So a guy and his uncle walk into a bar…
Stop us if you heard this one before, but you might not have. The guy is four-time Ted Lasso Emmy winner Jason Sudeikis, and the uncle is six-time Cheers Emmy nominee George Wendt, who died last month. The nephew paid tribute to his late relative during a charity event.
“He’s as fun and kind and as warm as any character he played on television or in films,” Sudeikis said of Wendt, speaking Friday at the Big Slick Celebrity Weekend fundraiser for Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Mo. “I mean, there’s that old saying of like, ‘Don’t meet your heroes,’ usually because ‘they let you down,’ I assume, is the back half of that statement. But he’s not one of those people.”
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Wendt, who played beloved barfly Norm Peterson on Cheers for its entire 11-season run from 1982-93, died May 19 at 76.
“He was an incredible influence to me,” Sudeikis added, per KSHB-TV Houston, “both as someone that plays the trail, being from the Midwest and teaching me that acting was a career you could actually have, if you really care about it.”
Sudeikis added: “He also always kept connected to his family, to his roots — both in Chicago, of course, where he’s from, but then also the time he spent here [at Rockhurst University in Kansas City]. And to a bar called Mike’s a whole bunch, where I think he logged maybe 18 credit hours.
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“But it was all in preparation of a job that we all know him for, Cheers. All time well spent,” he continued. “But yeah, we miss him greatly, and I love him dearly.”
Also on the panel was MCU star Paul Rudd, who said, “It’s going to be felt, his absence, this year, even though he’s so a part of it, just as much as any of us. He is a really really sweet guy. I loved him.”
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