“Those are the movies that get the kids”: Jack Nicholson’s issue with ‘The Matrix’
If Jack Nicholson hadn’t retired from acting more than a decade ago, then it stands to reason he’d have been approached by at least one of Hollywood’s biggest franchises to swing by and lend his legendary talents to a plum supporting part.
After all, the list of living legends to have stayed away from the big budget sandbox continues to dwindle, with many of his peers – including Robert Redford, Harrison Ford, Tommy Lee Jones, Jeff Bridges, Ben Kingsley, and Michael Douglas to name just a small few – having all signed on to appear in a Marvel movie at one stage or another.
Even though he was integral to one of the most influential blockbusters of its generation when he inhaled the scenery whole as the Joker in Tim Burton’s Batman, it was never an arena Nicholson was all that interested in returning to. In fact, the most effects-heavy film he ever starred in came when he reunited with the aforementioned director on Mars Attacks!, so pixelated punch-ups evidently didn’t appeal.
As a three-time Academy Award winner and one of the most celebrated actors in Hollywood history, Nicholson had the clout to pick and choose his roles very early on, and in the twilight years of his professional life, he decided that he’d had more than his fair share of hard-hitting drama, and pivoted into comedy to a significant extent.
Not that it dampened his abilities by any stretch, with Nicholson securing a Golden Globe nomination in the ‘Best Actor – Musical or Comedy’ category after uniting with rom-com great Nancy Meyers for Something’s Gotta Give, which featured Keanu Reeves taking third billing behind himself and Diane Keaton.
The film released in December 2003, shortly after Reeves had returned to screens as Neo in the Wachowskis’ sci-fi sequels The Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions. When asked for his thoughts on the franchise by David Sheff, Nicholson was somewhat dismissive of the industry’s most expensive productions, although he appreciated what they did for the bottom line.
“I don’t like movies in which special effects totally dominate, but those are the movies that get the kids, and therefore get the big numbers,” he said. “Even though I’ve made many successes, they aren’t like that.” Nicholson has plenty of classic movies under his belt, but as he alluded to, it’s hardly a coincidence that Batman is far and away the highest-grossing entry in his filmography, given its cultural appeal.
Not that he wrote blockbusters off as being anti-cinema, though, admitting that “there’s nothing wrong with mixing it in there.” Still, even if he’d continued acting past his swansong in James L. Brooks’ How Do You Know, the chances of seeing Nicholson following so many of his contemporaries into the blockbuster world would have remained decidedly slim.
