Remembering a star

ShareThis

Every year, when the Academy Awards ceremony pauses for a solemn remembrance of lives lost in the previous year, some names and photos spontaneously produce applause while others pass in silence.No single life is worth more than another, but if ever anyone deserved an audible affirmation during the Oscar telecast in February, it would be Paul Newman.It's fashionable today for stars to align themselves with charitable causes, sometimes as a publicity ploy, sometimes as a genuine measure of support, but Newman believed in sharing his good fortune.He famously refused to sign autographs -- Rolling Stone magazine once quoted him as saying, "I'm waging a one-man war against autographs" -- but he put his name on Newman's Own. It was a lark that turned into a serious food company that has generated $250 million for charities around the world and financed Hole in the Wall Camps for ailing children.I have a jar of Newman's Own marinara sauce in my refrigerator. I buy it because it's good and, more importantly, it does good.I have a DVD of "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," in case I need to watch Newman and Robert Redford (one of the most brilliant pairings of actors to ever come our way) prepare to leap off that cliff where "the fall will probably kill you," and I have a black-and-white photo of Newman taken during the shooting of "Slap Shot."In street clothes, not his Charlestown Chiefs hockey outfit, he has a can -- beer, I think -- in one hand, a cigarette in the other and he's looking directly at the camera. The picture's edges are curling and the shades of gray not as sharp as in 1976, but there was no failure to communicate ... with the camera.You don't see his famous blue eyes or the good looks that biographer Elena Oumano called reminiscent of Michelangelo's David in the animated movie "Cars," in which he spoke for Doc, a 1951 Hudson Hornet. But it didn't matter because his talent always trumped his famous profile, just as it transcended time, generations and the progression from sexy heartthrob to box-office draw and solid leading man to supporting player.His first Academy Award nomination was for playing the tormented Brick Pollitt opposite Elizabeth Taylor in 1958's "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" and his last was for 2002's "Road to Perdition," in which his eyes were icy cold as a Depression-era Chicago gangster boss.In the DVD commentary on "Perdition," director Sam Mendes said Newman confessed he was nervous his first day on the set. So was everyone else in his presence.How could they not be? By that point, Newman's film career had spanned a half-century, he had won an Honorary Oscar, a Best Actor award for "The Color of Money" (and had been nominated for a half-dozen other iconic performances) and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.When he received the Hersholt in March 1994, he quipped, "The salad dressing is out-grossing my films, which is a humiliation I can hardly bear." On a more serious note, though, he said, "You know, I think we're reminded too frequently about the things that don't work in this country and not frequently enough about the things that do."Newman will be remembered at the 81st Academy Awards because he was a superb actor, producer and director. But he was also a good-looking kid from Shaker Heights, Ohio, who smartly refused to be treated as a hunk and valued his privacy and who wasn't afraid to campaign for the presidential candidate of his choice, to take on the media or giant oil companies or lobby for anti-drug programs and disarmament.His daughters said that, to the end, "Dad was incredibly grateful for his good fortune. In his own words, 'It's been a privilege to be here.' "For those of us who stop while channel-surfing when we see his face and who remember distinctly sitting in a theater watching "The Sting" or where he confronted Sally Field in "Absence of Malice," I think the privilege has been ours, too.(Pittsburgh Post-Gazette movie editor Barbara Vancheri can be reached at bvancheri(at)post-gazette.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)