Marlon Brando

"Acting is the expression of a neurotic impulse. It's a bum's life. Quitting acting, that's the sign of maturity"

The quote from Marlon Brando briefly enlightens us to the sort of man who he was. Self loathing, vain and in many senses, a maverick. Yet to the arts, Brando introduced the world to 'The Method' which gained him huge critical acclaim to the point where even today, 8 years after his death, is considered as one of the best actors ever.

Growing up with two alcoholic parents, Brando was a lonely child. Both of his siblings have gone onto acting or other arts related careers. They were all influenced by their mother who engages in amateur dramatics. His father was rarely at home and this fuelled Brando's poor childhood. His attitude towards school was indifferent and even when he moved to Shattuck Military Academy he was expelled for being uncontrolled and inattentive. He always knew he was good at acting over anything else he tried and this gave him the drive to go into acting.After being rejected from joining the army, his break came from the actor's studio in New York where he studied with Stella Adler, one of the member who co founded Group theatre alongside Lee Strasbourg, a student of Stanislavsky. 

His early career highlight is considered to be the role of Stanley Kowalski from ' A Street Car Named Desire'. As mentioned in my previous blog, Brando's performance in the stage adaptation of Tennessee Williams magnificent play defined a generation and marked a drastic change in acting techniques of the time. The idea of method acting brought naturalism to the front of acting and Brando was the man to do this. However, it was his stage performance that not only developed acting style but increased its audience. Brando became an icon to all. Although fame went to his head and he swirled down the path of misfortune, there are points in his career which showed promise such as his performance of Stanley.

Street Car was the catalyst to Brando's career. Although he was a part of many disappointing films, his performances in films such as 'The Godfather' and 'The Last Tango in Paris' depict his skills as an actor who adapts the method technique. He considered the smallest aspects of detail in line delivery such as utterances and mumbles and his eye contact to characters are met well with the demands of the character who he played. Although as a self loathing person, Brando disappeared into oblivion, his legacy as an actor is unbeatable. He is a legend in the world of drama and even so in 1950's Hollywood.

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2004/jul/02/world.news1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marlon_Brando
http://www.marlonbrando.com/
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000008/bio
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http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/m/marlon_brando.html

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