Actor, radio, TV personality loved making people laugh

Radio and TV personality, play and movie actor, trivia buff, loving friend and husband. Died at age 58 of Alzheimer’s.

“Captain” Glen Gomez lived 58 years.

However, those close to him feel like he lived much longer.

“Glen was definitely one who made the most out of life,” said friend and co-worker Dr. Don Thomas. “To be honest, if you looked at all of his accomplishments in theatre and radio and newspaper and movies and everything that he’s done, you would swear that the man was 150 years old.”

Gomez is known to many publically as a hilarious character on television shows Real New Orleans and Morgus Presents as well as various plays at Le Petit Theatre in Houma and Southern Repertory Theatre in New Orleans.

However, the Houma resident is known to those closest to him as an always happy and joyful soul and trivia junkie who spent most of his childhood in libraries driving his thirst for knowledge.

It is a cruel twist that the man who won every trivia contest he ever entered succumbed to Alzheimer’s Disease at such a young age.

Well, just about every one.

About 30 years ago,

Gomez and his roommate at the time hosted a Trivial Pursuit party and invited many friends. One of which became his bride.

“I beat him. On a sports question, at that. So that got his attention, because nobody beat him. I was the first one to ever beat him.

It started there, and it went from there,” said Stephanie Gomez.

Glen and Stephanie Gomez spent nearly 27 years together in marriage before his death Dec. 22, 2014.

“He’s not perfect, but he’s perfect for me,” Stephanie said. “He’s a wonderful man and always treated me to the day he died like the day we met. He was always very kind and respectful and very romantic and very sweet and thoughtful.”

After teaching himself to read at age four, knowledge was just one of many of Glen Gomez’s passions. Making people laugh was another.

“He loved making people laugh. He loved entertaining people, and whichever medium it took for him to do that, Glen found a way to do it,” said Thomas.

Glen Gomez and Thomas hosted a morning radio show together on KCIL in Houma – where he got the nickname “Captain.” He also served as a traffic reporter for Metroscan, food critic for Gumbo Magazine and editor of the Tri-Parish Times newspaper. Although he made all those who read him love him for his witty radio and print remarks, as Thomas stated, “He even made the traffic entertaining” it was behind a camera and on stage where Glen Gomez really endeared himself to the public playing silly but loveable characters.

“It’s one of those gifts that God gives you. It’s not something you could teach someone on how to be funny. Glen had that gift. He had that talent of just able to say something funny to cheer you up when you were feeling down,” Thomas said. “He was just a very talented man, a sense of humor and a sense of comedic timing that I’ve never seen anybody equal.”

Glen Gomez’s talents made their way to the silver screen, too, playing parts in movies including Heaven’s Prisoner and Candyman 2: Farewell to the Flesh, among others.

His comedic chops were also utilized in soda commercials for Big Shot Soda and Barq’s Root Beer.

“He loved everything he did. If it was worth doing, you had to love it and had to be passionate about it,” Stephanie Gomez said of her husband. “He never wasted precious time on things that did not interest him or things that he did not think were worthwhile. He felt like life was short and you needed to have fun with what you loved and make the most of it.”

And when people weren’t watching and laughing are when he made some of his most important contributions.

One of his many donation endeavors came in the mid-90s when he was a contestant on Who Wants To be a Millionaire. Glen Gomez helped host a view party, which netted more than $3,000 for the Friends of the Library organization in Terrebonne Parish.

After suffering a stroke eight years ago, doctors found Glen Gomez had early onset of Alzheimer’s at the far too young age of 50.

“The few people that he did tell, we were hoping, well he has it, but this might not manifest until he’s 80 or 90 years old. But it started showing signs about four or five years after he was diagnosed. It started becoming pretty obvious, forgetting things,” Thomas said.

Around the time he was diagnosed, Glen Gomez left radio and took a job with the Terrebonne Public Library’s Main branch – a job his wife called his dream job.

“When Glen came to us after his radio career was over, he interviewed and he was just so knowledgeable and he was a people person so we hired him,” Terrebonne Parish Library System Director Mary Cosper LeBoeuf said. “When you work at the reference desk at the library, you never know what people are going to walk up and ask you, and some people may be a little intimidated. ‘What might they ask me?’ But Glen never was, because he was always curious to find what people needed to know to add to his knowledge, and I think he liked the thrill of the hunt.”

Cosper LeBoeuf said he was perfect at the job, but the effects of Alzheimer’s disease made his transfer to shelving books necessary. However, there, he was still capable of putting every book in the correct order.

Glen Gomez left the library in June, 2014.

He leaves behind no biological children but four daughters in which he and his wife – a former child protection worker – have “chosen” as well as six grandchildren among them.

New Orleans native turned Houma resident “Captain” Glen Gomez put smiles on the faces of people through many mediums including TV, radio, print and theatre. “He loved everything he did. If it was worth doing, you had to love it and had to be passionate about it.”

COURTESY