The first rule of obit etiquette is to never reveal what may have caused the demise of a recently dear and departed. But as I liked and greatly respected Michael Schlesinger, who occasionally shared comments on HE, I asked the other day what had happened.

“Mike had been laid up in the hospital for a while,” a colleague explained. “He checked in feeling weak overall, was admitted, given a room, and then just kept feeling weak. They couldn’t tell him why for quite some time.

“Eventually they diagnosed a cardiac condition. But then it was also discovered he had cancer, and that’s what finally took him out. It’s double awful that he had such a physically painful death, and that he went out without really understanding what had happened to him.

“He was an unfailingly standup guy who did a lot of wonderful work. For years he waved the flag of Budd Boetticher, even as generations of idiot Sony executives asked ‘Budd WHO?’ Eventually he got heard, and the Criterion Budd box is a testament to his perseverance.

“Last night I put on the Criterion Bluray of It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World and played his wonderful commentary, just to hear his voice.”