It seems like a million years ago that my mom had a crush on Richard Harris

He had just hit the Billboard charts with an out-of nowhere LP called A Tramp Shining

And later he would portray Dumbledore in the first Harry Potter movies

And I’m sure that if there’s a Heaven that Mom started looking for him right after she arrived

But I suspect she would have to wait in line

Because Mr. Harris more than 50 years ago captivated the souls of many midlife American ladies with his unforgettable cover of Jimmy Webb’s surreal tour de force “MacArthur Park”

His tortured voice giving substance to the crazy smile (Pressed in love’s hot fevered iron/Like a striped pair of pants”) and hallucinatory metaphor (“All the sweet green icing/Flowing down…”) of Webb’s web of lost-love insanity

Harris did not sing the lyrics so much as well them with all his actor’s skill

And drove my late, great mother to distraction and album-purchase

My uneducated guess is that Mom and her fellow fangirls loved the thought of a man so romantic he would let a special woman drive to him to Batshit Insanityville and beyond

And speaking of Batshit Insanityville, the sequel to the first Beetlejuice movie features an extended-play version of “MacArthur Park” featuring a gigantic cake

With flowing green icing

And Michael Keaton as Beetlejuice standing on top of the icing’d cake

Himself caked with putrefaction makeup

Standing as groom with his intended bride

And that’s just the tip of the cakeberg

So rest in peace, Mom and Richard Harris

The beetlejuice goes on