In the wake of Splash- a surprise hit comedy abut a fruit peddler and a mermaid- Hollywood has finally discovered John Candy. The movie came from Touchstone, a new division of the Disney studio, and Touchstone has big plans for Candy, who before now was best known as an alumnus of SCTV. Not that he's an overnight sensation. Candy has been in about 20 movies, including 1941 and The Blues Brothers, with Candy's friend, the late John Belushi.  Some of Candy's pictures have been nightmare experiences, such as last year's Going 
Berserk, and Candy had learned to be wary. When director Ron Howard sent him the script of Splash, Candy wanted to play the lunatic villain ( the part eventually went to another SCTV regular, Eugene Levy). But Howard talked Candy into playing Freddy, the hero's brother, and Candy turned a straight man into a wise cracking, high-living ! cartoon. Candy shrugs off his great review: "It wasn't Willy Loman or King Lear. People said, 'Wow, you can 
really act.' Hell, I was just doing what I've been doing for years on SCTV." 

Candy is now about to get the kind of freedom in Hollywood he's always wanted. He's working on the film Brewster's Millions and has a development deal with Touchstone which allows him to create and control his own projects. Still, Candy isn't hanging out at Malibu. He prefers living at his 20-acre farm near Newmarket with his family. " I've lived in L.A. and I know I will again. But I'm like a salmon. I'm a cheap Maple Leaf fan, and I always like to come back."

(taken from Toronto Life October, 1984 ed.)

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P.S : Many thanks, April