I don't recall bragging on this blog before -- the result of a dearth of material -- but the opportunity has now presented itself with this latest addition of my Quarterly Cinema Scan. Yes, it is true. I did, indeed, have a Hollywood brush with fame. In my fifth (1973-74) of eleven years at Most Holy Trinity School in St. Louis Park, I was Kelli Maroney's eighth grade teacher. She went on to become a professional actress, thus fulfilling the dream she always had since she was a kid. She is one of the two leads in Night Of The Comet, a campy 1984 sci-fi movie included on the list below.
Kelli's official website [classickellimaroney.com] states that she started on her quest to become an actress by attending theater classes at the Guthrie while in high school, then followed that by studying at the prestigious National Shakespeare Company Conservatory in New York. That is not entirely true. Kelli unofficially initiated her acting career in my class, seeing whether her little girl cuteness and flirtatious voice could buy her some leeway on a homework assignment or a test now and then. Once she caught on that I had caught on, we had some good laughs out of her ploy. Of course, that didn't mean she stopped trying. If you happen to watch Night Of The Comet, pay close attention to the scene where Kelli's character, Samantha, is pulled over by what she thinks is a state trooper. Seconds after she stops the car, she fixes her hair in the mirror, bats her big eyelashes, and says to the cop in a wistful voice something like, "I'm so sorry, officer, I must have not been watching my speed." That is the Kelli I know. It was not a stretch for her to film that scene. I'll bet it was done in one take!
I remember talking to Kelli's mother at parent-teacher conferences, and found her to be very nice. I never met her dad, but I believe he taught at De La Salle High School. He must have been quite a character. One time I asked Kelli about her dad, and she told me that the night before he had inquired about me with the words, "What's new with the SOB?"
Kelli got her big break in 1979 when, at age 18, she was cast as the villainous Kimberly in the TV soap, Ryan's Hope. She appeared in over three hundred episodes of that show. Her first part in a feature film was a quick appearance or two in 1982's Fast Times At Ridgemont High, which has become a cult classic. She has had relatively steady employment ever since, appearing in various TV shows and B-list movies, not to mention Comet.
I am happy for Kelli, as I would be for all of my former students, that she has been able to make a living doing what she loves to do. Even though I quit teaching thirty-three years ago, I like to believe I remember all of my former students. But, those with a humorous side are the easiest to recall. Kelli was certainly in that category. My only disappointment is that her website doesn't reveal that I inspired her to "keep her feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars." Come to think of it, that wasn't me; it was Casey Kasem.
Here are the films I watched at the Quentin Estates during the second quarter of 2013.
2. Before Sunset (2004 drama; Ethan Hawke is an author who hooks up with Julie Delpy nine years after first meeting her on a train in Austria) A-
3. Driving Miss Daisy (1989 drama; Dan Aykroyd hires Morgan Freeman to be a chauffeur for his mother, Jessica Tandy, who is resistant to the idea) A-
4. Hitchcock (2012 drama; Anthony Hopkins is Hitch, the famous director who is in the midst of filming one of his masterpieces, Psycho, and is married to a sharp independent woman, Alma, played by Helen Mirren) A-
5. The Hunchback Of Notre Dame (1939 drama; Charles Laughton is the cathedral bell ringer in medieval Paris who tries to help gypsy dancer Maureen O'Hara beat a homicide rap) B
6. King Of Kings (1961 biblical drama; Jeffrey Hunter is Jesus) C+
7. Life Of Pi (2012 drama; Suraj Sharma is a young boy who somehow makes it from the Phillipines to Mexico in a small boat, accompanied by a tiger) B
8. Night Of The Comet (1984 sci-fi; Catherine Mary Stewart and Kelli Maroney are Valley Girl sisters who survive an apocalypse and try to outwit the zombies and the mad scientists) B-
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