{"id":201,"date":"2021-09-23T12:21:06","date_gmt":"2021-09-23T12:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/?p=201"},"modified":"2021-09-26T15:00:10","modified_gmt":"2021-09-26T15:00:10","slug":"melvin-van-peebles-innovative-filmmaker-and-ultimate-renaissance-man-dies-at-89","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/?p=201","title":{"rendered":"Melvin Van Peebles, innovative filmmaker and the ultimate Renaissance man, dies at 89"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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THE FEARLESS, AMAZING MELVIN VAN PEEBLES, WITH HIS TALENTED SON MARIO, HAS DIED AT AGE 89.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n


Rest in peace, Melvin Van Peebles.

The filmmaker and Renaissance Man had an amazing career, and he lived a fascinating life. Mr. Van Peebles was 89.

Of course, I’m more familiar with Mr. Van Peebles’ son, Mario Van Peebles, who had a memorable role as rebellious Marine “Stitch” Jones, who clashes with Gunnery Sergeant Clint Eastwood in the comedy\/drama “Heartbreak Ridge.”

“I’m the Ayatollah of Rock-and-Rolla,” Mario Van Peebles said while wielding his guitar in the barracks. My boy Pete Koch\u200b was also in the movie, as the massive, personable Marine “Swede” Johanson, while taking a break from his seven-year NFL career with the Bengals, Chiefs and Los Angeles Raiders.

It’s an underrated flick, admittedly geared toward my demographic of the ’80s:

You know, too macho for my own good.

Melvin Van Peebles also had a memorable cameo in the 1993 movie “Posse,” a film looking at the role of African-American cowboys in the Wild West. Mario Van Peebles starred and directed that flick, and I actually wrote a movie review on it during my days on the border with the Brownsville Herald.

Melvin Van Peebles also worked as a playwright, composer, novelist and a cable car gripman in San Francisco, in his early years. He’s often remembered for directing Sweet Sweetback’s Baadass Song, a breakthrough film in the early days of the Blaxplotation movies of the early ’70s.

I’ve seen a couple television interviews he did a couple decades ago, and he was often wielding a short, snuffed-out cigar. He had four children, including Mario Van Peebles, and this compelling obituary by the Washington Post’s Adam Bernstein captures the essence of the amazing man.

Penned Bernstein:

“As his marriage and finances disintegrated, (Mr. Van Peebles) moved alone to Paris and supported himself as a gigolo while contributing to the satirical anarchist magazine Hara-Kiri.”

Cue David Lee Roth’s “Just A Gigolo\/Ain’t Got Nobody” if you like.

Rest easy, Mr. Van Peebles. You will be missed. 9\/23\/2021

(also posting this on my personal web site, jimmashek.com)<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rest in peace, Melvin Van Peebles. The filmmaker and Renaissance Man had an amazing career, and he lived a fascinating […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-potpourri"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=201"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":234,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201\/revisions\/234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jimmashek.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}