Chicagoist Staff Remembers Roger Ebert
By Staff in Arts & Entertainment on Apr 5, 2013 6:30PM
Chicago lost one of its best writers on Thursday. Roger Ebert ranks among Chicago's most influential writers, with the likes of Mike Royko, Studs Terkel and Nelson Algren. We mourn his loss with the rest of Chicago, and so we'd like to share with you our memories and tributes.
Steven Pate
Roger Ebert was a writer. He was not merely the first film critic to win a Pulitzer, not only the author of 20 books, not just a prolific reviewer and an astonishingly effective blogger. He was consumed by his vocation as writer, in the deepest sense: he made parts of his own interior life available to other people in ways that enriched them. His natural abilities belied the difficulties the his task as critic--communicating his enthusiasms clearly, honestly, and without pretense, but once the medium of television showcased those and other talents to the world, he grew to be much more than an arbiter of taste. He lived up to his status as an icon and household name by writing more, growing more, sharing more. "Siskel and Ebert at the Movies" is probably the first criticism of any kind that I can recall, but it was not until I read his reviews and columns that I discovered how much more there was to the man, and indeed to the being a critic, than a binary endorsement or rejection.
By the time I was fortunate enough to shake his hand, it was quite clear he was not just the possessor of a famous thumb, and that what he achieved was only incidentally about movies. Having already accomplished more than any critic should ever dream to, he made the most of a second, more challenging act. His courage and dignity while facing down the ravages of cancer inspired us all anew. To read his writing in these recent years was to encounter an unflinching writer at the top of his game, attuned to life and eager to share. No matter the subject, Ebert the writer was everything I took Ebert the person to be: tireless, generous, unpretentious, curious, fair, and very smart. “When I am writing," Ebert told Esquire's Chris Jones, "my problems become invisible, and I am the same person I always was. All is well. I am as I should be.” Roger Ebert never wanted us to feel sorry for him in life, and we should not feel sorry either for him or for ourselves because of his passing. Instead celebrate his rich life by enjoying something he has given all of us to keep forever, something which will outlast even our memories of the man himself, his words.
Rob Christopher
I certainly would not have even dreamed of writing about movies, let alone writing a whole book about movies, if I hadn’t grown up reading Leonard Maltin’s movie guides and watching Siskel & Ebert on TV. When I agreed with Ebert, which was fairly often, I would get all excited just sitting there watching the show, wishing I could join in that conversation on the balcony. Of course I felt the same way when he would pan a movie I really liked--I wanted to jump right in and tell him how wrong he was. His dismissal of David Lynch always irritated me. In fact I was so full of myself when I was 21 that I actually emailed him, chewing him out for dumping on Lost HIghway: wp.me/pymbF-13H
Many years later I posted an anecdote about Gene Siskel that Barry Gifford related to me and it was a genuine thrill to see Ebert retweet it. The city of Chicago has lost a great champion with his passing. The fact that he stayed in Chicago all these years, rejecting the siren songs of NYC and LA when it would have been so easy to move on, proves his loyalty to this cockeyed caravan of a city.
Lastly: FUCK YOU Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for not giving Ebert the Oscar he so richly deserved.
Chuck Sudo
The aspect of Roger Ebert's writing that most appealed to me was how effortless he made it seem as if the reader was entering a conversation. I read somewhere once that he wrote to capture the spirit of intelligent cocktail party banter, so a reader could feel like he was entering in the middle of discussion and chime right in. After Mr. Ebert lost his ability to speak and his writing became his primary (only?) form of communication, it took on a razor sharpness with not a syllable wasted. This was his greatest gift: To write with such economy, intimacy and impact. I'll miss it greatly but, like others, am happy he left behind so many examples of his writing.
Jim Kopeny
When I met Roger Ebert: My dad was in the army with Gene Siskel, so they knew each other, somewhat. My connection was with Roger Ebert. I knew him as the dour other half whose thumb pointed downward more often than upward when it came to movies I liked as a kid. But our tastes converged when it came to Pink Floyd's The Wall. So it's weird that this week sees both the first time I've ever watched The Wall on a big screen and the passing of Ebert, just a little while ago.
I was a Pink Floyd NUT near the final years of high school, so when I learned Alan Parker, director of The Wall, was coming to town I immediately secured tickets to see him speak. The evening's interviewer / moderator was Ebert. And it was during that session I discovered Ebert was incredibly intelligent and asked questions I would have never thought of in order to secure answers I appreciated even more. Afterward I got Parker to sign a book of mine about Pink Floyd, in the chapter about The Wall. But then I walked over to Ebert to tell him what a good job he did, a compliment he took graciously. That was over twenty years ago and despite my time in the Chicago media scene our paths never crossed again. I never really regretted that until just now, figuring it was just a matter of time until I saw him again.
Goodbye, Roger.
RELATED: This latest turn in his health, when it was announced a few days ago, reminded me of the Thumbs Up Roger project Chicagoist did years ago during his initial health problems. It was always reassuring to see just how many people were pulling for him.
Jon Graef
Roger Ebert first made me cry when I was a child. Not because I met him and he did something cartoonishly evil, like tell me there was no Santa Claus, or beat me up for my lunch money. Don’t get nervous. No, this offense was committed through television. Specifically, his movie review program, Siskel & Ebert, which was a popular half-hour criticism and film discussion that my parents, and I depending on what movie they would review, would watch. He, along with his co-host Gene Siskel had the temerity - indeed, the gall! - to pan what was once one of my favorite films as a child: The Adventures of Milo and Otis; no doubt a timeless piece of cinematic wonder that holds up to post- No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood-influenced adult eyes. Milo & Otis, an "animals go on the road" movie narrated by Dudley Moore, received a negative review, which made me, as a child totally capable of controlled rational thought and feeling, cry. My mother, bemused, asked me what was wrong. I replied that my precious Milo & Otis was panned by the bad men! My mother then patiently explained to me that those were just their opinions, and that I could disagree with them so long as I was respectful about it. A profound life lesson I carry with me to this day (or at least try to). Funny thing: I kept watching. And I watched some more. Then, I read Siskel and Ebert's separate, respective columns in the Tribune and Sun-Times as I got older. As print turned to web, I followed their voices there. And then, as the web turned into web 2.0, sometime after Siskel died, I followed Ebert on Twitter. Simply put, I would have neither an interest in movies, nor in criticism or reporting, without him, and I wouldn't be on the lifepath I am now without him. Some of his opinions over the years infuriated me (four stars for Knowing? three for the Adam Sandler remake of The Longest Yard?), especially as a horror and science fiction fan. But others thrilled me, such as his four star write-ups of Dark City and 2002's supremely underrated Frankenstein update May. Let's also not forget that Siskel and Ebert's championing of Halloween made that film what it is today. And so, some twenty-odd years after Milo & Otis, by virtue of his gut-wrenching passing, Roger Ebert has made me cry for a second time. The balcony may now, forever, closed, but film criticism lives on, and it is solely because of his efforts that it does, and that I am writing this now today. Roger shall be missed dearly.