The only actor Jack Nicholson wasn’t allowed to upstage: “You can’t be funnier”
Any director who hired Jack Nicholson knew exactly what they were getting: one of the best actors in the business who could blow almost anybody clear off the screen without having to break a sweat.
It didn’t matter if the movie was a drama, comedy, thriller, or period piece; he was that good and that magnetic that all eyes were inevitably drawn in his direction. It’s a gift that not many performers have ever had, but Nicholson made it look easy. Whether he was playing the lead or lending support, his co-stars needed to bring their A-game to avoid being swallowed whole by another towering performance.
Obviously, that wasn’t always the case. It wasn’t until after his first Academy Award-nominated performance in Easy Rider that Jack Nicholson became Jack Nicholson, but when he did, there was no stopping him. He’d notch another 11 nominations, win three Oscars, and take his place among the all-time greats, and that reputation ensured that nobody would dare ask him to tone it down.
He was also a savvy enough operator to understand that while scenery-chewing histrionics were required in pictures like The Shining and A Few Good Men, dialling it down was equally important. Nicholson was occasionally guilty of over-acting, but those instances were few and far between, and he was gifted enough to tailor himself to the film he was making at the time.
That wasn’t the case during his Roger Corman days, though, when everybody was flying by the seat of their pants. The One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Chinatown star credited the prolific producer as one of his most important influences, so when Corman told him not to do something, he was one of the few names in the business Nicholson would actually listen to.
To put it lightly, 1963’s The Raven was a chaotic production, even by Corman’s standards. In only his seventh feature, Nicholson found himself starring opposite a trio of heavyweight horror icons in Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, and Boris Karloff in one of the filmmaker’s many cheap and cheerful Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, which reused sets and even footage from movies he’d recently wrapped.
The Frankenstein figurehead was in his late 70s, was in increasingly poor health, hated having to wear the bulky costume of Dr Scarabus, and was adamant that he walked away from any scenes he shared with Corman’s protégé as the winner, with Nicholson revealing the one and only demand that was made of him.
“Roger Corman’s only direction to me on The Raven was, ‘Do anything you want, Jack, but you can’t be funnier than Boris,'” he told The Oklahoman. “So that’s what it’s like.” He had complete free rein to pitch his performance however he wanted, but the only thing he wasn’t allowed to do was steal any scenes away from Karloff, who wouldn’t have taken too kindly to being outshined by a relative unknown.
With the edict coming from his mentor, he did as asked, because he’d never say no to Corman.
