Leonardo DiCaprio
I posit one of two models:
Model the first:
On Thursday I went over to Que-Ni's to watch the premiere of Ugly Betty. Both of us noticed not only that Vanessa Williams' decollatage has aged disproportionately to her beauty elsewhere, but also that they could have cast a far better looking guy to play the Lothario figure. After the first half hour, the Lothario figure reveled that his character had a soul and depth. "Ah," I remarked, "that's probably why they didn't cast a better looking guy. If he were too good looking he couldn't convince us that he has vulnerabilities."
Model the second:
Have you ever noticed that while a Barbie doll actress has to work really hard to gain respectability, the same is seldom true for the Ken doll actor? Think of the best looking actor you know, and chances are he also has a pretty good reputation for his craft - Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift. Meanwhile there are a plethora of Pamela Andersons and Eva Longorias who will never be much more than a pretty face. If you're lucky, you could eventually become respectable BECAUSE you're a pretty face (Julia Roberts, Audrey Hepburn), but more likely we deny the talent to the pretty face even when it's present (like Marilyn Monroe). In any case, the attribution of talent to a pretty women is usually suspect, while a handsome man can rarely do wrong.
So which of these two models adequately describes how people regularly name Leonardo DiCaprio when they're trying to think of the shining talent of Generation X? I must have first heard it from Stewie in Family Guy ("He's no Leonardo DiCaprio, but..."), and I thought it was a joke, but then I started hearing it repeated more and more in serious contexts. By what standard is DiCaprio a good actor? Am I the only one who saw Romeo + Juliet?! That was one steaming pile of poo, and there was nothing about DiCaprio's performance that could be called "acting." So I'm guessing that people either find him good looking and excuse his flaws, or else they don't think he's good looking and detect vulnerabilities in his characters even though he doesn't bother to incorporate them into his performance.
The baffling thing is, I can't figure out which of the two models it is!
Model the first:
On Thursday I went over to Que-Ni's to watch the premiere of Ugly Betty. Both of us noticed not only that Vanessa Williams' decollatage has aged disproportionately to her beauty elsewhere, but also that they could have cast a far better looking guy to play the Lothario figure. After the first half hour, the Lothario figure reveled that his character had a soul and depth. "Ah," I remarked, "that's probably why they didn't cast a better looking guy. If he were too good looking he couldn't convince us that he has vulnerabilities."
Model the second:
Have you ever noticed that while a Barbie doll actress has to work really hard to gain respectability, the same is seldom true for the Ken doll actor? Think of the best looking actor you know, and chances are he also has a pretty good reputation for his craft - Johnny Depp, Brad Pitt, Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift. Meanwhile there are a plethora of Pamela Andersons and Eva Longorias who will never be much more than a pretty face. If you're lucky, you could eventually become respectable BECAUSE you're a pretty face (Julia Roberts, Audrey Hepburn), but more likely we deny the talent to the pretty face even when it's present (like Marilyn Monroe). In any case, the attribution of talent to a pretty women is usually suspect, while a handsome man can rarely do wrong.
So which of these two models adequately describes how people regularly name Leonardo DiCaprio when they're trying to think of the shining talent of Generation X? I must have first heard it from Stewie in Family Guy ("He's no Leonardo DiCaprio, but..."), and I thought it was a joke, but then I started hearing it repeated more and more in serious contexts. By what standard is DiCaprio a good actor? Am I the only one who saw Romeo + Juliet?! That was one steaming pile of poo, and there was nothing about DiCaprio's performance that could be called "acting." So I'm guessing that people either find him good looking and excuse his flaws, or else they don't think he's good looking and detect vulnerabilities in his characters even though he doesn't bother to incorporate them into his performance.
The baffling thing is, I can't figure out which of the two models it is!
posted by Rex at 9:27 PM
2 Comments:
1) Leonardo DiCapprio is a crappy actor and, in my opinion, not that good looking. Give me Brad Pitt or Keaneau Reeves any day.
2) Keaneau Reeves is the male Pam Anderson although I personally believe he gets a bum rap for his acting abilities. One may also consider Vin Diesel in this category?
3) Boys are better than girls no matter what you say 'cause we got wieners and you don't and there's nothing you can do about it 'cause you're all just dumb girls who can't act and don't drive trucks and can't play sports and spend too much time puttin pink powder on your noses to learn how to do anything right and you got cooties anyway so nobody would ever want to get close enough to you to hear you act anyway so just stay out 'cause no girls allowed in this club unless you got like humongoid boobies like pam anderson does 'cause she's teh hotttt and she had her cooties surgically removed when they were removing her original bone structure and replacing it all with plastic so stop saying bad things about my homies the hot (and totally good) male actors in the world.
Shows how much you know! No girl would put pink powder on her nose.
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