It’s no surprise Gene Hackman became a huge star in Hollywood when the Hays Code ended and filmmakers got more brave with their movies. He joined the other actors like Donald Sutherland, Dustin Hoffman and Elliott Gould along with the rise of younger actors like Robert DeNiro, Al Pacino and Harvey Keitel.
Hollywood actors up until the 1960s were Cary Grant, John Wayne and the younger Marlon Brando. They had a look to them that both glamor and rugged manliness. But Hollywood stars didn’t have to be perfect anymore. They could look like real people rather than what some gossip columnist would like to see.
Hackman rose to prominence playing Buck Barlow alongside Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway and Gene Wilder in Bonnie and Clyde. But it wasn’t until his role as New York Police Det. Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle in The French Connection that he became a star. The role won him an Oscar as Best Lead Actor and opened the door for the rest of his career. Doyle wasn’t a perfect character. He was flawed and probably a little racist. But that was needed for a gritty movie like this.
In later roles throughout the 1970s, he played a wide range of characters from comic-book villain Lex Luthor in Superman to Harry Caul in The Conversation and even a nice one-scene cameo as the Blind Man in Young Frankenstein. Hackman got the role on account of his friendship with Wilder. And it is brilliant casting. He gets off many laughs as the Blind Man who doesn’t realize he is doing more harm to Peter Boyle’s Monster by accidentally pouring boiling soup in his lap and lighting his thumb on fire. Hackman improvised the line, “I was gonna make expresso!” as the Monster runs away from the Blind Man’s house in pain.
By the 1980s had started, Hackman had become the go-to actor for roles in which filmmakers were initially uncertain to cast. Critic Roger Ebert would describe his role as an Army sergeant in the political action thriller The Package as a “Get Gene Hackman” role. Whether it was a big role as Norman Dale, the basketball coach in Hoosiers, who shows the players there’s more to the sport than shooting the ball, or horrible movies like Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, he proved great versatility. He even voiced God in the forgettable Two of a Kind but that’s probably why he went uncredited.
It’s no surprised he played military officials in movies like Uncommon Valor, Geronimo, Bat 21 and Behind Enemy Lines. He had that look of a military man who believed in precision and little room for error. As Navy Capt. Frank Ramsey in Crimson Tide, he managed to turn what others would’ve made an antagonistic character into a veteran who knew being a submarine commander can be an unpleasant job but he’s not there to make friends. In The Royal Tenenbaums, Bill Murray said he expected total professionalism on the film set. Brad Dourif, who co-starred with him in Mississippi Burning, echoed those comments.
That makes it fitting he played a movie director who wasn’t going to put up with the reckless drug abuse of Meryl Streep’s character in Postcards from the Edge but he was still gave her a chance for improvement. His prolific work from the 1960s to the early 2000s inspired a joke in the 1994 comedy PCU where a college student has a theory that at any given time, there is a Gene Hackman and/or Michael Caine movie playing on TV. Both would star in A Bridge to Far.
Despite being in movies about war, Hackman didn’t really care for violence in movies if it was exploitive. When approached by Clint Eastwood to play the brutal Sheriff “Little Bill” Daggett in Unforgiven, he initially refused. Then Eastwood kept talking with him about how the character and movie is different. Hackman won his second Oscar for the role.
As the 21st Century started, Hackman turned 70 and realized it was time to retire. Following the mediocre political satire comedy Welcome to Mooseport, Hackman figured that was enough. The movie had a great premise as a former President who moves to his vacation home in a Maine town to keep his ex-wife from getting it in the divorce. He is then persuaded to run for mayor because it can be considered an office and he doesn’t have to use it as an asset in the divorce settlement.
It could’ve been a good comedy. But it came off as a rejected sitcom idea from Newhart. So, at 74, Hackman decided to take a cue from the movie and just retire himself and live a private life in the Santa Fe area with his wife, Betsy Arakawa. Both were discovered to be dead in their home in late February, and had been reportedly dead for days. Officials report Hackman probably passed around mid-February at the age of 95.
Regardless of what happened, it shouldn’t diminish his legacy and what an actor is able to do. He was 37 when Bonnie and Clyde premiered. In Hollywood terms then, he wasn’t a has been, he was a never was. He would’ve been written off as just another character actor who appeared in a few movies and then vanished.
Instead his career surged in his 40s, 50s and 60s. You’re never too old for great success and sometimes retirement and a private life in latter years is the better idea.
What was your favorite role of his? Please comment.
Zane Says 