It was/is De Niro

Well, now the paperwork is more or less done and the work is well underway, I feel less antsy about publicly disucssing the book I'm working on. The commission is from Cahiers du Cinema, for an entry in its Anatomy of An Actor series. These are hardcover editions, beautifully designed and copiously illustrated, in which a particular screen performer's body of work as a whole is examined through the critical prism of ten specific roles/performances.  The French critic Florence Colombani has written the book on Marlon Brando, Karina Longworth has written one on Al Pacino, and I am doing one on Robert De Niro, for publication in the Spring of next year. The work on the book is pretty well underway and I am right now feeling as if it might not turn out so badly if I manage not to screw it up. I am grateful for all the good wishes I've gotten from readers and social media contacts already. I haven't read Colombani's text yet but I have read Longworth's, and I sincerely believe she did a great job, and that her insights will get you thinking about Pacino in a way you haven't up until now. If I can achieve something even slightly to that effect in my work, I'll be pleased. 

In the meantime, I have, ahem, a bleg. I really ought to have accosted Kurt Anderson at the screening of To The Wonder we both attended this evening, but I'm shy that way. So. I need to trakc down an article in Spy magazine, from the mid-eighties, which was about how the most celebrated actors in motion pictures weren't really movie stars from a box-office-grossing perspective. This was before Midnight Run and so of course De Niro was Exhibit A in the piece. I'm off to various libraries tomorrow for the second leg of my clippings research, and am hoping it will just turn up, but if anyone can give me a leg up with respect to this particular item, I'd be much obliged and you'd earn a mention on the acknowledgments page (oh, the glory). Please feel free to chime in such data as might be useful below, or send me an e-mail. Thanks!

UPDATE: Article located as of the morning of March 27.  Many thanks to all who gave tips. 

Comments

[Brian D.]

Can't wait! Very curious to see which films you choose, and hope NEW YORK, NEW YORK (one of my favorites of his) is among them. Congrats again!

[Peter Damm]

Google has every issue of spy in reader: http://books.google.com/books?id=24tXv1nFv40C&as_pt=MAGAZINES&output=html_text&source=gbs_all_issues_r&cad=1&atm_aiy=1980#all_issues_anchor

[Chris L.]

Couldn't be more psyched for the results of your labours! (As a secondary note, am also mildly intrigued by this apparent Longworth detente/olive branch. Not that we in the provinces knew the backstory, anyway. As sands through the hourglass, these are the critics of our lives.)

Malick's latest seems to have split its audiences evenly. Can't imagine that VOD will maximize its pictorial impact, but that's likely how I'll be seeing it. Better than no distribution at all, though. Looking forward to your review.

[Lex]

Very cool. Halfway hoping there's an epic appreciation of THE FAN.

Also this series should hire me to do one of these books but about Selena Gomez.

[Fernando]

Well, this is just great, Glenn. I very much look forward to the book.

[charles]

I think SPY magazine is up on Google Archives

[Petey]

I have to assume you know what you're doing, Glenn, but the decision to focus exclusively on Meet the Fockers and Little Fockers seems misguided to me.

I guess I'll just have to wait for the book.

[D Cairns]

Great job, congrats! And with Silver Linings Playbook showing DeNiro doing his best work in years, it seems a great time to be writing about him.

[jbryant]

This may be a minority opinion, but I think I'd include AWAKENINGS. But I've no doubt whatever Glenn chooses, the results will be aces.

[Jeff McMahon]

Congrats and good luck, Mr. Kenny.
I thought DeNiro in Silver Linings was a good example of the staleness his choices in roles in recent years has brought him to, but that might have just been my frustration with that movie's screenplay/direction.

[David Ehrenstein]

"The King of Comedy" is CENTRAL to DeNiro's art. More so than "Raging Bull," IMO.

[partisan]

I'd like to suggest ANGEL HEART, though I know you're not a fan.

[Petey]

"The King of Comedy" is CENTRAL to DeNiro's art. More so than "Raging Bull"

KOC is indeed a very interesting and entertaining performance, but it's still just a fluffy gloss on the epic Bickle that created the brand.

-----

Just saw the galley proofs, and I must say that the decision to concentrate entirely on Stardust seems an odd choice to me. "De Niro: The Pirate" is a catchy title, but Glenn's decision to totally ignore De Niro in the text and just recycle pirate jokes so old they've got whiskers seems a bit off-beat.

[That Fuzzy Bastard]

Oh neat! I'll be looking forward to analysis of his performance in HI MOM! Kidding, mostly. But seeing HI MOM!, with De Niro slathered in baby fat, did reinforce to me how important it is for movie stars to look 10 years younger than their age– unless you've gone through The Mouse Factory, it's tough to get the connections needed to land big roles until you're in your thirties, but all the big roles are for characters in their 20s. So being a 32-year-old man who can plausibly look 23, as De Niro was for TAXI DRIVER, is a vital career skill.

And I'll add that his JACKIE BROWN performance is way underrated. Any actor knows that the hardest thing to do well on screen or stage is shut up, listen, and stay present. De Niro's wordless reactions are central to a lot of the scenes in that movie (i.e. the scene where Ordell shows him what's in the trunk), and he absolutely kills it.

[Petey]

"And I'll add that his JACKIE BROWN performance is way underrated."

I'll disagree with this. Not because it's not an amazing performance, but because I think it is generally recognized as such.

"But seeing HI MOM!, with De Niro slathered in baby fat, did reinforce to me how important it is for movie stars to look 10 years younger than their age."

This is quite true. The fact that Johnny Depp and Leo DiCaprio are both rapidly approaching AARP membership, yet eternally look 19yo, is a large part of the secret of their success.

(And the fact that the 'Gerrit Graham JFK assassination explainer in bed' scene from that flick isn't up on YouTube is a massive failure of the entire internet.)

[atk]

congrats, I'm sure it will be fantastic.

[Blankemon]

Really looking forward to this one. Congrats.

[preston]

Great news, very happy for you and I know it will be great!

[Paul]

Excellent news. All I can add is that, should you choose to focus on or even mention We're No Angels, you need to know that de Niro's face-pulling, ticcing performance is a take on the director, Neil Jordan. (It's not as bad a movie as its lack of reputation might suggest).

[Graig]

Hey, great news! Can't wait to see it on the bookshelves. I recommend checking out John Curran's genuinely odd and troubling STONE from a few years ago for a top shelf third act De Niro performance.