The movie Jack Nicholson mistakenly vowed would be his last: “And that would be it”
Jack Nicholson occupies a semi-mythical place in the acting world. Widely regarded as one of, if not the greatest, screen actors of his generation, he has a seemingly supernatural ability to slip into the most demented of roles with the greatest of ease.
These days, he rarely makes public appearances, so when he turned up on the 50th anniversary edition of Saturday Night Live, people reacted like they’d just seen Bigfoot.
As it stands, the 88-year-old icon made his final movie appearance in the romcom How Do You Know. Directed by James L Brooks, the film is about a love triangle between Reese Witherspoon’s character, a professional softball player, Owen Wilson’s baseball pitcher, and Paul Rudd’s stock trader, where Nicholson plays Rudd’s father. While the film came out in 2010, if Nicholson had had his way, he would have retired a decade and a half earlier.
In 2003, Clint Eastwood was profiled by The New Yorker ahead of the release of soon-to-be Oscar-winning film Mystic River and his upcoming musical documentary Piano Blues. The legendary cowboy, who would have been in his early 70s at the time, was asked about the subject of retirement, and in response, he told a story about a conversation he had had with Nicholson a decade prior about it.
“I was with Jack, driving out to the golf range,” he said. “Jack said he was going to do just one more movie, The Crossing Guard, and that would be his last. I said I would do In the Line of Fire and A Perfect World, and that would be it. Well, he went on to act in about ten more movies, and I went on to act in or direct six more… They keep saying yes to you, so you keep on going.”
Released in 1995, The Crossing Guard is a drama directed by Mystic River star Sean Penn, where 58-year-old Nicholson plays Freddy Gale, a man whose daughter was killed by a drunk driver some years earlier. Gale, whose life falls apart after the incident, learns that the man responsible, played by David Morse, has been released from prison. Blaming him for all his woes, he embarks on a quest for vengeance. The movie scored well amongst critics, but failed to make any splash at the box office.
According to Dennis Hopper, a friend and collaborator of both Penn and Nicholson, it got “out of hand”.
Perhaps it was the poor response to The Crossing Guard that convinced its star to keep going. Whatever the reason, we’re glad he did. Post-1995, Nicholson appeared in a number of films that would expand his already impressive legacy. He won an Oscar for starring in 1997’s As Good as It Gets—although he did admittedly want to quit that movie—and was nominated for a 12th and final time in 2003 for his work on About Schmidt. As for Eastwood, he never stopped either, directing movies as recently as 2024’s Juror #2.
Both Nicholson and Eastwood are strong examples of age being but a number. They also prove that as long as you still have a passion for performing, you can stop on your own terms. Nicholson has reached that point, while Eastwood has yet to lose the bug.
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