I should have posted this a month ago…but, better late than never, right? A tribute to Richard Widmark, one of my favorite film noir actors. This originally appeared in The Wire on April 2.
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Pushing an elderly, wheelchair-bound woman down a flight of stairs is an unlikely way to become a star, but Richard Widmark was never a typical actor. Widmark shot to stardom in 1947’s “Kiss of Death,” in which he played Tommy Udo, a sadistic, giggling killer who plots revenge on the former partner who sent him to jail. In the film’s most memorable scene, Udo drags an old, wheelchair-bound woman out of her apartment and pushes her down a flight of stairs, gleefully laughing the whole time.
Widmark’s boyish good looks helped make him famous, but it was his distinctive voice and unmistakable laugh—alternating between an insane squeal and a desperate chuckle, depending on the role—that cemented him as one of the greatest noir actors of all time. Widmark won a Golden Globe in 1948 for his role in “Kiss of Death,” and he was soon typecast as the heavy in a number of films, including 1948’s “The Street with No Name.” A run-of-the-mill caper film packaged as a semi-documentary about the FBI’s clashes with criminal gangs, “Street” stands out mostly thanks to Widmark’s menacing and charming turn as Alec Stiles, a ruthless gang boss who is just a shade less crazy than Tommy Udo.
No question about it, Widmark was a tough guy’s tough guy. Along with his memorable noir roles, he starred in a number of Westerns, including “The Alamo” with John Wayne and “Warlock” with Henry Fonda. But off screen, Widmark hated violence and abhorred guns. In a 1976 interview with the Associated Press, he said, “I am an ardent supporter of gun control. It seems incredible to me that we are the only civilized nation that does not put some effective control on guns.”
That’s probably why Widmark was arguably at his best not as a macho hero or a menacing heavy, but as an underdog. In Jules Dassin’s seminal noir “Night and the City,” Widmark starred as Harry Fabian, a down-and-out hustler in post-war London whose attempts at landing a big score always evaporate like the wisps of fog that fill the city. Harry is a terrible con-man but generally a nice guy, and it’s here that Widmark’s real-life geniality and kindness shine through. His kindness makes it that much more agonizing to watch as Harry, wide-eyed, perspiring and half-hysterical, runs like a rat through the city’s bombed out buildings in the film’s delirious, downbeat climax.
Not all of Widmark’s characters met such unfortunate ends. In 1953, Widmark took on the role of hapless pickpocket Skip McCoy in Samuel Fuller’s “Pickup on South Street.” After unwittingly lifting from a woman’s purse a piece of microfilm containing information about secret Communist agents, McCoy finds himself on the run from not only the cops, but a gang of villains even worse than the criminal types he’s used to dealing with. Like Harry Fabian, McCoy is a likeable wise-ass, better at trading barbs than he is at throwing punches, and he makes it out of the movie not only alive but a little happier, thanks to his sharp wit.
Widmark even worked in some swashbuckling action as a Viking prince in 1964’s “The Long Ships,” in which he faced off against Sidney Poitier while searching for a gigantic golden bell. As Rolfe, Widmark once again laughs and cons his way through a movie. Strapped to the top of “The Mare of Steel”—a two-story scimitar down which doomed prisoners are forced to slide—Rolfe wheedles with the Moorish king Aly Mansuh (Poitier), convincing him that only a team of Vikings can successfully find and capture the bell. It’s a classic Widmark underdog moment.
The tail end of Widmark’s career was just as atypical as the beginning. Widmark starred in a handful of films, including “Coma” and “Murder on the Orient Express” throughout the 1970s and ’80s, but the projects grew less and less frequent (by his own choice), and he retired from acting in the early 1990s. Widmark steadfastly remained out of the public’s eye until his death on March 26—a quiet, thoughtful tough guy, right up to the very end.
