Pat Finn, a comedic actor who grew up in Wilmette and honed his sense of humor with close friend Chris Farley at Marquette University died Monday after a three-year battle with bladder cancer in Los Angeles. He was 60.
Mr. Finn attended Loyola Academy before going to Marquette, where he met and played rugby with Farley.
“We knew we wanted to do comedy, but had no idea how to do it at all,” Mr. Finn recalled in the 2015 documentary “I Am Chris Farley.”
The two entered a school variety show in which Mr. Finn played “Cool Guy” with an upturned collar and Farley played the “Nerd Guy” in glasses who came tumbling onto stage knocking over chairs, causing the audience to explode into laughter.
Backstage, after the two-minute skit, Farley said, “This is it. This is what we’re going to do for the rest of our lives,” Mr. Finn recalled in the documentary.
After college the pair went to Second City and sought out advice from Joel Murray, whose family grew a few blocks from Mr. Finn’s in Wilmette.
Murray, whose brother is actor Bill Murray, was a Second City main stage cast member. He took the pair across the street to Corcoran’s pub to chat.
“It was Pat and this guy in a rugby jacket that looked like Pig-Pen. We each drank about a six-pack worth of beer and they picked my brain about improv. I told them to go find Del Close at ImprovOlympic and take improv classes, and to do whatever you have to do, paint bathrooms, you’ll get a rate,” Murray recalled.
Farley and Mr. Finn also took classes at Second City and both landed gigs as improv actors there.
In 1994, at age 29, Mr. Finn was performing in a Second City Northwest show in Rolling Meadows called “It Ain’t Over ‘Til The Fat Lady’s Done Watching the O.J. Trial” when the director of the show, Bernadette Birkett, brought her husband, actor George Wendt, to a performance.
The connection with Wendt, who was a Second City alum, landed Mr. Finn a role on the “The George Wendt Show” as Wendt’s little brother.
The show was short-lived, but it was Mr. Finn’s first television gig, and he used it as a launching pad for other TV gigs, including appearances on “Friends,” where he played a love interest of actress Courteney Cox and on “Seinfeld,” where he played Joe Mayo, a pal of Jerry Seinfeld.
Mr. Finn’s friend Chris Farley, who joined the cast of “Saturday Night Live” in 1990 and became a superstar after starring in “Tommy Boy” in 1995, died from a drug overdose Dec. 18, 1997, in his home on the 60th floor of the former John Hancock Building. He was 33.
Mr. Finn held an annual Christmas Eve party at his Los Angeles home that was attended by dozens of Chicago actors who moved West.
“Pat had a charm about him. He was the type of guy who could call the cable company and complain, and the next thing you know he was getting a free NFL package, and he did it on stage as well, there was just something about him,” Murray said.
“My family and his family have spent a lot of summer vacations together and every Christmas and Thanksgiving together for about 30 years. I always say Los Angeles is pretty good if you hang out with all Chicagoans,” Murray said.
“All our hearts are with his wife Donna, who he worshipped, and his kids, who are like my kids as well. We had to promise Pat we’ll take care of them and try to be better people because he set the bar pretty high as far as how you should act in this life,” Murray said.
“His family was everything to him,” said Marilynn Gardner, president of Navy Pier Inc., the organization that runs Navy Pier, and a college classmate of Mr. Finn’s. “He was so selfless and no one was funnier.”
Mr. Finn’s older brother, Tracy Finn, said kindness was a hallmark that people around him noticed throughout his life, but especially in Los Angeles.
“It really stood out,” he said, noting that staff from Mr. Finn’s favorite restaurant visited him in the hospital and brought him food before he died.
He also loved watching the Bears win in recent weeks.
“In Pat’s final days, he showed the biggest signs when the Bears scored a touchdown,” his wife said. “No pressure, Bears, just saying, do it for Pat.”
In addition to his wife, Mr. Finn is survived by his daughters Cassidy and Caitlin and his son Ryan.
Services are pending.