Funny Man Moves On From Mashpee
The Teller likes to think we’re good at what we do: providing different and occasionally humorous slants on banking and real estate news. If you chuckle at one out of every 20 of our jokes, then we’ll consider ourselves moderately successful.
There is hope for the simple joke writer. We know this because The Warren Group, publisher of Banker & Tradesman and The Teller’s liege lord, is not-so-secretly spying on everyone who buys and sells a home in Massachusetts. So when Bobby Farrelly, a man whose career took off after co-writing and directing the movie "Dumb and Dumber," sells a waterfront home in Mashpee for $2.85 million, we close our eyes and can hear the surf crashing onto our private beach sometime in our successful future.
Farrelly, and his wife, Nancy, bought the property at 31 Starboard Lane in Mashpee in January 1999, presumably after the success of "There’s Something About Mary," for $792,500. In 2000, they built a new three-bedroom, three-bath, 4,539-square-foot house on the .29 acre lot. The property neighbors a small sandy beach, and features a prominent rock wall for privacy, and protection from the treacherous waves (Google Maps is a wonderful, wonderful tool for the would-be voyeur). It was purchased by a John and Jennifer Sullivan – no word on whether they’re funny or not.
Farrelly, along with his brother, Peter, is known for movies featuring off-beat and low-brow humor, and both brothers have signed on to write, direct and produce a new Three Stooges movie in 2010. If they’re looking for a Shemp to take a few pies to the face, The Teller knows someone who loves pie, comedy and beachfront property, and is willing to work for cheap.
There’s Money In Coin-Op
Everyone has had their lives touched, in one way or another, by coin-op amusement machinery. Whether it be a jukebox, a pinball machine, Asteroids, Pac-Man, Street Fighter II, Hoop-Shot, Big Buck Hunter, Golden Tee, or the new game where a group of drunken frat-boy tough guys see who can punch a punching bag the hardest (seriously, this exists), you’ve plunked quarters into a machine and been amused and entertained by the results.
Well, somebody has to finance the machinery filling with quarters in various bars, arcades and pizza places across the country. In New England, that somebody is often Firestone Financial Corp., of Newton. They’ve been in the business since 1965, and have seen the above coin-op phenomena come and go. Over the last decade, Firestone has funded more than 25,000 contracts to more than 8,000 customers, according to the company.
Now, Firestone Financial Corp. President and CEO David Cohen sits on top of the American coin-op industry. Cohen was elected chairman of the board of the American Amusement Machine Association (AAMA), a trade group that represents more than 100 coin-op amusement distributors, manufacturers and suppliers.
Cohen was already named "Man of the Year" by the AAMA in 2007, but now he’s the pinnacle of coin-op power. What kind of power does he yield, you may ask? He knows all the codes to Ikari Warriors. He knows where the flutes are in Super Mario Bros. 3. He knows every key combination for every finishing move in Mortal Kombat 1 and 2. He’s scored more than 1,000,000,000 points on the original Six Million Dollar Man pinball machine, and he’s got a jukebox with every 45 ever created.
More importantly, he’s the guy you go to when you want to find a vintage 1983 Star Wars: The Arcade Game console. And he’s the guy who can finance your purchase of the thing which, let me tell you, is very, very expensive.
In a recent release, Cohen said he is committed to AAMA’s mission: to preserve, promote and protect the coin-operated entertainment industry through ongoing communication and evaluation, exploring new opportunities and monitoring of industry and government activity.
The Teller isn’t exactly sure what platform he ran on to achieve his industry’s chairmanship, but we know it had something to do with a familiar topic: change.
