To Absent Friends: Peter O'Toole, Joan Fontaine

One of the great actors of his generation, Peter O'Toole died yesterday at the age of 81.  

O'Toole, who will be best remembered for his role in "Lawrence of Arabia", was nominated for acting Oscars a record eight times, but never won the award, although he was given a special Lifetime Achievement Oscar.  A great dramatic actor, my personal favorite O'Toole performance came in the 1982 comedy, "My Favorite Year".

In that movie, set in the 1950's, O'Toole played a washed up swashbuckling movie star who was in New York City for one week to guest star on a Sid Caesar-type comedy variety TV show.  O'Toole didn't often do comedy, but he was positively brilliant in this one, and it earned him one of those Best Actor Oscar nominations.  

One line in the movie had O'Toole's character quoting another famous English actor who was purported to have said on his death bed, "Dying is easy.  Comedy is hard."  Perhaps so, but Peter O'Toole made it look easy.

He had another great line in that movie when he said, "I'm not an actor, I'm a movie star!"  Trust me, in the context of the movie, the line was hilarious.


Another Hollywood passing this weekend was the death of Oscar winner Joan Fontaine at age 94.  I'm not going to pretend to know a lot about Miss Fontaine or her overall body of work, but I was aware of the fact that she was the younger sister of actress Olivia de Havilland, and that the two of them had a feud that was legendary, even by Hollywood standards.  They had not spoken to each other and barely acknowledged each other's existence since the 1930's.  Read the obits about it.  It's kind of fascinating.

Miss de Havilland, by the way, is still living and is 97 years old.  Wonder if she is taking any satisfaction in knowing that she outlived her rival sister?

RIP Peter O'Toole and Joan Fontaine.