Who? You may ask. Tisk! Tisk! Perhaps you may remember him better as The Penguin from the 1960's Batman tv series? That's right. The Penguin. One of Batman's greatest enemies, Burgess Meredith appeared in 21 episodes. Not bad considering the show only went for 120 episodes in total. But lets not forget, he also appeared in the 1966 Batman movie, alongside The Joker, The Riddler and Catwoman, which shows you not only how popular the tv show was, but also how popular his character was.
Is that it? Definately not! Prior to his days as The Penguin, Burgess Meredith appeared in various episodes of The Twilight Zone, and Rawhide (amongst other Westerns). In fact, Burgess had a fairly extensive acting career, even after his breakout role as The Penguin ended.
But it wasn't until 1976 when he was cast as trainer Mickey Goldmill in Rocky alongside Sylvester Stallone that Burgess Meredith found his next big role. He continued the role in the subsequent sequels, up until 1990's Rocky V (that's the fifth one).
Is that it? No! Burgess Meredith also appeared as Grandpa Gustafson, alongside veterens Walther Matthau and Jack Lemmon in the 1993 movie Grumpy Old Men, and the 1995 sequel Grumpier Old Men.
Had Burgess Meredith not died in1997 I'm sure he would've appeared in many more movies.
Now, onto the autograph. As a teenager my brother and I used to collect comics from our local comic book retailer (in Ringwood, VIC Australia). We became friendly with the owner of the shop who was intrigued by our autograph collections. Then one day, he gave me this little gem, a Batman trading card which he had signed by the one and only Burgess Meredith. Golden!
Thanks Ian! Until next time...
