Shirley, You Can't Be Serious?

I'm a little late to posting this. As I'm sure you heard by now, Leslie Nielsen passed away recently due to a pneumonia complication. Nielsen was my second favorite character in one of my favorite movies, Airplane!. He came second only to the guy who would make random comments at ground control, such as when he was handed a newspaper and was asked, "What do you make of this?" to which he responded, "This? I can make a hat, or a sailboat..."

Airplane! is one of my favorite movies of all time because of the satirical comedic style in which it was written - as a spoof on disaster movies at the time, and I absolutely loved the play on words! And who can forget the classic line, "Surely you can't be serious." "I am serious. And don't call me Shirley."

Sadly, after learning about Nielsen's passing, I realized there's a lot more movies he was in that I have yet to see, mostly similar to Airplane!. So I've tried my best to compile a list with clips of his notable films below. Enjoy!

Nielsen was born on February 11, 1926 and started his career in 1948, during Television's Golden Age.
His first major successful role was in the 1956 film, Forbidden Planet:



After establishing himself as a serious and dramatic actor with several MGM Studios films, Nielsen went on to work on other roles, including Disney's The Swamp Fox:



Hawaii Five-O:



The Poseidon Adventure (1972):



And then there was Airplane!:




Which led to his iconic roles as a comedic actor...in Police Squad!:



And of course, all the Naked Guns:



2001: A Space Travesty:



Dracula: Dead and Loving It:



And finally, Scary Movie 3 as the President:



I'm sure I missed a few but nonetheless, Leslie Nielsen was a great actor and will be sorely missed. RIP.