Where is my American Splendor?

I rewatched the film “American Splendor” on DVD on Wednesday night, and it was great to see Harvey Pekar alive again. That doesn’t hide the fact that he is gone forever, but he will live on in the movie as well as the work he did.

It’s amazing how seemingly obsessed he is with death, and how he’ll be seen after he’s gone. There’s a scene in the movie where Paul Giamatti plays Harvey waking up his wife, Joyce Brabner, in the middle of the night and asking her if he’d still exist after he died. Then he collapses.

And the penultimate scene, after Giamatti takes the actor playing Danielle to the school bus and starts walking back, and then suddenly we see Pekar and hear the voiceover where Pekar talks about having some time, with his cancer in remission (temporarily, it turned out) and how he might have some time between retirement from Veterans Affairs and dying to do more work and make more money.

Like most Americans, Pekar knew what really mattered in life and set out to get it done.

RIP, Harvey Pekar, and thanks for the inspiration.