A Damn Fine Cup of Culture

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

Extreme close-up on the face of Martha (Elizabeth Taylor) as the first sunlight hits the garden behind her. Soon a ray catches her tired, ragged, desperate face. An excruciating night of middle-aged drinking lies behind her now, behind George (Richard Burton), her dishevelled yet razor-sharp husband of many years, who has dealt Martha his final blow in their night-long cruel games, innuendos and infidelities. Martha seems a broken woman now as she slowly recuperates from her sobs and the two look on into an uncertain older age. Fade out and credits over Alex North’s deceptively beautiful harp and guitar elegy that brings Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1966) to a shattering close.

To me, Taylor (and Burton) is perfect casting here, even if she was barely 33 at the time of filming. So in our now serial discussion about actors seeming too old or too young to play certain parts, I therefore intend to flip the debate on its head and argue that to me, there are just as many (if not more) performances where the stars playing them were technically not age-appropriate at all, but they were still absolutely ideal in that role. Or rather, they are so convincing in it, I never really pay attention to their age at the time of production. I think that’s called (great) acting.

In the case of Elizabeth Taylor’s Martha, even though the actress was playing a fifty-something character, her own public image and turbulent relationship with Burton matched the performance perfectly and she literally amalgamated with the role. A lesser actress might have been stuck with such an iconic role forever, as was sometimes the case with other people on my list of age-inappropriate perfection.

Of course, the discussion around actors (and especially actresses) too young often descends into partisan or problematic territory, not only in the wake of #metoo: can we find Jodie Foster perfect casting as a teenage streetwalker (aged 12 at the time of filming)? Should we be amazed or aghast at a 13-year-old Linda Blair in The Exorcist? How perfect can we find Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting (both underage at the time of filming) in Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet (1968), especially after their own abuse allegations a few years ago? And can we still enjoy seeing Brooke Shields in Pretty Baby or, even more controversially, Mariel Hemingway in Manhattan? It appears that especially the permissive 1970s have left us with a legacy of highly memorable performances that have aged badly or that at least test our very different present-day sensibilities.

To me personally, the individual circumstances of casting and filming, as well as the way these characters are framed and depicted makes all the difference whether I find them cringeworthy today. All the examples above were technically age-appropriate with regard to the role played but might be seen as far less than appropriate otherwise. The safer territory here is certainly the flip side of the question: Are twenty- or even thirty-somethings too old to play teenage parts? After all, Tobey Maguire was twenty-six when he first played Spiderman, Malcolm McDowell an improbable twenty-seven in Clockwork Orange. Even more incredibly, Stockard Channing (33) played an 18-year old in Grease and Harry Potter’s Moaning Myrtle (supposedly fourteen) was played by Shirley Henderson, aged thirty-seven!

Again, ageism or age obsession do not help here beyond trivial numbers. What might stick out here are merely the more blatant examples in lesser performances, questionable costumes or bad setups. However, have I ever really thought of Sissy Spacek’s age during her unforgettably unsettling and touching turn in Carrie (she was twenty-six when playing a seventeen-year old)? Is Dustin Hoffman a lesser Benjamin in The Graduate at age twenty-nine? Or do we enjoy Michael J. Fox less just because he was twenty-three when supposedly still underage?

I certainly don’t think so. To me, each of them feels completely organic and natural at that very moment: the right actor picked by talented, clearsighted (casting) directors for parts that defined and further shaped their careers. They both disappear into the role and inhabit them without a shred of doubt. It’s hard to imagine them being cast with somebody else. Well, then again…

Just for fun, let’s just do a little age hallucinating at the end and envision if the same roles had been cast by much more age-appropriate people at the time: Can you see Tommy Lee Jones or Eugene Levy as Benjamin in The Graduate, both about 21 in 1967? Or how about Michelle Pfeiffer or Annette Bening as Carrie? Would you have paid money to go see Bette Davis or Joan Crawford as Martha (maybe with Burt Lancaster or Cary Grant at their side), each in their late 50s when cameras rolled? And would Mark Ruffalo or Paul Rudd have been just as iconic as Marty McFly (with Walther Matthau or Paul Newman as a much more age-appropriate “Doc” Brown) in 1985?

I must admit, the longer I think about this, the more interesting these possibilities and variations become! We might have to send Marty and “Doc” into the past and back to the future after all to find out! We would certainly find it a much different (if alternatively fascinating) world…

Extreme closeup on the face of Benjamin (Tim Curry) looking intently at Mrs. Robinson (Ava Gardner)!