{"id":59098,"date":"2024-09-06T17:04:56","date_gmt":"2024-09-06T17:04:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/?p=59098"},"modified":"2024-09-06T17:04:56","modified_gmt":"2024-09-06T17:04:56","slug":"r-i-p-james-darren-r-i-p","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/r-i-p-james-darren-r-i-p\/","title":{"rendered":"R.I.P.: JAMES DARREN, R.I.P."},"content":{"rendered":"

JAMES DARREN, R.I.P.<\/h1>\n

I feel that a piece of all of our childhoods\/teenage-hoods died earlier this week when film and television star James Darren passed away.<\/p>\n

\"James<\/a>

James Darren and Deborah Walley as Moondoggie and Gidget in Gidget Goes Hawaiian.<\/p><\/div>\n

My perennial favorite movie, throughout my entire life, is Gidget Goes Hawaiian<\/em>. I\u2019ve watched it many a time, and can even recite many of the lines from it. (I\u2019ve never seen any of the other Gidget<\/em>s\u2014just this one.)<\/p>\n

So some years ago, when Mr. X was being directed in a television movie by Gidget\u2019s gorgeous boyfriend, \u201cMoondoggie\u201d\u2014James Darren, of course\u2014I knew I had to visit the set in hopes of being introduced to him. (Mr. X did<\/em> invite me there, but he hates to intrude on anyone, especially in a professional situation, so there was no guarantee of the private meet-and-greet with Mr. Darren.)<\/p>\n

At that point in time, Gidget<\/em> was years behind him, (but never me<\/em>,) so I was a bit apprehensive about mentioning my love of that film to someone who had gone so far beyond it. But happily for me, Mr. X had apprised his director about my obsession before I arrived, and James was totally fine with it. He actually even seemed amused by it.<\/p>\n

After all those years of rooting for him as Moondoggie, I was so happy to see that James Darren was lovely to me. He even invited me to hang around and watch them filming.<\/p>\n

\"James<\/a>

James Darren recently.<\/p><\/div>\n

The only thing I regret about that day is not asking for a picture together. But this happened many years before selfies. And more importantly, he and Mr. X were working\u2014I was just interloping. I have a feeling he would have very pleasantly accommodated me, but even with a cell phone camera, I would never have imposed on James. (Or on anyone<\/em>!)<\/p>\n

But I have never forgotten that meeting. He was many years on from being Moondoggie, but James Darren was still one beautiful man.<\/p>\n

I hope that seeing so many tributes to him now has been warming the hearts of his loved ones. I\u2019m so happy that James leaves a plethora of filmed works so that future generations can have the fun of watching him that many of us have had for decades. You know that I<\/em> will be re-watching Gidget Goes Hawaiian<\/em> for the umpteenth time this week, and seeing him in all his handsome glory!<\/p>\n

R.I.P., James Darren<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JAMES DARREN, R.I.P. I feel that a piece of all of our childhoods\/teenage-hoods died earlier this week when film and television star James Darren passed away. My perennial favorite movie, throughout my entire life, is Gidget Goes Hawaiian. I\u2019ve watched it many a time, and can even recite many of the lines from it. (I\u2019ve<\/p>\n

Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":59097,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-59098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-r-i-p"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59098"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59105,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59098\/revisions\/59105"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/itsnotaboutme.tv\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}