There is a man that is so over the top, so larger than life, his very existence is often questioned. He does however, exist. And I somehow got him to agree to be my next guest blogger. Where did we go wrong America that a man like Mark Ruffulo is considered a heart throb? The guy looks like he’d be bed-ridden for days due to a hangnail. At one time America wanted its movie stars to have that shoot first, drink a beer, and say to hell with asking questions later and because the post written by my last guest blogger went over so well, I decided to continue with the theme and have yet another action star give us some of his thoughts about wine. Only in this case instead of a bone breaking martial artist I went with an unapologetic All-American American guy. This gentleman never needed to learn martial arts. His slick mouth and holier than thou mustache has gotten him through the “hairiest” of situations.
Am I speaking of Tom Selleck? Shit no. I’m talking about the mother-fucking bandit himself, Burt Reynolds. What you probably know is that he spends most of his time wearing Neoprene vests and destroying our U.S. interstates with his Trans Am but what you may not have known is that Mr. Reynolds is also a very knowledgeable wine appreciator. Because his birthday is coming up I thought it’d be a good time to get him to give us a few of his thoughts on what wine has done for him in his life. So without further introduction, and on his birthday, I give you Sir Dr. Burt Reynolds.
Wine? Yeah, I’ve been known to drink it. I’ve also been known to snort copious amounts of blow from the ass crack of a shaven donkey. I don’t see anyone wanting me to write about that. I could write about that kind of stuff forever. Or how about the time I powdered a dozen donuts with a half ounce of Molly? I seriously thought I was Lee Majors for almost a week. Not Lee Majors as in his character from The Six Million Dollar Man, but the actual Lee Majors. The guy was unbreakable man. I once saw him nose dive into an empty swimming pool. When he finally came to he screamed “water’s for assholes” and began doing a butterfly stroke across naked concrete. That’s a fucking man if you ask me. Is he still alive? Anyone know? Well if he is dead I bet a syringe, a .38 Special loaded with blanks, a boombox playing a Sinatra tape, his lawyer, and a small Thai boy were all in the room when it happened.
Why does Burt Reynolds like wine? Well, it tastes good, it makes food taste better, it gets stuck in my mustache and provides a little surprise libation later on in the day and most of all, chicks love it.
But I digress. I was asked by the guy who runs this electropage to give some thoughts about some of my favorite pairings. I’m assuming he means pairing wine with food but I only eat two things, jerky (be it beef, rattlesnake, caribou, dog, turkey, honey badger, meerkat, horse, earthworm, nutria, or marmoset) and ice cream sandwiches. It’d get pretty boring talking about the few wines that pair with those food products so instead I’m going to discuss wine pairings with things in my life that I enjoy. Life moment wine pairings, which some may say is a fairly conceptual undertaking. Others may be surprised I even know the word conceptual.
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| I'm the one in front. |
I may as well begin with the most obvious pairing. The 1978 Pontiac Trans Am 10th Anniversary Edition that was featured in the movie Smokey and Bandit 1-23 and Screaming Eagle Cabernet. Any vintage of Screaming Eagle will do but the most important part of this pairing is that you enjoy it while hauling ass through Texas at unheard of speeds while an entire troop of interstate patrol cars chases you down. The adrenaline coursing through your veins, the scream of multiple sirens, the roar of the 1 mile per gallon guzzling 6.6 Liter engine, and the unreal tannins from the cabernet all marry well into a perfect symphony causing every synapse in your brain to simultaneously explode. Sure oysters and Gewertraminer are good, but they’re far from that good.
You no doubt remember my role of Lewis Medlock in the movie Deliverance. I remember it like it was yesterday. It was easily the longest I’ve ever had to go without a mustache because not long after that I filmed White Lightning, which I’ll get to in a moment. My mustache is where I derive most of my supernatural powers. In Deliverance it didn’t make too much of a difference because I was allowed to wear a sleeveless neoprene vest during most of the filming of that movie. If the mustache is my number one power animal than the sleeveless neoprene vest takes second place hands down. To get to the pairing I have to remind you all that there is a scene where the actor Ned Beatty gets his manginity taken from him by a couple of ne’er-do-well backwoods types. Ned wasn’t very excited about doing the scene and what it may do to his career so at the time the director promised him an entire case of 1964 DRC which was epic even at that time. Ned agreed to the trade and did the deed and the rest is history. When Boorman (the director) got Ned that case of wine I had him pick me one up as well.
Bottom line is, Ned Beatty’s a complete asshole. He always has been and always will be. You’re probably saying to yourself, “how could a guy that's always as nice as Ned Beatty is in his roles be an asshole?” Believe me, the guy would kick his own mother in the shin for half a cigarette if she hadn’t already abandoned him when he was seven. One of my favorite pairings to date includes pulling one of those bottles of DRC from my cellar, popping the BluRay of Deliverance into the player, and watching that infamous rape scene on loop over and over again as I drink that entire bottle, finishing off the last drop as Ned’s bare ass is seen scurrying up that hill for his life. Fuck that guy.
For my third and final pairing I’m really just throwing a guess out there. You remember the movie White Lightning? Yeah, neither do I. Apparently I played a guy name Gator and believe it or not that dickhole Beatty is in that movie as well and surprise surprise, he plays an asshole. The guy was born for the character. He played a cop and I played a guy that was running from him while trying to expose him of being on the take from moonshiners. I learned all this on Wikipedia mind you because I don’t remember a damn bit of it, which is why it led to such a great pairing. The movie took place in Arkansas and that’s where we filmed most of it because the extras are more authentic…and cheap. Toothlessness is rampant and “redneck” make-up wasn’t needed at all. That much I remember. The rest of my memory is hazy though because of my consumption of the number one cash drop in Arkansas. Pot. I then mixed that cash crop with their number two cash crop, moonshine. Boom, kick assed pairing and a good three months of my life are completely gone. But in a good way. From what I’m told I insisted everyone call me Gator even off camera presumably in the interest of remaining in character but it was probably because Gator is a kick-assed name and this was the seventies. Nuff said.
Hope you enjoyed my stories folks. If I can leave you with one more piece of advice…sex while wearing a bolo tie isn’t as cool as it sounds. Good night.
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| Now a fragrance called Musk of Badass. |
(I’d like to thank my fellow wine nerd Barb for giving me the idea for this post. Hope you’ve enjoyed it.)