Welcome back to the Supporting Actress Smackdown. Each month we pick an Oscar vintage to explore through the lens of actressing at the edges. This episode takes us back to 1986.
THE NOMINEES For the 1986 film year the Academy honored three newbies (Tess Harper, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Dianne Wiest) the latter of whom would become a two-time winner, and welcomed back two veterans (two time winner Maggie Smith and previous nominee Piper Laurie). The characters assembled were a nosy cousin, a savvy girlfriend, a neurotic actress, a spinster chaperone, and an estranged mother.
THE PANELISTS Here to talk about these performances and films with your host Nathaniel are two regular TFE voices Cláudio Alves and Lynn Lee as well as civil rights attorney / cinephile Jonathan Diaz, and writer/cartoonist Rob Kirby.
SUPPORTING ACTRESS SMACKDOWN + PODCAST
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TESS HARPER as "Chick Boyle" in Crimes of the Heart
Synopsis: The chatterbox cousin of a family of sisters is horrified by their scandalous behavior.
Stats: 36 yrs old, 5th film, 5th billed. First and only nomination. 10 minutes of screen time (or 10% of the running time)
Cláudio Alves: While one can appreciate the gusto with which she devours Chick's dialogue, the actress does too much. Her lack of listening skills is in character, but Harper takes it to inorganic extremes, becoming an insular presence in what should be an ensemble effort. After a while, it starts to seem like a performer doing an exuberant routine rather than a real person's abrasiveness. Furthermore, while putatively funny, she's no fun, especially compared to the other figures in Crimes of the Heart. She's always joyless, not even taking noticeable pleasure in her own meanness. In this regard, Harper is like her fellow nominees, all of which are partially defined by how they convey their character's unhappiness. In this case, unhappiness is seen as a buffoon's petty vociferation, the need to dominate every interaction and make enough noise so that nobody can hear the deafening silence. Unfortunately, unlike her competition, Harper has no arc to help modulate this strategy, and it ends up rather dull. ♥♥
Jonathan Diaz: Despite the formidable talent assembled on screen, Crimes of the Heart is an overwrought mess—especially in comparison to the other movie in this category about the relationship among three sisters. As a live action version of Lottie from The Princess and the Frog, Harper gets bonus points for being the only cast member in this film to demonstrate anything approaching recognizable human behavior. It’s not enough to make her performance nomination-worthy, but Harper at least provides a breath of fresh air amidst the madness every once in a while. ♥♥
Rob Kirby: Harper's playing a broad cartoon villain here, which I guess is what the script called for. I felt like she wanted to give the audience a good time and went for it, playing one of those aggressively passive-aggressive witches we've all encountered at one time or another. While she's lively enough, it's ultimately all very one-note and this nomination feels unnecessary. ♥♥
Lynn Lee: I’m not familiar enough with the 1986 movie landscape to understand what Academy voters were thinking that year, but I cannot fathom what about this performance (or, indeed, this movie as a whole) was deemed worthy of an Oscar nod. It’s not that Harper is bad as Chick, the pop-eyed, nosy Southern neighbor and judgmental cousin, just that she’s completely one-note. That one note isn’t sharp or funny enough to amount to anything special. It says something that in our final glimpse of her – as she’s being chased up and a tree and spanked with a broom by a livid Lenny (Diane Keaton) – her most notable quality is that she’s less hammy than Keaton (whom I love, but who overacts painfully in this). ♥
Nathaniel R: Normally when a cartoonish performance is nominated you can chalk it up to someone being quite extra and waking up the audience in the midst of the dull movie surrounding them (think Renee in Cold Mountain). But what happened here? Crimes of the Heart is terrible but it's hardly "dull" or dully acted -- the actors are really going for it, bless, however ill-judged some of their choices are. There's something mildly funny about Chick's eagerness to intrude (which is why I like the beat of her springing into action post breakfast donut when she sees a car arriving) but despite only having a few scenes she somehow manages to repeat herself ad nauseam. So what accounts for the Academy's embrace? Was this merely a nod to say "sorry about the Tender Mercies snub?" ♥
Reader Write-Ins: "The perm, the makeup, the mom pants. Very external performance." - Peggy Sue (Reader average: ♥♥¼)
Actress earns 10¼ ❤s
PIPER LAURIE as "Mrs Norman" in Children of a Lesser God
Synopsis: An estranged mother tries to reconnect with her deaf daughter.
Stats: 54 yrs old, 24th film, 3rd billed. Third (and final) nomination. 8½ minutes of screentime (or 7% of the running time)
Cláudio Alves: Suggests a thorny relationship and years of biography without overemphasizing her actorly choices. From the start, one can see a connection with Matlin, a shared attitude before they ever share a scene proper. There's a noted similarity in how they defiantly regard Hurt, how both actresses inhabit the space as if always ready for a combative response from whoever is present. Their anger is marrow-deep, a bond forged in blood and pain, guilt too. Still, in spite of the characters' troubled domesticity, Laurie portrays a mother's essential knowledge of her daughter with bruised warmth. This matriarch knows her offspring like nobody else. Perhaps because of all that implicit history, one feels disappointed that her methods of communication feel so clunky, whether deliberately or by accident. Curiously, she does the same talk while signing that Hurt does, only more sluggish and out of practice. It feels like a barbed character choice in his case, but the purpose is less apparent with Laurie. ♥♥♥
Jonathan Diaz: Sort of a head-scratcher of a nomination, frankly. Laurie is a welcome presence and she does good, subtle work here, but she doesn’t really get enough to do in her handful of scenes to really make an impact. ♥♥
Rob Kirby: Though the talented Laurie does her considerable best to flesh out the part of Marlee Matlin's once-estranged-now-emotionally-available mother, the part is still little more than a three-scene cameo without a lot of There there (but some real banal dialogue). There's little she can do to distinguish the role, thus we have another nomination that feels like an instant also-ran. I think she made the cut mostly due to being a previous Oscar nominee. ♥♥
Lynn Lee: Laurie does well with what she’s given – she just isn’t given very much. Or maybe I’m biased by the now-established trend of treating de facto co-lead roles as “supporting”? For a character who only appears in a few scenes, she undergoes a pretty dramatic shift from coldly standoffish, all-business woman who denies any responsibility for her daughter’s issues to penitent maternal figure once said daughter seeks refuge and reconciliation with her. We don’t get to see quite enough in the writing to explain the shift, but it’s a tribute to Laurie’s quietly expressive demeanor that she’s convincing in both modes. ♥♥
Nathaniel R: Though we love a once-a-decade Oscar queen (see also Diane Keaton's 70/80/90/00s trick), Piper's third nomination in as many decades is unfortunately her weakest. She's affecting and subtle in her showcased scenes. I particularly love her naked impatience with William Hurt in her first scene and the detail of her rusty signing skills in her second and that you can feel them coming back as she speaks. Still, it's difficult to find a satisfying through-line or arc from the hostile defensive cold mother we meet forty minutes into this drama and the loving protective mother toward the end of the film. Was there another scene left on the cutting room floor? ♥♥♥
Reader Write-Ins: "She was solid, but not M'onique in Precious level, which is the standard for hating your daughter for driving a man away." - Drew C. (Reader average: ♥♥♥)
Actress earns 15 ❤s
MARY ELIZABETH MASTRANTONIO as "Carmen" in The Color of Money
Synopsis: The ambitious bored girlfriend of a pool player learns to hustle from a master.
Stats: 28 yrs old, 2nd film, 3rd billed. First and only nomination. 37 minutes of screen time (or 31% of the running time).
Cláudio Alves: In her very first scene, it's challenging to pay any attention to the men. She's so magnetic! The harshness with which Mastrantonio directs Cruise is especially lovely, only allowing a hint of amused affection to shine through. Then there's the pointed "disinterest" with which she regards Newman. Carmen often comes off as someone who wants to project boredom, even as she's paying acute attention to everything around her. We can denote dishonesty in her disinterest, a stiff pose of decadence with eyes too searching to be genuinely aloof. Even so, Mastrantonio's Carmen can also be surprised and out of her depth. When confronted by the older man, tension arises, and it's like a charade momentarily dissipates to reveal a couple of people that aren't nearly as smart as they think they are. The significant shift in the performance comes later, though. After the narrative has lost track of her for a while, Carmen returns a different woman whose romance has settled into an uneasy business partnership more than anything else. Unhappiness is a gradual realization in Mastrantonio's work, quiet and overwhelming, a youthful romance denuded of its original spark. It's a hidden grin that rots into a barely contained grimace ♥♥♥♥
Jonathan Diaz: The biggest surprise for me of the bunch. I had assumed that The Color of Money would focus on the relationship between Paul Newman’s Eddie Felson and Tom Cruise’s Vincent Lauria, but Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio’s Carmen is a critical piece of the puzzle. It’s not the stock girlfriend character you’d expect from a sports/gambling movie like this: she’s as much a mentee to Eddie as Vincent is, if not moreso. In her final scene, you can see in her body language and facial expressions that she reads Eddie perfectly. While Vincent is all oblivious bravado, Carmen is the real student of behavior—she’s internalized Eddie’s lessons in a way Vincent never could. Although she’s never the true POV character, as an audience we take our cues from her on how to regard both Eddie and Vincent. Mastrantonio amplifies Cruise and Newman just by reacting to them: the mark of a truly great supporting performance. ♥♥♥♥♥
Rob Kirby: For me, what's wrong with Mastrantonio in this meh drama isn't her, it's the role itself. She's stuck playing The Girlfriend in a Martin Scorcese picture, which means she's relegated to being mostly sidelined, despite her obvious intelligence and a decent amount of screentime. She also has the requisite male gaze-y topless scene. I'm left wishing they had sidelined the Tom Cruise character (fat chance), and made Mastrantonio and Paul Newman the focus instead. Color me that. ♥♥♥
Lynn Lee: This was Mastrantonio’s breakout role for a reason – she’s a standout as Carmen, the street-smart, hard-edged, coolly sexy girlfriend-manager of Tom Cruise’s still-green hustler. Carmen’s green, too, but she’s a quick study who sizes up Newman’s “Fast Eddie” and the value of what he has to offer much faster than her impulsive charge. Mastrantonio’s eyes are the game here - always watchful, always taking everything in and revealing very little in return. We never really get a read on Carmen’s true feelings for Cruise’s character, but the ambiguity in whether she’s using him or genuinely cares for him somehow makes her more intriguing than off-putting. Likewise, her one miscalculation – her clumsy attempt to seduce Eddie – could equally plausibly spring from her eye for the main chance and her instinct that she and Eddie are two of a kind. Ultimately, Mastrantonio emerges as the truest hustler of the trio – and a fine one she is. Why don’t we see her anymore in the movies? ♥♥♥
Nathaniel R: Mastrantonio curiously made no films between her doomed window-dressing debut in Scarface (1983) and this wonderfully savvy turn but what a remarkable leap! I love a good meta moment in cinema and in Carmen's watchful sponge-like recognition to Paul Newman's Fast Eddie we see that she knows that this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to elevate her entire future. Mastrantonio, the actress, understands the same about a starring role in a Scorsese picture. She's confident enough to recede, as the girlfriend of a star player is often expected to, but smart enough to always let us see her racing mind even when she's trying to be just 'the girl'. Her gift at allowing us to track exactly how Carmen feels about her show pony boyfriend (Tom Cruise's Vincent) from scene to scene is also involving. ♥♥♥♥
Reader Write-Ins: "Dencqueen" - Tom (Reader average: ♥♥♥½)
Actress earns 22½ ❤s
DAME MAGGIE SMITH as "Charlotte Bartlett, a Chaperone" in A Room With a View
Synopsis: A nervous spinster tries to protect her young charge from further scandal after an illicit kiss in the Italian countryside.
Stats: 52 yrs old, 23rd film, 1st billed. Fifth nomination (of a total six). 27 minutes of screentime (or 23% of the running time.)
Cláudio Alves: Poor Charlotte Bartlett can feel like the archetypal spinster of British literature. She's annoying and always ready to weaponize a martyr complex, so molded by the rules of Edwardian decorum that her actions can't help but stifle passion. However, in the hands of Smith and a team of master filmmakers, Charlotte blossoms into a much richer figure. She's both a beacon of comedy and an unexpected source of romanticism. Since an early – easily dismissible - proclamation that she's a woman of the world, Charlotte drops hints of her attachment to the idea of love, its poetic power to overwhelm and redefine life. Smith performs such a facet in quiet reactions, stiff glares that gradually become engulfed by curiosity, some trepidation. The character's about-face near the end isn't nearly as shocking if one has been paying attention to her pitch-perfect performance. Thankfully, due to a tremendous thespian's skill, the camera catches all those complexities. ♥♥♥♥♥
Jonathan Diaz: Smith is an actress who is so easy to take for granted because her floor is so high. Cousin Charlotte may seem a somewhat atypical character for those who know her best as the imperious Dowager Countess or sternly warm Professor McGonagall, but she’s a perfect match for Smith’s formidable strengths. She plays Charlotte’s fussiness for laughs while at the same time perfectly conveying the insecurities lying underneath. She’s also a fabulous scene partner, especially for Helena Bonham-Carter and Denholm Elliott. But honestly, this could (and should) have been a joint nomination with Judi Dench—their scenes together are such a treat. ♥♥♥♥
Rob Kirby: Smith gives what now feels like her quintessential Fussily Prim Spinster performance. But in 1986 it was still fresh, with Smith poignantly locating Charlotte's lonely sense of unfulfillment. ♥♥♥
Lynn Lee: As Claudio, Nathaniel, and I have expounded at length, Smith offers a master class of subtle comedic acting as “poor Charlotte,” prim yet hapless chaperone par excellence and queen of the passive-aggressive guilt trip. Smith knows exactly how to pucker up her mouth just so to express disapproval, and how to add just the right tone of querulous, burden-shifting self-reproach when she feels Lucy’s displeasure. But what takes her performance to the next level is how she handles Charlotte’s extraordinary about-face on the subject of Lucy and George, presenting it as an organic evolution in her feelings rather than an out-of-nowhere heel turn. The hints of a softer, more sentimental side are always there – you just have to be on the lookout for them. ♥♥♥♥♥
Nathaniel R: An absolute marvel of a performance, using every tool in an actor's kit from wonderfully nuanced facial expressions to insanely well judged line readings to carefully deployed physicality. Indeed, she's as expressive in movement (which is often, especially as compared to modern Maggie performances where she's always seated and imperious) as is close-up. One of those performances that gets better each time you watch the movie which is a nice treat since the movie is crazy rewatchable and this fussy spinster has hidden depths that only a great actress could reveal this judiciously and juicily. ♥♥♥♥♥
Reader Write-Ins: "An all-timer performance in an all-timer movie. [in '86]... I didn't full appreciate how much Smith was acting circles around the young leads." - Troy in SF (Reader average: ♥♥♥♥)
Actress earns 26 ❤s
DIANNE WIEST as "Holly" in Hannah and Her Sisters
Synopsis: A neurotic actress and recovering addict discovers a gift for writing and an unexpected romance with her ex brother-in-law.
Stats: 40 yrs old, 7th film, 10th billed (alpha order). 1st nomination and win (of an eventual 3/2). 28 minutes of screentime (or 26% of the running time.)
Cláudio Alves: Growing from bitterness to joy can be a tricky act to play. It's easy to be cloying. Wiest circumvents every pitfall of the premise with a master's precision. There's an exquisite sense of controlled chaos to her work as the unhappy Holly, her mere presence capable of changing the energy of any scene. That quality is what makes her so disarmingly magnificent, a consistent treasure trove of delightful surprises. Whenever I re-watch the film, it always feels as if I'm rediscovering Wiest's Holly, finding new angles and ideas. Moreover, while many superb actors falter in narration, going placid when they're so lively on set, Dianne Wiest brings her A-game to the task. She carries as much complicated emotion, shades of joy, and deep sadness into her voice-over work as she does when the camera is pointed at her. Indeed, the juxtaposition of narration and a silent close-up is a rhapsody of caustic frustration that's both unforgettable and diametrically opposed to the last time we see Holly. In that holiday coda, standing in front of the mirror and contemplating her newfound contentment, she's a thing of beauty, like happiness crystalized ♥♥♥♥♥
Jonathan Diaz: Weist is just tremendous in a movie full of excellent performances. As the fulcrum point between so many of the pivotal relationships in Hannah and Her Sisters, Weist is so dynamic, especially in her scene in the department store with Mia Farrow or her lunch with Farrow and Barbara Hershey—for me, the centerpiece scene. She plays beautifully off the entire cast: not just Farrow and Hershey, with whom she has realistic (and importantly distinct!) chemistry as sisters, but also with Woody Allen, Sam Waterston, and Carrie Fisher (who would have been a worthy nominee herself for this When Harry Met Sally-level sidekick performance). Weist is the glue that holds the entire ensemble together, and her performance is a very worthy Oscar winner. ♥♥♥♥♥
Rob Kirby: I intensely identified with Diane Wiest's angry, defensive creation back when this debuted in 1986 and I still do now, even though both the character and I have since figured things out. Wiest captures every nuance of Holly's wounded pride, and her sense of shame and terror at the possibility of never finding her artistic niche—and thus her place in life. It's a vibrant and involving performance—easily one of the best-ever winners in this category. ♥♥♥♥♥
Lynn Lee: Wiest’s Holly is a glorious train wreck you can’t stop watching. She seems to inhabit her own separate comic orbit that revolves around her paralyzing insecurity – whether it’s in her passive rivalry against her more aggressive frenemy, April (that voice-in-her-head monologue in the cab is perfection), her hilariously disastrous chain-smoking, coke-snorting first date with Mickey, or most crucially, her hyperloaded interactions with Hannah, who provides Holly financial support but undercuts her ego seemingly without even trying. Wiest’s gift lies in making Holly’s neuroses not just funny but counterintuitively charming, perhaps because she wears her vulnerability on her sleeve: you find yourself rooting for her to get a break even as you know she’d probably sabotage it. Her happy ending may be a bit engineered, but Wiest makes it feel earned. ♥♥♥♥
Nathaniel R: Like Smith's Charlotte, Wiest's Holly sucks all the oxygen out of every room with her fussy nervousness in a way that one recognizes as fully human and familiar (I wish this could be a tie!). The magic is in making recognizably maddening real life behavior into supremely entertaining comedy onscreen; you'd probably go running from Holly in real life but who wouldn't have signed on for a six hour miniseries, prequel or sequel, focusing on her past failures or implied future success! Though this was an instantly recognized-as-genius performance in '86, I'd forgotten how multifaceted her work is. She brings a real undercurrent of self-pitying anger mixed with the thinnest skin imaginable so you feel each blow Holly feels, even when someone is trying to help. Bonus points for being utterly hilarious in voiceover which is not an easy thing to do -- that drive with April & David is one of the funniest and most ingenious scenes from Woody Allen's entire filmography! ♥♥♥♥♥
Reader Write-Ins: "Wiest like so many things in Hannah and Her Sisters is basically perfect. It’s hard to describe how she balances all the saucers of Holly whether it’s the drug addiction past, the struggling actress present or the wannabee screenwriter future. Among the greatest performances from Woody Allen’s filmography." - Eoin (Reader average: ♥♥♥♥¾)
Actress earns 28¾ ❤s
THE OSCAR WENT TO... Dianne Wiest
RESULT: And the Smackdown agrees. It's a second (presumably) runaway victory for Dianne Wiest for her unforgettable "Holly" in one of Woody Allen's greatest films.
THE FULL PODCAST CONVERSATION
You can listen right here 👇 or listen on Spotify or iTunes or Stitcher to hear the in-depth discussion with our marvelous guests. [All Previous Smackdowns]
UP NEXT: 1937 is coming in late September so queue up Dead End, In Old Chicago, Night Must Fall, Stage Door and Stella Dallas ... it's an enjoyable crop of movies!