· Image Search

We have already used this space to sing the praises of Christopher McDonald, our "Hey! It's That Game Show Host, TV Weatherman, or Jerk, Rich or Otherwise!" And we still maintain that his talents are second to none. But, let's face it: he's starting to get on in years, and he's not going to live forever, which is why it's comforting to know we have Craig Bierko standing by, just waiting to step into McDonald's shoes.

Like McDonald, Bierko's niche involves both corniness and smarm: a sort of earnest insincerity. In McDonald, the role that best exemplifies this attitude is Jack Barry in Quiz Show. For Bierko, it's his performance in the title role of The Music Man, in which con man "Prof." Harold Hill must win over the entire town of River City by acting like the most fast-talking smoothie of an old-fashioned reactionary (raging against such illicit youth activities as -- gasp! -- pool!). Like McDonald, Bierko sells his corny smarm with a big, toothy smile, paired with a knowing wink. (Those of us who live outside the world's greatest superpower would observe that this quality is uniquely American.)

But, unlike McDonald, Bierko is able -- when necessary -- to divorce his smarm from his corniness, and is equally convincing in both kinds of roles. He was corny in the way that only sitcoms demand as a cast member on the short-lived series Sydney, Madman of the People, and Pride and Joy; he switched it up to play a smarmy Hollywood talent agent on Mad About You, and a smarmy, jazz-loving, pretentious porkpie-hat-wearing gaywad of a Carrie Bradshaw love interest on Sex and the City. (It was in this last role that Bierko introduced the world to his unusual back-hair pattern -- just a couple of little strips just at the nape of his neck, not unlike a Brazilian bikini wax. What's up with that?) He was a smarmy reporter on the short-lived The Court; corny as a cookie-cutter horror-movie protagonist in The Thirteenth Floor; smarmy and especially bastardous in Sour Grapes; smarmy again in an uncredited role as a commercial actor in Kate and Leopold; and, last week, made a fine return to form as a spectacularly corny young dad in Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star.

Will any future Bierko role marry smarm and corniness as seamlessly as The Music Man? Well, probably not. Unless someone puts together a revival of High Society with Bierko and McDonald playing the two male leads. Actually, someone should write a movie in which McDonald and Bierko play con-artist brothers. Wouldn't Matchstick Men be that much more appealing if it had Bierko and McDonald in the title roles, and absolutely no Nicolas Cage? That's a rhetorical question. Obviously.

Finally, a note about Bierko's love life. If you were asked to guess which H!ITG! -- of all the actors we've eulogized in this section -- had dated Janeane Garofalo for a considerable length of time, which would you consider a likelier candidate than Craig Bierko? Glenn Fitzgerald? Martin Donovan? Jennifer Coolidge? And yet, it is Bierko who holds the distinction. Unfortunately, the timing is off, or else we'd guess they broke up partly because he portrayed such an insufferable gaylord on Sex and the City, and partly because she was turning into an insufferable pinko who could no longer date someone so tall, and who thus consumed so many more resources than a normal-sized person. Anyway, now the door is open for Garofalo to work her way through the rest of the H!ITG!s. Next stop, Philip Baker Hall.