Author Julie Kavenaugh on Ballet Icon Rudolph Nureyev's offbeat film career

The Ballet Icon in typically dynamic form (Pantheon)


As a dancer, Rudolph Nureyev was one of the most electrifying performers of the 20th century. The fine new biography by Julie Kavanaugh of the great ballet icon, Nureyev: The Life (Pantheon) traces the drama of the great Nureyev in his life and work. The work is also a reminder that Nureyev was an exotic screen personality and starred in one of the most sensational films of the 70's, Valentino. Ms. Kavanaugh was kind enough to correspond with FSW about Nureyev's limited, but fascinating screen work.


FSW: Is it really true that RN was up for the role of the snake in Huston's segment of The Bible?

JK: From what I was told this was a serious consideration. In addition, for his section of the film, Orson Welles had RN in mind as the Angel of God who wrestles with Jacob

FSW: Was there ever a moment when it was possible that RN could have a serious career as an actor? Did he have any real interest in this?

JK: Film was almost as much of a passion as dance for Nureyev. His London friends the Goslings used to rent films - usually the classics - and screen them on a projector in their house. RN directed the feature film of his ballet Don Quixote and impressed famous veterans like cinematographer Geoffrey Unsworth by his profound knowledge of the art. There was a time in the midSeventies when he would have loved to have made an impact as a film actor, but unfortunately never found the right vehicle. Both Valentino and Exposed were disasters.


FSW: Do you think that if Nureyev had arrived on the film scene today (or at some other point) he would have been better utilized as a film presence? Did his potential as a film performer conflict with the style of 70's films?



JK: He was very badly directed by Ken Russell in Valentino (and his co-star Leslie Caron would agree). But the fact that he looks so superb and charismatic in the stills suggests that his main problem was having to speak the lines. He'd have been the most wonderful silent film star. Pauline Kael wrote in her New Yorker review, 'Seen up close...Nureyev has the seductive, moody insolence of an older, more cosmoplitan James Dean.'

Tough Guys Can't Act: Norman Mailer's Fascinating Film Legacy

Mailer as the Great Houdini in Cremaster 2


Norman Mailer's legacy as a great American author has been cemented long ago. Interestingly enough, most recently, Mailer's film work has undergone the process of re-discovery culminating with a series of screenings last summer at the Film Society at Lincoln Center.

It is often assumed that Mailer's film career has been a kind of long train wreck while his literary career has been an unchecked march to Mount Olympus. Strangely enough, Mailer's output as an author was often poorly received. In fact, the New York Times noted in today's obituary that few if any of his works were well-received after his first novel The Naked and the Dead.

Mailer the filmmaker and film subject, however, leaves a strange and interesting legacy. This legacy begins with one of the oddest films of the 70's (which is really saying something), Maidestone. Conceived in June 1968, the project started filming just days after the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. In the film, Mailer plays Film Director and potential Presidential Candidate Norman T. Kinglsey. As Mailer plays him, Kingsley is a charismatic, sexist artist with a philosophical interest in poitics and boxing. In many ways, this portrayal seems to be something close to the public, even stereotypical persona of the great author.

The film is a mess, but its fame is justified as it has one of the weirdest climaxes in cinema history as Rip Torn (who plays Kingsley's half brother) attacks Mailer/Kingsley with a hammer and Mailer bites off a portion of Torn's ear in a strange, horrific brawl while Mailer's children are screaming. The ending pushes real cinema to its limits and connects the film to the arbitrary violence of its time.

Mailer's film, for all its sensation and connection to the zeitgeist was a financial bomb and wiped him out financially for a time. As Mailer famously put it, "I would have done as well to have bought a yacht, taken it out to harbor, and sunk it."



Work in Cremaster series...

Mailer's most conventional foray into filmmaking was as director of the film Tough Guys Don't Dance. The 1987 film, an adaptation of his novel, involves a severed head, crooked cops and a detective with a past has some of the conventions of traditional film noir. But, the odd, bad performance of Ryan O'Neal and the crazed, charisma of eighties fave Wings Hauser make this a kind of fascinating misfire. Oddly enough, (and rarely pointed out) the film anticipates some of look and feel of Twin Peaks (an idea underlined by the presence of one-time David Lynch muse Isabella Rosselini.




Matthew Barney the All-American avant gardist used Mailer as a kind of icon in his Cremaster 2 series where the great author portrayed the great illusionist Harry Houdini. Mailer's work in Barney's film somewhat grounds the strangeness of the series and Mailer's comforting presence is a relief to the viewer. He also looks great with his snowy hair and Victorian bearing.



Mailer's late acting work took yet another weird turn with his avuncular turn as himself on the Gilmore Girls. It is an odd, but somehow touching performance by the old lion.