June 24, 2011

Solved Mysteries: Twin Peaks

Bayonne-born actor Walter Olkewicz has a habit of strange encounters in bars. Most people probably remember him from Twin Peaks as Jacques Renault. Here he is trysting with Laura Palmer and shooting off a famous drunken non-sequitor at the seedy Canadian club One Eyed Jacks:


Little did we know, One Eyed Jacks was not the first watering hole where Olkewicz stirred up trouble. It turns out that he made a trip to bar in Boston nearly a decade earlier and shook up the status quo. There, he encountered Cheers regular Norm Peterson (George Wendt), an old buddy from the high school wrestling team.


In Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, Laura Palmer was the "Muffin," and in this second season Cheers episode, Olkewicz (as Wally Bodell) revealed Norm's infamous "M-"nickname: "Moonglow." He then made unwanted advances on Norm's wife Vera, and ultimately, in one of the silliest fight scenes ever filmed filmed, succumbed to the real Great Wendt on the floor of Cheers.

One has to wonder, was this the point where Olkewicz lost his mind? After being rebuffed by Vera and defeated by Norm, did he assume Wendt's identity and then throw himself into a world of drinking, drugs, and dangerous women? I really don't know--I haven't seen his Mr. Belvedere episode yet.




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