Method and Madness

Reviewed by JEREMY McCARTER in the New York Times.
Published: January 2, 2009

On the night “A Streetcar Named Desire” opened on Broadway, Tennessee Williams sent his young leading man a rapturous telegram: “From the greasy Polack you will someday arrive at the gloomy Dane for you have something that makes the theater a world of great possibilities.” Looking back now, you might describe that as, word for word, the most poignant couple of lines Williams ever wrote.

For one thing, “greasy Polack” reflects a pinched view of what Marlon Brando achieved. Stanley Ko­walski is a brute, a vulgarian and a rapist, but Brando also gave him a canny intelligence and enough charm that the play’s audiences joined him in laughing at Williams’s heroine, Blanche DuBois, every night. Brando’s looks also helped: thanks to the poetic face he carried atop his muscled body, his loutish Stanley could have passed for a slumming demigod.
SOMEBODY
The Reckless Life and Remarkable Career of Marlon Brando
By Stefan Kanfer
Illustrated. 350 pp. Alfred A. Knopf. $26.95

Related
First Chapter: ‘Somebody: The Reckless Life and Remarkable Career of Marlon Brando’ (January 4, 2009)
'Somebody,' by Stefan Kanfer: The Lion of the Screen, and What Made Him Roar (December 9, 2008)
Times Topics: Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando's Filmography