Today's featured comment
I'm getting schooled again on the people who went to the same school as I did. My trivia question yesterday that asked which comedian/actor attended Santa Ana College brought several answers and most of them were correct.
The question was sparked by the appearance yesterday of Atlanta Braves pitcher Kris Medlen, who -- according to Jim Palmer -- played baseball at Santa Ana College, a community college about two miles from the neighborhood I grew up in, and an institution I attended briefly before heading off the a four-year college.
One of the first answers I got was from Dave, who thought it was Steve Martin, but I said he was incorrect. The answer I was looking for was Will Ferrell, but quickly realized with the help of some readers that Diane Keaton also fit the description. Well, turns out that Dave was right, too, and here's his response to my response.
Dave's take: Hey Pete, I went looking because I knew someone from SNL of the 70's went to Santa Ana and it was Steve Martin, before he went to Long Beach State.
"After high school graduation, Martin attended Santa Ana Junior College, taking classes in drama and English poetry. In his free time he teamed up with friend and Garden Grove High School classmate Kathy Westmoreland to participate in comedies and other productions at the Bird Cage Theatre, a theater concession inside Knott's Berry Farm. Later, he met budding actress Stormie Sherk, and they developed comedy routines while becoming romantically involved. Stormie's influence caused Steve to apply to Cal State Long Beach for enrollment with a major in Philosophy."
Pete's take: Funny thing is, I went to a site that listed the college's prominent students and Martin wasn't there, and I knew he went to Long Beach State, so I assumed Dave was wrong. Guess a quick run by Wikipedia would have saved me another serving of crow. Good job, Dave.
Associated Press photo
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Comments
Six Degrees of Diane Keaton:
(from Amazon.com Three Bonus Deleted Passages from Steve Martin's Born Standing Up):
During the day, I attended Santa Ana Junior College, taking drama classes and pursuing an unexpected interest in English poetry from Donne to Eliot. I would occasionally assist on a college stage production--never appearing in one--as a member of the crew. Years later I was looking through a box of memorabilia and noticed a silk-screened playbill of the musical Carousel, May, 1964, which listed me as a stagehand. The lead actress was Diane Hall. Something connected and I remembered that Diane Keaton's name was once Hall, (hence, Annie Hall). I confirmed with her that she was in that production. Neither of us remembers meeting the other, yet we must have worked in proximity. More evidence that I was a wallflower. Decades later, we ended up "making love" on the floor of a movie set on Father of the Bride.
Posted by: Mr. Trifecta | June 15, 2009 1:34 PM
Hey Pete, you stick your neck out there all the time for us, and we love ya for it. So you missed one, big deal. Funny how many famous people came out of that school, and yes, I include you.
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Pete's reply: Thanks, but don't include me. I wasn't really name-dropping, since I've never met any of those stars. It just popped into my head when Palmer mentioned it. Been so long I can hardly remember going there.
Posted by: Dave | June 15, 2009 7:35 PM