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The Long-Awaited Return of Rick Moranis

The former actor’s got a new new album called ‘My Mother’s Brisket’

by
Adam Chandler
May 09, 2013
Spaceballs(FanPop)
Spaceballs(FanPop)

Two questions you might be asking yourself right now: Was the return of Rick Moranis really long-awaited? Who is Rick Moranis again?

To answer your first question: I spent a lot of my hours indoors so I don’t know exactly how loud the public clamoring is for his return, but had Moranis retired during the internet era’s blossom, I think this would be a bigger story. To answer your second: You know, he’s that guy…from Spaceballs, Ghostbusters, Little Shop of Horrors, My Blue Heaven, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Parenthood, and most every movie from the late 1980s and early 1990s.

(For several short looks at his career, someone in the internet (literally in the internet I assume) has put together a collection of hilarious Rick Moranis GIFs for…somebody’s consumption.)

The actual story of Rick Moranis is a little sadder than you might remember. Born to a Canadian Jewish family, Moranis retired for the movie industry in the late 1990s, a few years after he became a widower. He found the rigors of travel for movies to be too much and called it quits. A few years later, Moranis inexplicably started writing music, a meld of country, autobiography, comedy, and neuroses. His first album, The Agoraphobic Cowboy, came out in 2005. At the time, it was rumored that he might start acting again.

In the last few years I’ve been offered a number of parts in movies, and I’ve just turned them down. I don’t know whether I’ll go back to it or not. I’ve been doing a lot of writing and a lot of parenting, and now I’m doing this.

Eight years later, Moranis is set to release a new album called My Mother’s Brisket. I, for one, am excited.

Adam Chandler was previously a staff writer at Tablet. His work has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Atlantic, Slate, Esquire, New York, and elsewhere. He tweets @allmychandler.