Arts & Culture
Requiem for a Right-Hand Man
Overshadowed in death as he was in life
Karl Malden died this past Wednesday.
You may not have heard the news over all the noise and clatter surrounding the death of Michael Jackson, but he did.
Poor unheeded, unloved, unmourned Karl Malden – trumped by a pop singer.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not bitter about the disproportionate levels of mourning going on. Only a fool would think millions of people would want to go to a memorial service for Karl Malden at the Staples Center, and people can miss whoever they want. But I do think there’s a cruel trick being played on Malden by the gods here, the same gods that gave him the nose that won him notoriety but kept him from the heights of matinee-idol superstardom. Here you have a legendary supporting actor who appeared in some of the greatest movies of all time, who won Oscars and Emmys, who built a career out of losing himself in his characters and snuffing his own desire for the spotlight in order to better serve movies starring men and women far less comfortable with anonymity but far more physically appealing to moviegoers, who prided himself on being an unnoticed force as an actor – and his death went almost completely unnoticed by the public.
As he was throughout his brilliant career, Malden was outshined by a bigger name, in the last performance he will ever give.
We’re talking about Karl Malden here, folks! One of the founders of the Actor’s Studio! One of Hollywood’s original method actors! Righteous Father Barry in On the Waterfront! Bumbling Mitch Mitchell in A Streetcar Named Desire! The guy who bull-whipped Marlon Brando in One-Eyed Jacks! The man who voluntarily chose to tone down his performance in Patton so that George C. Scott would have more room to consume the scenery! The guy who turned shilling for American Express into a hard-boiled art form! Yet none of that seemed to matter this week, when the death of a mere character actor was doomed to be lost amidst all the worldwide wailing for “the greatest entertainer who ever lived.”
As it turns out, Malden’s role as a supporting player didn’t stop at the studio gates. It was an existential state: the very essence of his being. Even in death.
It’s all there in Malden’s relationship with Brando. Like Moses’ brother Aaron, Malden recognized that his original running buddy had been touched by God. “I guess, in the final analysis, it is impossible to beat genius, ” he once admitted, “but it can be great fun to try to match it.” Of course, he never did. Never could. No one could. Not James Dean, not Robert De Niro, not Denzel Washington, not Anthony Hopkins, not anyone. But unlike Salieri with Mozart or Sonny Rollins with John Coltrane, Malden didn’t let his inferiority eat away at him. He didn’t let himself get swallowed up by Brando’s brilliance. Or rather he did let himself get swallowed up by Brando’s brilliance, happily and willfully and wisely, seeing it as a benefit to his career rather than proof of his inadequacy. How many men could be so confident and so modest at the same time?
Not me. If I had been Karl Malden in 1949, I would have pushed Brando in front of a bus when no one was looking and then selflessly and with a heavy heart volunteered to take over the role of Stanley Kowalski. All for the good of the movie, mind you, not for my own benefit. And all in memory of my dear, dear friend Marlon, whom I would have missed so terribly.
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[...] has been a brutal summer for fans of On the Waterfront. First came the news of co-star Karl Malden’s death on July 1. Then yesterday, August 5, word came down that the movie’s screenwriter, Budd [...]
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