Christopher Mayer (Vance) Dead At 57

[catlover79]

http://www.soapoperadigest.com/conte...-mayer-dead-57

By SOD • Posted: Jul 26, 2011

According to BRBTV, Christopher "Chip" Mayer, who played SANTA BARBARA's T.J. Daniels from 1987 to '88, died suddenly on July 23. He was 57 years old. Daniels was very active in the 1980s and '90s with contract roles on THE DUKES OF HAZZARD, GLITTER and SILK STALKINGS. According to IMDB.com his most recent role was 18 WHEELS OF JUSTICE in 2000. Mayer is survived by his fiancée Catherine and a daughter Ashley with first wife Teri Copley. He was also married to Eileen Davidson (Ashley, Y&R) from 1985-'86.

[Brian Damage]

Oh my!!!!

[Zoneboy]

How did I miss this one?

Chris

[McGillicuddy]

That IS a shocker!

[catlover79]

I just happened to find this story randomly. It caught me by surprise, too!!

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by catlover79

I just happened to find this story randomly. It caught me by surprise, too!!

Ok, that's usually how I find them. Still sad news nonetheless.

Shame that the announcement came on James Best's birthday.

[catlover79]

Yup - what else can one say?

[Mr. Television]

Wow and so young too.

[catlover79]

Exactly - that's what makes it even sadder.

[catlover79]

Christopher Mayer and Byron Cherry (Coy) reunited last month at the Johnny Cash Music Festival in Ventura, CA. Here are a couple photos I found - one of Mr. Mayer solo, and one of the men with their ladies (Christopher's fiancee Catherine and Byron Cherry's wife Krista):

[catlover79]

I also found several tributes as well as a two-part interview Mr. Mayer participated in at the time of this event. So here goes:

http://brbtv.blogspot.com/

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Remembering Christopher Mayer

Many thanks to Cheryl Dubuque for these great photos of the last appearance of Christopher "Chip" Mayer of "The Dukes of Hazzard" and "Santa Barbara." These were taken at the Johnny Cash Music Festival in Ventura, California, in mid-June, just a month ago, when Mayer appeared with his "Dukes" cuz Byron ("Coy Duke") Cherry. Looks like they had a great time ...

In the second photo, you can see Chris' beautiful fiancee Catherine Irvine (whom he referred to as his wife in our interview with him), along with Byron and his lovely wife Krista ... Our prayers go out to all of Chris' loved ones ...

Christopher Mayer passes away

BRBTV has just learned from the fiancee of Christopher "Chip" Mayer that the actor died unexpectedly on Saturday evening. Actress Catherine Irvine, whom Mayer was planning to marry next month, had been out of town shooting a new project when she received the news.

"I will be posting something as soon as I can find words, just wanted you to know," she tells us.

Born George Charles Mayer III on February 21, 1954 in New York City, Mayer became well-known as Vance Duke on "The Dukes of Hazzard" and T.J. Daniels on "Santa Barbara" and had a slew of other roles through the '90s. He was just coming back into the spotlight this year, doing appearances with his "Dukes" cousin Byron ("Coy") Cherry at the recent Johnny Cash Music Festival and the Hollywood Show in Burbank. He was 57.

BRBTV was thankful for the opportunity to speak with Chris a few weeks back about his work on "The Dukes of Hazzard" as well as "Santa Barbara." He was full of exuberance and a desire to get back out there and talk with fans after a long time under the radar. He talked freely about his faith, and we're thankful to know so surely that he is saved by God's grace. We certainly grieve over the untapped potential of his wonderful, joy-filled attitude -- the future experiences missed for both him and the "Dukes" fans -- and we are praying for comfort for his loved ones.

[catlover79]

http://brbtv.blogspot.com/2011/06/ch...er-part-1.html

Monday, June 06, 2011

Chatting with Christopher Mayer, part 1
He says on his Facebook page that he has "decided to discard Howard Hughes and re-assume Vance Duke," and every fan of "The Dukes of Hazzard" definitely knows the context of that. He's been our Holy Grail for many years of "Dukes" events. He's been the missing signature on the trunk lid of just about every General Lee out there. He's been the only surviving "Dukes" cast member most of us haven't had the pleasure to meet.

But earlier this year he re-emerged on the radar. Christopher ("Chip") Mayer resumed personal appearances with his Duke cousin, Byron ("Coy") Cherry, beginning with the Hollywood Show a few months ago and continuing on with this month's Johnny Cash Music Festival. For BRBTV, Mayer is a double-shot, as not only Vance Duke but also as T.J. Daniels on our beloved soap "Santa Barbara." And he certainly has been our Holy Grail, the interview we've been wanting for years. We're not going to blather on about exclusive-interview-blah-blah-blah, because most folks who use that term "exclusive interview" nowadays have no idea what it actually means in the *real* journalism world. But BRBTV is mighty happy to have connected with the gracious and friendly Mr. Mayer.

As we chatted with him via phone this this past Saturday (morning for him, noon for us! before his coffee, he said, noting that it probably was a good thing!), we touched on both "The Dukes" and "SB." In this two-parter for the BRBTV News Blog, we'll bring you some of that action. (For the whole text of the interview, see future editions of the BRBTV reference guides "Them Dukes! Them Dukes!" and "Send Me to Santa Barbara.") So let's talk this week about "The Dukes" ...

“The thing about the show that’s interesting," he says, "I don’t know if people realized it or not at the time, but it was becoming a sort of cultural phenomenon like ‘Bonanza.’ I had a great time on the show. I did personal appearances every weekend. I was on the set until 9 o’clock every night during the week. Obviously it was of wonderful financial benefit.”

Mayer talked about the audition process for "The Dukes," which found him with a daughter on the way by his first wife, Teri Copley, and in need of some financial security. His manager at the time, Ron Samuels (onetime hubby of Lynda Carter), asked him to try out for the show, the auditions for which Mayer remembers as a worldwide PR blitz in the wake of the departure of John ("Bo Duke") Schneider and Tom ("Luke Duke") Wopat.

“It was insane," he says. "There were producer meetings in the studio, and you’d go back there, and there’d be like four blond guys, and four dark-haired guys. I'd just do the audition and I split. You'd get a call the next week, and you go back, and there’d be like eight other blond guys and eight other dark-haired guys. They finally got down to the final four guys they wanted for each role. … They would take you to the airport, and you get out there, and Cathy Bach was waiting for us there. …You do exteriors out in Valencia, out at Magic Mountain, where they had Hazzard set up. .. Cathy Bach is in a pair of Daisy Duke shorts, and we got to the audition scene. It was kinda bizarre, because the other guys who are going for your role are standing there watching you. … You just snap the ball through it. But it was acting, you know. Nothing remotely realistic. … I guess about four or five days later, I was sitting in my apartment, and my first wife was pregnant with my first daughter Ashley, and my agent says, ‘Are you sitting down? Well, you got it!’”

So onto an amazing journey that would prove more meaningful to Mayer than he realized at the time. And into a world where he will be forever remembered -- replacement or not -- in our eyes!

“When we first did the show, a lot of people thought I should be doing serious acting, not bright colors and notes like it was then," he says. "Now in hindsight, it’s become something that’s very sweet and a cultural icon. Even though we were in a replacement role. It gave me an opportunity to bring my first daughter into the world in something other than a cold apartment.”

And now, so many years later, as we watch our beloved "Dallas" being given a "next-generation" approach, with not only original cast members but an emphasis on the kids of the show that could surely sustain it with a new fan base, and even as we remember Ben ("Cooter") Jones telling us that he once pitched that same next-generation idea to Warner Bros. for "The Dukes," BRBTV had to ask Mayer ... what would Vance Duke's life look like these days?

“I’d have a lot of kids," said the father of three girls. "And I’d be married to a really pretty girl that looked like Cathy Bach."

(Truth be told, Mayer has hooked up with a beautiful actress named Catherine!)

"I’d be in fairly good shape, but maybe have a little more on my waistline," he continues. "I would be somebody who would be involved in the community, maybe something with kids. I would be involved in Hazzard County and helping the community.”

Hmmm ... very nice, admirable traits. So in what other ways might the persona of Vance Duke intersect with the person of Chris Mayer, at least the Vance we knew back in the '80s?

“He was about family, he was about kids, he was about being respectful to women and not treating them like objects. And if you want a fight – hell ya, right now!”

Ahhhh. We love it. Especially the note he adds: “Kids and women are it, man. They’re the hinge on which the gate swings.”

Mayer, a lover of the Lord, is clearly happy with the blessings he's had in his life, and he certainly sees his experience on "The Dukes" as one of them. Chief in all of that, it's clear as you talk with him, is the opportunity to be back on the radar and to make some kind of difference to the people he encounters.

“Television is the opiate of the masses, but at the same time, the way it touches people, it’s such a great thing," he says. "The average person aspires to that. You can go and meet people and shake hands, and I love going out and making people smile, look them in the eye, shake their hands.”

He adds, perhaps not entirely tongue-in-cheek:

“I’m 57 years old now. I want to be a part of it. I’m not MIA. I’ve been in the Dukes of Hazzard Witness Protection Program.”

[catlover79]

http://brbtv.blogspot.com/2011/06/ch...er-part-2.html

Monday, June 13, 2011

Chatting with Christopher Mayer, part 2
Last week, we gave you some highlights of our long-awaited and soooo-much-appreciated interview with Christopher ("Chip") Mayer, who was Vance Duke on our beloved "The Dukes of Hazzard." This week, we continue that, with an emphasis on Mayer's work on the '80s soap "Santa Barbara," where he was the free-wheeling, morally compromised but overwhelmingly hunky T.J. Daniels, in pursuit of not only the lovely Kelly Capwell but also her mom, Sophia!

So what was his most vivid memory of working on that daytime show?

“I think it was just the amount of dialogue," says this actor whose career stretched from 1980 to 2000, "because normally you do a film or a TV show, and it’s an hourlong show, and we would take a week to do that. We would do interiors, with a blue screen behind us with the General Lee and all that … But on a soap, it’s a 3-10 deal. … You go in there, and everybody’s working like they’re hung over. And you do a dry run through different scenes. There was a lot of dialogue, and a lot of choreography. You might have to move to another area and sit down. And if you miss that, you feel like a big screw-up. I wouldn’t look at my lines until the day of the shot. There were days I had like 30 pages of dialogue. The amount of dialogue you had to learn day to day is one of the most challenging things about doing a soap.”

Though he shared his "SB" scenes with multiple Kelly Capwells, including Playboy Playmate Kimberly McArthur and we suspect Carrington Garland (though Mayer thinks he left before she took over the role), he seems most impressed by far with Robin Wright, who originated the character.

“Robin was a hoot. She ended up telling me at one point, I had gotten to be a bit of a maniac then because my first marriage had broken up … She looked at me and she said, ‘You’re too crazy. I’ll tell you what I am going to do.’ This was right at that time the movie ‘Casualties of War’ was being shot with Sean Penn and Michael J. Fox in Thailand. She said, ‘I’m going to go over to Thailand, and I’m going to meet Sean Penn and I’m going to marry him.’ She prophesied that. She’s cool, really cool. It just cracked me up. Only such a beautiful woman could go like, ‘I’m going to go over and meet the president of France and I’m going to …’"

Now, we know why T.J. was interested in Sophia -- for her money! -- but does Mayer think perhaps he was actually in love with Kelly, or was he just interested in her Capwell cash, too?

“I usually go with my own instincts," he says. "Everybody looked at it like, you were supposed to be the Chippendale dancer, the gigolo. But it’s all about the girl. You can find money anywhere.”

Nice.

T.J. was a pretty evil guy, but it must have felt like a juicy role. Were there things he would've changed about the character, if he could have?

“Like that movie ‘The Butterfly,’ if you change one thing, it will have a ripple effect. To be a gigolo was a character they needed to even out or overall texturize the character list. It was fun to do it, because to be an opportunist, you have to have that personality to live in L.A. So it was like I was subliminally culturally acclimating myself." He laughs.

"And there’s more texture to that than just playing romance. So no, I wouldn’t have changed anything.”

Mayer's time as T.J. Daniels was in the late '80s, a few years after he portrayed Vance Duke on "The Dukes." And his career certainly wasn't hurting after that, with a proliferation of roles on shows like "Silk Stalkings," "Baywatch" and "Xena: Warrior Princess." But his priorities began to change, he says, and he turned to construction work for about a decade and a half.

“It was a wonderful, wonderful 20 years. But as I got older and had the responsibilities of being a father, I was looking for something a little more steady.”

Does he have any desire to return to acting? Why, yes, actually. Mayer tells BRBTV he has something in the works right now, and it hearkens to his construction-work days. He has a friend who does what's called "faux finish" work, a painting technique that replicates materials such as marble or wood. The technique is evidently popular in L.A., and Mayer just shot a pilot for a reality show focusing on the work. He gave us the title "Faux-Get About It." The show is being shopped around right now, he says, even though today's reality TV trend doesn't necessarily rank high on his entertainment list.

“If you have a camera on the dash of your Range Rover, you’re not being real!” he quips.

Mayer is also looking into some motivational speaking work nowadays, with his wife Catherine, a Christian like him, upon whom he lavishes kind, loving words (just check his Facebook page!).

And speaking of Facebook, he makes no bones about the fact that it's new to him -- and not entirely comfortable.

“I’m not a computer guy or a Facebook guy or all that Twitter or Skype stuff. When I first set up the Facebook page, I felt like I was walking around with my zipper down. Because I’m super private. That’s not me. I’ve really been off for so long. But now I’m going to try to be more on."

With elements like "The Dukes of Hazzard" on his life experience list, it presents a nice opportunity for the actor.

"It’s a great way to make people smile. It’s fun to be a part of something that still has an intense devotion.”

BRBTV wishes Mr. Mayer only the very best.

*Here are a couple of photos of him with his SB leading ladies: Robin Wright (Kelly #1), Kimberly McArthur (Kelly #2), and Judith McConnell (Sophia):

[catlover79]

Last but not least, I found a clip of an SB episode from 1988 - featuring Robin Wright, Christopher Mayer, and Judith McConnell. Don't be turned off by the subtitles - the audio is in fact English.

[Mr. Television]

Thanks for posting these Monika. It's so sad. His death was so sudden. He seemed like a nice guy and it's great that he finally embraced his Dukes past.