On the Record

"I get no respect. They took the shirt right off my back," says Comedian Rodney Dangerfield, 60, head bobbing nervously, eyes bulging like a pair of hard-boiled eggs in a bowl of oatmeal, and his left hand grabbing at the spot where his tie once hung. It's tough, as Rodney will tell you, it's tough. What's a guy to do when the Smithsonian asks for a donation of his trademark white shirt and red tie for its permanent collection in Washington, D.C.? "I was a little hesitant at first," says Dangerfield. "I only have two ties." The $5 cravat—identical to the one he wore for his first television appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, 15 years ago—is a veteran of 65 Tonight show appearances. The shirt is an $85 white voile Beck & Sobel number (18-in. collar, 33½-m. sleeve). Shrugs Rodney: "They'll probably use the shirt to clean Lindbergh's plane." Now Lindbergh, there was a fellow who got respect.

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Faster than a hungry agent! More identifiable in cape than collar! Now able to deliver long sermons in a single breath! Look! Up in the pulpit! It's a man! It's a priest! It's Christopher Reeve not playing Superman! In Monsignor, the Man of Steel quick-changes to become a man of the cloth. Reeve, 29, plays an Irish Catholic priest from New York's Lower East Side who rises to become a Cardinal. The actor, a lapsed Episcopalian, spent seven weeks taking Catholic instruction from Paulist priests. For one location scene in Sicily, he performed a Communion rite for 300 extras. Recalls Reeve: "My mother said, 'Call me if you convert.' That didn't happen, but I developed enormous respect for the ritual I was performing." Does this mean he has put away childish things like playing comic-book characters? Lois Lane and other fans of Krypton's finest surviving hunk can relax. Reeve will shortly pull on his red-and-blue undies and rev his wires for takeoff in Superman III.

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The 1967 autobiography of Kathryn Crosby was entitled Bing and Other Things (sample chapters: "How to Marry Bing"; "How to Have a Baby—or Three"). Well, Bing is gone, and soon a lot of the "other things" will be too, says Kathryn, 48. Late this month at Butterfield's auction house in San Francisco, she will put virtually her entire collection of Bing-a-brac on the block. Included is Bing's first recording, I've Got the Girl, made in 1926 with Don Clark and his Los Angeles Biltmore Hotel Orchestra. Also up for bids: Bing's fishing gear (fish too, sold separately), the Crosby family Bible and most of his trophies and awards, from a plastic "The World's Best Dad" loving cup from Son Nathaniel to his platinum record for Silent Night. Says Kathryn: "This will allow some other people the opportunity to polish them."

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