To Absent Friends - Robert Heyges

The news reported yesterday on the death of Robert Heyges at the age of 60. Heyges, as you can see from the picture above, was one of the "sweathogs" on the 1970's hit sitcom, "Welcome Back, Kotter." He played Juan Epstein, and his comic bit was to write outlandish excuse/absence notes to Mr. Kotter, and sign them "Epstein's mother." Funny stuff at the time.

Reading an online obit last night, I saw that Heyges had some parts on other TV series over the years, and continued to do stage work in New York, but, of course, he'll be forever remembered as a Sweathog. While he never became the superstar that fellow Sweathog John "Vinnie Barbarino" Travolta became. at least he never stooped to the D-list reality tripe of Ron "Horshack" Palillo.

RIP Robert Heyges