It was sad to read of the passing of a terrific character actor, Charles Durning, on December 24 at the age of eighty nine. But it was surprising and profoundly moving too because to read the obituaries of Durningâ??s life is to realize that his greatest accomplishments had little to do with the reason for his prominence, namely his fame as an actor.
Indeed, to read about Durning is to understand just how important his life was in spite of his acting, not because of it. His story is one of survival, hard work, and service to country.
Durning was fortunate to survive his childhood first of all. As the ninth of ten children, five of whom died of scarlet fever and small pox, reaching adulthood was no guarantee. After the death of his father when he was a teenager, Durning up and left his family in order to relieve his mother of the burden of one more mouth to feed.
To earn a living he worked as a farmhand and as the usher at a burlesque show, which is where he got bitten by the performing bug. But his acting career was still some two decades away.
Having lost his father to illness incurred while fighting in World War I, perhaps it was no surprise that Durning would enlist to fight in World War II. But the mere description of his experiences seems more likely to have come out of a war-movie script than real life.
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