Jason Sudeikis offered a heartfelt public remembrance of his uncle, “Cheers” mainstay George Wendt, while hosting the Big Slick Celebrity Weekend fundraiser in Kansas City, Missouri, on May 31. It was the “Ted Lasso” actor’s first on-camera comment since Wendt died in his sleep at his Los Angeles home on May 20, aged 76.
Asked by local station KSHB 41 about Wendt’s influence, Sudeikis replied, “There’s that old saying, ‘Don’t meet your heroes … because they let you down.’ He’s not one of those people.” He called his uncle “as fun and kind and warm as any character he ever played,” crediting Wendt with demonstrating that success and humility can coexist.
Sudeikis donned a softball jersey bearing “Wendt 76” during the event’s celebrity game, a quiet nod to the year of his uncle’s birth and to Wendt’s age at the time of his passing. Big Slick—co-founded by Sudeikis, Paul Rudd and other Kansas City natives—raised a record $4.5 million for Children’s Mercy Hospital across the weekend, underscoring the charitable impulse Wendt often encouraged within his family.
Wendt’s death reverberated far beyond the fundraiser. Tributes poured in from former cast-mates Ted Danson, Rhea Perlman, John Ratzenberger and Kelsey Grammer, each praising the actor’s warmth and comic timing that made Norm Peterson a television landmark. Fans left flowers and beer mugs at Boston’s Beacon Hill bar that inspired “Cheers,” echoing the nightly greeting Norm received on screen.
While Sudeikis declined to discuss upcoming projects, he told reporters that honoring Wendt’s legacy means “keeping family close and treating every set like the corner bar—where everybody’s welcome.”
