Today's Opinion Page features the greatest contest between Brits and Americans since we last steeped our tea in Boston Harbor: which country harbors the better actors? Jonathan Last says the Redcoats win hands down. What do you think? Bogart vs. Burton? Streep vs. Smith (Maggie)?
1:28 PM ET | 03- 5-2007 | permalink
I think its a false choice. The point is the best actor may not shine if the role does not fit. Helen Mirren has much to be proud of in her career but she also has the Penthouse-produced "Caligula." She shares that film with Malcolm McDowell and Peter O'Toole. Likewise, Marlon Brando has had many award-winning performances but he also did the awful "Island of Dr. Moreau." Actors can rise to the occasion or fall to the depths of mediocracy. One nation doesn't have a monopoly on good actors. Its evidence of the weak self-esteem of Americans that this is a question for discussion at all.
British actors are willing to be ugly they do not have the same sense of VANITY as american actors.
Are you offering in part a false dichotomy as you aren't fully incorporating the source and quality of the material being acted. Is it fair, for example, to compare a single word of Tennessee Williams to approximately ten (of some of the most famous) lines of Shakespeare? This is also a curious re-working of American vs. British art, isn't it?
I LOVE BRITISH ACTORS, I even love British television!
I can't carry on conversations "around the water cooler" at work about the current T.V. programs because I TIVO and watch, Midsomer Murders, Masterpiece Theater, Mystery (Inspector Linley and Miss Marple).
The stories are better, the actors are better - they are just better! They are more believable - for example forensic scientists on bbc America look like forensic scientists. Here we have the CSI forensic scientists poring over their crime scenes in belly shirts and hot pants!!!!!!!!!!
The "next door neighbors" look like next door neighbors - NOT like super models!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, that is my uncomplicated and unscientific opinion - but I LOVE BRITISH ACTORS!
Thanks!
Is it not that Americans lack the gravitas to really tackle the epic roles and are better suited to light parts?
American actors are big babies! When are they going to stop saying it's the material, it's the lack of opportunity? Grow up and get in the fight.
What about Denzel Washington? The list of British actors, while wonderful, lacks diversity. I agree that British training, words, etc. is probably superior, but American actors are far more ethnically diverse.
Two Words:
Bette Davis.
Here are three great American actors:
Phillip Seymour Hoffman
Kevin Spacey
Robert Downey Jr.
Please name one good non-Shakespeare Kenneth Branagh movie!! This is a non-issue.
My pet peeve is child actors. Why are American children directed so badly? In English and other national film industries directors can coax good performances out of children but in American films I usually cringe. This aspect is less attributable to experience and training since the children are at the beginning of their careers.
Gene Hackman?
Leonardo DiCaprio?
Cate Blanchett? (Australian, not British)
Elizabeth Taylor?
I think the colonies are doing just fine.
The issue in America is that we value celebrity of talent or skill. Look at the "celebration" in the media of the death of Anna Nicole Smith or Britney Spears.
Actors will play the roles they are asked to play. If an actor is asked to play bland, mainstream shills for big business, as they are in the US, then that's what they will become good at.
Besides, as a nation, the United States cares nothing for good acting. Being entertained in the US is a pretty mundane, passive and predictable pursuit.
In short, US actors are as good as they need to be to serve the purpose that they are being asked to serve.
The difference in culture is a historical result. The British had hundreds of years with support for the arts, while Americans have only had a few hundred years trying to survive in a new world. Little focus was placed on skills that didn't help survival. Give Americans a few hundred years more to realize that we've gone past the basic needs, and the American focus on excess and the physical will drop off, while interest in the arts and philosophy will increase.
Is there anythig to the idea that British actors are not that interested in Fame? A friend of mine theoried that Australian actors are better because there's not as much chance for "success" so the motives of Aussie actors are purer ie for the craft of it.
Jonathon Last mentioned some of the best America (but still inferior to Englsh) actors and include Al Pacino. I have been watching this guy's movies for 30 years and yet to see him act! I wonder if anyone else REALLY thinks he's a good actor, or everyone's just afraid to be the one to blow the whistle.
Just another list (just the men to start with)
Marlon Brando
Tom Hanks
Al Pacino
Denzel Washington
Ed Harris
Jamie Foxx
Alan Arkin
Kevin Spacey
Alec Baldwin
You've forgotten some pretty important young Americans. Brad Pitt, who I always thought was just another pretty boy, can really hold his own. Think of him as the gypsy in Snatch!
Leonardo DiCaprio shines in just about anything he does, (Departed most recently comes to mind,) Maggie Gylenhall really is getting my attention, Reese Witherspoon is a juggernaut.
I listened and was appalled to hear the short list of American female actors.. superb performers such as Meryl Streep, Emily Watson, Ellen Bursten, Katherine Hepburn, Sissy Spacek, Cloris Leachman,Susan Sarandon, Dianne Keaton and too many more to mention. The fact that American actresses get cut out of any meaningful roles after 40 means that the only female faces we see in America are the youngest and least experienced. It is a tragic commentary on our culture that we miss out on the rich mature performances of our female actors.
American actors seem more into their "celebrity", publicity, their couterie, and entourage, whereas, the British actors are into the expression of emotions through words, their inherent meaning, and the nuance of language. After all, despite Movies being a "visual" medium, the image impact comes from audio, and a character's voice, the use of words makes us human. The Brits know how to use their voice, their understanding of how to use words, as well as expressions.
They're the best because they really know what Acting is about-- the whole whirly gig! They "suit the word"! Make wild rocks wanton!
I've just finished listening to "Talk..." And I believe a very important component of acting was omitted from the discussion (at least from the point where I picked it up); To wit: what an actor/actress does with his/her face. I offer as a marvelous example Jill Clayburgh in "An Unmarried Woman." Take a look at her face as her husband tells her he has fallen in love with another woman and is going to leave her. In an instant, her face turns from that of a happy mother and wife to a tragic face best described as "death warmed-over." Eloquent with no need for and accent, Brit or Yank. And counter to what your guest said about Laura Linney in :Love Actually," take a look at her face as she is dancing with Karl at the company party. I rest my case.
I am an ex-pat Brit - living and working in the United States since 1981.
I would like add a comment my family back in the UK (brothers and numerous cousins) all love Renee Zellweger to pieces! They just don't seem to ever get enough of Renee being a Brit!
As for me - I love Ms. Zellweger and Ms. Witherspoon but I confess I utterly adore the Dames Judi, Helen and Maggie (Dench, Mirren and Smith)!!!!
Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, yes beautiful actors, but medicore at best. Give me Damian Lewis any day, he was phenominal in Band of Brothers and Keane and this was before I even knew he was British.
what is your opinion of kate winslett, the austrailian actress? after seeing "holy smoke" and "eternal sunshine", i feel she is the finest actress i've seen.
Helen Hayes, Julie Harris,Lee Remick, Geraldine Page, Jo Van Fleet--(had more names, but I'm having a senior moment)Glenn Close, JESSICA TANDY
I am a director of theatre. My son is an actor in Chicago and has been trained and graduated from the DePaul Theatre School(The Goodman School of Drama.) Before that he trained at Walnut Hill School for the Arts in Boston. His wife is British and has been trained in England. She is acting in Chicago as well.
My writing partner is a trained British actress and I have directed her as well. They are equally fine actors. There is no appreciable difference. (all have their skills and faults)
This distinction that you speak of has to do with movies and movie stars , not the actual actors who are trained and trying to get work "on the boards'. The difference is the amount of respect that the average Hollywood producer shows the trained actor. Let's face it. An Oscar was just awarded to the 2nd or 3rd place winner in the "American Idol" contest, a person with absolutely no acting experience. There are many, many trained and fine actors in this country.
My son, by the way has studied Sheridan, Wilde, Congreve and the rest, as well as O'Neill, Wilder, Sherwood, Ibsen ,et al. It is certainly not the actor or the training in the U.S. at fault. These trained actors are seldom considered for movie roles. Denigrating the American actor is not the answer. Showing some respect for the trained actor here is.
Recently my son was in a play using a South London accent . He just received a role where he is using a specific type of Irish dialect.(for an Irish company , I might add.)
This idea that British actors are better only comes from the idea that the quality of what we are given on TV and the big screen. Let's face it. These people don't have a chance at these types of roles. It is a matter of respect.
By the way, a British theatre actor requires having an agent. Most British actors would admit that having attended certain prestigious schools gives one a foot in that door.(a certain elitism exists , in other words) In the States, most agents will discourage their working actors from working in the theatre because they are not high-paying jobs(for the agent, that is).
aLSO, I'm always amused to hear that although none of my theatre colleagues would dare think of discussing physics, mathematics or even psychology with any level of expertise, people with no expertise or training speak with absolute surety in this area.
Theirs also people like paul muni and anthony hopkins .i dont know so much about jammie Foxx ..as Les pionted out american actors are serving their purpose alot of acting in amerca is very predictable but i feel its lack of understand of that type of culture ..Brits are schooled and more in tuned with the arts then the U.S alot what america does is surrounded around glitz and glamour ...if U.S had better quality actors it wouldnt take as long for them to be recognized and acknowledged ...the ones that seem to be more impressionable are t he ones with colorful personalities Off screen whos careers are built on their popularity of what they do Away from the big screen rather than on it ..
My viewpiont on this is their should be a deditcation to this art form ..It makes for more interesting exciting roles ..people are starting to lose touch with the fact you dont need special affects for a movie to be good
Just a really open mind and imagination of a 6 year old
Mary Cimino (above) gets it right. I'd just add two points:
1. In the U.S. actors (and writers and directors for that matter)are more or less forced by reasons of economics and geography to choose between careers in live theatre or film/tv., as the chief "headquarters" of the two industries are 3,000 miles apart. In Britain, film, television, the RSC, the National, the commercial West End, the "off-broadway" equivalents (like the Royal Court, Donmar Warehouse, Old Vic, Young Vic etc.) plus all the Fringe companies operate within a few square miles of each other. The opportunities are plentiful for young, journeymen actors to work constantly and make a livable wage in a variety of venues while paying ONE rent. They also, by the way, face no competition from American actors (many of whom train at -- and financially support -- English drama schools like RADA, Guildhall, Bristol Old Vic, etc.) because the British theatre and film/tv industries are a closed shop.
2. A nation gets the art and artists it is willing to support. If we really care about the quality of the art of acting in American film and televison (and theatre), rather than swoon over the Brits and their accents, why don't we demand that congress fund the NEA at more than $0.11 per capita? Why don't we stop watching reality shows and start appreciating in droves the superb American acting (complete with excellent diction, even) of the James Spaders on shows like Boston Legal?
3.Okay, three points. Neal Conan talked about how wonderful Hugh Laurie's American accent was because it wandered all over the continent (I think he called it an I-80 accent.) By his own admission, Laurie's accent is all over the place because he can't master it! If an American actor zinged back and forth between between Yorkshire, Cornwall and the East End of London, everyone would would say, "Well, what do you expect from those untrained, sloppy American actors!"
Yes. And schools? RADA? We have Juilliard, Carnegie Mellon, UCLA , SUNY Purchase, Northwestern, USC, Cal Arts, Cal State at Fullerton, . These offer BFAs or BA, nor to mention fine graduate programs at Yale, ACT, Brandeis, Tisch, SMU and many more. The degreees are there to be had and they are fine ones and producing fine actors, John C Riley, Philip Seymour Hoffman and on and on, not to mention great new playwrights like Tracy Letts, Rebecca Gilman and ask me to name some more. Please.
The subliminal part that is not discussed is the ACCENT. Remember in "Love Acutally" when the Brit goes to America to find love? It was because of his accent. He knew those from the USA would LOVE it. We do!! So I am of the opinion that those great actors have an edge with that "way they speak." Even our wonderful Meryl Streep (sp) got her finest accolades using a foreign accent!
I don't go to many movies, nor do I attend the theatre. One thing that pushes me away from many American films is that so often I feel like I'm watching "Actress/Actor So & So" in the role of "Whoever." Yes, Tom Hanks et al can act, but I'm still watching Tom Hanks' latest vehicle. Whereas when I saw "Iris" with Judi Dench, I wasn't seeing Judi Dench. I saw Iris. One American actress (in my opinion not seen enough) who got an Oscar for being, not herself playing a character, but that character, is Linda Hunt. Too many of our Hollywood actors seem to put as much weight on their stardom and celebrity as on their acting.
I completely agree, I myself wanting to become an actor was a bit worried about my looks, my underbite I feel could greatly hinder my chances at being allowed opportunities in the hollywood circles. I feel that the greatness of character movies in America and great Genuine dedication of character actors has slowly disappeared since probaly in my generation if you watch enough films from the past and compare them to today you obviously see the difference. The only few people I think that are exceptions are Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, Al Pacino. People like Brad Pitt, Agelina Jolie are peole who got their fufilling the beauty ideal. But to due credit But I do think Brad Pitt has mad an genuine effort to not be just a pretty face on a picture. And be a serious devotee to the acting art.
I cannot understand anyone leaving Ralph Richardson off the list of contemporary great actors. How can you include the mannered and pretentious acting of Emma Thompson in Angels in American and not acknowledge the wonderful actress Chalfont who appeared in the stage production. What about actors like Bette Davis and Jessica Tandy. Jason Robards was a great actor, particularly in O'Neill plays. Wake up and smell the snake oil. What about Drew Barrymore's grandpa who dragged acting kicking and screaming into the 20th century.
Because the British teach people to ACT, and Americans teach people to remember what they felt like when they were 8 and their puppy got hit by a car, so they forget the line.
carnegy, julliard , north, ucla, suny??????????????????????????????????????? please everyone read that again.. those school ( julliard MIGHT be exception) are awefull!.. awefull!
I think the actor who plays Inspector Linley is a very good looking, and excellent actor. Would like to know more about him.
Do u know the name of the actor who plays Inspector Linley on British tv?
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