RIP RENE AUBERJONOIS

Actor RENE AUBERJONOIS has died. In 1980, right after I'd arrived in LA, I was hired by producer Sheldon Renan to cast and dub a Japanese animation TV pilot named "COBRA." I remembered a voice I had heard on a record album, and I thought it would be perfect for the lead character. The record album was a SPIDER-MAN "Rock Comic", an audio dramatization of the Spider-Man character with rock music. We tracked down the young actor who'd played Spider-Man and interviewed him - and that's how I first met René Auberjonois. We ended up not casting him for the part (Sheldon made the decision, with which I disagreed), but, of course, he went on to have a brilliant career in movies and television, and I eventually brought Spider-Man to life on television many years later. But he was the first real actor I met out here in LA and I never forgot him. And I still wish we had cast him in that animation pilot.