Where Is Mr. Kotter Now?

[Brian Damage]

What is Gabe Kaplan doing, appearing in the Palm Beach International Film Festival's opening night movie and starring in a Groucho Marx show in Coral Springs?

You could call it a welcome back for the guy who used to headline the sitcom Welcome Back, Kotter in the 1970s.

After Kotter went off the air in 1979, the expected thing would be for Brooklyn-born Kaplan, now 63, to grab another television series or even graduate to feature films. Instead, he was content to take the sizable bundle he made and sit at home, far from the limelight, fiddling with financial investments.


Font:****"I used to put groups of people together, but I didn't charge, I wasn't doing it to make money, advising people," he says over lunch in a sleepy Broward County hotel restaurant. "In the '80s, it was a different financial era and if you did the right due diligence and you had a good feel for the market, you could tell if a company would be successful. And I had a pretty good batting average."

It was a game, a gamble, in which he found he could outsmart the field, not unlike his other post-Kotter passion - poker. Between the two, he says, "I was completely fulfilled. I had no need to be on television."

True, he would compete in a few televised tournaments and he hosts a series called the National Heads-Up Poker Championship, but mention the idea of him taking on another sitcom and Kaplan will recoil.

His retreat from the limelight was not for lack of opportunities. "I was offered a lot - second person on a sitcom, third person. Every year to this day, I still get offered that stuff," he says with a shrug. "And no matter how many times I say 'no,' the offers keep coming."

Other than poker shows, the last time Kaplan appeared on TV was a 1984 episode of that has-been graveyard, Murder, She Wrote. "And the only reason I did that was because it was a comedian and the comedian was a killer. So I thought, 'okay, I have to do this one.' "

It was never his intention to be in the movie The Grand, an improvisational comedy about a - what else? - poker tournament. It unspools tonight at 7 p.m. at the Sunrise Cinemas in Boca Raton, the kleig-lit gala opening of the 13th annual Palm Beach International Film Festival.

"They first contacted me about being a technical advisor" on the film, he recalls. "When I met (director) Zak Penn and we started talking about poker, he said,

'y'know, there's a part that you could really get into. And it's improv.' So I figure this is great because we didn't have to know the lines." He plays poker ace Cheryl Hines' intrusive father. Of the shoot, he says, "You just go with it and you go three or four times and that's it."

So does Kaplan want to make more movies? "Nope. Unless another perfect offer comes along. If someone says, 'You want to play a gangster?' I would say, 'Yeah!"'

Nor will Kaplan be walking down the red carpet tonight. Instead, he will be at the Broward Stage Door Theatre, opening in Groucho, a biographical play about the legendary comedian, raconteur and quiz show host that also just fell into Kaplan's lap.

http://www.canada.com/montrealgazett...1-fd5ed8819c0f

[catlover79]

Thanks for sharing that article - I remember he published a book of emails last year, too. Pretty funny stuff.

[Skywalker]

Gabe's on tv alot these days on those late night poker shows. I'm not really a fan of poker, but sometimes it's fun to watch "Mr. Kotter" play and crack jokes with a bunch of people I've never heard of before.

[hatwink]

Originally Posted by Skywalker

Gabe's on tv alot these days on those late night poker shows. I'm not really a fan of poker, but sometimes it's fun to watch "Mr. Kotter" play and crack jokes with a bunch of people I've never heard of before.

It's good to see Gabe run things, first in the classroom, then on the poker table.He was on "Poker after Dark" a couple of weeks ago, and still has the same favor, albeit a bit heavier.