«The Last Movie Stars», the story of the long love story between Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward (score 8)- Corriere.it

After talking about our local stars, here is «The Last Movie Stars», the last movie stars, this time it’s an American couple, a great married couple, less quarrelsome than Liz and Burton, who met in 1952, blessed with love, success, many children, 19 times partners on the screen, even if there were certainly moments of despair in which life returned to black and white, full of pain, such as the death by overdose in 1978 of his son Scott, aged 28: we are talking about Paul Newman (1925-2008) and Joanne Woodward, the best students of Lee Strasberg’s school. They are the stars of the beautiful series (Sky documentaries and on demand) in which they tell, with the voices of actors and directors, friends and real children, how their lives and careers crossed paths from the 50s onwards. Both began in theater on Broadway (where Newman as well as “Picnic” and “Desperate Hours”, was also Plato!) that Woodward never abandoned, then as always happens they were requested by the cinema.

While the beautiful Joanne she was the first to become a diva and to win the Oscar already in ’57 with “The woman with three faces”, one of the films that put the teachings of psychoanalysis into practice, Paul, the most beautiful blue eyes in cinema, half-Protestant by birth and half Jewish, he in turn achieved star status, acclaimed by the crowds. But when they got married Joanne became the mother of the family and Paul broke into cinema with the best directors around, from Wise to Ritt to Rossene then Pollack, Rosenberg and many others. If the beginning had been depressing (he says “The Silver Goblet” as one of the worst moments of his career), with “Someone up there loves me”, Paul became very popular: it was a film about boxing, about champion Rocky Graziano, and he had taken the place of the beloved James Dean. The titles of the couple who loved each other from the first to the second half range from the American upper class (“From the terrace”) to the Faulknerian Southern countryside (“The long, hot summer”). But the actor also became loved by playing billiards in the «Swashbuckler», he flaunted all the sensuality of him, before the passion for car racing engulfed him in old age. Produced by HBO and Martin Scorsese in six episodes, directed and commented by Ethan Hawke who organized the work, the series, presented at the Rome Film Fest, has famous colleagues who willingly gave their voices to the protagonists following the collection of audio cassettes originals, almost all destroyed, but the transcripts of which were found by Stephanie Newman.

Clooney talks like Newman, Laura Linney plays Woodward, and then Zoe Kaan, Ewan McGregor, Scorsese himself, Sally Field, Mark Ruffalo and James Ivory who directed them in the last couple film «Mr. and Mrs. Bridge». Great galas, often interviewed by Letterman on TV, prizes at the Cannes festival, even if Newman had to suffer a lot for the Oscar and when he won it, for “The color of money”, he did not go to collect it but also had one for his career . In addition to the cassettes we see rare and precious archival materials, above all the theatrical beginnings and family home videos (better to use the plural, Paul already had a wife and two children when he met Joanne), the series is a piece of history of the best American cinema ( Paul also worked twice with Altman and with Lumet) and there are scenes from a marriage that lasted half a century with moments of alternating depression after his son’s suicide that the actor continued all his life to honor and help with charity, inventing a sauce, a “dressing”, which was and still is a bestseller. A nice balance between period films, interviews with friends and relatives and also with famous writers such as Gore Vidal: he was the one who called them “last movie stars”, and they were also excellent performers even if the secret was to appear that they did not act .

The secret of the union? They said: «Combination of lust, respect, patience and determination». And also the fortune of formidable opportunities, for her beautiful female protagonists and for him the Roy Hill diptych “Butch Cassidy” and “The Sting” in which Newman is paired with his friend Redford, both democratic activists (Newman was in ninth place among Nixon’s enemies) and intellectuals not in his spare time (Newman loved Thomas Wolfe and Camus). It is a product for cinephiles, a bit niche while Sky informs that the Italian remake of “Call my agent” has exceeded expectations, because the first episode, the one with Cortellesi, exceeded 1.9 million after a few weeks of unique contacts: the best debut of a Sky original series in the last year. Returning to the last couple of film stars, today only one part remains, namely Joanne, who had been stronger than her and who in the second half of her career did a lot of theater as a teacher and producer. Mrs. Woodward, born in 1930 in Georgia, also had great successes in films directed by her husband, including Williams’ “Glass Zoo”, but unfortunately for some years, protected by her daughters, she has been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and therefore cinema and life are confused with them.