Phil Hartman was turned down for TPIR

[Matt Ottinger]

Monday, A&E aired a Biography of the late comic actor Phil Hartman.  In talking about struggles he had in the mid-80s, they mention briefly that he had auditioned to be the announcer on TPIR.  Presumably this was in the period after Johnny died.  Obviously, he never got as far as an on-air audition, but it does create all sorts of fascinating "what if?" scenarios.

[DrBear]

"Hi, I'm Troy McClure. You might remember me from such game shows as...."

*sigh* what Phil would be doing with this year's elections on SNL ... probably doing BOTH Bush and Kerry.

Or, for that matter, to get back to game shows, he could have done a week of H2 as a variety of different people - Sinatra, Clinton, some of his own characters...

[JasonA1]

I noticed in an open to the "Pop and Rocker Game" he had a few inflections that sounded like he was doing a Rod Roddy impression. His enthusiasm and reading on that show was worthy of TPIR, IMHO. It's too bad he didn't make it to an on-air audition.

-Jason