Flickgrrl

Your lede for this story in the Inky -- http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20080406_Charlton_Heston__a_larger-than-life_man_who_portrayed_NO_HEAD_SPECIFIED.html-- has his age incorrect. He was 84.

Glenn: He was born in October 1924. Which makes him 83.

Best,

C

My apologies. Have you seen how many other news outlets have him 84? -- Reuters, AP, Variety...

If you search Google News for (Charlton Heston AND 84) you get about 1700 hits and if you try (Charlton Heston AND 83) you get 71 hits.

You seem to be right and in the minority!

Glenn

"Touch of Evil" hands down. He was great in a very uncharacteristic (for him) role. Scary movie.

Although Ben-Hur was a huge influence on my 11-year-old self when my mom took me to see it, my favorite Heston work remains Soylent Green.

It's not only a profoundly ominous sci-fi thriller, but the scenes with Heston and Edward G. Robinson (in a splendid swan song) are exceptionally moving examples of humanism is an otherwise deadened future society.

Note to readers: About Heston's actual age, the New York Times just posted a correction that according to his family, he was born in 1923, which would make him 84 at death. When I interviewed him in 1995, he gave the year as 1924, which is also the year he gave in his memoirs. Like I always say, an actor's birth certificate is as reliable a document as a deed to the Brooklyn Bridge. Whatever Heston's years were, he was tonic.

As a 12 year old in '69, Planet of the Apes blew me away. Remember, this was an era where typical "B" scifi consisted of movies such as "The Green Slime." All of a sudden, there was Star Trek on TV and "Planet of the Apes" representing thoughtful human issues (nuclear destruction and the thought process that leads to it) in futuristic settings. Heston followed that up with "Soylent Green" (overpopulation) and "The Omega Man" (biological warfare in a more entertaining version of "I am Legend than the recent version). I became a fan of his for life, notwithstanding his political beliefs which which I disagreed. So I too am more of a fan for his science fiction work of the late '60s and early '70s than the Biblical stuff. RIP.

Charlton Heston and Gregory Peck, mentioned above as political opposites, were beautifully paired in my favorite western "The Big Country" (along with "Shane", that is.)

Heston was at his best playing the conflicted ranch foreman, Steve Leech,
who has to see the stranger, Jim McKay (Peck) arrive to marry Pat, Leech's life long love in this film recounting what turns out to be a wide ranging battle between two families over water-rights.

What a cast: Alfonso Bedoya, Charles Bickford, Jean Simmons, Burl Ives, Chuck Connors, Carroll Baker -- plus Peck and a perfectly balanced performance by Heston. Directed by William Wyler. Not to mention one of the best western film scores ever, by Jerome Moross.

The Welles film, Touch of Evil, is one of my favorite films. I taught for a number of years in my Politics and Film class at UNC Charlotte. Heston gave one of his best performances as Miguel “Mike” Sanchez, the presumed hero of the film.

Sanchez, it turns, is a far more morally ambiguous character than one recognizes at first. Indeed, the one of the charms of the film is that one’s judgments of both Heston’s character and and the one played by Welles himself—as well as one’s view of ethnic conflict itself are called into question in the film

One year, one of my best and favorite students in the class was a member of the Republican club. And he had the honor of picking Heston up at the airport for a speaking engagement in Charlotte. So the student started chatting with Heston about “Touch of Evil.” Heston talked about with pride and the understanding that this one of his best performances. But as the student started talking about the moral ambiguities of Miguel Sanchez, Heston became indignant. He thought that Sanchez was the up and up hero of the film and totally rejected my student’s (and my own) interpretation.

My student rushed back to report this to me and he laughingly drew the appropriate conclusion: Heston gave such a great performance precisely because he misunderstood the film. He portrayed a man who was blind to his own flaws and limitations so well precisely because Heston could not see those flaws and limitations in the character.

Growing up in the 70's, one of my brother and mine's favorite films was The Omega Man, which was based on the story I Am Legend (remade with Will Smith last year). Loved Heston's performance--watching his character going to see "Woodstock" at the movie theater for the umpteenth time; playing chess with a plaster bust; gunning down those weirdo mutants; and finally dying heroically in the water fountain. Back then we had only 7 TV channels; such devices as VCRs and DVDs were still science fiction. So it was a big deal when one of the local stations would show one of our beloved movies like Omega Man. We never missed an airing. To this day, if the word "evil" comes up in a conversation, one of us will inevitably intone "What do we do to evil, brothers?" "Burn!" "Yes, burn!" Anthony Zerbe's TV anchor-turned-mutant was truly frightening to us kids back then.

The interracial love story subplot was interesting given the time the movie was made, however naturally racism and prejucide would vanish with only a handful of people left on Earth! I remember when I first saw 28 Weeks Later I wondered if the filmmakers cast the black actress as a sort of homage to the late Rosalind Cash in the similarly themed Omega Man.

Later I came to appreciate such films as Touch of Evil, but will always have a fond place in my memory for Omega Man. RIP Chuck.

RE: the Vidal/homosexual story

This is pure fiction. Vidal was NOT a scriptwriter for Ben-Hur. However several people who worked on the film, including the credited scriptwriters, denied that Vidal had anything to do with the film. This piece of fiction was another of Vidal's slaps at people he disliked.

Joe,

Both Maxwell Anderson and Gore Vidal did uncredited work on the Ben-Hur screenplay. The first I read of this was in Heston's 1978 memoir, "An Actor's Life." While Heston later refuted Vidal's claims about the homosexual subtext, the finished movie would seem to be evidence to the contrary. Just because Vidal is vindictive towards past colleagues doesn't mean his claim is fiction.

Thanks for posting,

C

the world has one less racist gun nut..just because he was in a few movies we should all care that hes gone ? well if you like racist propaganda (like the time he publicly claimed americas only problematic guns are in the hands of minorites..maybe a disproportionate amount but to say that the majority let alone all of problem guns are used by blacks or hispanics is just a lie told by an idiot and only believed by idiots who have no need for useless facts and statistics) or if you think any drunken hillbilly or inner city thug should have access to guns then maybe he would appeal to you also but if you like common sense or good movies then this is less then news...why waste space on this iconic loser when real people to be missed like chuck cassidy or gary sierski go ignored after then inital press frenzy ?

"God Love you, Carrie," would have been Chuck's response to your bitterness towards him. He would have said your freedom of speech and view point is what makes America beautiful.
We respect your right to speak. We feel sad that you are so angry and unloving. GOD bless you in the rest of your life. May you find peace through HIM.

Chuck loved the LORD and hoped that the whole world could live in peace and concern for one another.

I loved the twist appearance he made in the resent remake of "The Planets of the Apes." I really enjoyed "Charlton Heston presents The BIBLE" series. He is truely blessed now.

Carrie, thanks for the extended note on the Vidal story. That's really pretty damn funny.

MooseBreathMints,

What bitterness?

C

The story I love best about Heston was actually about his brother, Allen. Allen Heston was a VP at CIGNA, and I had the opportunity to work for him. The story around the office was that no one should ask him about his brother Charlton. Allen had earned a fare amount of respect from his accomplishments, and I guess he just was tired of the subject. One day, Allen and 3 buddies from the office went golfing. Allen hit a long drive that went right into a water hazard. After a short pause, one of his buddies said, "Don't you wish your brother was here now?"

"whocares" at 4:19 PM sounds like a typical member of the open-minded tolerant party... They always resort to name-calling with anyone who varies from their myopic world view while they walk around thinking very highly of themselves. Tsk tsk tsk. So sad.

Like Palestrajon, I really like "the Big Country." Heston's supporting role as a man torn between the love and respect for a man who gave him everything, trying to live up to the code of the West and to be his own man is superb. All the other characters are one way or another. Heston's Leech is conflicted all around. When Chuck Connors tells him to go "shine the Major's boots," Heston's look of embarrassment is pure acting. The arrogant foreman gets his come-uppance from a low-life Hennesey. I find that role every bit as strong as Ben-Hur and I never miss a chance to watch it.

Years ago, before cable TV, one of the local channels had a "Movie of the Week", a selected film that would be shown six or eight different times during a given week. When I was about 13 or 14, "The President's Lady" was on the Movie of the Week. This historical drama about Andrew Jackson, starring Heston and Susan Hayward, is not a great movie (probably not even a good movie), but to an adolescent girl, the love scenes between Heston and Hayward were just about the dreamiest things ever. He was so tall and handsome, and she was so beautiful. My best friend and I were instantly in love with him. For me, this lasted until I discovered Cary Grant. I completely disagreed with, and was saddened by, Heston's politics in later life, but vestiges of that teenage crush still linger.

It's a madhouse! A MADHOUSE!

Susan Hayward was HOT! "I Want To Live"!

Not that it amounts to a hill o' beans, as another actor said in a famous role, but -- you've credited my note on "The Big Country" to a ' PalestraJon ' on the 7th of April -- when it should have been credited to me, 'Eric' on that same day. I only say this because ' Joe ' agreed so enthusiastically later the same day . . .

That might make me bitter, although not perhaps as bitter as Carrie.

I'll be honest: for the most part, he always struck me as a rather hammy actor. Then I saw him do the Player King in Branagh's "Hamlet" and it blew me away. I've given second looks and more appreciation to his past performances, but the way he delivered the Player King's speech was awe-inspiring.

Not to mention his dead-on funny cameo in "Wayne's World 2."

Thanks, Chris, for remembering Heston's performance as The Player King. Heston was quite the Shakespearean. He believed that the only people who really understood the Bard were actors and the audience -- that reading the plays was an inadequate way of understanding them

Charlton Heston is the only American Actor I admire. He is elegant, handsome and gentleman.
He is so much better than any Male Supermodel.

So sorry Carrie!!!!! I misread who wrote the response. It was from "whocares." I apologize. - MooseBrathMints