The movie Marlon Brando hated watching: “You feel like a goddamn freak in a sideshow”
The term ‘Hollywood icon’ is often thrown around, but few actors can truly call themselves these words like Marlon Brando. For decades, Brando had a tight grasp on Hollywood, appearing in many classics that asserted him as a master of his craft. He certainly wasn’t easy to work with, but his difficulty contributed to the legend he created for himself as one of the most incredible talents the industry had ever seen.
Alongside names like Humphrey Bogart or Laurence Olivier, Brando is considered the cream of the crop, and his performances have influenced actors for years since he emerged on the scene in the 1940s. He appeared on Broadway during the early years of his career, notably originating the role of Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire, a complex yet volatile man.
The actor subsequently played the role in the film adaptation, directed by Elia Kazan, imbuing his performance with a sense of raw, toxic masculinity. He continued to appear in successful movies throughout the 1950s, earning five Academy Awards during the decade alone. He won his first in 1954 for On the Waterfront, in which he gave a masterful performance as Terry Malloy.
Throughout his career, he continued to earn acclaim, notably starring in movies like The Godfather, Apocalypse Now, Last Tango in Paris, Candy, and Superman. Yet, the challenging and complex characters he typically played certainly had a certain resemblance to Brando’s own nature. He was opinionated and strong-minded, and sometimes he made shooting movies, notably The Island of Dr Moreau and Mutiny on the Bounty, incredibly difficult for filmmakers.
If he didn’t want to shoot something, he’d often just refuse in a rather immature manner, making production quite the task. There are countless stories out there about Brando being a challenging man, and there was even a time when he was so furious while watching one of his own movies that he was seen “staggering up from his seat as if from a heart attack.”
The incident occurred when Brando went to the Italian premiere of his Oscar-winning movie On the Waterfront. As revealed in the book Hollywood on the Tiber by Hank Kaufman and Gene Lerner, Brando was not impressed when he realised that his voice had been dubbed into Italian. The actor reportedly said, “Why didn’t somebody tell me I was going to see a dubbed version?” before adding, “Get me out of here!”
He continued, “I’ve never seen myself dubbed. I’m an actor, not a ventriloquist’s dummy, for Christ’s sake. Can you imagine what it’s like to hear somebody else’s voice come out of my mouth? You feel like a goddamn freak in a sideshow. Christ, why didn’t somebody prepare me? Didn’t you guys know?”
Brando clearly wasn’t impressed by the fact that the version of the film being watched by the audience wasn’t the authentic experience. The actor’s outrage is understandable, too – who wants to watch a dubbed version of themselves on screen? Still, he hated the idea of watching the dubbed version of On the Waterfront so much that he got up and left.
