Penny Marshall died yesterday at the age of 75. A Bronx native, she began as an actress on the TV show Laverne and Shirley before becoming a movie director of such classics as Big, A League of Their Own, and Awakenings.
Big and Awakenings are both great NYC movies, although they couldn't be more different.
Big is a magical-realist comedy about a boy who becomes a man after getting his wish granted by a genie. It's most famous moment is when Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia dance and play "Chopsticks" on the big piano at FAO Schwartz.
Awakenings, on the other hand, is a very realistic drama based on the true story of Oliver Sacks, and the patients he treated at a hospital in the Bronx. Starring Robert De Niro and Robin Williams, it's a beautiful and tragic story of bare humanity and dashed hope. It's one of the most affecting movies I've ever seen.
Penny Marshall was a trailblazing talent who will be sorely missed.
P.S. Today is the 20th anniversary of another Tom Hanks NYC classic -- You've Got Mail, an ode to the Upper West Side. It's a fun, fluffy movie on the one hand but, on the other, it's a prescient story about gentrification -- an old fashioned movie that was way ahead of its time.
P.P.S. Apropos of nothing, did you know that Howard Stern made his movie debut in 1986 in a horrible and otherwise totally forgotten movie called Ryder PI? I've never seen it but, I'm just guessing, he's probably the only good thing in it!
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