Tramel (6 years ago)
A good friend tells me that Boyle played a serious bad guy in "Monster's Ball," the flick in which Halle Berry won an oscar. I haven't yet seen it. Of course, Boyle also played the father of a sports writer in Everybody Loves Raymond. Ray Barone, fictional as he was, was the only sports writer I know who spent every waking hour with his family and rarely attended a game.
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Tulsa World sports writer Jimmie Tramel is a former class president at Locust Grove High School. He graduated magna cum laude from Northeastern State University with a journalism degree and, while attending college, was sports editor of the Pryor Daily Times. He joined the Tulsa World on Oct. 17, 1989, the same day an earthquake struck the World Series. He is the OSU basketball beat writer and a columnist and feature writer during football season. In 2007, he wrote a book about Oklahoma State football with former Cowboy coach Pat Jones.

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