brendan halpin

I’m kind of obsessed with celebrity second acts. The great majority of people who enter any kind of entertainment field don’t have any measure of success. Most of the people who enjoy success in one field find that success fleeting. Precious few people find success in two different fields. Here are 4!

Michael Blodgett appeared on numerous TV shows in the 60’s and 70’s but is best known to people who are me for playing good-looking sleazebags in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970) and The Velvet Vampire (1971). (Beyond the Valley of the Dolls was written by Roger Ebert and contains some absolutely priceless lines of dialogue as well as one of the best party scenes in all of cinema. It’s also mildly racist and extremely transphobic, so be aware of that if you go looking for it.)

Shortly after appearing on both The Secrets of Isis and Electra Woman and Dyna Girl, he decides he’s done with acting. (Two more cult classic appearances! He is Mr. Cult Cinema and TV!)

So he starts writing! He writes, among other thing, the novel and resulting screenplay for Chuck Norris’ Hero and the Terror. He also wrote the screenplays for Rent-a-Cop, starring Burt and Liza (if you lived through the 70s or 80s, no last names necessary!) and Turner and Hooch, the dog and cop buddy comedy starring Tom Hanks! (Spoiler: the dog dies. Do not watch.)

Telma Hopkins first rose to fame as a member of Tony Orlando and Dawn in the 70’s. She appeared on all but the first album (Dawn was a fiction during the recording of the first album), and sang on nine top-40 singles.

Tony Orlando and Dawn, like literally everyone in the 70’s, had a variety show for a while, and then Telma parlayed that into an acting career. She’s been working steadily ever since. I knew her from Bosom Buddies, but she’s also been a series regular on Gimme a Break!, Family Matters, and Are We There Yet?

Almost nobody hits the top 40 nine times. Almost no actors become series regulars on one series, let alone four!

I dunno if this really counts as a second act, but Ellen Foley had a really interesting career. First, as a singer. She’s best known as the woman singing with Meat Loaf on “Paradise By The Dashboard Light.” (No, that’s not Karla Devito! Karla was on the tour but not the record!)

She also performs lead vocals on the Clash’s “Hitsville UK” as well as backing vocals on “Corner Soul” and “Car Jamming.” I have not looked this up but I am confident saying she is the only musician to record with both Meat Loaf and the Clash. She also provided backing vocals on Blue Oyster Cult’s “Mirrors.” (Not a good song. Not a good album. The first 4 BOC albums plus Fire of Unknown Origin are probably all you need, and if you like those, Imaginos is fun too).

Anyway, my point here is that she features prominently on two wildly different songs by wildly different artists, but that’s probably true of a lot of backing vocalists. But most backing vocalists haven’t then gone on to play the public defender on 2 seasons of Night Court! (see photo, above). Oh yeah, she also released a solo album produced by Mick Jones with a bunch of Strummer/Jones songs you can’t find anywhere else, and she had small roles in signature 80’s movies Tootsie, The King of Comedy, Cocktail, Fatal Attraction, and Married to the Mob.

I first knew her from Night Court and had my mind absolutely blown when I found out she sang Hitsville UK and then subsequently blown again when I found out she sang Paradise by the Dashboard Light. So basically she had a pretty wild ride for 10 years or so! Good for her!

This one should be a book, at least. I know it’s been proposed as a movie a few times. As near as I can tell, there has never been a biography of Sylvia Robinson published, which is a terrible shame because from the little I’ve been able to glean from halfassed online research, hers was a pretty amazing life.

She was born Sylvia Vanderpool and came to public prominence as half of Mickey and Sylvia, who had a hit with “Love is Strange” in 1956. You know, the song with “Sylvia, how do you call your loverboy?” which is referenced in both The New York Dolls’ “Trash” and Lou Reed’s “Beginning of a Great Adventure”?

Then, in 1973, she has an R&B hit as Sylvia with “Pillow Talk.” She takes her Pillow Talk money (I’m just assuming she got ripped off of her “Love is Strange” money since she was a Black recording artist in the 50’s) and starts a record label.

Which goes under, but she starts another one with the help of some shady business partners: Sugar Hill records. Yep. She has the idea for and supervises the recording of “Rapper’s Delight,” thereby making her one of the foundational figures of hip hop. She later pushes Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five to put out a song that reflects the challenges of real life, and this becomes “The Message,” probably the second most influential hip hop song of all time, right after “Rapper’s Delight.” (Both feature dumb homophobia, so if you go seeking them out, be prepared.)

Fun fact: she had the Sugar Hill Records house band play Chic’s “Good Times” as the backing track for “Rapper’s Delight” but didn’t clear it. Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards of Chic sued and wound up with half the royalties from “Rapper’s Delight.” Undeterred, she did the same thing when Melle Mel went to record “White Lines,” only this time the song was an obscure instrumental called “Cavern” by an obscure band called Liquid Liquid. Liquid Liquid sued and won 600k. Sugar Hill records went bankrupt and never paid the judgment.

I haven’t even gotten into the shady business partners! Just an incredibly interesting life with enormous impact on popular music. And nobody’s even written a book about her!