“I just look in his eyes”: The 1980 movie that convinced Bradley Cooper to become an actor
From blue-eyed heartthrob to one of the most exciting directors working today, Bradley Cooper is everything people love about Hollywood and has conquered all that he’s set his mind to.
He’s been in multi-billion dollar blockbusters, Oscar-winning classics, and everything in between, and he is still very much in his prime. His film about John Bishop might not have taken off, but one of the films that inspired Cooper to follow his dreams was The Elephant Man, David Lynch’s retelling of the life of Joseph Merrick.
“I saw it when I was about 12 years old,” he told CBS News, “My father showed it to me, and there was something about the story”.
Released in 1980 as Lynch’s sophomore (and first major) release, The Elephant Man was produced by Mel Brooks, who had his name removed from the credits to prevent people from thinking it was a comedy. John Hurt stars as Merrick (who is incorrectly called ‘John’ in the movie), a man with physical deformities who is rescued from the circus by a kindly surgeon, played by Anthony Hopkins. The film is a beautiful exploration of human nature (both good and bad) and the power of simple acts of kindness.
Three years before Lynch’s film, playwright Bernard Pomerance debuted a stage version of The Elephant Man, and in the years since, the show has been revived a number of times, with an array of famous actors stepping into the main role.
Billy Crudup was nominated for a Tony in 2002 for his performance. David Bowie once played the part, which simultaneously makes no sense and all the sense in the world, and another name in this illustrious list is Cooper, who fronted the 2014 revival of the play on Broadway.
“I just look in his eyes,” Cooper said of his pre-show ritual, “I just sort of sit with him in the room for about ten minutes… I stand on this stage every night, me, not as him. And with the audience, we take that journey to become him together; I feel like I go away. I don’t ever think about the breathing or the contortion.”
Despite being released just a few years apart, The Elephant Man play was not used as a source for the film. It was adapted into its own television movie in 1982, and the producers of the stage show even sued Brooks, although the comedian claimed that Merrick’s life story was public property, but none of that stopped Cooper from giving it his all. His performance got rave reviews and landed him a Tony nomination, the first and only time that has happened in his career.
Even if Cooper had won the award, it wouldn’t have compared to the feeling of playing a character with whom he had such a strong connection. There’s an argument to be made that an able-bodied actor should never play a character with a disability, but there can be no denying that The Elephant Man has produced some truly captivating performances on screen and on the stage.
