LOU RAWLS

I read that Lou Rawls left earth today.

When I had first come to Los Angeles,
I worked with him.
It was my first lead role.
I played a confused poet,
and he played my angel
in a film I adore called,
"The Price Of Kissing".

Lou sang everything.
He'd repeat what someone said as a song.
He would be told,
"We have to go to set now."
And Lou would head that way singing...
"Weeeeee.... have to Goooo to the set...
Now... Oh yeah, to the set now..."
in his unmistakable, unbelievable
Lou Rawls voice.

Lou had fans everywhere.
If he was spotted on the set while we were filming,
there were always autograph requests.
Lou would oblige in his constant stroll.
We'd be walking down the sidewalk,
and he'd sign a bunch of stuff,
make people's day,
and never miss a beat.

Lou had alot going on.
I asked him once how he handled everything.
Lou Said,
"Just keep on movin',
Juuuuuust Keeeeep On Movin', Ooooh yeah...".
He was so nice to me.
I was new and trying to learn everything
and asked him a million questions.

The night after we finished filming,
Lou was playing the blue's festival
about 2 hours away.
Me and my other cast mates and
some of the crew all piled into
a huge Suburban and went with him.

Instead of our intimate little set
we had been on for weeks together,
we were now with Lou and a
billion people.
Lou was the same Lou,
with the same stroll,
and now hundreds of people calling out
to him everywhere.
It was really fun and funny to watch.

In the film,
it was Lou who spoke two of my
favorite lines
(in a film that had so many well written
lines, courtesy of writer, Vince DiPersio).
One was:
"Passion in the space between wanting something
and getting it"
the other was,
"It's not the people you throw down with
that you hold close,
It's the people
who LOVED YOU."
(In which Lou ad-libbed right after,
which he always ad-libbed,
"You turkeys aren't listening to what
I'm saying, I'm getting out of here"
and left the scene).
He also added his signature,
"Yeah Buddy", to almost every line
he said while we were shooting,
which always made me smile.

So Lou,
thanks for being so nice to me,
and I try and never forget ...

To Juuuuuust Keeeeep On Movin'.
Ooooh Yeah.

R.I.P.




Lou, Me, Jenn and Rela
(they were the beautiful Hair and Make-Up godesses)