Loggia-cally Speaking

At the time of his death, in early March 1982 at the age of 33, John Belushi was working on a script for something called "Noble Rot" with Don Novello (better known as “Saturday Night Live’s” Father Guido Sarducci). After two consecutive box office flops in 1981 – “Continental Divide,” a romantic comedy attempting to sell Belushi and Blair Brown (star of the 1980s TV dramedy “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd”) as the new Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, and “Neighbors,” a dark comedy sabotaged in pre-production when Belushi and Dan Aykroyd ill-advisedly swapped roles against type, with Aykroyd as the dangerous loose cannon and Belushi as the anal retentive stick-in-the-mud – Belushi wanted to star in a throwback to screwball comedies, playing the troublemaking son of a Northern California winemaker in “Noble Rot.” The title refers to a type of fungus that grows on grapes.

Reviewing "Neighbors," critic Roger Ebert observed, "Belushi, the most
animalistic animal in 'Animal House,' played the mild-mannered Keese.
And Aykroyd, who often plays straight-arrows, makes the new neighbor
into a loud neo-fascist with a back-slap that can kill."

After Belushi died, seemingly every project Dan Aykroyd embarked upon had been intended to include his buddy and “SNL” cast mate. Aykroyd conceived “Ghostbusters” as vehicle for himself and Belushi. In an interview on “The Today Show,” Aykroyd stated that Belushi was supposed to be his costar in “Spies Like Us.’

The 1986 action comedy “Armed and Dangerous,” which ultimately teamed John Candy with his “SCTV” costar Eugene Levy, had floated around Hollywood for six years, with over a dozen versions of the script before being considered as, yes, a film for John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd.  John Candy stepped in for the late Belushi, and John Carpenter, who had recently made the hit movies “Christine” and “Starman,” was slated to direct. When Aykroyd, Candy, and Carpenter all dropped out of the project, Brian Grazer, who co-produced the movie with actor James Keach, announced he would hire a different director. Referring to Aykroyd and Candy, Grazer said, “I couldn’t care less if they’re in it. If they want to come back, that’s fine. If they don’t, we’ll give other actors a chance to be in a hit.”

After John Candy came back onboard, Tom Hanks, with whom Candy had shared the screen in “Splash” and “Volunteers,” was briefly considered for the role that eventually went to Eugene Levy. “Armed and Dangerous” finds John Candy as a fired patrolman and Eugene Levy as a disbarred lawyer who end up as security guards for a low-rent outfit run by a crooked union and sanctioned by cops-on-the-take.

 

John Candy (pictured above with a leery Eugene Levy) would soon hit his stride
in "Spaceballs," "Planes, Trains and Automobiles," and "The Great Outdoors."

From a budget of $12 million, the film grossed under $16 million. In his review for The New York Times, critic Walter Goodman noted, “If the very sight of John Candy…strikes you as a hoot, then perhaps ‘Armed and Dangerous’ is for you. It is difficult to imagine who else this latest movie about a pair of bumblers could be for.”

 

Going undercover in "Armed and Dangerous," Eugene Levy dons ass-less chaps
while John Candy channels Divine, the hefty drag-star of "Pink Flamingos,"
"Female Trouble," "Polyester," and "Hairspray."

The production curiously attracted a number of talented and otherwise intelligent performers, including the late Robert Loggia, who portrays the corrupt union czar, Michael Carlino (pictured below). After suffering from symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease for five years, Loggia died December 4, 2015, age 85.

In the Los Angeles Times obituary, Jeffrey Fleischmann pointed out that the Academy Award-nominated actor “embodied both swagger and mischievous charm…Loggia, who could be both sly and sweet, carried an everyman’s understanding and a conman’s cleverness.” He became a favorite of director Blake Edwards, who cast him in five films, including three "Pink Panther" pictures. Behind the camera, Loggia directed episodes of the TV series "Quincy, M.E.," "Magnum, P.I.," and "Hart to Hart."

Robert Loggia declared in a 1990 interview, “I’m a character actor…I play many different roles, and I’m virtually unrecognizable from one role to another. So I never wear out my welcome.” (Pictured below) Robert Loggia refuses to wear out his welcome in "An Officer and a Gentleman," "Scarface," "Jagged Edge," "Big," "Independence Day," and "The Sopranos."

Born Salvatore Loggia to Italian immigrants, he was raised in Manhattan’s Little Italy. After serving in the U.S. Army, he joined the Actors Studio.

 

In his first film, Robert Loggia (left) played a mobster in "Somebody Up There
Likes Me" (1956), starring Paul Newman as boxer Rocky Graziano. This was
the second feature film for Paul Newman, who was stepping into a role
originally intended for James Dean, killed in a car crash before shooting started.
"Somebody Up There Likes Me" was also the first film for Steve McQueen
(right), who appeared uncreditd as a street thug.

Loggia’s big break came in the 1958 Walt Disney Studios series “The Nine Lives of Elfego Baca” (pictured below) portraying the real-life New Mexico-born gunfighter, lawman, lawyer, and politician in the closing years of the Western frontier.

The year 1966 found Robert Loggia starring in the short-lived TV series “T.H.E. Cat” as Thomas Hewitt Edward Cat, a former circus acrobat-turned-cat burglar-turned professional bodyguard. The series, created by Harry Julian Fink, one of many writers credited with creating “Dirty Harry,” lasted a single season, as did a later series, “Mancuso, FBI.” Loggia was nominated for an Emmy Award for the latter, although he was unhappy with the direction the network was taking the show.

Loggia received an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of a gruff (“Fuck him, he was trash!”) but sympathetic former private detective in 1985’s “Jagged Edge,” starring Glenn Close and Jeff Bridges. Loggia followed three noteworthy performances – in “Scarface,” “Prizzi’s Honor,” and “Jagged Edge” – with a role in “Armed and Dangerous.”

As mentioned, “Armed and Dangerous” somehow attracted several other capable and seemingly smart actors. Indulge us for this curtain call...

Fresh from her breakthrough role as "Goose’s" widow in “Top Gun,” Meg Ryan plays the perky (what else?) supervisor at Guard Dog Security.

Maggie Cavanaugh (Meg Ryan): "Just remember, when you pull the trigger, the
bullets come out going very, very fast. So make sure to keep the weapon pointed
away from you. You are now armed guards. God help us all." The New York Times
critic Walter Goodman called her "a pleasant presence in a movie full of meatheads."

Kenneth McMillan, best known as the loathsomely obese, disease-ravaged Baron Vladimir Harkonnen in the 1984 film “Dune,” directed by David Lynch, portrays Ryan’s overprotective father, the gruff captain of the security company.

 

Kenneth McMillan (pictured above in "Armed and Dangerous")
was 56 when he succumbed to liver disease in 1989.

Crooked union representatives are played by Jonathan Banks, twice nominated for Emmy Awards for his portrayal of Mike Ehrmantraut in both “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul,” and Brion James, a versatile character actor who appeared in a number of movies directed by Walter Hill, including “Southern Comfort” and “48 Hrs.” and is best remembered as replicant Leon Kowalski in “Blade Runner.”

Jonathan Banks (left) and Brion James (right) play
dubious union stewards in "Armed and Dangerous."

Don Stroud, cast as a crooked cop (pictured below), is probably familiar to most moviegoers as one of Clint Eastwood’s favorite punching bags, as murder fugitive Jimmy Ringerman in “Coogan’s Bluff” and as loudmouthed gunman Lamar Simms in “Joe Kidd.”

Former professional wrestler Tommy “Tiny” Lister, who plays an imposing security guard aptly named Bruno, is best known for his role as Deebo, the neighborhood bully in “Friday” and “Next Friday.” Lister became a born-again Evangelical Christian and was later convicted of mortgage fraud.

 

Tiny Lister's menacing presence in a number of films was amped up by the fact
that he was born with a detached, deformed retina in his right eye.

Speaking of imposing physical presences, noted female bodybuilder Teagan Clive pops up, naturally, in a workout gym in "Armed and Dangerous." Besides occasionally appearing in movies, Clive wrote scripts for the late-1990s TV series “Conan.”

 

In 1989, Teagan Clive played the title role in "Alienator," a sub-bargain-basement
ripoff of "The Terminator," directed by Z-movie auteur Fred Olen Ray.

The actor cast as the crooked union treasurer (there sure are a lot of crooked characters in this picture), James Tolkan, is most recognizable as "Stinger" in “Top Gun” and as Hill Valley High School hall nazi Mr. Strickland in the “Back to the Future” films (pictured below).

 

"You remind me of your father...He was a slacker, too."

A judge is played by Stacy Keach Sr. (pictured below), a familiar face as Carlson, tirelessly inventing gadgets for inept secret agent Maxwell Smart (Don Adams) on “Get Smart,” and as kindly Clarence Birdseye in commercials for the Birds Eye brand of frozen foods.

Bruce Kirby (pictured below), the father of the late actor Bruno Kirby who appeared on several episodes of “Columbo” as the continually befuddled LAPD Sgt. Kramer, appropriately plays a police captain (who is not crooked) in “Armed and Dangerous.”

Erstwhile ‘80s game show model K.C. Winkler (“The New High Rollers”) and Judy Landers, best known for roles as a none-too-bright blonde in the late ‘70s into the ‘80s (including the TV series “Vega$” and “B.J. and the Bear,” as well as the movies “”Stewardess School” and “Club Fed”), have their moment in the comedy as a pair of clueless dinner dates.

 

Noreen (Judy Landers): "Gosh, I didn't realize it was going to be this formal.
If I had known it was going to be this kind of party, I would've worn underwear."

Let’s see, whom are we forgetting in this eclectic cast? David Hess, whose serial killer (Krug Stillo) got his just desserts on the business end of a chainsaw in the original “Last House on the Left,” appears on-camera for a few seconds as a (get ready) crooked ice cream truck driver (pictured below).

Legendary jazz composer and mambo maestro Tito Puente plays himself and performs “Oye Como Va” (yes, the song popularized by Santana was written by Tito Puente in 1963).

 

Tito Puente (pictured above) was forever immortalized in "Stripes" when Bill
Murray is breaking up with his girlfriend and tells her, "Tito Puente's going
to be dead, and you're going to say, 'Oh, I've been listening to him for years,
and I think he's fabulous.'"

Last but certainly not least, Steve Railsback  (best known for his portrayal of Charles Manson in the miniseries “Helter Skelter” and as a fugitive in 1980’s “The Stunt Man”) steals the picture as a grinning, drawling trucker who calls John Candy “Slim” and sets up the movie’s show-stopping, action-packed climax.

 

(Left) Charles Manson (Steve Railsback in "Helter Skelter"): "I am only what
you made me." (Right) Cowboy (Steve Railsback in "Armed and Dangerous"):
"Hold onto your saddle horn, son!"

Director Mark L. Lester, whose track record includes “Truck Stop Women” (1974), “Bobbi Jo and the Outlaw” (1976), “Firestarter” (1984), and “Commando” (1985), may have been an unlikely choice to handle comedy, but when it came to action, he blowed things up real good.

“Armed and Dangerous” executive producer Harold Ramis, who also wrote the screenplay, based on a story by co-producers Brian Grazer and James Keach, was so unhappy with the final cut of the film – which The New York Times dismissed as an “exercise in inanity” – that he requested his name be removed from the credits.

 

"It's a 50 caliber. They used to use it to hunt buffalo with, up close.
It's only legal in two states. And this isn't one of them."

A couple weeks after the disappointing opening of “Armed and Dangerous,” John Candy (whose salary had soared to $2 million a picture) told an interviewer, “I’m always hearing about these great scripts. But then they say, ‘Oh, it needs a rewrite.’ Then before you know it, there’s another rewrite, and then it needs a little polish, and by the time that has been done, the script is almost incomprehensible.” Candy was also known to say, “My agent is always telling me, ‘It’s not called show art, it’s show business."

Time has been kind to "Armed and Dangerous." Despite critical pans and
a disappointing box office, the film has become a cult comedy favorite.

Afterword

Robert Loggia was a friend of the TV show "Family Guy." In two different episodes, the camera cut away to a close-up of the actor snarling a single line.

"NOT OK!" Robert Loggia growled. His other cutaway had him
grumble, "Eight fucking hours later!"

In another episode of "Family Guy," Peter Griffin got stuck in a line at the airport behind Robert Loggia, who painstakingly spells out his name to the customer service agent: "'R' as in 'Robert Loggia' - 'O' as in 'Oh my God, it's Robert Loggia' - 'B' as in 'By God, it's Robert Loggia...'"

John Viener, who provides multiple voices on "Family Guy,"
supplied the voice for the animated Robert Loggia.