Robert De Niro.
Brando was raised in the
Omaha, Nebraska area. His mother, a kind and talented woman with
an
drinking problem who was involved in local theater, first
interested him in stage acting. Brando was a gifted
mimic from early childhood and developed a rare ability to
absorb the tics and mannerisms of people he played and to display
those traits dramatically while staying in character.
Brando had a tumultuous childhoood, in which he was expelled from
several schools. His father was largely critical of his son, but
encouraged him to seek his own direction. Brando left Nebraska for
New York City, where he studing method acting at the
New School, then enrolled at the Actors' Studio run by Lee
Strasberg and Stella Adler.
Brando used his method acting in summer-stock roles, then made it
to Broadway in the bittersweet drama, I Remember Mama, in
1944. He achieved real stardom, however, as Stanley Kowalski in
Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire in
1947, directed by Kazan. Brando sought out that role, driving
out to
Provincetown, Massachusetts where Williams was spending the
summer to audition for the part.
Brando's first screen role was the bitter crippled veteran in
The Men in
1950. True to his method, Brando spent a month in bed at a
veterans' hospital to prepare for the role.
He made a much larger impression the following year when he
brought his performance as Stanley Kowalski to the screen in Kazan's
adaptation of "Streetcar" in
1951. He was nominated for an
Academy Award for Best Actor for that role, and in each of the
next three years for his roles in Viva Zapata! in
1952, Julius Caesar in
1953 and On the Waterfront in
1954.
Brando finally won the Oscar for his role of Terry Malloy in
On The Waterfront. Under Kazan's direction, and with a talented
ensemble around him, Brando used his method training and
improvisational
skills to produce a performance that continues to display
new facets on each viewing. He improvised much of his dialogue with
Rod Steiger in the famous, much-quoted scene with him in the
back of a taxicab.
Brando followed that triumph by a variety of roles in the 1950s
that defied expectations: as Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls,
where he managed to carry off a singing role; as Sakini, a Japanese
interpreter for the U.S. Army in postwar
Japan in The Teahouse of the August Moon; as an Air
Force officer in Sayonara, and a Nazi officer in The
Young Lions. While he won an Oscar nomination for his acting in
Sayonara, his acting had lost much of its energy and
direction by the end of the 1950s.
Brando's star sank even further in the 1960s as Brando turned in
increasingly uninspired performances in Mutiny on the Bounty
and several forgettable comedies and westerns. His career had gone
into almost complete eclipse by the end of the decade thanks to his
reputation as a difficult star and his record in overbudget or
marginal movies.
His performance as Vito Corleone in
The Godfather changed all that. Brando once again had to
beg for a part, forcing a screen test in which he did his own
makeup.
Francis Ford Coppola was electrified by Brando's
characterization as the head of a crime family, but had to fight the
studio in order to cast him. Brando won an Academy Award for his
intelligent performance; once again, he improvised important details
that lent more humanity to what could otherwise have been a cliché
role.
Brando was the second actor to refuse an
Oscar (the first being
George C. Scott). When he declined the
Academy Award for Best Actor for The Godfather in 1972,
Brando sent
actress and phony
Native American
Sacheen Littlefeather (nee Maria Cruz), who was booed as she
denounced
Hollywood's portrayal of her people.
His career since then has been uneven: in addition to his quirky
performance as Colonel Kurtz in
Apocalypse Now and his intensely personal performance in
Last Tango in Paris, Brando has also played Jor El,
Superman's father, in the first
Superman movie--a role he agreed to only on condition that
he did not have to read the script beforehand and his lines would be
displayed somewhere offscreen. Other roles, such as his performance
in "The Island of Dr. Moreau", are, if possible, even worse. Yet
Brando continues to turn in intereting performances--despite his
announced plans to retire--in movies such as A Dry White Season
(for which he was again nominated for an Oscar in
1989), The Freshman in
1990 and Don Juan DeMarco in
1995.
Brando's notoriety, his family's troubled lives, his self-exile
from Hollywood and his
obesity have, unfortunately, attracted more attention than his
acting career in recent years. He has also earned a reputation for
being difficult on the set, often unwilling or unable to memorize
his lines and less interested in taking direction than in
confronting the film director with odd and childish demands. On the
other hand, most other actors have found him generous, funny and
supportive.
Filmography as actor includes
-
The Score (2001)
- Free Money (1998)
-
Baseketball (1998)
- The Brave (1997)
-
The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996)
- Don Juan DeMarco (1995)
- Christopher Columbus: The Discovery (1992)
-
The Freshman (1990)
- A Dry White Season (1989)
- The Formula (1980)
-
Apocalypse Now (1979)
- Raoni (1978)
-
Superman (1978)
- The Missouri Breaks (1976)
- The Nightcomers (1972)
- Ultimo tango a Parigi (1972)
-
The Godfather (1972)
- Queimada (1969)
- The Night of the Following Day (1968)
-
Candy (1968)
- Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967)
- A Countess from Hong Kong (1967)
- The Appaloosa (1966)
- The Chase (1966)
- Morituri (1965)
- Bedtime Story (1964)
- The Ugly American (1963)
- The Mutiny on the Bounty (1962)
-
One-Eyed Jacks (1961)
- The Fugitive Kind (1959)
- The Young Lions (1958)
-
Sayonara (1957)
- The Teahouse of the August Moon (1956)
-
Guys and Dolls (1955)
- Desir? (1954)
-
On the Waterfront (1954)
- The Wild One (1954)
-
Julius Caesar (1953)
-
Viva Zapata (1952)
-
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
- The Men (1950)
