St. Elsewhere alum and Animal House actor Stephen Furst has passed away at age 63.
Sad to report the passing of Stephen Furst, who joined St. Elsewhere in season two as a recurring character, playing medical student Elliott Axelrod, and then joined the main cast for season three onwards. The cause of death is reported as complications from diabetes.
Furst is probably best known for his pre-St. Elsewhere role as the naive fraternity pledge Flounder in the great college movie, National Lampoon's Animal House. He later appeared on Babylon 5 in the 90s, and worked extensively as a voice-over actor.
Here are a couple of news stories from elsewhere on the web:
Elliott meets Mrs. Hufnagel's son, Alvin, and bids her a final farewell with a burial at sea.
Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) brings mirth to a
grieving Dr. Daniel Auschlander (Norman Lloyd),
with some help from Gary Larson.
At last, we've reached the final chapter in the saga of Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop), St. Eligius's most memorable patient. Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst), is a carrying the box that contains her ashes, which Dr. Wayne Fiscus (Howie Mandel) assumes contains cookies. After Elliott explains what the box is for, Wayne tries to convince Elliott that his obligation as a doctor ends when the patient dies, but Elliott feels bad for the medical mismanagement that led to her demise, and he feels that she deserves to have her burial wishes carried out with respect. Elliott intends to have a memorial service in the chapel and bury her at sea, to which Wayne responds by suggesting he just flush her down the toilet.
In the chapel, Elliott is having a solitary moment of remembrance for his departed patient when he is joined in the chapel by a despondent Dr. Daniel Auschlander (Norman Lloyd). Auschlander is mourning the death of his old friend, Dr. George Wyler, who was featured in a three-episode arc earlier in the season. Dr. Wyler was a Nobel-winning humanitarian who worked in Africa, but ran afoul of the government in his adopted homeland, and returned there knowing that the consequences would be dire. And lo, they were--he was greeted with a hail of machine-gun fire. During George's visit to St. Eligius, he and Daniel shared some meaningful moments while playing the chapel's organ, so it was a fitting place for Daniel to mourn his old friend. Elliott approaches, and can't but giggle at the Far Side comic in the newspaper sitting on the organ ("The real reason dinosaurs became extinct"), which brings a smile to both their faces.
Alvin Hufnagel (Boyd Bodwell) bids his mother a curt
farewell before kicking his guests out of his new apartment.
Wayne and Elliott then pay a visit to Mrs. Hufnagel's apartment, which Elliott has inherited. Wayne discovers a personally autographed photo of Bobby Orr, and Elliott explains that she was a season ticket holder to the Bruins; however, the seats have been left to Ernest Borgnine. (Wayne feels that Fuji was the real star of McHale's Navy.) He finds a baseball glove that was given to her by Ted Williams, which tells Wayne he can keep. Elliott is planning on selling the stuff, or giving it away, with the exception of the gerbil, which has joined its owner in the great beyond. Then there's a knock on the door. It's Alvin Hufnagel (Boyd Bodwell), who immediately recognizes his glove in Wayne's hands. He gives Elliott a particularly dirty look.
After playing with the dead gerbil, Alvin gets down to business. "You stole mother's affection," he accuses Elliott. Elliott tries to explain how they bonded over the death of Murray Robbin, but Alvin is convinced that he deliberately charmed the old woman with the intent of being included in her will. He's hurt that she didn't leave him anything, but he's a little too sensitive to hear Wayne's criticism about never having visited. When he calms down, Alvin has to admit that they didn't get along. Elliott tries to make Alvin feel better by giving him the computer, but the dejected son wants everything, which the good-hearted Dr. Axelrod concedes without a fight. He invites Alvin along for the burial, but he's not interested, and wishes her a terse, "Goodbye, Mother."
Elliott delivers Mrs. Hufnagel to her final resting place.
In a moving final scene, Elliott delivers what he hopes are appropriate final words, from Sir Walter Scott's The Lady of the Lake:
Fleet foot on the correi,
Sage counsel in cumber,
Red hand in the foray,
How sound is thy slumber!
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble in the fountain,
Thou art gone, and for ever!
He pours out her ashes, and bids a final "Goodbye, Mrs. Hufnagel," before tossing the rose from his lapel in the water.
And so ends the saga of Florence Hufnagel, ashes to ashes, dust to dust:
There's one last bit of Hufnagel mythology left over. In the season six episode, "Night of the Living Bed", which aired three days before Halloween, 1987, Mrs. Hufnagel is believed by many at St. Eligius to be making her presence known once more. The room where she died seems to be haunted, its lights and TV flicking on and off on their own. Eventually, the bed starts shaking, the floor starts shaking, and the floor opens up and pulls the bed down with it. But it turns out not to be a haunting--the magnetism from the new MRI machine installed on the floor beneath was just too much for the old facility to handle.
So that doesn't quite count as another appearance. As the Gluck family always said: "it is better to be despised than forgotten."
Mrs. Hufnagel is gone but not forgotten as Elliott meets with her lawyer, who is settling her estate.
Dr. Victor Ehrlich (Ed Begley, Jr.) admires Dr. Elliott
Axelrod's (Stephen Furst) size 10EEE wingtips.
The nineteenth installment in the saga of Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop), the late doctor-tormentor extraordinaire, is much shorter than the previous two installments, but even though the sickly old woman has left the corporeal realm, she still manages to impose on the staff of St. Eligius.
Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) is dressed in a suit, which the wise-cracking Dr. Victor Ehrlich (Ed Begley, Jr.) comments upon by asking "who died?"
"Mrs. Hufnagel," Elliott deadpans, explaining that the lawyer handling the late patient's estate asked to meet him that night. Elliott is expecting to have been willed something, to which Victor warns, "Whatever it is, you don't want it. The old bat didn't own anything, a ham radio, a couple of gerbils, maybe..." But the goodhearted Axelrod still thinks it pays to be nice to patients.
Elliott meets with Bradford Norton (Michael Fox), senior partner of the law firm Norton & Inch, which had represented the family since Goody Gluck's first Salem Witch trial. It turns out the only beneficiaries named in Mrs. Hufnagel's will were Elliott and a reptile park. Mrs. Hufnagel, ever the early adopter of technology, recorded a video will, enabling Florence Halop to make one final appearance on the show.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) leaves Elliott with words
of wisdom: "Try not to use me as a benchmark to judge
other women."
Never one to miss the opportunity to cut someone down, she acknowledges that it must have been hard for Elliott to make friends with "that Mack truck tire around your waist." In a classic comedy device, she accuses Elliott of having a schoolboy crush on her, and when he protests that he didn't, she correctly predicts on video that he would complain, and responds from the beyond "You did, too! Shut up, chubs." But she liked that he cared about her, and that he cried on her shoulder when Murray died. She leaves him with the Gluck family creed--"It is better to be despised than forgotten."
Then they get down to business--her estate was worth $250,000. Elliott gets everything left after $75,000 goes to Earl's Reptile Park, and they deduct medical bills, mortgage costs, gambling debts, helicopter rentals ("Florence was quite an aviatrix"), state and federal inheritance taxes, and legal fees resulting from "a regrettably undecided lawsuit against American Samoa." That leaves $137.65 for Elliott, which should be enough to cover the boat rental and a breakfast special, as he has been entrusted with disposing of her ashes at sea.
Here's Mrs. Hufnagel's final appearance on St. Elsewhere, in "Tears of a Clown":
I've left in the final shot which includes a glimpse at the relationship between Dr. Jack Morrison (David Morse) and his college-student girlfriend Clancy Williams (Helen Hunt), who has been reduced to being his babysitter now that Jack has to redo med school on top of his duties as a resident. The argument that erupts in this scene leads to the end of their relationship. I love St. Elsewhere's long, continuous shots that would flow into the next scene.
Other trivia:
The Salem Witch Trials took place in 1692. It has been established that Gluck family (Hufnagel is her married name) came to America shortly after the Mayflower, which made the passage in 1620. Goody would have been lucky to have legal representation, as most accused were not afforded the opportunity. The Trials forced the legal system in the new colony to tighten up its game, like not allowing testimony involving specters as evidence, requiring proof and not just hearsay, etc.
Mrs. Hufnagel needs gallbladder surgery, but she insists on a new physician when she meets Dr. Chandler.
Ham radio enthusiast Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop)
assumes that Dr. Philip Chandler is an orderly.
In her previous appearance, Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) had been discharged from St. Eligius, but a visit from Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) and his gift of a baked ham for his former patient aggravated her gallbladder symptoms and landed her back in the hospital. In "Give the Boy a Hand", her case has been assigned to Dr. Philip Chandler (Denzel Washington). Mrs. Hufnagel, whose racial insensitivity had been established in her first appearance, is trying to get a signal on her ham radio to connect with her compadre in Puerto Rico. Phil enters, but she assumes he's an orderly and asks him to adjust her antenna.
When he explains that he's her new doctor, she's not having it, and insists on someone else. Phil asks her why, and she's not shy about her reason: "You're colored." While conceding that Phil is a snazzy dresser, and despite learning that he went to Yale, Hufnagel is wary of his credentials, as he was likely put through due to affirmative action. Phil defends himself--he graduated pre-med Summa cum Laude with a distinction in biochemistry, his grade point average was 3.9, and he finished in the top 2% of his class at Yale. Her dismissive, racist, yet hilarious reply: "Go tell it on the mountain."
Dr. Chandler handles Mrs. Hufnagel's (Florence Halop)
racially-insensitive remarks with class as only Denzel can.
Her colicystitis requires surgery, and all the physician has to do is see her through post-op follow-up, but when he asks his colleagues Axelrod, Fiscus (Howie Mandel) and Ehrlich (Ed Begley, Jr.) to help him out and take over his case, he gets a sharp rebuke from the three doctors who have already done a few rounds with St. Eligius's most infamous patient. So, with the other doctors "too chicken" to take her on, she warms up to her latest physician. She's in good spirits after her operation, especially pleased the whiz of a surgeon was Asian.
It occurs to me now that not everyone might find such overt racism as funny as I do, but if you've got the kind of sensibilities that led you to watch and enjoy St. Elsewhere, then you'd probably get why it's funny coming out of this abrasive, old woman. Things have changed a lot since then. I haven't interacted with an overt bigot in a long time myself.
Despite her racial insensitivity, she's friendlier to Phil than all the other doctors except Dr. Bobby Caldwell (Mark Harmon). I think she respects people who stand up to her (or in Caldwell's case, those who charm her). Or maybe she just likes the good-looking ones.
Some other observations:
Chandler says he has taken over her case from Dr. Po, who has been called out of town. We met Dr. Alan Po (Brian Tochi) in the third season premiere, when he was one of the first-year residents taking a tour of the hospital led by Wayne Fiscus. Unless some stuff with him got cut out in syndication, this is the only other mention of that character. I enjoyed that the character's name was a goof on "Edgar Allan Poe".
Elliott's neck brace is the result of a headlock applied by a large, agitated patient in E.R. who freaked out while Elliott was taking blood. 1990s TV viewers will recognize him as James Avery, who was hilarious as Uncle Phil on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. His name does not appear in the credits.
We learn a bit about Mrs. Hufnagel's background. Florence's family, the Glucks, came over on a ship that pulled into Plymouth Rock just after the Mayflower. I couldn't make out the name of the boat. If anyone wants to take a stab at it, feel free to do so in the comments section.
Elliott pays a visit to the recently discharged Mrs. Hufnagel with the gift of a baked ham.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) was surprisingly
tech-savvy, especially for 1985.
In "Saving Face", the thirteenth episode of St. Elsewhere's third season to feature patient Florence Hufnagel (Florence Halop), Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) is planning to pay a visit to a patient he has been worried about, and he asks senior doctors Wayne Fiscus (Howie Mandel), Victor Ehrlich (Ed Begley, Jr.), and Annie Cavanero (Cynthia Sikes) for gift suggestions. When Elliott reveals that the patient was none other than the abrasive Hufnagel, Ehrlich suggests he needs therapy.
For the first time, we see how Mrs. Hufnagel lives--in an apartment that houses her personally autographed photo of Ernest Borgnine, and her home computer which she uses to figure out the odds at the track. I enjoy Elliott's reaction to learning that a senior citizen like Hufnagel would be computer-savvy. I'm not sure what the actual percentage of American households had a personal computer in them in 1985, but it couldn't have been that high. (They had already done an arc in season two where a hacker breaks into the hospital's computer system and removes patients' records; it turned out to be a ten-year old girl home from school during a snowstorm, who later learns that she killed someone.)
Elliott has brought a ham for Mrs. Hufnagel, who is grieving the death of her almost-fiancee, Murray Robbin. (The gift is appropriate since Murray, a comedian of limited talent, was quite the ham himself.) He doesn't want to impose, but Mrs. Hufnagel, in an uncharacteristically friendly mood on her home turf, invites Elliott to stay and eat the ham with her, as she could use the company.
Elliott (Stephen Furst) is afraid he's killed Mrs. Hufnagel
with his gift.
Unfortunately, the ham aggravates Hufnagel's gallbladder symptoms, and she ends up unconscious on a gurney in the St. Eligius emergency room, convinced that Dr. Axelrod tried to kill her.
For those who remember this arc, I've left in the complete shot in the E.R. that includes part of the introduction of Maddy and Dean, a pregnant 14-year-old girl suffering from cocaine intoxication and her junkie/hustler boyfriend. Maddy is played by Lycia Naff, who earned a place in pop culture as the three-breasted prostitute in Total Recall, and Dean is played by Tim Van Patten, who had previously played Salami on Bruce Paltrow's The White Shadow, currently serves as executive producer on Boardwalk Empire, and also directed the pilot episode of Game of Thrones among numerous other impressive credits.
This clip also features Karen Austin as Dr. Mary Woodley; prior to this role, she had recently played Night Court's original court clerk, Lana Wagner. She's been working steadily since the late seventies, but I mostly know her as the mom in the John Candy comedy Summer Rental, which was a fixture on Saturday afternoon television in my youth.
Mrs. Hufnagel is discharged from St. Eligius, but suffers a great loss along the way.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) isn't about to let
"Butch", a.k.a. Dr. Annie Cavanero (Cynthia Sikes),
lay a hand on her.
"Bye, George" features the most of Mrs. Hufnagel we've seen in any one episode so far. For the first time, we see that maybe there's a vulnerable, caring person in there somewhere after all.
Once again, Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) has been passed to another doctor. This time, attending physician Dr. Annie Cavanero (Cynthia Sikes) gets the nod, having taken over the case from Dr. Jack Morrison (David Morse), who can no longer see patients since it was revealed that he had fast-tracked his education and was not qualified to practice medicine.
Fortunately for Annie, Mrs. Hufnagel's treatment for phlebitis has ended. She asks Annie about her decision to propose to her new love, Murray Robbin (Murray Rubin). The rumors about Cavanero that Hufnagel refers to involve visiting surgeon Dr. Christine Holtz (Caroline McWilliams), who became fast friends with Annie and stayed at her home, but then Annie became uncomfortable when she found out that Holtz was a lesbian. Rumors flew that relations between the two were more than platonic. I enjoy the shout out to Miami Vice, which had just debuted a few months earlier.
Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) tries to comfort a
greiving Mrs. Hufnagel.
Mrs. Hufnagel's proposal to Murray doesn't work out as she had hoped, as Murray is not ready to be tied down. Meanwhile, Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) has asked Murray to teach him how to tell jokes. Sadly, their first lesson is cut short when Murray's pratfall turns out to be a fatal heart attack.
Elliott now must tell Mrs. Hufnagel the terrible news. Axelrod, the sensitive son of a callous veterinarian (he'll be played by Louis Nye), can't bring himself to tell her, as he is reminded of the childhood trauma of losing his dog to a passing car and having to bury it. According to Edward Copeland, their scene in the chapel is Stephen Furst's personal favorite.
You'd think that Murray's story would be over, but two seasons later, we find out what happened to Murray once he departed this earthly realm. In "After Life", we learn, courtesy of Dr. Wayne Fiscus (Howie Mandel), that Murray had unfinished business, and as a result, his spirit was still languishing in purgatory, alongside fellow former St. Eligius patient Rockin' Ralph (Richard Marcus), a.k.a. the Birdman of St. Eligius, who had been there since season one. Murray hadn't yet achieved his dream of making people laugh. By the end of Wayne's time there, Murray manages to get a chuckle out of him.
If you haven't seen St. Elsewhere before, I understand if this sounds strange. And I'm surprised that you read this far.
St. Eligius just can't get rid of Mrs. Hufnagel, who demands a new doctor upon readmission.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) lays down the law.
As Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) discharges Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) at the end of "The Children's Hour", he prescribes phenylbutazone to help with her phlebitis and her aches and pains. In the next episode, "Dr. Wyler, I Presume", Axelrod, a first-year resident, is excited to be paged by name to the E.R. until he learns that the patient demanding to see him is none other than Mrs. Hufnagel, who is now unconscious and has a nearly-empty bottle of phenylbutazone on her. Dr. Philip Chandler (Denzel Washington) rejects Elliott's plea to take the patient off his hands, and orderly Warren Coolidge (Byron Stewart) refuses Elliott's order to relay instructions for the nurse before
She had been taking four times the prescribed dose, but nonetheless demands a new physician who isn't trying to kill her. The duty falls on Dr. Jack Morrison (David Morse), whom Hufnagel recognizes as the one with the red knapsack and the kid who never says much on rounds. She questions Morrison about his medical education (which he obtained in Mexico), and then is horrified to learn that the doctor has ordered a barium enema for her: "N-O. Nobody touches the booty."
According to Wikipedia, phenylbutazone is no longer approved for human use in the United States, but is commonly prescribed to horses. Hufnagel was admitted with gastrointestinal bleeding, which can be a side effect...in horses.
It will turn out that Hufnagel is right to question Morrison's medical education; in the next episode ("Whistle, Wyler Works"), it will be revealed that Jack fast-tracked his medical degree, and is not actually qualified to practice medicine. He will have to redo medical school while doing his residency and raising his infant son by himself; this lasts into season four. Fortunately, his diagnostic skills improve considerably once he actually learns some medical knowledge.
Elliott has a run-in with Mrs. Hufnagel during his first solo night in charge of the ward.
Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) backs into trouble
in the form of Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop).
After appearing in longer scenes in her previous three episodes, Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) plays a supporting role in her brief appearance in "Homecoming". Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) is a first-year resident, and this night is the first where he is the only doctor on call. Axelrod is nervous about being in charge for the first time, but after a reassuring conversation with Dr. Bobby Caldwell (Mark Harmon), he takes command of the ward, and that's where our clip begins.
Axelrod tries to chat up the non-doctor staff working on the floor, who don't exactly respond to the man in charge, but his attempts at fraternization are interrupted when he absentmindedly backs into Mrs. Hufnagel, who is turning the corner in a wheelchair, in search of ice. When she asks him to go fetch it for her, Elliott lays down the law, giving her a little extra encouragement as he orders her back to her room.
Right after this scene, things get serious when an old guy codes. As Mrs. Hufnagel said, people check into St. Eligius, but they don't check out (although Elliott ends up saving this guy, and handling himself quite well in the emergency situation). I don't know if anyone has ever counted it, but I wonder if St. Elsewhere had the highest patient mortality rate of any medical TV series.
Mrs. Hufnagel demands better accommodations and makes a new friend in fellow patient Murray Robbin.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) reluctantly
relinquishes the role of physician to Dr. Elliott
Axelrod (Stephen Furst).
St. Elsewhere's writers took a break from their favorite curmudgeon in season three's "Sweet Dreams", the first episode to not mention the patient since her debut in "Playing God (Part 2)". In "Up on the Roof", she's back, having escaped from her room to complain about the malfunctioning electric bed in her current room and demand a room in the new wing, much to the frustration of her physician, Dr. Wayne Fiscus (Howie Mandel). I've left in the entire shot, which also includes the arrival of visiting bone marrow specialist Dr. Christine Holtz (Caroline McWilliams); it runs for 1 minute, 8 seconds.
For the first time, Hufnagel gets two scenes in an episode. After we see her in the opening scene, she pops in on the patient next door in search of a spare bedpan. The patient is aspiring stand-up comedian and colitis sufferer Murray Robbin (Murray Rubin). He's probably the worst comedian in the world, but the two patients bond over their common afflictions. Dr. Elliott Axelrod arrives to find that Hufnagel has taken issue with how he diagnosed his patient.
And so begins the relationship between Florence Hufnagel and Murray Robbin:
St. Elsewhere's most memorable patient makes her third appearance to report a stolen pair of slippers.
Mrs. Hufnagel (Florence Halop) wants to know who
took her slippers.
In her third appearance on St. Elsewhere, in "Strikeout", patient Florence Hufnagel (Florence Halop) pesters Nurse Shirley Daniels (Ellen Bry) and Dr. Elliott Axelrod (Stephen Furst) at the nurses' station. Elliott is trying to locate a patient, and while Mrs. Hufnagel complains about her missing pair of slippers, Shirley tells Elliott that the patient was transferred to Boston General for surgery.
This encounter is particularly significant because this is the first time we see Mrs. Hufnagel with Elliott, and it's where she first refers to him as "Chubs". Of all the staff at St. Eligius, Elliott is the only one with whom she will develop a bond.
I decided to leave in the entire final shot of the scene, which, in classic St. Elsewhere style, is a handheld shot that starts on the conversation between Shirley and Elliott, follows him as he tries to catch the elevator, tracks Mrs. Hufnagel as she spots the Mr. Cranston who she thinks took her slippers, settles on the characters in the next scene, firefighters Manny Schecter (Stephen Elliott) and Michael Duffy (John Hammond), as we see Mrs. Hufnagel frantically trying to reclaim her footwear from the other patient in the background, and follows Manny and Michael into the elevator as it goes down. The shot is 34 seconds long.
Sad to report the passing of Stephen Furst, who joined St. Elsewhere in season two as a recurring character, playing medical student Elliott Axelrod, and then joined the main cast for season three onwards. The cause of death is reported as complications from diabetes.
