NY Times
Style Section
April 27, 1997
Most fans are not as driven as Eve Harrington, the dogged young admirer in "All About Eve" who all but takes over the life of Bette Davis's character in the film. Most simply sign up for a fan club.
And there are thousands to choose from. Fan clubs keep the flame burning for the likes of Elvis and Mr. Ed, Tanya Roberts and Tanya Tucker, Betty Boop and Betty White.
They exalt everything about the honoree, transforming a celebrity-lover's brush with greatness -- an autograph-signing at a stage door, for example, or a particularly poignant scene in a long-forgotten television series -- into something with almost religious connotations.
Most clubs offer a newsletter. A few have Web sites. Some provide a cornucopia of keepsakes, from autographed glossy photographs to full-fledged autobiographies.
"Fan clubs are a way of reaching out and touching someone," said Michael T. Marsden, a dean at Northern Michigan University in Marquette and a specialist in popular culture. "Most fans are intrigued, most fans are maybe even worshipful. They see something larger than themselves."
Not all clubs revolve around the expected. Some are, well, just a bit removed from the mainstream.
"I've been in fandom long enough that I know everything out there has its followers," said Linda Kay, the president of the National Association of Fan Clubs, a clearinghouse in Burbank, Calif., that lists more than 2,000 clubs in its directory. "And what's odd or strange to one person certainly isn't to another."
A half-dozen club organizers explained how it all started....(SKIP to Hexum section)...
He's best known for the CBS-TV series "Cover-Up" and for accidentally killing himself with a prop gun loaded with blanks. He also flexed his muscles opposite Joan Collins in the television movie "The Making of a Male Model." Jon-Erik Hexum has been dead for 13 years now, but his fan club lives on, with 300 members paying $8 a year.
Not even its founder, Alan J. Carell of Portland, Ore., who has 12 filing cabinets jammed with Hexum memorabilia and is working on a Hexum biography, can explain the interest in a beefy actor who was hardly a household name when he was alive and is hardly a cult figure now.
"I don't know how many times I've thought, I've only gotten three or four inquiries last year, maybe I should pull the mentions in the directories," said Mr. Carell, 52, a former military medical instructor. "But than I though, I started this because I thought maybe the guy would vanish, Hollywood being Hollywood, and this guy is worth remembering."
Mr. Carell also collects turn-of-the-century operatic records. "Everybody else is interested in rhythm and blues, but I like things that nobody is bothering with," he said.
Return to the Jon-Erik Hexum Remembrance Page