“He can do what he wants”: Jack Nicholson on the inspiration of Marlon Brando
The bigger the star, the more leeway they get to walk their own path, something Jack Nicholson knew better than most after emerging as one of the ‘New Hollywood’ movement’s shining lights in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
However, as wayward as he was away from the camera at the peak of his hard-partying and hell-raising powers, Nicholson was always the consummate professional in front of it. He might have been the industry’s most famous wildman, but at the end of the day, Nicholson was always respectful enough of the profession to turn up, do the job, and execute his character to the best of his abilities.
He marched to the beat of his own drum during his downtime, but the three-time Academy Award winner was also completely dedicated and devoted to his craft. He was a headline-grabber, sure, but he wasn’t a troublemaker. Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said for Nicholson’s idol, who eventually became a close friend.
Like many of his generation, Nicholson worships the ground that Marlon Brando walked on, and it was a career-making experience to work with his hero on the 1976 western, The Missouri Breaks. Naturally, there were shenanigans afoot because it would be foolish to think two talents of their calibre with that kind of reputation would behave themselves, but neither of them phoned in their work.
That’s something that couldn’t be said about a lot of late-stage Brando, even if Nicholson defended his next-door neighbour from such criticisms. In fact, when David Sheff dared to suggest that the transformative A Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront figurehead had overstayed his welcome and been reduced to “playing caricatures of himself,” he wouldn’t stand for the slander.
“There’s nothing ill-advised for Marlon Brando,” he replied. “He is a horse of a different colour. He can do what he wants.” That’s exactly what he did, too, even if it ended up causing plenty of frustrations among various co-stars, crew members, and directors when the legend let his unprofessionalism run amok.
Nicholson’s impassioned defence of Brando came just months before the actor passed away in July 2004, having spent years battling against ill health. As a result, the former confessed that “we don’t hang out much lately,” but he still described them as “like the perfect neighbours” because even though they weren’t spending every waking minute together, “We watch each other’s back.”
There’s barely an actor in Nicholson’s age bracket who didn’t start out their career seeking to emulate Brando, but he went one step further by living on the same street and forging a close friendship. Of course, even if that hadn’t happened, he was enough of a fan to defend Brando against suggestions he was slumming it by declaring he’d more than earned the right to do whatever he wanted.
