 |
| Newberry Library |
The Royko play is back. At the Chopin Theatre until Dec. 22. Having maintained a manful silence during its first run, the smart thing for me to do would be to continue keeping my big yap shut.
But being a newspaperman was never a particularly intelligent way to make a living, never mind being a columnist who — I think people forget — is supposed to stir the pot.
First the short take. I saw "Royko: The Toughest Man in Chicago" during its initial run in September — how could I not? — and enjoyed the one-man show, in the main. I love the part when Royko compares writing for a newspaper to being a kid playing outside at dusk, begging for just a few more minutes, another turn at bat, before he has to go into the house for a bath and homework and all the dull non-fun stuff kids are forced to do. This was in the context of the death of the great Chicago Daily News in 1978. Now we face the looming demise of the entire industry. I'm going to miss this.
And I'm no Royko. Royko was great, the greased hub on which Chicago spun, span, and the play captures that nicely. Reading a Royko column, I used to say, was like having a computer chip implanted in your brain, a new circuit about whatever subject he was addressing. His thoughts become your thoughts. He was that good. Not all the time of course — people forget that. Royko wrote his share of duds — five days a week, you had to. But enough home runs to keep fans cheering.
Where writer/actor Mitchell Bisschop falls short is that Royko was not the sum of his writing, but a human being, and a deeply flawed one at that. He could be menacing and mean, there at the end of the bar at the Billy Goat, sucking back his cocktails, snarling at the world. The daring suburbanite or forward young journalist who approached him did so at his own peril.
Fame can be as addictive as any drug. It does bad things to people, and it inflated Royko's self-estimation and made him a jerk to his younger admirers. He was the king of the hill, but was also terrified of being knocked off his lofty perch. Everything was a battle for supremacy. You shook his hand, he tried to crush it.
I never had a good encounter with him. Not one. He once threatened to break my legs, and not in some teasing, avuncular way, but in a dead serious "I'll-break-your-fucking-legs" way.
I never had a good encounter with him. Not one. He once threatened to break my legs, and not in some teasing, avuncular way, but in a dead serious "I'll-break-your-fucking-legs" way. A little of THAT Royko might have given the play more bite. But then, I suppose Bisschop wouldn't have gotten the cooperation of the family needed to pad his play with big blocks of Royko's classic columns.
Maybe this play will inspire someone to write an actual play about Royko, the man, and his era that doesn't quote any columns. The material is certainly available.
Right here, I have a letter from Royko framed in my office, displayed as a kind of trophy and a reminder of the frequent price of success. Not addressed to me, but to a woman he accosted in a bar, and when she didn't recognize him, threatened with a broken ketchup bottle.
"Please accept my apologies for my disgusting, boorish, and inexcusable behavior," Royko begins. "If I caused you any discomfort or inconvenience, I am truly sorry. Any anger you felt, and I probably gave you cause to be outraged, can't equal the self-disgust and anger I experienced when I eventually realized what a sorry fool I had made of myself."
Right here, I have a letter from Royko framed in my office, displayed as a kind of trophy and a reminder of the frequent price of success. Not addressed to me, but to a woman he accosted in a bar, and when she didn't recognize him, threatened with a broken ketchup bottle.
"Please accept my apologies for my disgusting, boorish, and inexcusable behavior," Royko begins. "If I caused you any discomfort or inconvenience, I am truly sorry. Any anger you felt, and I probably gave you cause to be outraged, can't equal the self-disgust and anger I experienced when I eventually realized what a sorry fool I had made of myself."
To continue reading, click here.
from Kate in Chicago: Excellent column this morning, Neil! Thank you!
ReplyDeletefrom me as well....my Dad tossed the DN and his fedora on the living room chair every night arriving home from work downtown
DeleteI guess the saying "don't meet your heroes" has a lot of merit.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering if you have any thoughts on the wider question of separating the art from the artist. It's been more relevant the past few years as we find some venerated celebrities turned out to be awful people, at least at some points in their lives. I find for myself I have a sort of scale regarding their personal failings - for some I can still enjoy their art without much consternation, for others there is a giant asterisk in my mind taking away some level of appreciation, for other others I can no longer look at anything they've done at all.
In general I believe in judging the art and not the artist. I can enjoy Wagner. There are exceptions — I can't really see a Mel Gibson movie anymore. Most people have flaws. Some are forgiven — Charlie Chaplin married Oona O'Neill when he was 17, and people still revere him. Woody Allen, not so much. It's complicated.
DeleteSHE was 17.
DeleteYes, "she." Typo. Thanks.
DeleteI don't understand the controversy about Woody Allen at all. Soon Yi Previn was in her early 20s when she started dating him, certainly an age which by any measurable standard a person is free to make choices about whom they can become romantically involved with.
DeleteShe was his stepdaughter
DeleteNo, she wasn’t.
DeleteTotally agree with Steven K. Also, the case was independently investigated THREE times, yielding nothing. Loved Mia as an actress but dare I say "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned".
Deletethe pull from that apology letter sounds like something you might hear at an AA meeting, another essential aspect of Royko that is only hinted at in the play
ReplyDeleteMy family was Royko loyal, followed him with every move he made from TDN to the Sun-Times to the Tribune (the cultural/political history of those papers and their subscribers: Do the under 40s know about that at all? Col McCormick mean anything? IIRC he gets name-checked in that part of the play), but in the last years his hard right turn and laziness made it sometimes painful to read. As Mark Shields said when he died, he turned into another old Republican complaining about taxes and that pot-smokin' draft-dodger in the White House. That said, he could still crank out some vintage Royko in those years, as rare as it was.
and as an old school Royko fan, the play could have used more Slats Grobnik
I don't think that a negative view of Clinton exactly amounted to a "hard right turn". I voted for Dole in 1996, not because I agreed with all of his policy positions, but on the basis of his character; I respected his service to his country, particularly his being a WWII veteran. Clinton, on the other hand, was revealed early on to be an unfettered sleazebag, to anyone that cared to pay attention.
DeleteMike's first columns were in 1964...and he wrote about 7,500 of them until he died, in 1997. All of which is now a long time ago. When someone has been gone that long, and started that long ago, only people of a certain age know and remember them at all.
DeleteGeezers in their 60s and 70s certainly remember reading Royko regularly for decades. Folks in their 50s might remember him from their kid days. But those in their 40s and younger, probably not. Even college journalism majors are mostly clueless about who he was. They barely recognize his name anymore. It's the way of the world, especially for the vast majority of those who write.
I wonder what I miss.
ReplyDeleteIs it Mr. Royko? Is it the simplicity of the world when multiple newspapers fought for truth and justice? Is it for a time when you didn't know who someone was until you met them or read them?
Something has changed since the passing of Mr. Royko; though I suppose a lot has changed since the late 90s.
What would fix this rotting hulk that is our society?
Mr. B
One of my prized possession is a note from Royko tellling me to, quote, fuck off. I just always figured he was a blustering coot who was either drunk or in the throes of a hangover. Half the time he though of himself as the toughest guy in the room; the other half, his head hurt so bad that he couldn't bear the sound of another human's voice. Mix in a heavy dollop of genius and there he was.
ReplyDeleteI would love to see a comment here from one (or more) of his surviving softball team cronies. His court jesters. The suck-ups. Many were Chicago household names of the 1970s. Kissing his bottom, enabling his boorish behavior. Because doing so gave vague bragging rights? ("Yeah, I know Royko. I'm on his softball team. I pose for team photos with him. I'm right there jockeying for position in the shot, grinning, looking cheesey, trying to get next to Mike!") What did they really think? Good career move maybe.
ReplyDeleteBack years ago, I always bought the Sun-Times (and still do) but I would always borrow someone's Tribune in the office only to read Royko. Neil said it perfectly "No one can compete with him, and only a fool would try". I thought he was one of the best and way more good columns than bad. And like Mark K. says, I really don't need to meet people who's work I admire. I am happy to stay in the back.
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen the play. I don't doubt that it's perhaps too focused on the positive and doesn't choose to spend time fully portraying the "deeply flawed" human being responsible for the writing, however. But I'd have to guess that you might be in the minority in wishing that it did, NS.
ReplyDeleteLots of folks are just looking for a good time, after all. (Particularly at this depressing juncture in the history of the republic.) It's gotten some pretty good reviews.
When somebody sees "Jersey Boys" or "Movin' Out," I don't think most of us wish they'd include more of the worst songs in those catalogs, rather than a steady stream of overplayed hits. ; )
Regardless of that, this column certainly contains a very interesting anecdote about the letter and why it happens to be in your possession to this day.
I won't see the play. I loved his column, but I don't want to lionize him. But I must say that every time I see Rupert Murdoch's sorry face, I think of Royko and how right he was about him.
ReplyDeleteDeeply flawed human being? Damn betcha he was. Have seen that description used before...for Frank Sinatra, whom Royko famously pissed off once. They both were mean drunks, and not at all approachable. You would no more walk up to Royko and say "Hi, Mike!" than you would stroll over and say "Hi, Frank!" to Mr. Sinatra (that other Mr. S).
ReplyDeleteNever had a good encounter with Royko, either. Because I never had one at all. I avoided him, because I was warned when I started at the paper that it was best to keep one's distance. So I never even spoke to him. Well, once...we grunted at each other, while standing side-by-side in the men's toilet at the Billy Goat. Maybe the fact that he actually knew me by sight oughta count for something.
He would literally hold court in the newsroom. He'd sit on a desk, while his legion of sycophants surrounded him...and hung on his every word. I was not among them. Seeing those performances bothered me. Maybe because I wasn't raised to be a suck-up or a kiss-ass.
Other than the rebuff from the Widow Royko, Mr. S, how did you like the play? [joke]
Sounds like Mike got the brush, too...and it was dipped in a coating of whitewash, and painted over his dark side, thanks to his family's blessing of the production. Looks like at least one of them has picked up where he left off. But what the hey, at least she didn't threaten to break anybody's legs
The hard truth was this: Mike got nasty when he got loaded. Like the time when he physically challenged a Tribune pressman who sat on "Mike's Stool" at the Billy Goat, and got decked. Didn't see the clocking, but I heard about it. A lot.
Mike had a softer side, though, as anybody who read him regularly will readily attest. He idolized Fred Astaire, of all people, and surprised many (including me) when he wrote a glowing tribute after the old hoofer died, in 1987. I still have that column. A high school drop-out, Royko tried hard to portray himself as having been a hood and a punk...roaming the streets, ditching school, acting tough, and hanging out in pool halls. It's been a while since I read the Royko biographies. But from what I can recall of them, his reality was a lot different.
Many Roykoisms are probably still rattling around in my head. Computer chips in the brain.. But these two are more than enough. After MLK bought it, he said: "There is a gun being put to our own heads. And nobody is holding it there. It is our own finger and our own trigger." And after the sudden death of his wife, he wrote: "If there's someone you love but haven't said so in a while, say it now. Always, always, say it now." Which I do. A lot. You never know.