Comments by "Morgan King" (@MorganKing95) on "Top 10 Jack Nicholson Performances" video.

  1. Your list is great, as well as your arguments for the ranking order. However, I would have called it the best actors of today, or best actors of the 21st Century. When I hear best actors of all time, I think of actors like Marlon Brando, Spencer Tracy, Laurence Olivier, Charlie Chaplin, Mickey Rooney, Paul Newman, Clark Gable, James Stewart, or Cary Grant. I don't think Jack Nicholson disappear into his roles that much either, and I'm not that much of a fan of him, but I think people call him one of the best actors of all time because his movies mostly have been great. I also believe he has a magnetism or a certain personality that moviegoers love about him. During the Hollywood Golden Age, actors were famous and beloved because they had certain trademarks and personalities that they brought into every movie. It may have looked like they played the same character over and over again, but that's how the standards were. I think Jack Nicholson has relied on that, and that the conservative critics have praised him for that. I also have an example from Marlon Brando when he appeared in "On the Waterfront". He said: "It (the iconic taxi scene) wasn't wonderful at all. The situation was wonderful. Everybody feels like he could have been a contender, he could have been somebody, everybody feels as though he's partly bum, some part of him. He is not fulfilled and he could have done better, he could have been better. Everybody feels a sense of loss about something. So that was what touched people. It wasn't the scene itself. There are other scenes where you'll find actors being expert, but since the audience can't clearly identify with them, they just pass unnoticed. Wonderful scenes never get mentioned, only those scenes that affect people". In other words, I think Jack Nicholson (and many actors from the Hollywood Golden Age) touches or impresses the audience because they believe in the movies' situations, and they think that Jack blends in with them. He has a great naturalism in his acting, as well as presence. I have a divided opinion of the philosophy "Acting is not about emotions and creating characters, it's about storytelling" (I've heard that from my acting teachers in high school, as well as from a Scottish acting coach in a Youtube video), but I guess it's true in some occassions. I'm more into emotions and character development, but I also think that it doesn't matter how great the character is developed or how emotional he/she is if the situation is not relatable or believable, or that the character's emotions are unfitting for the situation. You can disagree with me if you want, I respect that, but that's my impression of acting and Jack Nicholson    
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  2. Michael Colby While I agree with you that Jack Nicholson’s performance in ”The Shining” is not better than the other performances you mentioned (I do not think it is his best performance either), it seems to me that you evaluate actors almost entirely (or at least to a large degree) on characters and emotions. While those aspects of an actor are important and make performances great, they are not the only things that matter. If only those things matter, why do you even need actors? If the script calls for a beggar, then just get a real beggar from the street. The performance will be realistic, but it will also become very internal and lifeless.   Other important aspects of an actor include line delivery, dynamism, tempo-rhythm, storytelling, subtext, motivation, making situations believable, process, reaction and interaction, presence, and acting based on given circumstances. Although Jack Nicholson does not always focus on characters and emotions that much compared to the actors you mentioned, he certainly has managed to bring out the other aspects of an actor, and to most actors and directors, that is good enough. His characters are also very different if you analyze them in-depth. And like I have mentioned earlier, if the situations of the story are clear and relatable, and the actor believes in it and makes it believable to the audience, what more can you ask for? And although many acting performances may look easy to play from the audience’s perspective, it is often very difficult to make them look easy and natural if you try acting them out yourself, and critics, directors, and actors know that. Some of the roles I believe are among the most difficult ones to make look natural include: -       An alcoholic -       Someone with a mental illness (PTSD, Schizophrenia, OCD, psychosis etc.) -       Someone who is suffering from a deadly disease (AIDS, cancer etc.) -       An authoritative person -       A transgender, or playing someone of the opposite gender   Much of the reason acting legends like Laurence Olivier and Spencer Tracy received so much praise was because they made every performance look so easy and natural, so much that the audience and fellow actors did not notice that they were acting. In the Hollywood Golden Age, and also in Norway where I come from, almost all of the actors look they are playing the same character over again, but it does not mean that the actors are bad, it is just a different acting style than what you and your favorite actors prefer. Classically trained actors focus more on storytelling, the situations, and the given circumstances, and believe that characters and emotions emerge organically as a result. I prefer method acting over classical acting, but I do not look down on classically trained actors just because it is a different acting style than what I prefer (I know Jack Nicholson is considered to be a method actor, but he does not remind me of one), because I realize that classical acting is what works for them and makes their performances the best.       
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  3. Michael Colby​ ”I look for actors that can really embody a wide variety of characters. Why should I be imprsesed with somone who plays the same character in ever movie?”   ”I think he [DDL] was so concentrated on sounding like Lincoln that he forgot to add an emotional side to his character”   ”plenty of actors disapear into their characters”   ”there is no way in fucking hell you could recognize him [Guy Pearce] in those roles, he completely disapeared into them”   ”Oldman's at his best when playing cartoony characters and does not seem nearly as good when trying to be serious”    ”All he [Christoph Waltz] did was act like his usual charming self”   ”So you are saying that Heath Ledger did not have stretch or transform himself in The Dark Knight?”   ”He [DiCaprio] stretched himself beyong limits and completely disapeared in character”   ”He was a charismatic, cocky great looking guy. That is Brad Pitt in real life he did not need to stretch himself very far at all. Honestly Norton gave a much more transformative performance in a much more complex character”   ”You watch Memento and La Confidential you would not even believe you are watching the same actor, same goes if you watch Lawless and The Rover, or Animal Kingdom and The Propostion. How Pearce changes his voice, his accent, his mannerisims, his gestures, his speech pattern, the way he holds himself is head and shoulders above Leo”   ”He [Brad Pitt] always plays the exact same character and anytime he tries playing someone other then himself he fails”   ”Gary Oldman and Guy Pearce are both character actors which means they have immense range so cross those 2 off the not enough range list”   ”not the exact same, but I can always tell I am watching him [Brad Pitt]. With Guy Pearce I cant even reconize hm in most of his films because of how much he disapears into a character”   ”Keaton played himself (that was part of the joke actually) Gyllenhaal completely disapeared into his character and that is harder to do”   ”The reason you could not recognize him [Matthew] is because of his weight loss and facial hair, his acting was nothing special as he just played the same character he does in all his films”   ”all Mathew did was lose weight and do a poor impersonation of himself. Every nominee was superior, especially Leo and Bale”   There are not very much comments I have seen that are not about characters and emotions. But if you really focus on the other aspects of an actor when you evaluate them, then it is splendid, and I have nothing more to say. I just wish to see that more often. And once again, many audiences do not mind the actor playing ”himself” or that the actor does not make every single character unique, because they believe in the story and the situations. It is a different acting style, and it was also the standards during the Hollywood Golden Age with actors like Charlie Chaplin, Fred Astaire, Clark Gable, Humphrey Bogart, and James Stewart. Also, one of the teachers at my drama school often asked his students to actually play themselves, because he wanted to focus on the story, the situations, and the given circumstances, and the acting still looked convincing to me because they brought out all the other aspects and instruments of an actor     
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  4. Jack Nicholson actually said "We are all Brando's children". Marlon is definitely one of the most influential actors of all time, and his performances in "A Streetcar Named Desire", "On the Waterfront", "The Godfather", "Last Tango in Paris", and even "Julius Caesar" have impressed me more than any performance I've seen from Jack. As for Daniel Day-Lewis, watch "My Left Foot", "Gangs of New York", "There Will Be Blood", and "Lincoln"; they have all blown my mind
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