By Ray Bennett
LONDON – Richard Widmark, who has died aged 93, made an indelible impression as a psychopathic criminal in Henry Hathaway’s 1947 Victor Mature vehicle “Kiss of Death”. It won the Minnesota-born actor an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actor and kicked off a long career playing criminals and cops on America’s mean streets.
My favorite memories of Widmark with his killer smile and deceptively sly line readings, however, are in Westerns starting with William A. Wellman’s “Yellow Sky” (1948, above) in which he competes with Gregory Peck for the charms of Anne Baxter. He’s also outstanding in three Edward Dmytryk Westerns – “Broken Lance” (1954) with Spencer Tracy and Robert Wagner, “Warlock” (1959) with Henry Fonda (pictured with Widmark below) and Anthony Quinn, and “Alvarez Kelly” (1966) with William Holden.
Widmark made “Backlash” (1956) and “The Law and Jake Wade” (1958) for John Sturges, the latter starring Robert Taylor and the redheaded Canadian beauty Patricia Owens. John Ford directed him in ‘Two Rode Together’ (1961) with James Stewart and “Cheyenne Autumn” (1964) but while Ford shot the opening Civil War episode of the 1962 Cinerama epic “How the West Was Won,” Widmark is in the terrific railroad sequence directed by George Marshall.
The blond actor’s performance as Jim Bowie is the best thing in John Wayne’s bloated “The Alamo” (1960) with Wayne and Laurence Harvey (pictured top) and he has a good time with Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum in Andrew V. McLaglen’s “The Way West” (1967), which also sees Sally Field’s feature film debut.
I have a soft spot for his stab at romantic comedy opposite Doris Day (pictured above) in “The Tunnel of Love” (1958) directed by Gene Kelly and for his wonderfully droll performance as a colorfully ruined dentist in Richard Quine’s “The Moonshine War” (1970). An acquired taste, the latter is an oddball picture, scripted by Elmore Leonard from his own novel, that also features one of the rare movie outings by the great Patrick McGoohan (pictured with Widmark below) as a duplicitous ex-revenue agent.
Widmark never quite made it to the top flight of Hollywood leading men but he ranks with the likes of Mitchum, Robert Ryan, James Mason and Jack Warden as performer who always make even bad pictures worth seeing, which is more than you can say of most.
Here’s Widmark’s obituary in the New York Times
Olivier Awards performances rock the joint
By Ray Bennett
LONDON – The joint was jumping at the Olivier Awards Sunday night with performances from the nominated musicals and a tribute to the works of lifetime achievement honouree Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Most unforgettable was the reaction of the young cast of “The Magic Flute – Impempe Yomlingo” (pictured) who had performed earlier. They were watching from the balcony of the ballroom at Grosvenor House and when the show was named best musical revival, boy, did they sing out in triumph!
It was exhilarating, and a grand advertisement for the Young Vic production, which sets the Mozart classic in South Africa, and is playing at the Duke of York’s Theatre through April 12.
But the one who had the industry crowd standing in applause was Elena Roger (above). The petite Argentine star of the 2006 revival of “Evita” performed “As If We Never Said Goodbye” from “Sunset Boulevard” and blew the roof off.
Richard E. Grant was the droll host of the evening, dripping with sarcasm over many of the corny lines he had to deliver. Presenters included Kevin Spacey and his “Speed-the-Plow” costar Jeff Goldblum who was paired with a delighted Barbara Windsor.
All the winners were gracious although I didn’t hear best actor Chiwetel Ejiofor (“Othello”) name-check his Iago, Ewan McGregor. The best acceptance speech was by surprised choreography winner Toby Sedgwick, who devised the motion of the puppets in the National’s hit “War Horse”, which returns at the end of the year.
Sedgwick observed that working with the faux equines for so long didn’t necessarily turn a person into a horse and then began to snort and stamp his foot.