The Big Interview: Jamie Farr

[Zoneboy]

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If there ever was a guy for whom the phrase “dress for success” had special meaning, that would be Jamie Farr.

The 76-year-old currently starring in Stage West’s production of Tuesdays with Morrie was just a struggling character actor back in 1972 when he was asked to read for a one-episode role on a new sitcom set during the Korean War.

If you guessed that the show was M*A*S*H, the role was Corporal Klinger and that his cross-dressing antics made Farr still a bankable star nearly 40 years later, you’d be 100% right.

What you probably couldn’t guess as easily, unless you’ve had the pleasure of meeting him, is that Farr is a button-bright, razor-sharp, regular kind of guy who talks about the fact that his hometown (Toledo, Ohio) named a park after him with more pride than any of his Hollywood credits.

On the day we met for our interview, the electrical power blew at Stage West, but Farr gamely walked down 18 flights of stairs so we could still have our interview.

“Yeah, I’m older than you, but it’s easier coming down than going up, as any celebrity could tell you. Hey, sometimes you drink the wine, sometimes you crush the grapes. That’s what life is all about.”

If he starts to sound a bit like Morrie Schwartz, the philosophical hero dying of cancer in his current show, that’s perfectly understandable, because this marks the fourth time he’s played the role in recent years.

“You know, when they first asked me to play this part, I wondered why. I thought I wasn’t that kind of guy. But then it dawned on me that just because it was a sad story, I didn’t have to play it sad. Don’t play the ending, play the man and his humour.

“I realized that Morrie has decided to live for as long as he left and that makes it more upbeat. Still, it’s a tough play to do, though. Even though it’s only 80 minutes long, he’s got a lot of words and I didn’t want him to start sounding like Yoda from Star Wars.”

Farr’s face is normally lit up with the joy of living, but if you really want to see him switch on the high beams, ask him about growing up in Toledo, Ohio, where he was born on July 1, 1934.

“What a city! We had every nationality there. Greek and Lebanese in my neighbourhood, Jewish in the north end, across from the railroad tracks, Polish at the other end of town, Hungarian in the west end. I used to think everybody looked like me, short with a big nose, until I was old enough to leave the neighbourhood.

“Dad had a little food store on the corner of Locust and Erie. Other merchants would come by to sell him things. I remember Leon, a big guy who sold olives and pine nuts and bulgur ... you could smell him coming blocks away. Leon would buy a dozen eggs from my father, take the tops off, fill them with cream and then drink them! If they knew about cholesterol in those days, he would have gone off the chart ...”

But what Farr loved best, even back then, were the comedians he was listening to late at night on his crystal radio set.

“Jack Benny, Burns and Allen, Bob Hope and — best of all — Red Skelton. I was so crazy about him. When his movie of DuBarry Was a Lady came to our movie theatre I broke open my piggy bank to get the 12 cents I needed to see it. I didn’t tell my Mom. I sat through it twice and got a spanking when I got home. But a few years later, Red Skelton would be my sole support.”

The stage-struck would page through old issues of Theatre Arts Magazine and one day he saw an ad for the Pasadena Playhouse in California.

“I decided I really wanted to go there and study so I wrote a letter asking to be admitted. I got in, but we couldn’t afford the $600 tuition until my parents cashed in some of their war bonds. They really didn’t want me to be in show business, they wanted me to take over the family store, but they saw how much it meant to me and they let me do it.”

Farr did well at the Playhouse and soon made his screen debut in 1955 in Blackboard Jungle, following it up with No Time for Sergeants. But his initial optimism faded where he learned “there weren’t a lot of roles for short Lebanese guys with giant schnozzes.”

Until the writers on Red Skelton’s popular TV show came up with a new character called Snorkel, “a character with a big nose who could smell anything.”

Farr auditioned for the producers who were impressed enough to bring him to Skelton’s Bel Air mansion.

“I was actually shaking. We were driving through the big iron gates to meet my hero. The guy I’d been listening to since I was a kid.

“Red took one look at me and asked ‘Was your mother scared by an anteater?’ Like they say in Casablanca, it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

For two years, Farr enjoyed the thrill of working on a hit show and being with his idol, but then he was drafted into the army and — ironically, in light of his later success — sent to Korea.

“But when I was though, it was like I’d never even been working. That’s how fast they forget you in this business. I didn’t want to bother Red, but after months of trying to get a job and failing, I dropped by to see him before I went back home to Toledo.

“He took one look at me and said ‘Oh, my God, you’re not leaving! You have a little bag that says Doctor of Comedy on it. You’re employed by me.’”

Farr stayed with Skelton until he started getting cast in shows like F Troop, but it was still pretty hand-to-mouth until he answered that 1972 call for a one-time-only spot on M*A*S*H for a guy who was willing to wear a dress to get out of the Army.

“The director that week had me rehearse it kind of swishy and even though I didn’t feel it was right, I went along with him. Then (author) Larry Gelbart got onto the set and said ‘Jamie, this isn’t any good,’ and I said ‘I know, why don’t I just play him as a real guy.’”

The rest is history. Corporal Max Klinger kept coming back and back. By the time the show went off the air in 1983, the only people who had been on more episodes than Farr were Alan Alda and Loretta Switt.

Once the long-run series ended, Farr has kept happily busy in all media. Besides a variety of TV and film projects, he’s enjoyed a successful stage career all across North America, including his critically-acclaimed stint replacing Nathan Lane in the Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls.

The conversation comes back to Tuesdays with Morrie and I ask Farr how he thinks he’d react to the news that he was dying of cancer.

“I don’t know what I’d be like. I obviously think about it now because of my age. I don’t know if I’d be heroic. I do so enjoy life that I’d hate to leave it. You see, everybody dies, we just don’t want to believe it.

“I’m still drinking the wine and I don’t want to go just yet. I guess I’ll find out when the time comes.”

JAMIE FARR’S FIVE FAVE COMEDIANS

RED SKELTON — The greatest clown. My hero, my mentor. He could make you laugh and cry in the same sketch.

DANNY KAYE — In my opinion, the single most brilliant performer. He could sing, dance, do comedy, drama, everything.

DANNY THOMAS — My fellow Lebanese funnyman. I think his greatest strength was his storytelling. No one could spin a yarn like Danny.

JACK BENNY — He created a single character and played it with endless variations all of his life and never got boring. That’s a rare art.

SID CAESAR — I think he was the greatest sketch comic. He was able to change himself into a hundred different characters and yet somehow always stay Sid.

[Marvo301]

Great article!

[Dr. Thong]

I recall years back that Farr said he'd decided to get a nose job early in his career, but a friend talked him out of it, telling him that as a comedic actor, it would be his bread and butter. The friend, obviously, was right.

So, Farr was 37 when he started on M*A*S*H. I always thought Klinger looked too old to be a 20-something draftee. But he was great on the show and a memorable character.