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208.58.2.83
In Reply to: I couldn't tell if Nicholson was playing the Joker again or playing George Carlin playing Jack Nicholoson. posted by sjb on October 17, 2006 at 21:13:00:
...is that Jack's very real Boston gangster, Whitey Bulger, was himself an almost bigger-than-life character.-- Shot people at a favored spot and had 'em all buried there.
-- Kept young girls in basement captivity.
-- Prowled the streets openly.
-- Sold huge amounts of drugs but never known to do any.
-- Brother was longtime Speaker of the House (Dem, natch).
-- Had the head of FBI in Mass. on the payroll ("Zip" is currently serving a very long sentence).
-- Has been spotted in gay bars.
-- Has been seen in womens' clothes.
-- Tossed the owner of a liquor store out on his butt, taking over *immediately*.
-- Won the Mass. lottery. (Huh!)
In that context do you still find Jack's act extravagant?
clark
Follow Ups:
nt
It's not the extravagance of the character - I'm all for it - that turned me off to JN's performance it was, well, his performance. I really felt like I was watching him play the Joker again and, at times, he truly sounded like George Carlin doing a comedy routine.It wasn't that he shot people (or how, or where) or that he was into young girls or was flamboyant, etc. It was that, in his portrayal of THAT kind of person, he was playing him in the same way he's done other things and that - for me - made him into a caricature.
"Except for the point, the still point, there would be no dance, and there is only the dance. " T.S. Eliot
s
I think it's like directing a Charlie Kaufman script.Take Michel Gondry's work in Human Nature and Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind.
Kaufmans' scripts are already over the top and when Human Nature was directed in a way that was also over the top it failed but when ESOTSM was directed with lighter touch it suceeded (brilliantly, in my opinion)..
I think it's a similar thing... if the character is so over the top you don't want to add all your own cliched over the top mannerisms... you want the character to come to you, to play their over the topness like it's the most normal thing in the world and let it speak for itself. Don't jump up and down going look how well I can play over the top even if I bring every tired trick I've ever used for such things to the role.
Playing it the way JN did the guy never felt menacing or like a homicidal maniac (and I'll bet if one were around the real guy in real life it would be extremely uncomfortable) he felt more like a clown. At least to me.
"Except for the point, the still point, there would be no dance, and there is only the dance. " T.S. Eliot
...and would still clown around in drag. What to make of him?The Departed actors spent considerable time here in town. My guess is that Jack, hearing all of this, devised stuff like the ratface, and the black dildo, to portray the clown aspect (I've read that at dinner parties Hitler would do amusing impressions of Goebbels etc.) and relied on the script (shootings in cold blood) to cover the cruelty aspect.
clark
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