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Redemption Song |
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Four-time Academy Award nominee Jeff Bridges finally gets the Oscar win he deserves, for CRAZY HEART. |
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Few actors can inhabit the prosaic surrounds of a tenpin bowling alley with the same intrigue as Jeff Bridges. He did so through the extended shenanigans of The Big Lebowski, and again in the poignant opening of Crazy Heart, in which the actor plays grizzled country music singer Bad Blake.
Blake’s been told he won’t be getting a free tab at his own gig. It’s a scene to convey the soul crushing depths the singer’s life has plumbed. The flirt with fame, perpetual gigs, third rate motels, hard drinking, regrets. Bridges telegraphs all this in that one brief moment, and he also makes you desperately curious about his character.
For Scott Cooper, director of Crazy Heart, the role of Bad Blake was always destined to be played by Bridges. “We knew from the beginning we wanted Jeff without question,” he recalls.
“He’s one of America’s finest actors. Every gesture he makes is earned; every thing he does is real. And I knew he was already a very talented musician.”
Acting was in his blood. He was born into a show business family, and made his first screen appearance at age six months, as a crying babe in the arms of Jane Greer in The Company She Keeps (1951).
Interestingly, Jeff Bridges would reunite on screen with the actress 30 years later in Against All Odds (1984). Jeff’s father, Lloyd Bridges, was the star of TV series Sea Hunt, and his son started making appearances on the adventure show by the time he was eight.
Recognition came early; Jeff Bridges was 20 when he played troubled football star Duane Jackson in Peter Bogdanovich’s acclaimed coming of age drama The Last Picture Show (1971).
Despite earning him an Oscar nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role, Bridges was still not convinced he wanted to pursue a career in Hollywood. There were other things, like music.
Since then he has committed himself to the craft of acting, in a diverse number of roles earning tremendous acclaim and becoming known as the ‘actor’s actor’. But music has been a constant passion in his life, with Bridges finally releasing an album in 2000, with no less than legends David Crosby and Michael McDonald on backing vocals.
Bridges has always immersed himself in his characters, however Crazy Heart offered a rare confluence of his two most loved pursuits.
“This was just a wonderful role,” he says. “Between the music, the acting and getting the chance to work with so many great players, it was one of the most intense, enjoyable experiences of my life.”
The script for Crazy Heart was only the beginning. To understand Blake is to also know the music that he sings, and that’s why the songwriting is crucial.
Veterans T-Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton were enlisted for this aspect of the film – among them the duo have worked with luminaries from Johnny Cash through to Elvis Costello.
Indeed, the late Stephen Bruton felt a deep affinity for Bad, having spent much of his life on tour buses rambling through roadhouses far from home.
“It’s an interesting life,” Bruton said before his death. “Nothing but the performance is real. You’re not responsible to anything you did yesterday and it’s great for a while but it can easily become a state of arrested development. At some point you have to walk through the looking glass.”
Often considered the most underrated great actor of his generation, Jeff Bridges may finally be getting the kudos he deserves following his Crazy Heart Oscar triumph for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role.
The toil he undertakes to find his character is legendary. In The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989), Bridges actually learned to play all the songs in the film. Though Dave Grusin recorded the soundtrack, Bridges painstakingly watched and memorised footage of Grusin’s hands playing the music.
For his remarkable performance in Fearless (1993), Bridges did drawings to express his feelings about being an air crash survivor, many of which were incorporated in the film by director Peter Weir.
For Crazy Heart, Bridges immersed himself in the musical side of his character first. Although he had been a serious musician for years, nailing Blake’s particular mannerisms was key to the role, as was nailing the style of a man who was once a legend but is now trapped in a life on the road.
Bridges was instantly drawn to the character. “Oh, there are so many wonderful elements to this one,” he remarks. “Music, for one, comes to mind. I’ve been playing music since I was a kid, so that was a big draw for me.
“I also loved the script and director Scott Cooper. We got along instantaneously and he’s very talented. He knows country music backwards and forwards and his enthusiasm is contagious.
“Then there’s Bad Blake, who is such a human guy. He’s like all of us, with lots of positive qualities and plenty more faults.”
To lose himself in that particular world, Bridges spent days and night working with T-Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton – playing and singing and soaking up atmosphere – until it was second nature to him. Only then did the character begin to instinctively emerge.
Throughout the process of writing the songs, a big inspiration for both Burnett and Bruton in turn was Bridges’ unwavering commitment to every nuance of the role.
“Jeff influences the writing of the songs in two ways – by who he was becoming and the way the person sounded.”
In the end, Bridges’ hard work as an actor is purely to honour his character. It’s a dedication that translates to effortless execution on the sound stage.
To depict Bad Blake’s descent into addiction and bad behaviour – and his struggle to get himself back – Bridges keeps it ordinary, like the inside of a tenpin bowling alley.
“I didn’t want to build up the pressure of it,” he says. “I wanted to always stay as relaxed as I could and just create that empty space where whatever is going to come out, has a chance to come out.”
Discover Crazy Heart at JB Hi-Fi » |
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