He came. He made us laugh. He left.
In his private life, John Candy was shy and secluded, but when it was showtime, whether it was on stage, on TV, or in the movies, he exuded a grand persona that was welcoming, captivating, and, above all else, hilarious.
Candy was a fixture of the comedy scene throughout the ‘70s, ’80s, and early ’90s. Chances are, we’re going to name at least one movie of his that you love. But his career finished tragically early. In his work, his size gave him an advantage as it made him stand out among all the other comedians. But it also came with a great cost to his health and, ultimately, ended his life, although not before John Candy left behind a legacy that few other funny men and women could ever hope to match.
Early Years
John Franklin Candy was born on Halloween – October 31, 1950, in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada, a town in the Greater Toronto Area. He was the son of Sydney and Evangeline Candy and had a brother named Jim, who was two years older than him.
John’s father was a veteran who served with the 48th Highlanders in World War II. However, he struggled to adjust to regular life after the war and sometimes woke up in cold sweats in the middle of the night. Sydney Candy also had trouble holding down a job and bounced around from one gig to another until he saved enough money to buy a used car lot and become a salesman.
For a while, it seemed like this brought some much-needed stability to the Candy household, but tragedy struck not long after. In 1955, John’s father died of heart disease at the tender age of 35, leaving behind a “great emptiness in [his] heart,” in Candy’s own words. Unsurprisingly, the loss of his parent had an adverse effect on his development, and Candy would later reflect that he was “very depressed and sad” during his childhood. To the outside world, he came off as that quiet kid who always kept to himself. On the positive side, John also learned to be reliable, loyal, and protective of those around him, traits he maintained throughout his life.
Even though John was the younger sibling, he felt the need to fill the role of family provider left open by his father’s death. He started making some extra pocket money by collecting and selling bottle caps. After that, he served as a delivery boy for a pharmacy, and finally, when he was old enough, he found a job at a local fish and chips shop. This was after the family had relocated from Newmarket to East York, back then a borough of Toronto, where two-thirds of the population had British origins.
During this gloomy period of his life, John sought refuge in movies. The Donlands theater was just down the street from him, and the teenage Candy visited it two to three times a week, finding a bit of solace in the make-believe world of Hollywood. He began recreating the scenes he saw on the silver screen back at home, and John soon learned that, even if it was just temporarily, acting allowed him to become another person with a different life.
At school, Candy was an average student. When he entered ninth grade, his mother sent him to Neil McNeil, a Catholic high school in Toronto, about an hour’s drive away. His run of mediocre scholastic performances continued, but by that point, Candy had already realized that he wasn’t earning a Rhodes Scholarship anytime soon and focused his energy on other pursuits. He played clarinet in the school band and served as treasurer on the school council, but the main thing that garnered him recognition from his classmates was his position as an offensive tackle on the football team.
Already, John Candy was a big guy, and in most cases, this made him feel self-conscious, an emotion he would struggle with for the rest of his life. The football field, however, was one of the few places where John could use his size to his advantage, not to mention let loose some of the frustration that he was bottling up inside him. The school won the championship with Candy on the team, and unsurprisingly, he began dreaming of a professional career. That dream, however, was soon shattered, thanks to a career-ending knee injury. From then on, Candy had no choice but to express his love of football from the stands, although much later, he would take his fandom to the next level when he became part-time owner of the Toronto Argonauts of the Canadian Football League and was there when they won the championship.
With football no longer an option, the question was, “What to do now?” Once again, John’s weight concerned him. He saw football not only as a viable career but also as a good way of getting into better shape. He looked for an alternative that was physical but did not involve sports, and he thought he found it…in the military. The US military, to be specific, which was on a heavy recruiting drive due to the Vietnam War. His friends and family all made attempts to dissuade him from taking this drastic step, but John drove to a recruitment center in Buffalo and tried to enlist. However, the same injury that ended his football plans also disqualified him from a life in the army.
Back in Toronto and with high school in the rearview mirror, Candy felt directionless. He enrolled at Centennial College and studied journalism, but this was just a stalling tactic. He had no passion for it and barely attended class. He worked a string of odd jobs, but none of them provided him with a long-term future. Candy didn’t find a new purpose in his life until his second year of college, when he left the journalism program and switched to theater.
Breaking into Showbiz
In 1970, John Candy started taking theater classes in college. With football no longer on the table, he had reverted to his earlier passion – acting. It didn’t take him long at all to get his foot in the door because fortune finally smiled on him to make up for some of the previous times when it kicked him in the butt. That same year, Candy met Catherine McCartney, a talent agent in Toronto, who happened to be looking for a young actor of John’s size to star in a commercial. Her only question to him was: Could he play a high-school football player?
The answer was a resounding “Yes.” After all, McCartney was basically asking Candy to play himself from a couple of years earlier. And so John Candy made his debut in showbiz, starring in a toothpaste commercial opposite Canadian TV show host Art Linkletter. Soon after that, Candy appeared in another commercial for Molson’s Golden Ale, and then a few more as he and Catherine McCartney struck up a friendship that would last the rest of their lives. She later reminisced that Candy had “a tremendous heart and a helping-hand quality…John had the ability to make people feel special even if he had only known them a short time. Once he became your friend, he was always there for you…”
Candy moved from commercials to theater. In October 1971, he was featured in the inaugural season of Toronto’s Tarragon Theater, appearing in the play Creeps by David Freeman. He got paid $40 a week for it and was absolutely thrilled about it. He dropped out of college to focus his attention on acting full-time. The following year, Candy spent the summer touring with the Caravan Theater, a troupe that put on children’s plays. He got the job after another member of the cast turned down the gig – a guy named Dan Aykroyd. Eventually, the two met up and, as was often the case with John Candy, struck a lifelong friendship.
In early 1973, all of Ontario’s aspiring actors collectively jumped for joy when they received some exciting news – the Chicago-based improv comedy group The Second City was opening a new branch in, well, a second city – Toronto, and the top brass was coming to hold auditions. John Candy’s name was on their list, as was Dan Aykroyd’s…and when the auditions were over, Aykroyd had earned a spot on the cast of The Second City Toronto. John Candy did not… because they loved him so much that they wanted him to join the main troupe in Chicago.
This was a temporary position that only lasted for a year or so. While in Chicago, though, Candy met another one of his future on-screen buddies – Bill Murray – who acted as a mentor and guide to the fish-out-of-water Canadian by schooling him on stage during the day and then taking him to experience Chicago’s wild side at night.
Candy loved it there and wanted to stay in Chicago, but his comedic talents were desperately needed back in Toronto. That version of The Second City was in trouble. In fact, by the time John had returned, the group had already gone bankrupt once, had been sold to a new owner, and was in danger of going bankrupt for a second time.
The problem wasn’t the acting. Even before Candy provided the troupe with his comedic presence, it still had plenty of great talent such as Eugene Levy, Gilda Radner, Catherine O’Hara, and Joe Flaherty. The problem was the material. It was too American, mostly consisting of recycled sketches from the group in Chicago, and this didn’t appeal to a Canadian audience that preferred localized content. If the sketch had a hockey fan, he should root for the Maple Leafs, not the Blackhawks. Eventually, the writers got the message. Once they started coming up with original material, the reviews became much friendlier, and the box office started getting fatter. With his career in theater a success, it was time for Candy to take the next natural step and move to the screen.
SCTV
During the early ’70s, John Candy made his debut both in television and in movies. His first TV appearance was on a family show called Cucumber in 1972, and his first starring role came soon after, in another kid’s program named Dr. Zonk and the Zunkins, where he played opposite his Second City partner Gilda Radner. On the big screen, Candy first appeared as an extra in a hockey flick called Faceoff, then had an uncredited role in the 1973 movie Class of ‘44, an unsuccessful sequel to the 1971 hit Summer of ‘42.
Over the next few years, John Candy had a steady supply of TV work and was becoming a recognizable face on Canadian television, oftentimes paired alongside one or more of his Second City colleagues. Movie roles weren’t quite as generous or remarkable yet. In fact, nowadays, the most noteworthy thing about them is that, early in his career, Candy didn’t want to be pigeonholed strictly as a comedian, so you’ll see him in films like the horror movie The Clown Murders or the thriller Double Negative.
1976 was a landmark year for John Candy and Canadian comedy in general. Following the success of Saturday Night Live across the border, Andrew Alexander, the owner of Second City Toronto, felt like he had his back against the wall. His company was raking in over a million dollars a year from the stage productions, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to keep his young, talented cast with theater alone. Already, Dan Aykroyd and Gilda Radner found success in America with the aforementioned Saturday Night Live, and it was just a matter of time before the others left to look for greener pastures. So he searched high and low for a way to put Second City on television. Thus, during the fall network season, SCTV made its debut on Canadian airwaves.
It was on a network that nobody watched and had a pitiful budget of $35,000 per episode. As Candy said:
“Our producers found the cheapest studio and made the cheapest deal possible. Being the simpletons that we were at the time, we accepted their offer.”
Despite these obstacles, the cast used the shodiness of the sets to their advantage and played up the cheapness and sleaziness of television. Initially, the show was intended as more of a traditional sitcom set in a small-town TV station, with a running plotline tying the episodes together, mixed with “in-show” television segments that satirized real television. In that version, John Candy would have played the role of a washed-up, broke star who was forced to return to his hometown and work for the local station. However, the tight schedule and the almost non-existent budget made this version impossible. The cast had to shoot one segment at a time, and they started with the TV sketches since those were easier to film. After doing a few of those, everyone realized that the satirical sketches worked well enough on their own without a need for a connecting plot.
Against the odds, Second City TV was a hit. As you might imagine, the show featured mostly Second City Toronto alumni. In fact, six of the seven original cast members first cut their teeth in that theater troupe. The one exception was Harold Ramis, who came from the Chicago version and acted as head writer for the show’s first season.
SCTV ran for six seasons between 1976 and 1983, with the last three seasons also broadcast in the States on NBC. The show garnered 15 Emmy nominations and a spot on Canada’s Walk of Fame. Even though all the actors would go on to have successful careers in comedy, John Candy was the breakout star, described by show director George Bloomfield as “the grand master.” It’s not particularly surprising, then, that Candy eventually left the show and television, in general, because Hollywood came a-calling.
Going Hollywood
Although John Candy already had a few movie credits under his belt, it wasn’t until his success with SCTV that Hollywood started paying closer attention. Plus, many of his theater buddies had become big stars, so movie execs came to regard Second City as a great source for comedic talent. But even with these advantages, it would still be a long time before Candy would garner both the critical and commercial validation he desired by playing the lead in a big Hollywood hit.
For now, he had to contend with smaller parts in movies that featured his friends in the spotlight. Candy started out in 1979 with a minor role in the Steven Spielberg comedy satire 1941, starring Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi. It was a big-budget production like Candy envisioned, but it was only a modest box office success, and it’s not really remembered as one of Spielberg’s finest.
Candy’s next movie, however, was straight-up iconic – 1980’s The Blues Brothers, once again starring Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi. It’s widely regarded as one of the best comedies of the decade, maybe even of all time, marking the first time that John Candy appeared in a hit. Even though his part in it was small, it was a step in the right direction.
Next up was the 1981 military comedy Stripes, starring two of his other Second City peers – Bill Murray and Harold Ramis. This time, Candy had a much bigger role as he played Ox, an overweight recruit who joined the army to become a “lean, mean fighting machine,” strangely echoing Candy’s own experience following high school. He worked with Harold Ramis again in National Lampoon’s Vacation, which Ramis directed. It was just a brief appearance this time, but the movie did mark the first collaboration between John Candy and John Hughes, who wrote the script. Those two would go on to make some great movie magic together a few years later.
In between his forays into Hollywood, Candy occasionally returned to Canada to star in domestic productions. Unsurprisingly, he was a bigger deal in Canada, so the roles were, generally, meatier. First, there was the 1981 adult animation Heavy Metal, where Candy voiced multiple characters and, as you’ve probably come to expect by now, starred alongside some of his Second City buddies such as Joe Flaherty and Eugene Levy.
In 1983, those three guys did another Canadian movie titled Going Berserk. It wasn’t exactly the Hollywood blockbuster that Candy wanted, and it flopped like a fish upon release, but for the first time ever, he received top billing in a movie.
Back in Hollywood, Candy reverted to being the sidekick instead of the headliner, but at least he picked the right movie for it. It was the 1984 romantic comedy Splash, starring Tom Hanks and Darryl Hannah. It became a hit with critics and audiences alike, and Candy played Hanks’s brother in what is generally considered to be his breakout role. The New Yorker raved about his performance, writing:
“Ron Howard has a happy touch, and he’s the first film director who has let John Candy loose. This gigantic, chubby Puck has been great in brief appearances, but the role of Freddie the playboy is the first role big enough for him to make the kind of impression he made in the SCTV shows.”
Candy’s success was rewarded in 1985 when he finally scored a lead role in a Hollywood movie – the comedy Summer Rental, where Candy played an air traffic controller who went on a family vacation to a resort town in Florida and, after numerous hijinks and shenanigans, ended up in a sailing competition against the rich, arrogant antagonist who was a mainstay of ‘80s comedies. The following year, Candy had another starring role in Armed and Dangerous, another comedy where he played a security guard alongside Meg Ryan and his frequent on-screen companion, Eugene Levy.
Unfortunately, both movies were flops, especially Armed and Dangerous, which was labeled a debacle, a “disaster,” and a potential career-killer. Ultimately, it didn’t kill Candy’s career, although it did put him back in the passenger seat, once again taking on secondary roles in films such as Brewster’s Millions alongside Richard Pryor and the Mel Brooks Star Wars parody Spaceballs.
Candy’s star might have waned a little, and some didn’t see him as leading man material anymore, but fortunately for him, one person still did, and he would soon convince the rest of the world of that fact.
Planes, Trains, and Polka Bands
In 1986, John Hughes had finished writing a script for a movie he intended to direct and produce. It was a road trip, holiday, and buddy comedy all rolled into one. It was about two strangers going on a wild journey from New York to Chicago to make it in time for Thanksgiving dinner, with all sorts of mischief along the way, of course. One of them was Neal Page, an ad man who was your typical no-nonsense, cynical business exec, played by Steve Martin. His comedic foil was Del Griffith, a shower curtain ring salesman who was his polar opposite – an always friendly and upbeat guy with good intentions, but who tended to bungle things…and set cars on fire. The movie was called Planes, Trains and Automobiles, and John Hughes thought John Candy would be perfect for the role.
To be fair, he was right. Candy absolutely nailed the part. The movie came out in 1987 and was a big hit with audiences and critics, and today, it’s hailed as a holiday classic. And it’s not even the most popular holiday classic that Hughes and Candy made together. In 1990, the latter played a role in the former’s Christmas blockbuster, Home Alone, which turned Macaulay Culkin into one of the most recognizable faces on the planet. Especially after putting on aftershave. Candy’s part wasn’t big, but it was memorable, as he played a polka musician who helps Kevin’s mother get home. She was played by his former SCTV partner Catherine O’Hara, by the way, but by this point, it’s probably harder to find a John Candy movie that doesn’t have another Second City alumnus.
It’s fair to say that John Hughes had the greatest impact on John Candy’s career. Nowadays, either Home Alone or Planes, Trains, etc. is probably Candy’s best-known role for most people since they both get plenty of repeated viewings ‘round Christmastime and Thanksgiving.
Between those two, Candy appeared in two more John Hughes movies – The Great Outdoors, where he co-starred with Dan Aykroyd, and Uncle Buck, a rare occasion where John Candy played the lead without having to share top billing with someone else. Both films did well at the box office despite lukewarm receptions from critics. They certainly performed better than some of the other movies Candy did at that time, such as the detective comedy Who’s Harry Crumb? and the abysmal Speed Zone, which was supposed to be Cannonball Run III, but got reworked after none of the stars of the first two wanted to have anything to do with it.
Candy started his career in the ’90s by stepping outside his comfort zone. First, he played the romantic lead in Only the Lonely, a rom-com with Ally Sheedy, and then he played a shady lawyer in the Oliver Stone political thriller JFK, arguably his most unconventional role.
In terms of comedy, Candy hit a rough patch as he had another series of flops, most notably Dan Aykroyd’s bizarre directorial debut, Nothing but Trouble, starring Chevy Chase and Demi Moore, where both Candy and Aykroyd played dual roles. It wasn’t until 1993 that he had another hit by starring in one of the most beloved underdog stories in cinematic history – Cool Runnings, based on the true story of the Jamaican national bobsleigh team making it to the Winter Olympics.
Afterward, Candy starred in two movies – Canadian Bacon and Wagons East, and even tried his hand at directing for the first time with the TV comedy Hostage for a Day. Little did he know that he would never get to see any of them released because John Candy died in his sleep of a heart attack on March 4, 1994, aged 43.
His size had always been a health concern, both for him and his loved ones. There were times in his life when he made the effort to slim down, but these were always short-lived. Plus, Candy had been a pack-a-day smoker for most of his adult life, he dabbled with drugs, and his family had a history of heart disease. Adding them all together made his passing tragic and sudden, but perhaps not surprising.
But let’s end on a positive note. It’s been over 30 years since John Candy passed away, and yet, many of his movies are still beloved by the public and get plenty of screentime, especially around the holidays. His legacy is firmly established in the upper echelons of comedy and will remain there for a long time to come.
