Quote of the Day: Short People
Walter Matthau, as Kendig, in HOPSCOTCH, to a photograph of Myerson, played by Ned Beatty.
“Hello, Myerson, you short person.”
I liked this film, lightly. I always sort of wondered what it was doing in the esteemed Criterion Collection. Always sort of assumed it was just somebody’s perverse favourite. And I still suspect that’s the case. But as I say, it’s likeable, and there’s room for a certain chance element in a (supposedly) well-ordered universe. A nice little film like this turning up amongst all those world classics kind of makes me feel warm inside.
Footnote: Ronald Neame is still very much alive. He’ll be ninety-seven in April. Good show!
I heard about somebody once whose answering machine message was a plummy, “Hello, this is Ronald Neame.” But IT WASN’T.
Footfootnote: Glenda Jackson does have real screen chemistry with Walter Matthau. But I still don’t want to see them touch each other in any way.
Footfootfootnote: several supporting characters are named after crime/espionage writers: Follett, Ludlum, Westlake. The mention of Donald Westlake brings me back to my oft and loudly stated contention that Walter Matthau should have played Westlake’s doleful criminal mastermind John Dortmunder.
I’m currently reading The Road to Ruin, which pits Dortmunder against an Enron-style corrupt executive with a valuable car collection. Fun!
January 21, 2008 at 10:14 pm
My favourite Walter Matthau moment among many is the baleful glare he gives Martin Balsam at the very end The Taking of Pelham 1,2,3 (what an underrated film) as Balsam gives himself away with a tell-tale sneeze. And the last line from The Front Page’ “Son of a bitch stole my watch!” And… (that’s enough Walter Matthau quotes – ed).
As for fantasy casting of harboiled crime novels – that’s a wonderfully rich seam. I note that Tommy Lee Jones will appear as James Lee Burke’s Dave Robicheaux in Bertrand Tavernier’s next film. A big improvement on Alec Baldwin I’d say. This is a genre where casting seems to get it right more than wrong- Fred Ward as Hoke Mosely in Miami Blues, Lee Marvin as Walker in Point Blank, Robert Foster in Jackie Brown etc. I look forward to someone doing justice to George Pelecanos’s Nick Stefanos and Washington Quartet series – especially King Suckerman.
January 21, 2008 at 10:19 pm
Oh but that was early Alec Baldwin when he was still smokin’ hot! He started out as a Studio 54 bartender you know.
Mr. Neame told me he enjoyed working with Matthau and Jackson enormously and they simply adored each other. It shows. Making a light film like this is no simple task.
January 21, 2008 at 10:49 pm
“He started out as a Studio 54 bartender you know”…I *did* *not* *know* that!
That’s even better than Sir John Mills starting out as a Noel Coward chorus boy!
I had forgotten until I re-read your article that Neame made The Prome of Miss Jean Brodie, one of the best Edinburgh-set films (as well as giving Maggie Smith a chance to practice her Miss McGonigall accent for Harry Potter.)
I guess the hardboiled thriller casting tends to work well as there’s never any shortage of good tough-guy actors. And if they don’t have to look pretty, the field widens considerably.
I’ve read a Hoke Mosely novel or two but not any Pellicanos or Burke. But that’s exciting about Tavernier, an appealing director who’s done good work with US thrillers in the past: his Jim Thompson adaptation, Coup De Torchon is well worth a look.
January 21, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Wouldn’t a sub-footnote be a toenote?
January 21, 2008 at 11:58 pm
Maybe…and then a toenailnote. But what THEN?
January 22, 2008 at 12:51 am
Okay, so this has no bearing on the current discussion, or on the post at hand, but I can’t resist. I guess I’ll plead that it’s tangentially connected because . . . um, the actor in the anecdote I’m going to share has roots in TV’s Homicide, a cop show, which while not being hard-boiled is at least . . . a cop show?
Anyway, on today’s Fresh Air program on NPR, Terry Gross interviewed TV actor and director Clark Johnson (who played Detective Meldrick Lewis on Homicide and is now involved in The Wire). Johnson started out in special effects, and he talked about working effects for David Cronenberg, whom he said “loved to use lots of fake blood.”
Johnson said that while he was working on The Dead Zone for Cronenberg, he was on a truck setting an explosion, and the moment the explosion went off, he fell off the truck and cut his arm. There was blood everywhere. Cronenberg walked up carrying a bucket! and said, quietly, “Let’s keep the blood.”
January 22, 2008 at 12:51 am
Baldwin is quite open about his Studio 54 days. He gave a teriffic interview to Interview where he talked about the exceedingly well-turned-out gentlemen who would give him $100 to “fetch” a packet of cigarettes.
This is why his dream has been to play Halston in a biopic of the fashion designer and inveterate partygoer.
January 22, 2008 at 7:59 am
Even the most tangential discussion is justified by its subject being Clark Johnson let alone any of the Homicide Life on the Street/The Wire cast/Shield directors. I’d show myself up by saying that I love Clark Johnson’s commentaries on The Shield dvds especially his nicknaming of hulk-like star Michael Chiklis “Chiks”. So I won’t.
Not denigrating Alec Baldwin – incendiary cameos in Glengarry Glen Ross & Malice (”God Complex? I AM God!”) and big kudos for all those great animated voice jobs – but he just wasn’t the right Robicheaux.
January 22, 2008 at 10:57 am
Well, if Baldwin’s film comes off, I only hope it’s better than that “54″. What a cop-out that was!
Baldwin’s best work may be his cameo roles. Sounds like he can be kind of a pain on set (and elsewhere) but he’s a powerhouse alright.
Love the Cronenberg story, Levi. He says on The Brood, where they massacre a kindergarten teacher in front of her class, the kids found out the gore was made from food colouring and other tasty stuff, so they were chanting “More blood! More blood!”
Mike, what’s your kid’s name? i could run the Great Dictator clip as Euphoria — or anything else suggested. We haven’t had a suggestion from anyone under 20 yet!
January 22, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Footnote, toenote, toenailnote, toejamnote?
See? This is why I love filmmaking. The actual behind the scene process is so damn weird. Where else can you see kindergarten kids eating fake blood and chanting “More blood! More blood!” ?
January 22, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Elver, I can see you’ve never been to Edinburgh.
January 23, 2008 at 3:19 am
Nope. Never been to England, even. But having just watched two seasons of QI, I must say, I love the British way of making obscure jokes about parts of their own country. That’s the kind of humour that’s not very common in Estonia.
January 23, 2008 at 9:49 am
Ah, QI! When Fiona suffered depression, that was the only show that could force a laugh out of her. I should really write to Stephen Fry to thank him.
Maybe the problem is, all of Estonia is equally obscure? ;)