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| Jim Nabors in 2008 |
Jim Nabors, a good-hearted Alabama boy with an amazing baritone voice, who made it big in Hollywood playing aw-shucks Marine private Gomer Pyle, has died at age 87 at home in Honolulu.
I well recall hearing - with great disbelief - that rumor back in my high school days that he and Rock Hudson had gotten married. It was just too silly to take seriously: I mean, really -- those two, obviously straight as a board? They didn't fit the gay stereotype at all. It was to laugh.
But little did I know that both Nabors and Hudson really were gay. Sadly, Hudson died of AIDS in 1985, but Nabors lived a long, full, happy life with his partner of 40-plus years, Stan Cadwallader, happily running a macadamia nut farm on Maui and doing the occasional singing or acting gig. The couple were married by a judge in Seattle in 2013, shortly after same-sex marriage was legalized in Washington state.
Nabors kept his private life private, and there's nothing wrong with that. I suppose his modest, gentle style of humor is quite incomprehensible to the frenzied children of this harsh and vulgar age, but I remember his character fondly. May he rest in peace.
In this clip from Gomer Pyle, USMC, Nabors displays his big, beautiful singing voice:
2 comments:
Nice tribute. He was a low key actor. Not necessarily my sense of humor, but a good guy.
I think so too. From all I've read, he was just a sweet guy, and never let fame and fortune go to his head.
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