PARENTS OF ANARCHY
The connection isn't made quickly. Ginny and Bob Heidrich look like the average Hilton Head Island retired couple. They sing in the
First Presbyterian choir. He plays trumpet in the Dixieland Jazz Society and is active in the American Legion. She's been in leadership
roles with the Daughters of the American Revolution and Tri Delta alumni. She's a retired teacher. He's a former construction consultant.
Neither has a motorcycle. Neither would pass for a Hell's Angel. But on rare
occasion the connection is made.
"Hey, aren't you
..."
Bobby's parents? Yes, they are -- sort of.
Robert "Bobby" Munson is just a character on the FX series "Sons of Anarchy." They're the parents of Mark Boone Jr., the long-standing
Hollywood and TV actor who plays Bobby.
Boone is the type of guy whose name might not be easily recognizable but his face is,
if you watch enough movies. He's played dirty cops in "Batman Begins" and "2 Fast 2 Furious," the motel clerk in "Memento" and had
guest roles on "Seinfeld" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm." Now he's part of the outlaw biker gang on "Sons of Anarchy."
He's worked
consistently in the business for the past 20 years, his grizzly beard and rumpled appearance usually lending him to roles with names
like "Shady Private Investigator," "Pawn Shop Owner" and "Greasy FBI Man."
To his parents, he's just "Mark," the soccer standout
from his days growing up on the north shore of Chicago and at the University of Vermont. After college, he moved to New York and performed
stand-up comedy with friend Steve Buscemi, who later cast him in his directorial debut, "Trees Lounge." The inspiration for his stage
name came from an inscription on a war memorial in New York City and ever since he's been known to friends as "Boone." "I can't call
him Boone," said Ginny Heidrich. "I still call him Mark."
His parents have traveled to sets with him, once to New Zealand where
they had dinner with the producer of "30 Days of Night" and his wife, Lucy Lawless, aka Xena the Warrior princess (who's very sweet
and unassuming, they said, not at all like Xena).
Mostly they see him at their cottage in northern Wisconsin, along with their
two other children and grandkids. He did come to Hilton Head in November, and they went to a restaurant, where he was promptly greeted
as "Bobby."
They keep up with the multiple movies and shows he's in each year, even if the violence in "Sons of Anarchy" is
a bit much or if his scenes prove squeamish, like in "2 Fast 2 Furious" when a rat crawled around on his bare belly.
Of course, in real life, he's not the slimeball outlaw that he usually plays on the small or silver screen. But, much like his current
role, he does ride a hog, a 2003 Harley Davidson Road Glide.
Bob Heidrich has stories about playing Prince Charming in sixth grade and performing with acting troupes in college. As it turns out,
they're all performers. Maybe that connection isn't so hard to make after all.
The show, FX's "Sons of Anarchy," explores a
notorious outlaw motorcycle club's desire to protect its livelihood and sheltered California town. To watch the show, go to vod.fxnetworks.com. Season
3 premieres in September.