 |
| SHE’S SONIC GOOD: Molly Erdman likes to do it in the car. photography courtesy of Molly Erdman |
 |
| photography courtesy of Sonic |
In the off-season, Dallas Morning News sportswriter Evan Grant can use his Texas Rangers blog for happier pursuits, such as advancing his crush on actress Molly Erdman, better known to most as “the girl from the Sonic commercials.” That’s how we found out that Erdman is a Dallas native, a Greenhill School alum, and a Rangers fan. Naturally, we couldn’t let Grant have her all to himself.
You had a cat named after former Rangers third baseman Steve Buechele. Did that cat turn out to be blandly handsome but otherwise exceptionally average as well? We ended up trading him to the Pirates.
Jordan Carlos from The Colbert Report graduated from Greenhill, too. What about the school makes it a comedic hotbed? Is it the peacocks? The peacocks, definitely. And in my early days, there was always a slight skunk smell in some of the older buildings, trapped in the old walls and released occasionally like Renuzit. To this day, whenever I smell skunk (which is fairly often in the hills of LA), I get nostalgic for fourth grade. In all honesty, the comedians of today are the nerds of 15 years ago, and since Greenhill is a pretty good place to be a nerd, it translates into being a pretty good place for comedic training. I mean all of that in the best way.
Technical question: in the course of filming those commercials, how much food do you have to eat? Or do you spit it all out? It varies. Usually, at the beginning of the day, we’ll voluntarily take bites (and swallow them) as we’re shooting, but that tapers off as the day wears on and the minivan heats up and is saturated with the smell of Sausage Biscuit Dippers. Some products are easy to fake eating, but with sandwiches, we always have to have a bite out of them.
Now that you’ve established yourself as a comedic actress with the Sonic spots, are you looking to stretch with some dramatic work? Like, say, a credit counseling ad? Dare to dream. Maybe we could at least do some “very special” Sonic spots to tackle some tough issues.
Is there any ice better than Sonic ice? I have to say, it is the best. Wait, unless it was dry ice and then your Route 44 Strawberry Limeade would look like it was bubbling and steaming. That would be pretty terrific.
The New Money Man
Larry Throm rides into town to save DISD from its budgetary morass.
The news: Larry Throm, 58, starts his job this month as DISD’s new CFO at a salary of $258,000. The district called him a “game changer.” Throm told the News that the $84 million problem is “absolutely fixable.”
The prediction: by June, it will dawn on Throm that DISD’s financial problems are far thornier than he was led to believe during the interview process (see “racial politics” and “fubar computer systems”).
The hope: that Throm has the skills and grit to accomplish here what he did at his last job in Austin, where he was given credit for that district’s stellar financial performance and long tenure of the superintendent. Fingers crossed.
