In the back corner of the Del Close Theater at iO, there's a shrine to Del, who is widely considered the father of longform improv. He was in the Compass Players, the Committee and was very influential in the early days of Second City (and Saturday Night Live for that matter). iO was founded as a place for him to teach. When his name is brought up, the word "guru" gets thrown around unironically.

The shrine includes pictures and toys, his ashes, and a little holder where people leave cigarettes for his ghost (and where other people steal cigarettes when they run out of smokes).

One of his dying wishes was to have his head cut off and his skull given to the Goodman so he could appear in productions of 'Hamlet' after his death. Months later Charna donated his skull to the theater as part of a big ceremony with references to Del being a "fellow of infinite jest."

A pretty good theater story.

Jon Favreau (who studied under Del briefly) wanted to use the skull in the doctor's office in his movie, 'Elf.' I remember reading that logistically they couldn't get it in time and I remember thinking that it was a shame.

And, of course, it later came out in late 2006 that the skull at the Goodman wasn't Del's skull at all. You can't just have someone's head cut off and their skull donated. It's not that simple. There are, you know, laws. As Charna finally admitted in the New Yorker, "I told the pathologists, ‘I will give you Del’s body, and it’s a great body, because you can study the effects of smoking, alcohol, cocaine, and heroin on the brain. All I need is the skull.’ They thought about it, and then said, ‘There’s a fine line between research and art, and we’re concerned about our funding.’"

So his full body was cremated. Charna bought a different skull from an anatomical chart company, pulled out most of the teeth ("We left the ones in the back, because it turns out that pulling teeth is like pulling teeth") and temporarily passed it off as Del's to the Chicago theater world.