In his early thirties, long after most aspiring actors have given up their show business quests, Hackman decided to take the performing plunge. He studied at the famous Pasadena Playhouse, where he and fellow student DUSTIN HOFFMAN were voted "least likely to succeed." Undaunted, he went to New York to try to break into the theater. Thanks to his unactorish looks, he soon found modest success in small Off- Broadway productions and in television, eventually leading to a starring role in Any Wednesday on Broadway in 1964.
Hackman had emerged as a legitimate character actor, but he had yet to achieve star status. After working in support of such luminaries as ROBERT REDFORD in Downhill Racer (1969) and BURT LANCASTER in The Gypsy Moths (1969), he was given a rare costarring role with MELVYN DOUGLAS in I Never Sang for My Father (1970). The critics raved about Hackman's complex performance, and he was honored yet again with an Oscar nomination as Best Supporting Actor.
Finally, in 1971, when he played obsessed, uncouth New York cop "Popeye" Doyle in The French Connection, everything fell into place. The movie was a smash with both critics and filmgoers and, suddenly, at the age of 40. Hackman had become a star and the recipient of an Oscar as Best Actor. He had found the secret of his future success: Play both heroes and villains as vulnerable, human characters.
After The French Connection, Hackman's career in the early 1970s consisted mostly of good roles in good films that did not fare well with anyone but the critics. The all-star disaster film The Poseidon Adventure (1972) aside, he starred in such highly regarded movies as Michael Ritchie's Prime Cut (1972), Scarecrow (1973), and Francis Ford Coppola's post- Godfather masterpiece, The Conversation (1974). Despite good notices, however, Hackman was in need of a hit. He went back to the well to recreate Popeye Doyle in French Connection II (1975), which proved to be a success.
Unfortunately, the second half of the 1970s became a relative wasteland for Hackman. Except for Night Moves (1975), a good movie that failed at the box office, most of his other vehicles were often poor films that were also big commercial losers. By the end of the decade he was playing Lex Luthor in Superman (1978) and Superman II (1980).
In the early 1980s Hackman starred with Barbra Streisand in the little-known but wonderful comedy All Night Long (1981). Again, he was well reviewed, but the film went nowhere. Finally, in 1983, Hackman fired up the public in one of the first Vietnam-related movies, Uncommon Valor (1983), which became a sleeper hit. Since then, whether successful or not, either his films or his performances (or both) have generally been critically acclaimed. With a prodigious output during the mid- to late 1980s, he delighted filmgoers with brilliant characterizations in films as varied as Under Fire (1983), Misunderstood (1984), Twice in a Lifetime (1985), Hoosiers (1986), Bat 21 (1988), Another Woman (1988), Mississippi Burning (1988), and The Package (1989).
Hackman's standout role of the 1990s was as Little Bill Daggett in CLINT EASTWOOD's revisionist, postmodern western Unforgiven (1992). Little Bill was the sheriff of Big Whiskey, intent upon brutalizing any gunman who might venture into his jurisdiction; he was equally concerned about building himself a house, but he is not a proper carpenter or sheriff. There is black humor in his failures on both counts. In The Quick and the Dead (1995), he plays another lawman named Herod, the archvillain who runs a town called Redemption in a film that overflows with allegory.
Some other villainous roles include those in The Firm (1993), that of a corrupt lawyer; Absolute Power (1997), that of a lecherous, murderous U.S. president; and The Chamber (1996), that of a white supremacist charged with murder. In Under Suspicion (2000), he played a lawyer accused of the rape and murder of two 12-year-old girls. In Heartbreakers (2001), he plays a wheezing tobacco tycoon who is likely to become a murder victim.
Hackman has also fallen into a number of military roles. In Crimson Tide (1995), he played the commander of the submarine USS Alabama who clashes with DENZEL WASHINGTON over an order to fire the sub's missiles. In Behind Enemy Lines (2001), a similar kind of conflict exists between the inexperienced young soldier (Owen C. Wilson) and Hackman as an experienced admiral who wants everything by the book.
Another phase of leadership was in The Replacements (2000), in which Hackman played a professional football coach. Hackman also revealed a flair for comedy in The Birdcage (1996), playing an obtuse right-wing senator whose daughter is about to marry the son of a gay nightclub owner (ROBIN WILLIAMS). In The Royal Tenenbaums (2002), he played a selfish, disbarred attorney attempting to reconcile himself with his dysfunctional family. In 2003 he played another sinister attorney in Runaway Jury. Of the more than 75 movies Hackman has made, six have grossed more than $100 million.
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1. Don Ameche was one of the leading men of 20th Century Fox
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