In light of her recent Oscar nomination for The Fighter (although that shouldn’t be the only reason, and it isn’t) I look at the long slow steady trajectory of Melissa Leo’s career at Fandor.
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In light of her recent Oscar nomination for The Fighter (although that shouldn’t be the only reason, and it isn’t) I look at the long slow steady trajectory of Melissa Leo’s career at Fandor.
“The awful thing about life is this: Everybody has their reasons” — Octave in “The Rules of the Game”
Wharever reasons you have for an essay as excellent as this are good ones, even if they seem more like pretexts.
Comparisons are odorous, but the first thing I thought of in your “Racing Daylight” notes was of how we first see Virginia Mayo in “White Heat”: not only is Verna Jarrett asleep, but she’s snoring. Even if this is a crime picture and she’s a gangster’s wife, you’d think we’d meet her more flatteringly than that!
Ha – love the detail about Virginia Mayo! I think it’s always a thrill when an actress resists vanity. Very difficult to do. (Speaking of Ann Dvorak in Three on a Match …. that’s a pretty brutal performance and she looks pretty bad in it, pretty damn ROUGH).
But I’ve been a fan of Melissa Leo for a long time. She’s my kind of actress, and that’s my kind of career. I’m drawn to people like her.
Homicide: Life on the Street was the best show on television for a time. It had a terrific ensemble cast but Melissa Leo, Andre Braugher, and Isabella Hofmann really stood out. I haven’t seen Melissa in anything else but I see the other two quite regularly. It’s something I need to correct.
Rob – Frozen River is phenomenal. Highly recommended, on all scores!
Also Racing Daylight is interesting – you can rent it at Fandor (at the bottom of my post).
thanks for making the plug, Sheila! I hope more people leave comments at the bottom of your article, or at least hit the Facebook “like” button – it makes us look good to the folks upstairs. :)
Oh, it was a really fun project, Kevin – I got to see a lot of things I hadn’t seen, and many of them I didn’t even mention in the piece! Her career is just too darn long!
That was my friend Dan who left the comment over on Fandor, and I’m so happy about that because he’s a Bostonian and his response to the movie (and Leo’s performance) means a lot. “Word” he replied. Ha!
He knows the Alice Ward type.
Ihave been following her career since she was on All My Children. That was so long ago, I don’t even remember when. Always so interesting to watch. Sometimes, she seems like the only real person in the scene. It’s great to see her getting the recognition she deserves!
Kathy – what did she play on All My Children, I’m curious??
I agree: in a fake movie, she emerges as real. I actually can’t stand 21 Grams – despite the good acting from everyone involved – and the shots of her cleaning the grille on the truck, in her American flag T shirt are just heartwrenching.
She’s always good!
But I’d love to hear what character she played on All My Children!
I don’t remember her name; but, she was Cliff Warner’s (Peter Bergman) sister. She was good, even then.
Sheila:
I grew up with “Newsday,* which had an inspired soul writing the movie guide. His tag for Mayo was “the always pretty Virginia Mayo,” and it was jarring to find that she didn’t always come off that way. William Wyler made her Marie Derry, the unsympathetic wife in “The Best Years of Our Lives,” for instance, and Raoul Walsh, who directed her in “White Heat,” gave her another good role in “Colorado Territory” the same year (1949). She’ plays Colorado, the Ida Lupino role in a recasting of “High Sierra,” and she’s fallen for Joel McCrea’s outlaw Wes, a widower who’s fallen for Julie Ann, the seemingly nice girl Dorothy Malone plays. The nice girl isn’t that, though, and after it’s clear that she’s not, Colorado asks Wes what his late wife was like.
Wes describes her and when he’s finished, Colorado says: “She sounds like Julie Ann.”
A dumbfounded Wes (we men can be very thick at times) realizes that she’s right (and that he’s been so eager to find another woman like her that he made Julie Ann into her), and asks: “How did you know?”
And Mayo comes back with four simple words which sound like the greatest curse a person could lay upon themselves:
“Because I’m a woman.”*
Always pretty, maybe, but not only that by a long shot.
* Not to be confused with recent birthday girl Dolly Parton’s “Just Because I’m a Woman.” Those duets with Porter Wagoner are nice, aren’t they?
I am envious of those who can have someone’s entire career at their disposal like you just did with Mayo. Well done! I have seen all of those movies – she is terrific in Best Years – God, she enraged me in that …. Clearly a fearless actress in some respect to let herself be seen so unsympathetically. But (and this is a strength of the film) – you kind of get where she’s coming from too. She’s not just a horrible soulless dame – she’s someone who wants a little fun out of life. It’s just that her desire for fun and recognition means she completely cuts off from what her husband is going through.
I think my favorite moment in the whole damn movie is Teresa Wright telling her parents, “I’m going to break up that marriage.”
I need to do a post on that. I would suggest that it is one of the most radical moments in all of American film, deeply disturbing to the status quo – because it’s a “good girl” saying it, because she’s telling her PARENTS, and also because she is obviously RIGHT.
I’ve been wanting to write about that moment for a long time. Ugh, where is my 48 hour day?
No one has mentioned “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada,” in which I discovered her and was amazed by her fearlessness in that role. I am thrilled she has received the recognition and acclaim she so richly deserves.
Bud – there is so much in her career, it is hard to mention it all. I agree that she was amazing in that role!!
Sheila:
You’re right: I am too hard on Marie Derry. This was a marriage entered into after a whirlwind courtship and neither party really got to know one another; for years, Fred’s been away in the Air Corps, the only tangible evidence of him the regular paycheck. Now he’s home, he’s out of uniform (bye-bye, regular paycheck) and…he’s not what she expected. I don’t agree with her point of view, but it’s a legitimate one. (The movie’s title can be taken in many ways: she’s right to feel that she has wasted the best years of her lives on him.)
It’s just that compared to Wilma, who wants Homer even with his hooks, and the Stephenson women (both Milly and Peggy), she does come off as a villain, if not one as noxious as Mr. Mollett.
I would very much like to see you write about the “break that marriage up!” scene one of these days.
A last Mayo note: while she did an Ida Lupino role commendably in “Colorado Territory,” I don’t think she did nearly as well with Barbara Stanwyck’s role in “Ball of Fire” when she was in “A Song Is Born.” Honey may be healthier than Sugar(puss), but her glass of buttermilk was much less intoxicating.