Over the years, Denise and I had the pleasure of chatting with Mr. James Whitmore now and then in Malibu. He was such a charming and humorous man, and, occasionally, he and I would joke with one another on various topics. One time, I shared with him the true story that the very first movie I ever saw as a young kid in the 1950s-with my father and growing up in the West Adams area in L.A.-was his scary film, “Them!” (Jokingly, I told him that, after seeing his real scary film, I required extensive therapy before I had the courage to ask my parents for an “Ant Farm,” to which Mr. Whitmore responded with a so-called “courtesy chuckle.”) Perhaps, the funniest chat we had was when I had a joke all set up in advance: I asked him that, given our health-conscious society, if there’s ever a sequel to “Them!” will the giant ants attack a city leaving mounds of artificial sweetener in the desert instead of sugar? Without hesitation, he retorted, “There’s no need to worry that these giant ants will ever return. We wiped them all out the first time around!” We’ll truly miss Mr. Whitmore.
David and Denise Pepper