Wilson Post Blogs

Dear Ken: What is going on in the life of Frankie Muniz, who starred as Malcolm in the sitcom “Malcolm in the Middle”?

Francisco James Muniz IV, 25, has backed off his acting career a bit to pursue music and race car driving. He is the drummer in the Phoenix-based band You Hang Up. He has been open wheel racing since 2006, competing in the Atlantic Championship. And he has been writing screenplays and produced a few movies. Muniz stars later this year as a super hero in the movie “Pizza Man.” Born in New Jersey, he grew up in Knightdale, N.C. (population 6,200), where his mom was a nurse and his father a restaurant manager. A big basketball and soccer fan, he was taught how to play the drums by his pal Zac Hanson of Hanson brothers fame. 

Dear Ken: Where have I seen Aaron Eckhart before? He plays Sgt. Michael Nantz in the movie “Battle: Los Angeles.”

Eckhart, 43, has movie credits going back to 1993. Among his best are “Any Given Sunday,” “Erin Brockovich,” “The Missing,” “Thank You for Smoking,” “The Black Dahlia,” “Rabbit Hole” and “The Dark Knight.”  Born in California, he completed high school in England and Australia before attending college at Brigham Young University. He actually broke his arm while making “Battle: L.A.” “We were doing a stunt, and I slipped, and I fell about seven feet and flew right on my arm and my head, just barely missing some rocks, broke my arm, kept on going and finished the scene,” said the actor.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
It was cold this morning, 20 at the house at 6. I dressed accordingly. The gray light had just started to show on the fringes at the top of the trees as I eased the Arctic Cat into the briar patch and shut it off. It looked as though there might not be much of a sunrise, just a spreading of the gray. I made a last check of my pockets, cocked the crossbow and began to ease into the cedars and push my way, using elbows only, into the middle.

Dear Ken: Whatever happened to the great Mel Blanc, the man who was the voice behind Bugs Bunny? Born Melvin Jerome Blank in San Francisco, “the man of a thousand voices,” died in 1989 in Los Angeles of emphysema and heart disease at age 81. The gifted voice actor first gained fame on radio’s “Jack Benny Program,” but it was as dozens of famous cartoon characters that America and the world came to know his talents. Among other animated characters, Blanc provided the voice for Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Elmer Fudd, Porky Pig, Tweety Bird, Yosemite Sam, Pepe Le Pew, Foghorn Leghorn, Speedy Gonzalez, Barney Rubble and Sylvester the Cat. The words at the top of Blanc’s tombstone read: “THAT’S ALL FOLKS.”

By JOHN L. SLOAN
There was a huge gap between the smell of azaleas in Lower Alabama and the crisp, cool air of the rising thermals as the sun warmed the mountains. Six years. A six years filled with heat, sand, cold, and wind…always the wind. And often, excessively often, the sound of gunfire and mortars and choppers and bombs.

And screams.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
That is a question before Tennessee state legislators. Introduced by Rep. Frank Niceley (R) Knoxville, HB 1112 would make it legal to raise and import whitetail deer into Tennessee for commercial purposes.

Let me make it simple for you. What this bill would do is allow Tennessee residents to enclose deer in pens and raise them as they would cattle and then sell the live animals, the body parts for food consumption, allow the killing of them by individuals and sell the various by products.

Dear Ken: Can you provide a bit of background on Matt Damon?

The actor, 40, was born in Cambridge, Mass., where his mother was an early childhood education professor and his dad was a stockbroker. One of his childhood friends was Ben Affleck. Damon entered Harvard as an English major in 1988 but dropped out before graduating after he co-starred in the movie Geronimo: An American Legend in 1992. He had also worked in Mystic Pizza, Rising Sun and School Ties. It was 1997’s Good Will Hunting, which he wrote with Affleck, that turned him into a star and also won him and his pal Oscars for best screenplay. The Boston Red Sox fan is a serious poker player.

Since turkey season opens Saturday, April 2, I thought this week and next, I would tell you a couple true turkey hunting stories to get your wattle and snood all aworking. I may even join Big Daddy for a hunt myself. JLS
By JOHN L. SLOAN
It could be raining. The dew is dripping from the trees so heavily it could be rain. I am getting wet and glad it isn’t cold. Again, the coyote sings and again the gobbler answers. He is across the swamp and we will have to hurry if we are to try for him. We have walked some distance from the where we parked the truck. It is almost time for the sky to change clothes from funeral black to church gray.

Eddie starts out at a fast walk. Eddie Salter knows this swamp better than I know my office floor. That is why I am so surprised when he steps into the creek. Fortunately, it is only three feet deep and the drop was less than a yard.

Dear Ken: Can you share some background information on Liam Neeson, star of the movie “Unknown?”

Neeson, 58, was born in Ballymena, Northern Ireland, where his mother was a cook and his father a caretaker at a Catholic boys’ school. An excellent amateur boxer as a schoolboy (that’s how his nose was broken), he worked as a forklift operator and truck driver before he became a professional actor in Dublin in 1976. His first big movie role came in “Excalibur” in 1981, and he has since starred in such movies as “Darkman,” “Leap of Faith,” “Schindler’s List,” “Nell,” “Rob Roy,” “Michael Collins,” “Les Miserables,” “Gangs of New York,” “Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace,” “Kingdom of Heaven” and “Clash of the Titans.” The 6-foot-4 Neeson provided the voice of the lion, Aslan, in “The Chronicles of Narnia” movies. He also worked on Broadway in “Anna Christie“ and on TV in the series “The Big C.” Neeson’s late wife, actress Natasha Richardson, died from head injuries suffered in a skiing accident in 2009. They have two sons.

By JOHN L. SLOAN
He is back again this morning in his usual place, the big tree out on the point. I have fished several days this week and he has been there every morning. I have never seen a fisherman sit so still. If I didn’t know, better I would think he was statue or maybe a Bill Vandeford picture.

It is foggy this morning and his head is hunched between his shoulders to stay warm and ward off the damp. I feel somewhat the same way but instead make a cast. Soon, the sun will rise behind him and he will become a silhouette. Later when it gets really hot, he will move down the bank and closer to the drop-off where it goes from just a rocky bank to 40 feet of cooler water. He is following the natural movement as am I. Of course, we are both just guessing. I am betting we are right but until one of us catches a fish, we won’t know.

Dear Ken: Tell me what you can about actress Jennifer Lawrence, who plays Ree Dolly in the movie “Winter’s Bone.”

Lawrence, 20, was born in Louisville, Ky., and began her acting career at 14. By 17, she was playing the teenage daughter in the TBS sitcom, “The Bill Engvall Show.” Her other TV credits include “Monk,” “Medium” and “Cold Case.” Her movies include “The Poker House” and “The Burning Plain.” Later this year, she co-stars in “The Beaver” and “X-Men: First Class.” For her role as a poor Ozarks teen searching for her missing, meth-making father in “Winter’s Bone,” she had to learn how to fight, chop wood and skin a squirrel. As for the latter, she said. “You could ask me about anything and compare it to cutting up a squirrel, and I would choose the other. . . . I know squirrels are like rats with bushy tails, but it’s cute! It’s an animal and I was, like, Ohhhhhhhhh.”

By JOHN L. SLOAN
The debate goes on. Should hunting behind a high fence be legal? There are those in favor of it and they see absolutely nothing wrong with it. There are those who are diametrically opposed to hunting behind a high fence and are of the opinion that those who do so should be tarred and feathered.

The question is one mostly of two view points. First, is it ethical to hunt an animal that is, in effect penned and unable to escape? Second, should it be legal to do so? Now also in consideration is the possibility that penned animals give rise to diseases, which may then be spread, to the wild population.

That is another situation. Let me right now state my position. I think that if there is sufficient acreage involved the for the animal to evade the hunter and the baiting or feeding of the animal is not involved, thereby providing fair chase in my opinion, then I have no problem with it.

Dear Ken: What can you tell me about actor Chris Hemsworth who plays Thor in the new movie? I have never heard of him before this.

Hemsworth, 27, hails from the Land Down Under where he starred in the Australian soap opera “Home and Away” for three years. His brothers, Luke and Liam, are actors in Australia (Liam also tested for the role of Thor). He appeared in three movies, “Star Trek,” “A Perfect Getaway” and “Ca$h,” before taking up Thor’s hammer. Sometime this year he stars in a remake of “Red Dawn” and “The Cabin in the Woods.” Next year he reappears as Thor in “The Avengers.” Hemsworth married Spanish actress Elsa Pataky in December. He describes Thor’s character saying, “He’s doing what he’s doing for his family and to protect the kingdom, and he thinks it’s the right way to do it. It just happens to be a very aggressive way of doing it, which probably isn’t the right way.” “Thor” opens at theaters May 20. 

By JOHN L. SLOAN
Before I started hurting in every joint, I loved a tanning bed day for a little fishing on Percy Priest or Center Hill or Dale Hollow. It wasn’t too bad on Old Hickory, either.

You know the kind of day I mean; a day that makes you want to spend a half-hour at Sun Tan Village soaking up some serotonin and easing the ache in your aging joints. You want drizzle and a temperature that is several degrees below comfortable. It is the kind of day when the clouds hang just feet over the bow of the boat. You have to keep wiping your glasses to get the fog or drizzle off. You are often tempted to pull up the hood on your rain suit but that bothers your vision. Intermittently the sun comes out and cooks you just enough to tease you.