Paul Newman: Between the Cat House and the Jail House

growing up, I was never, ever into blondes, but I had also never seen a Paul Newman film. I defined blondes on film by James Dean, and though I tried to give Dean a fair shake, I am not one for the Rebel Without a Cause mentality; he's too immature. too whiny. and too one dimensional. I love Brando, but he's always bold, always the brute and  always the sex object, which is just as singular a role as Dean's.

Newman is none of that and all of that. In 1958's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Elizabeth Taylor was at her sexual peak: she was the kitten crooner; she was Maggie the Cat. but despite all that, she definitely had to fight Brick (Newman) for the scenes. In particular, in the bedroom. Even though Brick is on crutches, drinking whiskey, sprawled out on the couch or in the background to every one of Taylor's foreground scenes, he is always in absolute immediacy. when Taylor pulls down her silk stockings, after one of those "no neck children" throws ice cream at her, Brick is in the mirror, in the background, stealing the scene. 

Newman was always tight lipped; he was quiet, pensive and he only said words worth saying, which made him ideal for a Tennessee Williams' play. furthermore, Newman's characters, to those around him, within those scenes, always seemed like the James Dean, the Brando: reckless, drunk, bold and dumb. 

but to the audience, behind that famous smirk, there was always something more. there is an image he epitomized: the shake of the head, the sly grin, eyes bold and bright in a sideways glance. his no's were always tentative, and no one around him could ever live up to his expectations:

his characters had a reason for everything, which despite the circumstances between the rich and the poor, the athlete and the war hero, though both are definite drunks, there are vast similarities between his characters of Brick and Luke in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Cool Hand Luke. 

Newman was always Brick; he was always Luke.

that famous scene in Cool Hand Luke, where he finally let's himself break, after his mother dies, after  being locked in the hole for two days, after he ran away twice and then spent two days digging his dirt out of the boss' ditch and then moving the dirt from his other boss' yard, he is the same person he is after he told his father about dying, after he let the lie out in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; after he told his dad about love and objects, injected him with morphine. after he let out the ghosts, and everyone had turned away, there was something about Newman's character that let everyone— the characters, the audience— know he still had God on his side, and that Newman, with that cocked head and sideways grin, knew that despite the grimness of the situation, it was all a comedy.

 he knew nothing was absolute, which is why, in both Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and more apparently, in Cool Hand Luke, death becomes the only way to escape— the money, the man, the rules, the family morals, the laws and regulations— because just running is never enough; however, running is in the simultaneous comedy and tragedy of Newman's films. it makes him the banshee, the bodhisattva— it's the gravity and grace, and it's something that the other blondes— the Dean's and the Brando's— of his time lacked.

And I didn't even talk about Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

"faster, faster, faster, until the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death."

 :hunter s. thompson

a few weekends ago, after a weekend out on the boat, diving for scallops, seven of us riding an hour home crammed in the same truck, and ian starts telling me, whispering really, in the den of all that noise, that he can really relate to hunter s. that he really gets this disassociation. and we're all covered in salt, hats and sunglasses, sitting in each others laps, still swaying from 9 hours on the boat, still crammed into a small space, and he is talking about disassociation. closer and closer to the house and ian was ready to throw himself into the street, he couldn't take the feeling.

last weekend: we spanned the entire weekend on the motorcycle. friday on: wander home from downtown, take it out to very north tampa, lovebugs smashing on our helmets. come back home and sleep a few hours, go back out all day saturday. do some things. go to a party at a house in a neighborhood that used to be really frou-frou, a neighborhood none of my friend's parents were ever rich enough to live in. in the car, everyone was talking about how strange it was to visit their friends house's instead of their parent's friend's houses in this neighborhood, where everything is named after French horse racing terms, which has to be real weird for the French, and all the houses are stucco with barrel tile roofs, which was weird too. but mostly we were just looking for deers in the dark. mostly.

at the house we drank and talked. and there were three little girls who take ballet, watching a barbie movie in the back bedroom. and i couldn't remember if i had ever been to a party where the kids were pretending to sleep and me not having been one of those kids. it got late. 

 i remember those kinds of parties when i was small, but they were rarely at my parent's house. usually we were up north and it was in december. and my mom would buy me a new outfit at JC Penny's because she had underestimated the cold or because she knew there would be this awful little girl at the party in a Laura Ashley dress just being terrible. it got late.

we sped downtown at 2a from new tampa. ian was wearing his wayfarers, nodding in and out in his polo shirt, looking very 80s.very much like someone that dug ssstudio. i have this terrible habit of relating people to characters in books, in history, in film. it is a terrible habit of relation/disassociation.

there are things i should be doing now. i bought vegetables yesterday from the swamp man down the street, he always walks me out to my car and says things like his momma taught him to be good to ladies, and his momma was so mean, he bets she's even meaner now that she's dead. swamp man is an ex wrestler with a small tea cup dog.

september is almost over. there are things i should be doing. i cannot wait until the weather changes and we go camping.