FEEDBACK

I think of the term “actress” without any of the negative connotations that some do. It generally conjures for me talented, admirable women like Gene Tierney, as you pictured her with Sheri Linden’s thought-provoking consideration of the word (“From Actor to Actress and Back Again,” Jan. 18).

Neither have I in my 47 years ever heard anyone try to use it pejoratively. All things considered, I find that with the exception of very obscure history there is little to object in it. Yet it will never apply to me, and I don’t presume to sit in final judgment of its usage.

I would say to my fellows in the acting community, female and male, who wish to put the word to the sword that they consider direct action with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the accepted ultimate arbiter of right and wrong and good and bad in filmmaking, by refusing to condone or participate in the academy’s award season usage of it in the actor-actress categories. That is, take a page from Gen. William T. Sherman’s post-Civil War election playbook and tell the academy, in so many words, that “if drafted I will not run, if nominated I will not accept, if elected I will not serve.”

George C. Scott and Marlon Brando did as much, for reasons of their own, and lived to tell the tale.

James McCarthy

Granada Hills