Richard Dreyfuss picks his favourite Richard Dreyfuss movies
The late 1960s and early 1970s gave rise to many of the film industry’s most revered actors, with multiple stars breaking through in conjunction with the rise of the New Hollywood movement. Directors such as Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas made a name for themselves, often working from the same pool of actors.
One of these stars was Richard Dreyfuss, who secured his first minor, uncredited film role in Mike Nichols’ The Graduate in 1967, followed by another minuscule appearance in Valley of the Dolls. However, it only took a few small parts in movies such as The Young Runaways for Dreyfuss to secure a significant role in Lucas’ American Graffiti, for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe award.
By the mid-1970s, Dreyfuss had risen to the top of his ranks, starring in movies such as Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and The Goodbye Girl, with the latter earning him a ‘Best Actor’ win at the Academy Awards. Since then, Dreyfuss has starred in many movies and television shows, subsequently winning more prestigious awards, such as a BAFTA and a Golden Globe.
However, when speaking to Rotten Tomatoes about his favourite projects, he didn’t pick any of the aforementioned highly-acclaimed movies that put him on the map. Instead, he mainly selected comedies like the poorly reviewed Let It Ride. Even though “the director [Joe Pytka] did not know how important it was to keep the eye-lines correct,” resulting in the actors looking “slightly goofy because we’re not quite looking at the right spot,” Dreyfuss called the film “hysterically funny”.
With that, he selected the romantic comedy Once Around, directed by Lasse Hallström. Describing it as a “beautiful movie,” Dreyfuss explained: “It was funny, and it was moving, and it was great.” He continued, “Holly Hunter is fantastic. It’s actually quite a brilliant movie, and I’ve always been extremely proud of it.”
Another pick was Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, based on Tom Stoppard’s play of the same name. The tragicomic tale, also directed by Stoppard, was described by Dreyfuss as “more fun than a barrel full of actors”. Detailing further, he added: “[It] gave me a chance to do something I’d never done before, which was great.”
“The whole thing is fun,” Dreyfuss explained. “When I read a script, if I can’t find the fun, I don’t do it. But it just so happens that I have more fun in my career than anybody. It was just fun, and it kept being fun. I’m quite more than satisfied with my body of work. And that’s exactly what I had intended when I was a kid. I wanted to have a body of work that I was proud of. And I think I pulled it off.”
The actor also picked Moon Over Parador, rating it an “eight and a half” on “a scale of one to ten”. He said: “It’s something that you can really… If you just see it from the beginning, you’re captured, you’re hooked”. The 1988 movie was a remake of The Magnificent Fraud from 1939 and saw Dreyfuss star alongside Raul Julia and his older brother, Lorin Dreyfuss.
Finally, Dreyfuss completed his list with Mr Holland’s Opus, which earned him multiple coveted award nominations, such as nods from the Oscars and Golden Globes. Recalling filming, he explained: “No film ever bonded [people] like that film. Usually, the crew goes one place, and the cast goes another, and the extras go another. And in that film, we all went out together, sang karaoke together. We had a great time.”
The actor revealed that filming was so much fun that the cast would often do multiple takes “just because it was fun to do”.
Check out the full list below.
Richard Dreyfuss’ favourite movies:
- Moon Over Parador (Paul Mazursky, 1988)
- Let It Ride (Joe Pytka, 1989)
- Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (Tom Stoppard, 1990)
- Once Around (Lasse Hallström, 1991)
- Mr Holland’s Opus (Stephen Herek, 1995)
