Charles Rocket
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Charles Rocket (born August 24, 1949, Bangor, Maine) is an American film and television actor. After working in local TV news for a few years, he made his network debut on the popular program Saturday Night Live.
Rocket was cast for the 1980–81 season, which followed the departure of the remaining members of the show's popular original cast and original executive producer Lorne Michaels. Singled out by new executive producer Jean Doumanian as the star of her new ensemble, Rocket was promoted as "kind of a cross between Bill Murray and Chevy Chase." Rocket was given the coveted role of anchor for the show's Weekend Update news parody, and was featured in several sketches.
However, the new cast (save for Joe Piscopo and later Eddie Murphy) was not at all popular with audiences. Rocket would eventually doom both his and Doumanian's tenures on the show with one word. An episode hosted by Dallas star Charlene Tilton, featured an ongoing joke occurred in which Charles was shot, a parody of the famed "Who Shot J.R.?" episode of "Dallas". At the end of the show, a wheelchair-bound Charles loudly commented to the camera that he'd like to know "who the fuck did it", followed by Tilton slapping her hand over her mouth in shock. The incident seemed to encapsulate all that was wrong with Saturday Night Live at the time, and both Rocket and Doumanian were soon fired.
Rocket recovered from this early career setback and has since acted in many films, such as Dances with Wolves and Dumb and Dumber, and as a recurring guest star on episodic TV.