The New Biographical Dictionary of Film: Completely Updated and Expanded (439 page)

It was in the late 1930s that Stein sent Wasserman to Los Angeles, like a missionary, to spread the reputation and reach of MCA. There are now two biographies (by Connie Bruck and Kathleen Sharp) that attest to how thoroughly Lew did his job, and how astutely he recognized that as the studio structure declined so there was room for talent agencies to become driving forces in the business.

In the old days of the standard seven-year contract, there had been so much less room for agent maneuvering. But as stars branched out on their own and formed independent production companies so the picture business became one-off as opposed to long-term. It was Wasserman who pushed the theory that artists (generally stars) deserved profit participation from films that depended on them. Some say he invented that approach. That is not so. But he put it into practice on a wider scale than anyone else, starting with the deal that gave James Stewart profits as opposed to upfront salary on
Harvey
and
Winchester ’73
(a deal done with Universal).

The fifties was the richest decade of MCA’s life, not just because it attracted so many major stars and contrived deals they had not dreamed of, but because the agency also obtained a waiver from the Screen Actors Guild so that its production company, Revue, could gain a huge advantage in television series work. That waiver, which was illegal, came from MCA clients Walter Pidgeon and Ronald Reagan, and it lasted seven years—a nostalgic touch.

It was in 1962 that MCA effectively took over Universal, with Wasserman becoming head of the studio. The Wasserman name is on hardly any pictures, but he had an enormous paternal influence on many star careers and on directors ranging from Alfred Hitchcock to Steven Spielberg. The business style of MCA carried over to the studio with the result that it was a place renowned for being late and tough on residuals and very wary of challenging material. But Wasserman was a ruthless manager who saw the way to open the studio backlot as a tourist site, and who also envisioned a pattern of mass opening with TV advertising (on
Jaws
) that changed the business.

Wasserman might have retired or passed on, but he needed a last dramatic coup, and it proved to be the sale of Universal to Matsushita, an operation in which he was greatly assisted (and maybe out-manipulated) by Mike Ovitz, who had certainly wanted to be Lew Wasserman. The deal to Matsushita was not as rich as hoped for—though it left Lew with at least $350 million. Alas, under the Japanese, Universal fell apart and went from hand to hand in a shaming process that was proof of how power in Hollywood, lovely as the dawn sometimes, can still burn off by eleven.

John Waters
, b. Baltimore, Maryland, 1946
1970:
Mondo Trasho
. 1971:
Multiple Maniacs
. 1972:
Pink Flamingos
. 1975:
Female Trouble
. 1977:
Desperate Living
. 1981:
Polyester
. 1988:
Hairspray
. 1990:
Cry-Baby
. 1994:
Serial Mom
. 1998:
Pecker
. 2001:
Cecil B. DeMented
. 2004:
A Dirty Shame
.

John Waters is, in many ways, the classic modern homosexual movie director, with wit, courage, and mischief to spare, born a Catholic in middlebrow Baltimore and gradually encouraged to make mock of everything his mom cherished—while secretly longing to be Mom. He has achieved a great deal, becoming a recognizable cultural icon way beyond Baltimore, and being generally endearing. But it’s notable that he has mellowed as he’s grown older, which is another way of pointing to the variety of ploys the American mainstream has for muffling the outright offensive. Waters might, once upon a time, have been a candidate to be the American Buñuel, especially when he had the raw hatred of Divine at his command (notably in
Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble, Polyester
, and
Hairspray
). But when Divine died, in 1989, Waters was rather exposed for his innate kindness and moderation. His subsequent films are, if you will, “regular” satires—and Kathleen Turner carried
Serial Mom
way beyond Waters’s normal cult following.

So we like John Waters, and regard him as dirty-naughty and middle-aged. Will he retaliate? Can he find it in himself to be monstrous or explosive? I doubt it. Indeed, if you ever contemplated the anarchist end of American filmmaking from the point of view of J. Edgar Hoover, or Jack Valenti, say, and wanted to invent an ostensibly dangerous but truly safe figure to occupy it, you couldn’t do better than John Waters. Alas.

Emily Watson
, b. London, England, 1967
I am not one of those who speak of Emily Watson as a luminous saint of truth. In fact, very often during
Breaking the Waves
(96, Lars von Trier), I wanted to get up on screen and wring her character’s neck. I loathe and despise that film, its maudlin religiosity, its cruel, reckless mix of sensationalism and sentimentality, and its own sense of being very significant. This is much more the fault of von Trier than of Ms. Watson (it could be that I’m the outcast, I admit). But there have been other signs of the actress’s readiness to be woeful and manipulative at the same time that leave me very guarded.

She spent time at the Shakespeare School of Acting, and did some theatre in Britain, but she won the role of Bess in
Breaking the Waves
when Helena Bonham Carter flinched at the sexual explicitness it called for. Watson was nominated for that performance, but she has had an odd career since then:
Metroland
(97, Philip Saville);
The Boxer
(97, Jim Sheridan); Maggie Tulliver in
The Mill on the Floss
(97, Graham Theakston) for British TV; as Jacqueline du Pré in
Hilary and Jackie
(98, Anand Tucker); as Olive Stanton in
Cradle Will Rock
(99, Tim Robbins); the mother in
Angela’s Ashes
(99, Alan Parker); awful in the more-than-awful
Trixie
(00, Alan Rudolph);
The Luzhin Defense
(00, Marleen Gorris); as a maid in
Gosford Park
(01, Robert Altman);
Punch-Drunk Love
(02, Paul Thomas Anderson);
Red Dragon
(02, Brett Ratner);
Equilibrium
(02, Kurt Wimmer);
The Life and Death of Peter Sellers
(04, Stephen Hopkins);
Separate Lies
(04, Julian Fellowes);
Wah-Wah
(05, Richard E. Grant);
Corpse Bride
(05, Mike Johnson and Tim Burton);
The Proposition
(05, John Hillcoat);
Miss Potter
(06, Chris Noonan);
Crusade in Jeans
(06, Ben Sombogaart);
The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep
(07, Jay Russell);
Fireflies in the Garden
(08, Dennis Lee);
The Memory Keeper’s Daughter
(08, Mick Jackson);
Synecdoche, New York
(08, Charlie Kaufman);
Cold Souls
(09, Sophie Barthes).

Naomi Watts
, b. Shoreham, Kent, England, 1968
In
Mulholland Dr
. (01, David Lynch), her breakthrough film, Naomi Watts was already thirty-one, with a history of small roles and forgettable pictures that were ideal experience for the downbeat history of hopeful yet hopeless Hollywood blondes so crucial to the Lynch picture. Part of the power of
Dr
. was the ease with which she suggested the twinning of fame and anonymity (glamour and ordinariness) in such women. It remains to be seen how her fate will be settled.

She was fourteen before she left England to go to Australia (she was the daughter of the sound engineer with Pink Floyd) and she is still an intriguing contrast of English bloom in an Australian heatwave. How close did she come to wilting? In Australia first, and then for several years in Hollywood, she was not a someone that anyone knew. She is a very good actress—as witness her agonized character in
21 Grams
(03, Alejandro González Iñárritu)—but her biggest hit is as the endlessly endangered female figure in
The Ring
(02, Gore Verbinski). Is she strong enough to assert herself in the manner of her Australian friend, Nicole Kidman?

Her first film was
For Love Alone
(86, Stephen Wallace), followed by
Flirting
(91, John Duigan);
Matinee
(93, Joe Dante);
Wide Sargasso Sea
(93, Duigan);
Gross Misconduct
(93, George Miller);
The Custodian
(93, John Dingwall);
Tank Girl
(95, Rachel Talalay);
Bermuda Triangle
(96, Ian Toynton);
Children of the Corn IV
(96, Greg Spence);
Timepiece
(96, Marcus Cole);
Persons Unknown
(96, George Hickenlooper);
Dangerous Beauty
(98, Marshall Herskovitz).

She was a voice in
Babe: Pig in the City
(98, George Miller);
The Christmas Wish
(98, Ian Barry);
The Hunt for the Unicorn Killer
(99, William A. Graham);
The Wyvern Mystery
(00, Alex Pillai); an Australian actress in L.A. in
Ellie Parker
(01, Scott Coffey);
Down
(01, Dick Maas);
Plots with a View
(02, Nick Hurran);
The Outsider
(02, Randa Haines).

With more fame, her projects have improved: the short,
Rabbits
(02, Lynch);
Ned Kelly
(03, Gregor Jordan);
Le Divorce
(03, James Ivory). She was set to produce her next film,
We Don’t Live Here Anymore
(04, John Curran), and she was in
I Heart Huckabee’s
(04, David O. Russell) and
The Assassination of Richard Nixon
(04, Niels Muller).

She had the lead in
King Kong
(05, Peter Jackson), and she carried it off in the most sporting manner. But a feeling dawned—she is great-looking and a very good actress, but she lacks the stamp of stardom. Her credits mount, but does her career grow?
Stay
(05, Marc Foster);
The Ring Two
(05, Hideo Nakata);
Ellie Parker
(05, Scott Coffey);
The Painted Veil
(07, Curran);
Eastern Promises
(07, David Cronenberg);
Funny Games
(08, Michael Haneke);
The International
(09, Tom Tykwer);
Mother and Child
(10, Rodrigo García); and as Valerie Plame in
Fair Game
(10, Doug Liman).

John Wayne
(Marion Michael Morrison) (1907–79), b. Winterset, Iowa
I once showed
Red River
in a course for American students and at the end—like Charles Foster Kane at the opera—I stood up alone to applaud. This was 1971. Later we argued about the film. Yes, they could see the relaxed epic storytelling. They admitted that Hawks brought a beautiful simplicity to the filming. Of course, the action scenes were breathtaking. They liked the way Walter Brennan was used as a narrator. They had been very impressed by the shots of cattle on the move. Grudgingly, they conceded that the theme of family relationship and conflicting stubbornness was well worked out. They had nothing against the special masculine romanticism. Clift was astonishing, was he really dead? And even Joanne Dru was pleasing. Pushed to the limit, they allowed that this film showed more aspects of John Wayne than most. But ultimately,
Red River
never had a chance because they would not stomach John Wayne.

The reasons for that are not obscure. One has only to remember the unctuous moment in
The Alamo
(60) when Crockett/Wayne, having cuddled “Angelina Dickinson,” turns to Widmark and Laurence Harvey and with good nature bathing his features says: “Kind of a shame kids have to grow up to be people.” My students were people who could not transport Wayne’s heroics into adulthood. Nor would they have liked the uncompromising political bias of
The Alamo
when Wayne addressed the world: “Republic—I like the sound of the word … One of those words that makes me tight in the throat.” Less still did they admire his remorseless weighing in on the American right and that heartfelt tribute to political obscurantism:
The Green Berets
(68), a film Wayne directed and profited from against every humane and tactful objection.

They are reasons enough for qualifying Wayne the man, but not for shutting
Red River
out of one’s mind. At worst Wayne was unthinking, a boor, harsh, and arrogant—the character he plays in
Red River
. But just as reaction has misled the world into ignoring Leni Riefenstahl’s worth as an artist, so Wayne’s sincere wrongheadedness once obliterated the fact that he was a great screen actor.

As a child he moved West and, after a football scholarship at the University of Southern California, Tom Mix got him a job at Fox. There he met John Ford and worked as a set decorator on
Mother Machree
(28). Gradually he edged into acting, by the storybook means of being a bystander. His first big part was in
The Big Trail
(30, Raoul Walsh). Walsh had seen him carrying a big armchair above his head—carrying it with flair and flourish. Throughout the 1930s Wayne was a star of matinee Westerns, sometimes a singing cowboy, working his way round most of the smaller studios and making something like a hundred films. By 1939 he was with Republic when John Ford asked him to be the Ringo Kid in
Stagecoach
. The success of that film lifted Wayne from regular work to stardom. Republic pulled themselves together for a major vehicle for him
—Dark Command
(40, Walsh)—and Ford called on him again to play a seaman in
The Long Voyage Home
(40).

Even at that stage, Wayne had this virtue denied to Ford’s “stock company”: he did not ham. Universal put him opposite Dietrich in
Seven Sinners
(40, Tay Garnett) and Republic lowered its sights to more Westerns. For the next few years he made fodder at his home studio and more adventurous work outside, much of which only exposed his monotonous fierceness:
Reap the Wild Wind
(42, Cecil B. De Mille);
The Spoilers
(42, Ray Enright);
Flying Tigers
(42, David Miller); with Joan Crawford in Jules Dassin’s crazy
Reunion in France
(42); and
The Fighting Seabees
(44, Edward Ludwig). In 1945, he was in
Back to Bataan
(Edward Dmytryk),
Flame of the Barbary Coast
(Joseph Kane), and overshadowed by Robert Montgomery in
They Were Expendable
(Ford). He was bizarrely paired with Claudette Colbert in a comedy,
Without Reservations
(46, Mervyn Le Roy), but Republic still pushed straight Westerns at him.