He was vacationing in Hawaii and disappeared. One such exaggeration is the food fight at Doug Kenney's funeral in A Futile and Stupid Gesture, though that did almost happen in real life. This culminated, sadly, with Kenney's sudden death in 1980. The real Doug Kenney of A Futile and Stupid Gesture didn't live a life filled with laughs and gags as you might expect, though.