There are few patriarchs within the teen film genre like Mel Horowitz in “Clueless.”
The straight-talking litigator portrayed by Dan Hedaya terrifies everyone in his path – with the exception of his daughter Cher, played by Alicia Silverstone in the beloved 1995 film. He’s a man of multitudes. Direct and assertive, yet attentive and loving.
The heavily New York–accented Mel is an outlier to the breezy Beverly Hills setting of the movie. Although “Clueless” is loosely based on Jane Austen’s 1815 novel “Emma,” the film’s director Amy Heckerling drew on a range of influences outside of Emma’s father, the charming Mr. Woodhouse.
“I suppose the main inspiration for Mel was my father – an angry accountant. He was always yelling about one thing or another,” Heckerling recently told CNN over email. “I never seemed to figure out how to diffuse his anger, unless we were driving and I’d stick in a Benny Goodman or Mills Brothers tape.”
Heckerling continued to build Mel, taking cues from detective and gangster archetypes, looking for an actor who would be normally cast in such roles – like “Law & Order” star Jerry Orbach or Quentin Tarantino fixture Harvey Keitel. Both were approached, but prior filming commitments and a strict budget for “Clueless” kept either from landing the role. Hedaya came into the picture via a recommendation from a friend of Heckerling.
“He looked like he could play Bob Shapiro, the famous litigator working on the O.J. trial. I was so happy we were able to get him,” she said of casting the character actor, whose other credits include 1996’s “The First Wives Club” and playing Richard Nixon in “Dick” in 1999.
In “Clueless,” although Cher is Mel’s only biological child, he opens his home to his college-aged stepson Josh, played by Paul Rudd. Mel “treats him like a son,” according to Heckerling. Studying law, Josh spends an inordinate amount of time at the Horowitz mansion, aiding Mel in his legal cases and referring to him as “dad,” much to Cher’s chagrin. But in Mel’s words, “You divorce wives, not children.”
While other characters who encounter Mel appear to find him scary, “Cher only sees lovable daddy,” Heckerling observed. Cher possesses the ability to stay positive and calm in the face of her dad’s fury, which is something Heckerling learned when dealing with her own father: “If anger is coming at you, it doesn’t mean you have to let it in.”
In a touching scene toward the film’s climax, Mel lists Cher’s personal achievements, mentioning that her organizational skills and caring nature reminds him of Cher’s dearly departed mother. Although Mel is seen as tough, he’s also fair. His ability to verbalize praise sets him apart from fathers in similar features at the time, such as the overbearing Walter in “10 Things I Hate About You” (Lary Miller), rigid Harlan in “She’s All That” (Tim Matheson) and the legacy-obsessed Sam in “Varsity Blues” (Thomas F. Duffy).
Just make sure you don’t sit in Mel’s chair.