I am pretty sure I escorted Roger Ebert out of the Virginia Theater for the very last time at the end of Ebertfest. For those who don't know, Roger created a film festival in Champaign Urbana 15 years ago. Originally called "The Overlooked Film Festival", the event was a celebration of the four things Roger loved the most: His wife Chaz, Movies, Champaign/Urbana/the University of Illinois and Steak and Shake. The festival brought actors, directors, screenwriters, movie executives and thousands of other friends together to celebrate all of the things he loved the most.
I was on "Roger duty" for this last day of the 2012 Ebertfest. That meant I needed to help him in and out of the theater, help him to and from his seat and just make sure he and his wife Chaz had what he needed. The festival was showing "Citizen Kane" one of Roger's all time favorite movies. And for the first time the version being screened was the "director's voice over" which in this case, was the voice of Roger Ebert himself talking through every scene of the projection. It was a magical afternoon just to hear Roger's voice again in the theater.
For those that don't know, Ebert has battled cancer for at least the last 10 years. Eventually he would lose his jaw and vocal chords and with that his ability to "tell us" about the movies he loved and hated so much. Even the loss of his voice couldn't quiet Roger though, adapting his computer with a "Hal like" speech adapter.
While on "Roger duty", Ebert needed to take a short break and we escorted him into the theater office to rest. On his way back to his seat one of the patrons was complaining loudly to the staff about how he had assumed the original movie would be shown and not a voice over by Ebert. While at his loudest, Roger walked by. Roger displaying grace, looked into the man's eyes, nodded as a grandfather might nod trying to calm a disrespectful grandson, extended his hand and gave a look of understanding.
I don't want to imply in anyway that Ebert and I were close friends. Like thousands of others I had the opportunity to spend time with him and have a few brief conversations. We both have two loves in common, movies and the UI College of Media. And we would talk about both when we shared time.
The most notable of our encounters happened at the San Diego Airport in 2004. Roger was in San Diego for treatments for the cancer and I was there for the national convention of my national fraternity. Standing in the airport security line, I noticed Roger was standing in front of me. We shared greetings and once through the line he invited me to join him to get something to eat. He noticed Nathan's Hot Dog's in the food court and we started our adventure.
Now Roger loved to eat. He is famous for taking friends to Steak and Shake in Champaign and leading debates about how the burger, bun and fixings at this fine establishment was the finest in the world. If you didn't know any better you might think Steakburgers deserved the same notoriety as the finest of French wines. But this was Roger, if he believed something, it was important for his friends to believe the same thing. His long time sparring with critic Gene Siskel grew out of this stubbornness. And of course the rest is history.
The first time I met Ebert was shortly after he had reviewed "Chinatown". Ebert loved the movie as did I and my closest lifetime movie critic friend Brenda did. But Siskel didn't. I was in the CBS studio in Chicago interviewing Brent Musberger and Siskel was there doing his weekly on air review for the station. I argued with Siskel about how wrong he was about the movie and he shot back "if I liked every movie, no one would read my columns!" I shared this with Roger when I met him later that summer and he thought Gene's argument was just childish. That was Roger. Adults agreed with him, children...well they were just children.
So I return in this story to Nathan's Hot Dogs. We both had an hour until our flights. Roger bought us 4 dogs and fries. He spent the first 20 minutes admiring the hot dog. The casing was perfection. The bun toasted just right. The fries while not quite Steak and Shake thin fries but were the next best thing. And the toppings were just heavenly. He reminded me the San Diego Nathan's was no near as good as the original at Coney Island, but still, well worth the investment!
We spent the rest of the time talking about movies and in particular Hitchcock movies. I told him one of my favorite classes at the UI was a Hitchcock and his works class where we read the screenplay or books the movies were based on and then critiqued the movie. We talked about my favorite Hitchcock movie, North by Northwest, and got into Psycho, Notorious, The Birds, and finally Rear Window, which he was hoping to show at the festival soon. It was truly amazing to "pick a topic or a movie" and then let him lecture about the history of the movie.
I mentioned before Roger has hosted a film festival in our area the past 14 years. Roger grew up in Urbana and loved to come back. Over the past 14 years he has shown over 100 movies and offered insights into each of them before and after the screening. For those of us who have attended every year I think we might be eligible for a doctorate in film studies. For me at least, I have a much better understanding of what it takes to make and distribute a movie. It has been fascinating for sure.
And a huge part of the festival has been his friends who have come back to be celebrated by Roger and Chaz. Standing on Park St you might bump into actors, directors, producers, writers, and masters of all of the elements of film making. And most if not all would tell you a story about how Roger changed their lives with a review he wrote or a call or letter of encouragement they had received. As I said if he liked you and liked your work, he stubbornly argued for you.
So today I remember that afternoon in San Diego I spent with Roger Ebert. I'm taken back to the last day of Ebertfest as I escorted Roger out to his car after the lights were back on from the last movie. As he held my arm going out of the theater I mentioned that afternoon at Nathans. He squeezed my hand to tell me he remembered and gave a look to Chaz, they must have had same discussion before, as if to say "see Chaz, I told you Nathan's was the best!". Another debate won by Ebert for sure.
My heart goes out to Chaz and all of Roger's true friends across the country but especially here in Champaign Urbana. The 15th Annual Festival is in two weeks. This will be the perfect memorial for all of his family and friends. Four days of movies, of Steak and Shake, of boasting about the University of Illinois being the best university in the world, of comforting Chaz and who knows, maybe we can fly in some Nathan's Hot Dogs for the day. We'll all miss you Roger Ebert.
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