John Doe: Punk, Musician, Actor, and hot dude of intrigue.
I first knew him as Liz's dad on Roswell, Jeff Parker. He seemed vaguely familiar--like someone I had seen in a bit part before, and I just couldn't place him. IMDB'd him and that rang a few bells. He’s been in a bunch of films I’d seen: Salvador, Boogie Nights, Brokedown Palace.
Fast forward about a year and a half. Roswell’s been cancelled. . . boo! I now have the Documentary film channel, which seems rather irrelevant, except for the fact that they aired a film on the Punk movement. Interviews with various now old and lame-looking ex-punk rockers included John Lydon, Jello Biafra, Debbie Harry, Joe Strummer and . . . John Doe.
Huh? Whaa? Hey! Look! It’s Liz’s dad from Roswell on some Punk Documentary! Holy Shit! What’s this band he was in? X? What kind of band name is X? Those crazy punk kids. Hmmm. I like the Punk music. Maybe I’ll download some X.
Album Downloaded: Los Angeles
Wow. This is really fucking good. Wow.
Hey! I know that song! It’s the first track on the Suburbia soundtrack!
Okay. This is really weird. Liz’s dad was a punk. A hot, sexy punk boy. I’m having some trouble with the whole TV/reality thing, I know.
Fully into the whole X thing now, I fork out the cash- or my boyfriend does for me, anyway- for the actual album. Am pleased with all the pretty, shiny pictures in the booklet.
Further John Doe sightings occur while watching Law and Order, and The Good Girl—in which he plays some kid’s dad again. Man. Why don’t they give him a part where he can play, like, some really cool bartender who arm wrestles, and fixes motorcycles, but is hiding a dark secret from his past? John Doe himself, had this to say about the weirdness of going from pretty punk boy to lame old guy:
“Two years ago, I was Claire Danes’ dad in ‘Brokedown Palace,’ and it was a little weird. We were hanging around, and I was thinking, ‘She’s so smart and cool, so pretty.’ Then I thought, ‘Oh, man, I really could be her dad!’”
He got into acting because of Allison Anders, the indie film director, who invited him to act in her student film, Border Radio.
He is a native hailer of Decatur, Illinois. His birthday is February 25, 1954. Send him a card!
Here is something else that he said that I thought was cool:
I think it's too bad somehow the media is doing a job to deny people of their culture, so that they don't even know who X was, or who the Ramones were, Patti Smith was or Iggy Pop. I mean I'm talking about someone who is 17 or 18 years old, and has 20 CDs where every record is Smashing Pumpkins. They probably don't know where any of that shit came from, or where tattoos came from, who started making tattoos, and who started jumping off stages and they should, because it's part of their culture. I guess that's up to people like me to spread the word. Stage diving started with Tony Alva and his skateboard crowd, and they would jump on stage and spin around and miss everything. They wouldn't even touch a beer on the stage. Now you see it on Pepsi commercials. It's very strange. Makes you wonder what year it is. Now I've noticed there's a resurgence of slam dancing and pogoing instead of crowd surfing. Give it a fucking rest, man. What year is this? 1981?"
(from the Michigan Daily, Interview with Brian A. Gnatt: http://www.pub.umich.edu/daily/1995/10-19-95/arts/john.doe.html)
MOVIES:
MUSIC:
- Adult Books/We’re Desperate, X 1978, Dangerhouse (single)
- Los Angeles, X 1980, Slash
- Wild Gift, X 1981, Slash
- Under the Big Black Sun, X 1982, Elektra
- More Fun in the New World, X 1984, Elektra
- A Minute to Pray, A Second to Die, The Flesh Eaters 1984(?), Ruby
- Ain’t Love Grand, X 1985, Elektra
- Poor Little Critter on the Road, The Knitters 1985, Slash
- See How We Are, X 1987, Elektra
- Live at the Whisky a-go-go on the Fabulous Sunset Strip, X 1988, Elektra
- Meet John Doe, solo 1989, DGC (out of print)
- hey Zeus!, X 1993, Big Life/Mercury
- KISSINGSOHARD, The John Doe Thing 1995, Forward/Rhino
- Unclogged, X 1995, Infidelity
- For the Rest of Us, The John Doe Thing 1998, Kill Rock Stars
- Freedom Is . . ., The John Doe Thing 2000, spinART
- Dim Star, Bright Sky, solo 2002, Artist Direct