In honor of Robert Redford, who passed away September 16 at age 89 at his home in Sundance, Utah, today we resurrect a competition 20 years old in which he played a major part, as he did in all his movies.
In a month of March way back when, before our Journal Papers were born and before some of you reading this were born, we created the Purty Man Tournament to decided who was the prettiest man ever. (We had sone time on our hands.)
The official name was and still is the Best Looking Man Ever Of All-Time Tournament.
We used the same format as March Madness: 64 teams (individual men) divided into four regions and seeded, 1 through 16.
Readers called in or wrote in with their picks during the competition. We thanked them then and thank them now.
This is the finished and Official Final Sheet, complete with explanations and comments for each in the Field of 64. And, of course, results. If you see another sheet on the streets or in the highways and byways that says “Official Sheet” but it’s not this one, it’s not the Official Sheet. And that’s official.
NOTE: This is intensive so we have two of the four brackets here, with the winners of each bracket. That gets us halfway to the Final 4. The next two brackets and the Finals will be next week, unless I am fired first. Which would be a shame. Or maybe not.
HISTORY REGIONAL:
1. Sampson: Can all those statues be wrong? This is the Sampson that knocked down the walls, not the Sampson after the chains and the eyes gouged out and all that.
2. Sir Lancelot: Snagged Guinevere from King Arthur.
3. Henry the 8th: He had to be a hottie because after a while the women knew what they were getting into and they STILL hung out with him.
4. Maximus Aurelius: Think The Gladiator movie. That’s who this guy is. If you don’t think he belongs on the list, you tell him.
5. King David: Hey, he’s King David. The guys seeded above him should thank their lucky stars they don’t get him in the first round.
6. JFK: I don’t really get him, but he married Jackie O. I ‘get’ Jackie O.
7. Alexander the Great: The called him “The Great,” and it wasn’t because he conquered the world.
8. Tonto: So good looking he didn’t NEED a mask.
9. Trigger: Better looking than Roy. Or, for that matter, Dale.
10. Moses: He’s on here because Charlton Heston didn’t make the Actors Regional and because he started out in a reed basket.
11. Einstein: Everything’s relative, even good looks.
12. George Washington Carver: The graying on the temples, classic. And don’t EVEN think he was just about peanuts. He had game. Would have been a higher seed but he was rebuilding several acres of plowed fields this year; STILL made the tournament.
13. Romeo: Where art thou, Romeo? “I’m right here! Right here at No. 13!”
14. Abraham: Fathered a nation. Ahem…
15. Jefferson (either Thomas or George): Together, and without the white wigs, these two would have made one good looking, really well-dry-cleaned man.
16. Adam: Once upon a time, the best looking man on the face of the Earth. Dare you to question me.
** All the top seeds win in the first round except those who faced the vaunted Old Testament contingent: Moses gets past Alexander the Mediocre and Abraham lays the wood to Hank the 8th.
After a Sampson victory over Tonto, the second round is dominated by upsets. No. 5 David whips No. 4 Max: (“It’s good to be king…”); Abraham beats JFK and Moses beats Lancelot by a staff, settling up an Old Testament-flavored Regional.
With the lineage so thick you could cut it with an ancient dagger, Sampson beats David, Moses beats Abraham, then Moses — again, a No. 10 seed —slays No. 1 Sampson in a scrap for the ages.
No. 10-seed Moses advances from the History Regional.
ACTORS REGIONAL:
1. Paul Newman: (This is back when I was still trying to get in good with Joanne Woodward.)
2. Robert Redford: Even as a youngster, had ‘champion’ written all over him.
3. Matthew McConaughey: He doesn’t wear deodorant, but this isn’t scratch-and-sniff.
4. Sean Connery: “Connery. Sean Connery.”
5. Patrick Dempsey: Dr. McFive-Seed
6. George Clooney: In an episode of Sex in the City, the girls compared him to a Chanel Suit; he never goes out of style.
7. Sidney Portier: Clooneyish back in his day.
8. Cary Grant: See 8 seed.
9. Cary Grant: I wanted to make sure he won a game, so I made him an 8 and a 9 for a first-round matchup. He deserves it. Cool customer, sleek and smooth.
10. Tom Selleck: My mother did not miss Magnum, P.I. She did not miss it, I’m telling you.
11. Taye Diggs: Got game and the young ladies love him.
12. Steve McQueen: Little guy who played big.
13. Benjamin Bratt: Young Cary Grant in style.
14. Denzell Washington: Cary Grant without the polish. (Remind me to tell you about the time I almost ran over him in Shreveport. Still scares me. Near disaster. True story.)
15. Marlon Brando: He was a contender.
16. Robert Conrad: In the wild, wild West; so good he got his own battery commercial.
** The only first-round upset: Bratt surprises Connery, Sean Connery, then rides the wave of momentum to an upset of Dr. McFive-Seed in the second round and — goodness — No. 1-seed Paul Newman in the Regional Semis. (I did the seeding as the lone member of the Tournament Committee and now, 20 years later, I’m STILL surprised Newman got beat.) McConaughey beats Clooney but then loses to Redford in the Regional semis, if for no other reason than I’m tired of having to look to see how to spell his name.
Bratt’s impressive run ended against Redford in the Regional Finals; it’s a familiar feeling when you’re going up against The Sundance Kid
No. 2-seed Robert Redford advances from the Actor’s Regional.
So Moses and Redford are in the Final Four.
One man from the ATHLETES REGIONAL and another from the POTPOURRI REGIONAL (think Usher, Lord Byron, Bugs Bunny, e.g.) will advance to face them. That’s next week. With this AND college football AND October baseball, that’s a lot of drama, I know. Ain’t it great?!
Contact Teddy at teddy@latech.edu
