George Morfogen as the head waiter in What’s Up, Doc?, directed by Peter Bogdanovich.
I just learned Morfogen died in early March.
He was one of Peter Bogdanovich’s oldest friends. And great in his much larger role in Bogdanovich’s They All Laughed, doing his back exercises on the floor as he talks to Ben Gazzara, quietly having a nervous breakdown. I love that his arc in They All Laughed basically sums up to: “Infidelity is sometimes okay.”
George Morfogen in “They All Laughed”
When Mitchell and I spoke to Bogdanovich after the screening of They All Laughed, Morfogen’s performance came up, and Mitchell said, “He was the head waiter in What’s Up, Doc” and Bogdanovich had a moment of being truly impressed and taken aback that Mitchell would put it together. I mean, the “Table 1” moment is really his only moment in the movie! Bogdanovich absolutely loved it. So much of what makes life livable and beautiful is REMEMBERING.
George Morfogen’s career involved much more than these two movies, but the memories involved with these two are very precious to me.
RIP.
