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She could chew the scenery with the best of them — munch the drapes, snack on the sofa, nibble the ottoman. But what Joan Crawford couldn’t do, according to F. Scott Fitzgerald, was think.
“Writing for Joan is difficult,” griped the novelist, who by the late1930s was trying his hand as a screenwriter, in a letter to a friend. “She can’t change her emotions in the middle of a scene without going through a sort of Jekyll and Hyde contortion of the face, so that when one wants to indicate that she is going from joy to sorrow, one must cut away and then cut back.”
Crawford, that is, was unable to show the process of thought. Like many performers, she was rotten at rumination.
That’s not a slam at the IQ of the average thespian; it is, rather, an acknowledgement that acting is active, while thinking — at least from the outside — is passive. Unless one resorts to tricks, tics, gimmicks and shortcuts — scratching the head, arching an eyebrow, stroking the chin — it is dauntingly difficult to put across the illusion that the synapses are firing away.
Yet actors are often called upon to do just that, to let audiences know that their characters are making decisions, solving problems, sifting, sorting, creating — engaging, that is, in the activities we generally deposit in the bin labeled “thinking.” And in many cases, they have only seconds to do it.
Watch Julianna Margulies in her role as Alicia Florrick in the CBS drama “The Good Wife,” a woman whose husband (Chris Noth), a prominent politician, has cheated on her in flamboyant fashion. The secret of the show’s appeal? Margulies’ ability to dramatize a woman thinking. It’s a subtle, often unsung art.
In many scenes, Alicia must respond quickly to developments in her professional and personal life. With a less disciplined actor, these moments would be broad and sloppy, and “The Good Wife” would be a conventional domestic melodrama about a humiliated spouse. Margulies, however, through a series of faint, almost imperceptible shifts in her facial expression and body language, is able to suggest Alicia’s intellectual poise — on the fly, and in the public eye. She is remaking her life, one smart decision at a time. Thus we don’t pity her for her plight; we respect her for her acumen. The difference is crucial, and it’s a big reason viewers come back, week after week.
The same quality is present in Jeremy Renner’s powerful performance as William James, the American soldier and bomb-squad expert stationed in Iraq in “The Hurt Locker” (2009), the Oscar winner for best picture. At first, he appears to be a man who expresses himself exclusively in crude, rambunctious, physical ways; he fights, he drinks, he runs, he sweats, he barges face-first into danger. As the film progresses, however, and particularly in a crucial late scene, it becomes clear that what really matters is less what he does and more how he thinks.
Is it a hint from the filmmakers, we must wonder, that this overtly rough, tough, brawling character bears the name of one of the greatest philosophers in American history?
Perhaps we’re meant to understand that, for soldiers as well as philosophers, thinking is the defining activity.
Great thinking scenes can show up in unexpected places. There is a muscular yet brooding quality to Clive Owen as the title character in “King Arthur” (2004), a leader who cogitates at full gallop. With Linda Hunt’s morally complex character in “The Year of Living Dangerously” (1983), the set of the jaw is enough to suggest the shattering epiphany that initiates the movie’s tragic climax.
Likewise, Kate Winslet’s portrayal of the writer Iris Murdoch in “Iris” (2001) is filled with delicate, telling moments when the character is obviously thinking: observing her world, scribbling her novels.
Some actors fall back into cheap habits to suggest contemplation. When he wanted to signal that his character in the TV series “ER” was thinking, George Clooney would tilt his head and then jiggle it. Clooney has the charm to get by with this, but to appreciate the difference between a bored Clooney on autopilot and a conscientious Clooney who is fully engaged, contrast his technique when depicting two thinking men: the head-jiggle in “ER” versus the soulful, fathoms-deep stare in his role as the title character in the 2007 film “Michael Clayton.”
No matter how devilishly handsome he might be, an actor, it turns out, still needs his noggin.
