From The Guardian: Dwayne Johnson is the Marlon Brando of our age. In 1947, a young Marlon Brando very nearly missed out on the starring role in A Streetcar Named Desire because director Elia Kazan wanted an older, less attractive star for the part. Today, that prejudice remains in an entertainment industry reluctant to acknowledge the acting chops of such similarly studly thesps as Channing Tatum, Ryan Reynolds and – above all – Dwayne Johnson. Ever since he cast off his petrological wrestling persona with a revelatory turn in Richard Kelly’s bizarre, oft-misunderstood Southland Tales, Johnson has taken on a succession of challenging roles and challenged them right back. In Tooth Fairy, he created (where Vin Diesel failed in The Pacfier) the first sympathetic bodybuilding babysitter in Hollywood. In The Other Guys, his 5-minute cameo as a farcically reckless NYPD detective proved funnier than Will Ferrell’s entire two-hour grandstand. And last year, in Michael Bay’s Pain & Gain, a criminally underrated satire of capitalism, he delivered a complex, emotional character study that also saw him grill a man’s hands on an outdoor barbecue. Charlie Lyne
Posted on: Mon, 23 Jun 2014 09:58:17 +0000
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