Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Hollywood in flashback mode

Here is a lookback at Hollywood stars reprising yesteryear greats from the field of art, music, literature and cinema

Isn't it uncanny when you find Hollywood actors, essaying the roles of yesteryear greats, from the fields of art, music and literature, start looking like them? Such has been the cases with Sean Penn, Ed Harris, Jamie Foxx and Philip Seymour Hoffman, who played politician Harvey Milk, expressionist painter Jackson Pollock, blues singer Ray Charles and author Truman Capote. Movies like "Milk", "Pollock", "Ray" and "Capote", all have the actors playing the title characters. And what's more? The names of all these films are either the first or the last names of the title characters. Sean Penn has his creases and laughter lines in the right places to fill in the shoes of gay rights activist and politician Harvey Milk.

And he did just that in "Milk", winning an Academy Award for best actor for his role. Ed Harris's cigarette hung on his lips as he unleashed his imagination on the canvas, playing expressionist painter Jackson Pollock in the movie "Pollock". The nonchalance with which he let the cigarette hang defined the spunk shared by the yesteryear painter. In "Ray", Jamie Foxx's additional talent, that of being a singer and a songwriter, helped tilt the Oscar jury's votes to his favour as he played blues singer Ray Charles with elan. And in "Capote", Philip Seymour Hoffman capitalized his square-shaped face as he played controversial writer Truman Capote, winning an Academy Award for best actor for his effort.

And talking of Hollywood, why should the ladies be left behind? Pedro Almodóvar once said, that his Spanish muse, Penélope Cruz, belongs to the "carnal, gutsy, cleavage-heaving, loud" Mediterranean school of acting, a style, also shared by Italian actor and yesteryear screen-scorcher Sophia Loren. No wonder, then, that when she got to act with Sophia in Rob Marshall's 2009 musical, "Nine", Penélope gushed, "She looks like a goddess." Kristen Stewart soared on the popularity charts with her mullet when she played rock-and-roll icon, Joan Jett, in the rock biopic, "The Runaways".

And now, with her dark eyes and full lips, Anne Hathaway is all set to play Judy Garland in an upcoming biopic on the Golden Era star's troubled life. While Beyoncé made a debut, playing Foxxy Cleopatra, in "Austin Powers in Goldmember", a cheeky throwback to 70s 'blaxploitation' queen, Pam Grier, Jennifer Aniston was recently on the cover of a fashion mag, channeling Barbra Streisand. Gwen Stefani wowed us with her Jean Harlow act in Martin Scorsese's "The Aviator", while Halle Berry's 'Dorothy Dandridge', in the Emmy Awards-winning TV series, "Introducing Dorothy Dandridge" was remarkable.

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