“I feel I wasted a great opportunity”: the 1999 role John Goodman regrets most
As far as modern cinema’s finest character actors go, John Goodman is right up there with the very best. While he’s rarely given the opportunity to play the lead, he’s one of those guys that everyone knows is guaranteed to deliver a performance that’s solid at the bare minimum.
With an extensive background in film, television, and theatre dating back to the mid-1970s, Goodman has had plenty of time to hone his craft. Growing up idolising Marlon Brando, he may not have adopted the method, but he nonetheless drew inspiration from his hero by dedicating himself equally to every role.
Versatility has been the name of the game over the last half a century, with Goodman pinballing between stage work, small-screen sitcoms, and big-screen outings covering almost every genre available: drama, comedy, thrillers, horror, sci-fi, fantasy, farce, period pieces, creature features, and animation; he’s done it all.
Along the way, he’s worked with some of the industry’s most celebrated auteurs, from his multiple Coen brothers collaborations to Steven Spielberg, Mike Nichols, and Robert Zemeckis. Unfortunately, when he worked with one of the all-time greats, a combination of personal and family problems filled Goodman with regret after he failed to make the most of the opportunity.
For an actor of Goodman’s generation, though, Scorsese occupied a different category altogether. By the late 1990s, he had already delivered everything from Taxi Driver to Goodfellas, earning a reputation as one of the defining American filmmakers of the era. Opportunities to work with him weren’t simply another credit on the CV; they were the sort of chances performers waited years to receive, which perhaps explains why Goodman remains so candid about his disappointment.
Goodman has been open in discussing his battles with alcoholism and depression, which already meant he wasn’t in the best frame of mind when cameras started rolling on Martin Scorsese’s sorely underrated Bringing Out the Dead, matters that were exacerbated by his only child falling ill.
“Oh, I was in a bad place,” he confessed to Business Insider. “My wife brought my daughter up for the shoot, and she got appendicitis. I got home from work at about six in the morning. She had been up all night. We brought a doctor in. We had to get her to a hospital in midday Manhattan, and it was impossible.”
Goodman admitted that throughout the shoot, he “was not getting a lot of sleep”, leaving his daughter in the care of close friend Dan Aykroyd when he was on set. “Plus, I was in a bad place mentally,” he explained.
“I wish I would have been present for the film because I feel I wasted a great opportunity.”
John Goodman
Whether or not those issues were perceptible to Scorsese remains up for debate, although the two have never worked on another project together. “I don’t even think he even considers me to have burned a bridge,” Goodman ruminated.
“I’m not worried about that. I had some problems going on at the time.”
The irony, of course, is that Bringing Out the Dead has only grown in stature since its release. Overshadowed at the time by some of Scorsese’s more celebrated crime epics, the film has gradually found an audience that appreciates its oddball energy and bleak humour.
Even though he was reuniting with his Raising Arizona co-star Nicolas Cage under Scorsese’s direction, it’s fair to say that Bringing Out the Dead doesn’t feature one of Goodman’s most memorable turns. Of course, he’s more aware of that than most, and he’ll always regret it.
