When I was growing up, back in the '50s and '60s, television was dominated by variety shows instead of talk shows, and comedians who appeared on those programs - especially mimics - all seemed to hone in on the same targets.
There were three main movie- star staples that comedians would do over and over. You could count on it.Whether it was on "The Ed Sullivan Show" or any number of others, and whether the comic was Frank Gorshin or Rich Little or whoever, they would invariably pop up to do their imitations of those three stars:
- James Cagney. The comic would usually be shifting his feet and moving his arms as he said repeatedly, "You dirty rat," which Cagney himself actually never said.
- Kirk Douglas. A grunting, grizzled voice would be affected as the comic kept poking a hole in his chin.
- And Burt Lancaster. The comic would offer a full-tooth grin, while squinting his eyes and speaking in a halted, affected speech pattern.
Lancaster and Douglas co-starred in a number of films, of course, with Douglas typically playing the more intense, hot-headed character, while Lancaster appeared more mellow and laid back.
Maybe that's why I always had a fondness for Lancaster in his varied movie roles - he was so relaxed and confident. Or at least he appeared so.
Lancaster's death Thursday evening at the age of 81 takes from us yet another of that generation of movie stars, about whom it may accurately be said, "They just don't make 'em like that anymore."
And looking back on Lancaster's incredible legacy of films, that really is a shame.
Even Douglas, a peer, colleague and rival, as well as a close friend, acknowledged Lancaster's range some years ago when he called him "living proof that you can be a sensitive actor and macho at the same time."
Lancaster was born Burton Stephen Lancaster on Nov. 2, 1913, in New York City and grew up in East Harlem, a tough section of Manhattan's Upper East Side.
An athlete who excelled in basketball and went to NYU on an athletic scholarship, Lancaster preceded his acting career as an acrobat in circuses and vaudeville.
When bookings slowed down during the war, Lancaster took odd jobs until he was discovered, according to studio biographies, in an elevator by a stage producer who mistook him for an actor and offered him an audition.
Lancaster's first movie was "The Killers" in 1946 and made such an impression that he became an immediate star.
Though he gained some of his greatest popularity in athletic characters, particularly in such seafaring epics as "The Flame and Arrow" and "The Crimson Pirate," Lancaster alternated such films with more sensitive roles in "All My Sons," "Come Back, Little Sheba" and "From Here to Eternity."
And he proved himself equally adept at playing villains, as in "Sorry, Wrong Number" and "Kiss the Blood Off My Hands," and heroes, as with "His Majesty O'Keefe" and "Jim Thorpe - All American." And he made his directing debut in 1955, with "The Kentuckian," in which he also starred. Sadly, he never directed again.
Nominated four times for the best actor Academy Award, Lancaster won in 1960 for his fire-and-brimstone portrayal of "Elmer Gantry." And he followed that triumph by gracefully slipping into older roles of some stature in films like "Judgment at Nuremberg," "The Birdman of Alcatraz," "Seven Days in May," "Atlantic City" and, in his last big-screen feature, "Field of Dreams."
Not to mention "Gunfight at the OK Corral," "Brute Force," "The Swimmer," "The Professionals," "Go Tell the Spartans," "Local Hero," "The Rainmaker," "The Leopard". . . .
Lancaster's final film was a 1990 TV miniseries version of "The Phantom of the Opera" (which is scheduled to be shown on cable television next weekend).
No, they don't make 'em like that anymore. But thankfully, we still have his movies.
In fact, give me a mediocre Burt Lancaster movie over most modern films any day.
- QUOTE OF THE WEEK: Burt Reynolds:
"I saw Burt Lancaster in `The Crimson Pirate' on TV the other night, and I enjoyed every minute of it. I'm sure that Burt got to the point where he said, `I'm not gonna do that crap anymore' . . . but when I sat there watching `The Crimson Pirate,' I found myself jumping up and down and enjoying him 1,000 more times than watching him in some of his later films."
- QUOTE OF THE WEEK II: Sam Shepard:
"If I know anything about movie acting, it's from practicing my Burt Lancaster sneer - from `Vera Cruz' - at 16 in front of a bedroom mirror."
- QUOTE OF THE WEEK III: Burt Lancaster:
"Most people seem to think I'm the kind of guy who shaves with a blowtorch. Actually, I'm bookish and worrisome."