The smartest thing I ever did was try to become an entertainer instead of an actor! I don’t think I’m a very good actor.īut weren’t you picked up off The New Steve Allen Show as an actor? I was very fortunate I was able to change up my career.
Then I played Vegas 35 years running, headlining. My mother called me and said, “Why’d you say that?!” What are you going to do for the rest of your life?” I said, “Oh, I guess I’ll just wait ’til my nuts drop.” That’s what they do, they drop. They said, “Jim, it seems like you’ve got the world by the tail. I’ll never forget, I said this on Good Morning America, and I got so much flack. You own a macadamia-nut plantation in Hawaii. I met more fascinating people here than I ever did in Hollywood. For an old guy like myself, it was a Godsend. It’s the farthest islands from any major landmass in the world. There’s nothing else like Hawaii in the world. The ocean is constantly changing, so there’s always something to see out there. And now I root for the Colts and everything that’s Indy.
I never expected to be a part of the race because I’m from Alabama, but I had such a good time the minute I first sang “Back Home Again.” I became part Hoosier. Just watching the kids grow up and start racing themselves. The Andrettis and the Unsers and everybody. I always love watching the old families at the race. About the third time we tried to do it, it was the middle of the afternoon by then, and the crowd started booing me because it seemed like I brought on the rain. I’d go out to sing, and just before I’d sing it would start raining again. Every time it rained, they had to dry the track off. Gosh, anytime I got through it! I remember one year, it rained. What was your best performance at the 500? He looked down and said, “Would you like to sing the song?” Hell, I thought he meant “The Star Spangled Banner.” I went down there five minutes before race time, and when I was introduced to the conductor of the Purdue band, I said, “What key do you guys do this in?” He said, “We’ve only got one key.” I said, “No, ‘The Star Spangled Banner’ has two keys.” He said, “You’re not singing that.” I said, “What the hell am I singing?” Scared me to death. He had actually seen my show at Lake Tahoe. Harrah of Harrah Casinos, and he was a car guy. I heard you had to write the words on your hand the first tim e you sang “Back Home Aga in.” It’s the highlight of my year to come there and sing, but as the old song goes, I don’t want to stay too long at the fair. The week after Indy I’ll be 84, and I don’t fly well anymore. I just thought I was getting a little long in the tooth. Why did you decide to make this your last year performing at the Indy 500? In a revealing and wide-ranging interview, Nabors told IM why he decided to call it quits-and looked back on a life and career that have included acting advice from Andy Griffith, lunch with Eleanor Roosevelt, and watching football with Richard Nixon, to name just a few of the highlights. Unfortunately for us, Nabors has announced that his 35th performance of Indiana’s unofficial state song on May 25 will be his last at the 500. And when another surgery in 2012 kept him away, a video crew traveled to Hawaii so a recording of Nabors’s rendition could be played in his stead. After a pacemaker procedure prevented him from making the trip to Indy in 2007, it was the fans who serenaded him as he watched the race from a hospital bed.
But the truth is, since the first time Nabors faced an IMS crowd in 1972 and crooned the lyrics from notes scribbled hurriedly on his hand, we have embraced the Southern-bred baritone as one of our own.
That might seem strange to someone from New York or California.
#GOMER PYLE WELL GOLLY TV#
Instead, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway bestowed this great honor on Jim Nabors, a man born in Alabama and currently settled in Hawaii, who is best known for playing Gomer Pyle on TV some four decades ago. The Indianapolis 500’s pre-race ceremony is rich in homegrown tradition, with performances by the Purdue University All-American Marching Band and Indiana native Florence Henderson, and Terre Haute’s own Mari Hulman George issuing the famous Start your engines! command.Īn outsider might assume that “Back Home Again in Indiana,” of all songs, would be performed by a born-and-raised Hoosier.
0 kommentar(er)
