Is an Actor’s Courage Always to Be Condemned?

If the theme of Kenneth Turan’s article on actors departing from their “star” roles (“Paul, This Isn’t You,” Calendar, Dec. 2) was valid, we never would have had Garbo in “Ninotchka,” Marlon Brando in “The Godfather” or Humphrey Bogart in “The Treasure of Sierra Madre.” I don’t know whether any of these actors were trying to “stretch,” but certainly nothing in their previous work would have prepared an audience for those magnificent performances. And I could cite many more examples.

It is true we have always had two kinds of stars: those whose performances came from the exploitation of their personas (I’m not using the word exploitation pejoratively) and those whose work falls into the general category of “character” acting. From Mae West to Paul Muni.

But to use this as a stick to beat actors who can bridge both is, to me, arrogant. To go after Paul Newman is just silly.

When you analyze Newman’s work over the years, there is an astonishing range in it. When the first shot of him appeared in “The Sting,” no exposition was necessary. The character was so complete, you knew the whole pre-picture life of the man. This was true of him in “The Verdict” and in Robert Rossen’s “The Hustler.”

I pick these movies because on the surface, they are all con men. Yet can anyone say that the characterizations are similar? Of course not. They are three different people. Paul Newman’s best work has always been “character” acting. “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” “Hud,” “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Newman “stretched” a long time before Turan became aware of it.

I also disagree with Turan about Newman’s performance in “Mr. and Mrs. Bridge.” I think he is superb. One of the hardest kinds of acting is to reveal the inner life of a character without using words or situations that label the person. The underlying level of fear, almost terror, that lay beneath that smug, self-satisfied, middle-class man is, to me, extraordinary acting.

But that’s not the most upsetting thing in Turan’s article. There is a tone in it that seems to want to settle, like so much else today, for what is easily identifiable. “Just give us your blue eyes, baby.” “Why don’t you just take your overbloated salaries and stop trying to do ‘good’ things?”

The fact that Turan is historically wrong about movie acting only adds to his condescension. Is there anything in Katharine Hepburn’s “persona” performance in “Stage Door” to prepare us for the magnificence of her “character” work in “Long Day’s Journey Into Night” or “The African Queen”? How would Turan classify Spencer Tracy, James Mason, Bette Davis, Ingrid Bergman or Robin Williams?

There is real harm in this kind of criticism, illustrated by what happened last year to Michelle Pfeiffer. Pfeiffer came to New York to appear in “Twelfth Night.” The production and she were torn to shreds by critics. I saw it and thought she was wonderful. When one considers that it was her first Shakespearean performance, it bordered on the miraculous. The point is, I doubt if she’ll try the theater again, much less Shakespeare, and that’s my loss. We all lose by it.

For me, all good acting has human revelation in it. The actor has nothing to use but him or herself. Come, come, Mr. Turan. It’s not your face, heart, soul and body up there. It’s theirs. Since when is courage something to be condemned? You don’t even pay for your admission. If you want safety and security when you reach into your box of popcorn, you’ve always got all those sequels to look forward to.