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Charles Durning has played Santa Claus in (to date) five unrelated Christmas-themed projects, two of which are TV movies that have aired within the past three weeks. Who's he going to be asked to play next -- Howard Taft? Homer Simpson? In a daring dual role, both of those fat motorcyle-riding twins? Durning, we want you to live a good long life. Just because they comp you a steak at Morton's doesn't mean you have to eat it.

Whatever damage Durning's extra poundage may be doing to his organs, however, it's great for his career as every movie's default big fat southerner (that is, when he's not playing the default fat Italian or Irish cop, as in, respectively, Dog Day Afternoon and Dick Tracy). Durning was born to play characters with names like Otis P. Hazelrigg and Louis Thibodo and Wylie Hunnicutt. He is in his element as a folksy yet wily lawyer, sweltering in his shirtsleeves in a dim '30s-era Alabama courtroom. The guy who, after court, heads down to the ol' barber shop for a trim and a jaw and maybe a chaw. Then steps out in his summer-weight suit -- white or seersucker, preferably -- and suspenders, to stand under some insufficient shade, or perhaps sit in a rocker on a sun porch, fanning himself with a fedora and begging whatever woman is handy to bring him some lemonade.

Durning doesn't always play stereotypical southern lawyers. He's also good at priests (as in his recurring role on Everybody Loves Raymond) and politicians. But really, all that's changed for Durning as he's aged is that he now plays more folksy judges than folksy attorneys. And when a Muppet project comes along, he's no longer spry enough to play the villain, as in The Muppet Movie; instead, he has to play someone who does a lot more sitting, and occasionally laughing, thus causing his belly to jiggle like a bowl full of jelly, as in Elmo Saves Christmas.

Jiggle on, sir. Just...maybe, some time, try the baked chicken.