Today, we look at how a news story in 1985 on Paul Thomas Anderson’s father featured the future acclaimed film maker hooping it up in the backyard.
This is “The Past Was Close Behind,” a feature that spotlights moments, exchanges, etc. from older pop culture works that take on a brand new light when viewed in concert with later pop culture works or events. Basically, stuff that looks hilarious (or interesting) in hindsight.
Paul Thomas Anderson, the film director who has been nominated for 11 Academy Awards in his career (and counting) without ever winning one (yet. His new film, One Battle After Another, is already garnering a good deal of award buzz), is the son of the late Ernie Anderson, a famed voiceover actor who is best known for being the voice of ABC from the late 1970s through the mid 1990s (in Cleveland, Anderson is also beloved for playing the local horror TV movie host, Ghoulardi).
In 1985, the Baltimore local TV station, WJZ-TV, did a news story on Anderson, and amusingly, for some reason, there’s a sequence with the then 61-year-old Anderson playing basketball with his teenage son, Paul…
It’s not a big deal, it’s just fascinating to see such an iconic filmmaker as a teen playing basketball with his dad.
Okay, folks, if you have any suggestions for a future The Past Was Close Behind, drop me a line at brian@poprefs.com!
