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16. Another Flight to the North

"I don't feel quite natural around these here parts. I'm goin' back to Skunk Holler where I can be just plain Superman!"

That's what Sylvester J. Superman said on his return from Alaska. The best laid plans of mice and hicks! Sylvester didn't get to go home immediately. First, he had to perform again across town.

I'm not sure how it happened. We'd planned on doing our live adaptation of the Adventures of Superman episode, Flight to the North, only once. Somehow we received an invitation to take our act on the road, i.e., to perform in another church. Actually, this was another new church in Kent. At the time, they met in the coffee shop of a local motel. I've forgotten the pastor's name. He and I used to get together from time to time.

Well, I was up for it. Thankfully, it didn't take much arm twisting to get the rest of our cast members to reprise their roles. The only exception was my daughter, Ruth, who'd played Lois Lane. For some reason, she was unable to do it again. Lois had only a few lines, but her presence served to advance the plot. How did we get around this problem? Elementary, my dear Watson. We traded Lois for Jimmy Olsen! My son Alex had a good friend in the other congregation who quickly agreed to play the role. And the show went on.

The logistics were a little different in the coffee shop. For one thing, our audience sat at tables (just as they did in their informal worship). We had a bit less room up front in which to perform. On the plus side, however, we could enter and exit through an actual door instead of a curtain. We got no opportunity to rehearse there, but our blocking had been tight to start with so lack of space wasn't a real problem.

We changed the beginning of the show. Rather than making my initial appearance in "Look! Up in the sky!" fashion above the crowd, I came on in my Kent clothes and gave an introduction. As our sound man played the familiar theme, I pulled open my shirt to reveal the famous S. Then I went "backstage." The variation saved time in changing costumes. All I needed to do was re-button my shirt, tighten my tie, and put my glasses back on. I quickly reappeared as Kent to confront the larcenous Leftover Louie.

The rest of the play was pretty much a replay of what we'd done at Kids-Play (the day care center where our church met). The cast performed well, the props worked, and the stunts - if not spectacular - didn't embarrass us. What's more, in contrast to our last audience, I can remember this group laughing at the funny lines. Everybody had a good time. I'm only sorry we had no pie after this one.

So, at long last, I'd fulfilled my life's ambition and had become Superman. At least, I'd joined the ranks of those who had performed in those colors. I had played him not once but twice. I'd appeared, in classic open-shirted, S-revealed mode, in a couple newspapers, one quite prominent. I'd lived my dream. How did it feel?

As somebody has famously said, "Be careful what you wish for. You might get it." Let me tell you what I learned about playing Superman.

1. It's work. Some people roll their eyes at the costume. Having worn it, I have nothing but respect for anybody else who has. I remember the late Gene Siskel's review of Superman: The Movie. In it, he praised Chris Reeve's performance, saying, "He makes you forget he's wearing that silly costume." Apart from looking silly to some, that costume presents other problems. For one thing, if one is going to wear form-fitting clothing, one really should look to one's bulges. And I'm not just talking about your tummy. A couple years later, I wore the suit for some children and one boy couldn't keep his eyes off my crotch. He said, "Don't you have underwear on?" Yes, I had on underwear, but I'd stupidly forgotten that which, thankfully, I'd had sense enough to wear before - an athletic supporter!

Thankfully, there are "pockets" available in which to store troublesome appendages. And speaking of pockets, as I moved about in the costume, I sometimes heretically wished that Siegel and Shuster had thought to include them in their original design. If you've ever played Superman, sooner or later you've had to ask yourself one simple question: Where do I put my hands? I always thought Dean Cain looked a bit uncomfortable in his uniform because he didn't seem to know what to do with his hands. (He could've hooked his thumbs in his belt, I guess, but somehow I doubt that would've inspired the necessary awe.) He usually stood around with his arms folded. Obviously, the man needed some pockets to stuff his hands in while he pondered Lois' latest outrage. All actors who play the role must deal with the same wardrobe. Some make it look easier than others. Obviously, though, like those boots made for walkin,' this suit was made to act in, not stand around in. Superman's not a philosopher; he's a real hands-on kind of guy.

Though he's a man of action, the canon of Super-scripture strongly implies that he needn't work out to maintain either his strength or his physique. In the real world, of course, this isn't true (unless you count the 1950s when George Reeves worked in a Hollywood where he-men lifted bottles not barbells). I'd considered wearing a costume with sewn-in muscles, then discarded the idea. Fortunately, I'd been exercising and had been keeping my weight down. That wasn't always the case. Just a few years before, if I had attempted to play "more powerful than a locomotive," from certain angles I would've looked heavier than a locomotive! I didn't have to work any harder to look decent in the part, but I gained a greater appreciation for actors who go from the buffet on one set to the gym on another - and stay there.

2. It's limiting. I mean from an acting standpoint. Let's face it; our hero never gets the best lines. Flight to the North is a delightful episode of the old TV series, but not on account of its hero! A desk clerk, who appears in three scenes, gets the funniest - consequently, the more memorable - stuff to say! The rule applied throughout The Adventures of Superman's seven-year run. Sure, I can remember lots of things George Reeves said as Superman, but it's Perry White's dialogue I relish: "Kent, I spend half my life attempting to keep track of you, Lois, or young Olsen. I spend the second half regretting that I spent the first half attempting to keep track of you!" What's more, John Hamilton, who was born to play the character, got to portray a whole range of emotions - everything from fatherly concern to apoplectic rage. He's the sidekick in the westerns who "does the dance," i.e., the dance of frustration denied the stalwart hero. He's also the character with whom we identify.

The limited range of the Superman role doesn't apply simply to black-and-white TV. Witness the latest big screen portrayal, Superman Returns. In it, Brandon Routh got, what, six lines? At least, that's the way it seemed.

But, then, as mentioned above, Superman's a doer, not a talker. If he were more of the latter, he'd be less of a doer - easier to identify with, but less a hero. Thus, writers' attempts to humanize Superman are problematic at best, misguided at worst. It's not just because he's an alien. It's because he's less a character than an archetype. Arguably, like the Tarzan, like the Lone Ranger, like the notion of the Hero itself, Superman functions best when he talks least. In any event, Superman represents a real challenge for an actor - and not just because he wears tights.

3. It's embarrassing. I didn't exactly become famous after my stint as the Man of Steel - except at the bank. There was a lady teller there who plastered my Akron Beacon Journal photo on the partition by her work station. It stayed up there for weeks. I couldn't walk in without her greeting me with, "Hi, Superman!" That wasn't so bad. If only she hadn't followed up, each time I came in, by bringing a different lady over to inspect me.

"This is him!"

Blank look.

"Look at the picture! It's Superman! He's Superman!"

"Oh! Well, that's very - nice. Nice to meet you, uh, Superman."

I'm not sure why, but I started to get a bit anxious about this. I wasn't annoyed with her. I found the woman's delight endearing. Nevertheless, for some reason, it bothered me to be pointed out as Superman. As the hillbilly version would say, I didn't feel quite natural round these here parts! Maybe it's because I knew I wasn't nor ever would be the Man of Steel. They may look like regular sized red boots, but they are impossibly big shoes to fill.

On the bright side, though, nobody ever attempted to rob the bank while I was there!

4. He's not me. As I've reflected on the Flight to the North experience, I've thought about our modern American insistence on mixing the real with the fictional. You see it in the blending of news and entertainment; it's getting so you can hardly tell the two apart. The principle also applies to the pen-and-ink creation called Superman and the men who've portrayed him. That fusion of myth and reality first displayed itself in 1959 when headlines screamed, SUPERMAN KILLS SELF. We saw the phenomenon again when Christopher Reeve died. People had a hard time disassociating the actor from his role. Kenny Rogers' song, The Last Ten Years, captures that cognitive dissonance with its sad refrain, "We even lost Superman." I don't know where he got his idea for that one, but Kenny might just as well have been talking to a certain bank teller in Stow, Ohio.

I began to understand the actor's fear of typecasting, which is, after all, the fear of not being appreciated for oneself: I'm a real person who achieves things under my own power, not at the end of somebody else's cables in front of somebody else's blue screen. Granted, I experienced this on a very small scale, but experience it I did. And the experience helped me realize something. Slowly, I was beginning to see that my lifelong ambition to be Superman was really my desire for personal significance.

I'll say more about that when I conclude my story (Just three more chapters. Tell your friends!). For now, I'll just say that, though this wasn't the last time I wore the colors, it was certainly the most enlightening.

Don't Miss the Next Thrill-Packed Episode: The Woman Who Hated Superman.

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Superman on Earth

16. Another Flight to the North

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