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| Donald Shutherland Price and Prejudice (2005) |
‘He was hurt to have never been nominated for an Oscar’
James Gray, director, Ad Astra (2019)
24 June 2024
It’s impossible to talk about Donald without acknowledging his perfect timing. That such a person could become a movie star is a testament to what a wonderfully fertile time the mid-60s and 70s were for the cinema. He could have only happened in that moment. Donald was a true contradiction, a rare talent. He could convey great presence and tragic awkwardness at the same time. His genius was his ability to lay bare a wounded soul at war with himself. Unlike the superheroes with whom we are now obsessed, he played heroes: tremendously complex figures whose lapses allowed for transcendence and beauty.
I think the ending of Fellini’s Casanova – in which his character is dancing with the doll – is one of the most moving things I’ve ever seen, mostly because of his tragic and anguished vulnerability. In Klute, his character solves the crime, but what moves us is his self-loathing and tenderness.
It’s very hard to act an emotionally repressed character – a performer without a lot of moments of explosive and declarative scenes necessarily must rely on the depth and quality of his thoughts. In fact, our celebrations of great performances often involve ones with a lot of yelling, but Donald allowed the richness of his inner life to speak for itself, and his work looms large.
In that way he’s a beautiful symbol – maybe even the apotheosis – of the 70s actor. What we love and remember most about those movies might well be their conflicted leading characters: Al Pacino in The Godfather, struggling so deeply with profound moral and ethical conundrums. Robert De Niro in Raging Bull. Gena Rowlands in A Woman Under the Influence – a person ever in turmoil. Donald’s work was all about a mature confrontation with our internal schisms, and he seemed utterly unconcerned with “likability”. His haunted face conveyed a deep well of sadness and longing.
But he wasn’t like that in person. In fact, he was quite joyous. I wrote Donald’s part in Ad Astra with him in mind, and made a lot of adjustments to the shooting schedule to accommodate him. During the shoot, we became very close. He was the perfect combination: an actor who comes with ideas but also understands that it’s a dictatorship, not a democracy. He really revered directors he respected, and his choices always surprised and excited me. He had tremendous energy and would always put up a fight for things he cared about. I almost always let him win because his arguments were better than mine.
Donald was very aware of how cameras would respond to his physicality and how various lenses would treat his face. He was also one of the great listeners of all time, and that would always inform his reaction in a scene. Over multiple takes he’d give you beautifully different things. And then, if you gave him an adjustment, he’d be great in a whole new way: the sign of an extremely trained and accomplished actor.
On set, I like to play a lot of classical music and Donald always knew the piece, no matter how obscure. Even, once, some early electronica by Éliane Radigue – a drone, lasting several minutes. He knew it right away somehow.
So we really vibed. After the shoot, we talked with some degree of frequency until he got sick. He liked to discuss history, art, politics, literature. During the early lockdowns, I called him up and said I wanted to finally get round to Goethe’s Elective Affinities, which of course he had read. So as I was reading it, I had a sort of personal book club with Donald Sutherland. It was fantastic.
He was extremely learned and had an informed opinion on virtually everything. He reminded me of the German actor Maximilian Schell – the two had very similar dispositions; they shared a kind of resigned wisdom.
Donald was aware he’d made his mark as an actor. But I know he was deeply hurt that the Oscars never thought to nominate him for anything. I would tell him how silly it all was, but it had made him feel not fully part of the community. Who knows, maybe it made the work richer.
He was also very conscious of the degradation of cinema. Most artists who lived through the 60s and 70s are now in a kind of extended feeling of mourning – not just for the people who created some of that beautiful work, but for a system that no longer accommodates it and for the cultural guardians who no longer seem to want it.
Donald knew he wasn’t a movie star by business decision but rather due to the caprice of history – and he played a significant role in a mature culture willing to embrace complexities. I’m not sure he’d be a star today. So much of bad art is about the external fight without any acknowledgement that we are all haunted by our riven souls. We oversimplify ideas of identity and look at the world with a very black-and-white, Manichean approach.
Donald was not that. On screen, Donald was fucked-up. But fucked-up is the core of drama. And Donald was its heart.
As told to Catherine Shoard
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