RIP Jeff Conaway

Actor Jeff Conaway passed away this morning after a long hospitalization. He was just 60 years old. After having early success on television with a role in Taxi, and on Broadway and film as Kenickie in Grease, Conaway saw the promise of success go away as he spent way more time chasing his demons than his career.



Conaway first played Kenickie as a replacement on Broadway, garnering strong reviews for his performance. He once again played the role when the 1978 movie was brought to the silver screen, but the character's big song, Greased Lightnin', was taken away and given to Danny Zuko, played by mega-star John Travolta. This left the Kenickie role pretty much as comic fodder in the movie.





He appeared in the television hit Taxi, playing Bobby Wheeler, the beautiful-but-not-so-bright actor/taxi driver. The show was smart and funny, with an escellent cast that included Judd Hirsch, Danny DeVito, Marilu Henner, Tony Danza, Christopher Lloyd, Andy Kaufman, and Carol Kane. He started working on the show just after filming Grease, and stayed with it until he was fired in 1982. It was said that his demons were already haunting him at this point. Hopefully now he will find some peace.

Str8 Boys Need Love Too - Ace Young

Photos by me from Binghamton, NY, Washington DC & Uncasville, CT

My appreciation of Ace Young has been documented by my driving 6 hours to catch him performing live, seeing him a couple of times playing Kenickie in Grease on Broadway last fall/winter. It was about a year ago Ace released his first self-titled CD, with a release party at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut. It was produced by Desmond Child, the musical genius. It is a pretty good freshman offering, but established no traction with resistance from radio to play non-studio songs. There were some select combo CD/DVDs for sale, with the first video and some behind-the-scenes footage. That footage included scenes of a shirtless Ace working out to get ready for a shirtless photoshoot. That alone could be worth the price of admission.

Screencaps from the Behind The Scenes DVD

Well, the fanworld of Mr. Young was thrown in a tizzy recently when he announced his engagement to Allison Fischer, whom he met during the stint in Grease. I wish them the best of luck, and hope we get to see and hear much more from the both of them. Until then, this is the video for Addicted from his eponymous CD. It is a song I still love.

Ace Young Addicted Video Premiere

You can listen to more of Ace's music on his MySpace, buy the CD from iTunes and most other retail and online stores, but I think the CD/DVD package can only be purchased in Target.