I
was so sorry to learn that the marvelous actor
Herbert Lom
(born Herbert
Karel Angelo Kuchacevič ze Schluderpacheru in
Prague in 1917) passed away, but reading his son Alec's comments in the
obituary and refreshing my memory about Lom's life and career this morning was
both fascinating and uplifting.
I've always loved Herbert Lom's performance in The Lady Killers, which
I believe was his
first pairing with Peter Sellers, preceding their Pink Panther partnership by a
decade.
But I was really interested to read Lom's comments about Sellers and the reasons for his
terrible, tragic relations with his children. They seem exceptionally insightful and
certainly aspects of behavior I can recognize in parts of my own life:
"Peter [Sellers] was always a mixed-up guy, a childish fellow. But if you're fond of
children, you're also fond of childish men. He was always very
helpful to me. After he was famous, and when I was still in trouble with the US
embassy, he wrote a letter in
support of me which was magnificent. But it is true that he was very
cruel to his children. He was so hurt
by the way children treat you when you're their father. I have
been hurt by my children. But he was not in possession of a proper brain when it came to these
things."
Requiescat in pace.
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