Sellers should have won the Oscar!!!!
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Picnic10 — 10 years ago(November 28, 2015 09:48 AM)
Peter Sellars made a brilliant spoof of Richard III reciting The Beatles A Hard Day's Night. Peter Cook could have probably played Chance but it would have been a character that he was playing- Cook would have still been in there inhabiting Chance more like a driver controls a vehicle. Sellers WAS Chance. It was Oscar-worthy to me with some fine supporting performances.
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ragingbull1965 — 10 years ago(November 28, 2015 10:46 AM)
Though I like Peter Cook, he was not the comedy genius that Sellers was. And you're absolutely right; Sellers
was
Chance. Had any other actor played this role, it would have just been an actor playing a part rather than embodying it like Sellers did. Even today, almost 40 years after the release of this film, if it were to be remade now, I honestly cannot think of any modern-day comic actor who could play the role with the same finesse as Sellers did. The closest person who might have been able to pull it off was the late Robin Williams but even then, not with the same flair as Peter Sellers. As you said, we'll never see the likes of him ever again. -
Picnic10 — 10 years ago(November 29, 2015 01:35 PM)
The exact traits of Chance - of innocence , opportunism and duty combined are in danger of extinction because a) how to be innocent in a world with so much information b) how to truly retain innocence even in being opportunistic when you have enough information to know the full implications and c) how to be dutiful in a sarcastic, cynical, individualistic world where socialism in any true form has been labelled archaic, in stages, by governments for 35 years or more? For someone to truly play Chance now, they'd probably be caricaturised as autistic. But autism is, I am sure, repressed emotional and/or intellectual genius or need. It is repressed because its expression could confuse, stifle, belittle or cause other merer mortals to think that too much is expected of them and could result in unwarranted ridicule. Even if he isn't what most would define 'street smart', I see Chance as a kind of genius - just like a mathematician sometimes deals with constants, he lives for constants, trying to move from one gilded station to another, not allowing the messy uncertainty that clouds others minds, that many others in a capitalist and pseudointellectual political world feed off. Prolonged uncertainty could destroy him so he is above politics. I think he genuinely is a natural philosopher who many would unfairly take to be a simpleton. Who could play this - Tom Hanks already did.
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ragingbull1965 — 10 years ago(November 29, 2015 01:52 PM)
Yes, Tom Hanks! Excellent choice. I should have thought of him also. But you are right that if this film were made today, it would have to be a period film going back at least before the Internet and before cable television. Yes, Hanks would be the perfect choice. But I don't see Chance as an opportunist - that word to me has negative connotations of someone looking to get ahead through conniving means. Chance was simply at the right place at the right time. He never understood what had happened to him. Yes, maybe he was autistic because he never once set out to hurt anyone. When the attorneys handling his patron's estate asked him if he had any claims against that estate, you get the impression that Chance didn't understand what the attorney meant because Chance responded by saying "I don't think so". Chance lived in a world of his own because he didn't understand the world around him.
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telboyD — 9 years ago(April 23, 2016 01:12 PM)
Nah Tom Hanks would have just been 'Tom Hanks' as always. I'm not saying he isn't a great actor - he is! - but he's a 'personality actor'. He knows it, and that's why he's possibly the greatest at his trade, along with the likes of Jimmy Stewart, Paul Newman or John Wayne. Sellars was entirely the opposite - a 'character actor', through and through. I'd go so far as to say that, along with Alec Guinness, he's the ultimate Character Actor's character actor. You have to remember Sellars is acting his socks off throughout; consistent accent, body language, total characterisation all that beep takes huge amounts of concentration, and Sellars was the master. Go back to The Goon Show and you see, he was doing it right from the beginning. It's about time he was afforded recognition as one of the true masters.
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ragingbull1965 — 9 years ago(April 23, 2016 01:20 PM)
But don't you think that the role of Forrest Gump also required tremendous concentration? The role of Gump comes the closest in similarity to the role of Chance. Each persona was essentially a man-child that basically just coasted through life without any real ambitions or plan. But no matter where life took them, they always seemed to land on their feet. Therefore, I will respectfully disagree with you and say that Hanks is the only other actor who could have played Chance if
Being There
was to be remade today. -
ragingbull1965 — 10 years ago(November 25, 2015 01:27 PM)
I never read any such comment but I don't think that was the reason, thought I could be wrong (certainly not the first or last time). Whatever the reason, he was robbed and no matter the reason, one is just as good as another and nothing can change the injustice that was done.
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ecjones1951 — 10 years ago(December 23, 2015 10:48 AM)
If you're keeping track, this is one of those in between times you were wrong. OK, OK, relax. The reason I did not post the source you required previously was that I could not remember which book it was in, so now, here you are.
Grossing Out's- future, however, had been put in doubt after Sellers saw Ashby's outtake ending, which he felt undermined the impact of
Being There.
In a rushed and emotional telex set to Ashby in March 1980, he said, "I must reiterate once again that the outtakes you have placed over the credits do a grave injustice to the picture for the sake of a few cheap laughs. It breaks the spell, do you understand? Do you understand, it breaks the spell!" "as I said in my previous telegram there's not much point in the film going to Europe as I saw it last night." Sellers believed that the outtakes had hurt his chances of winning the Best Actor Oscar, so in an attempt to repair their friendship, Ashby changed the European prints to have the regular ending Sellers favored.
*Grossing Out
was the movie Ashby and Sellers were planning to do next.
Nick Dawson.
Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel
Screen Classics, 2011
That's on page 226, btw. As the kids say, "hope this helps!"
- future, however, had been put in doubt after Sellers saw Ashby's outtake ending, which he felt undermined the impact of
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ragingbull1965 — 10 years ago(December 23, 2015 01:52 PM)
Thank you for posting. As someone who has never liked technicalities, I would sincerely hope that the final decision did not come down to something so trivial but I guess when something goes down to the wire, anything can be used as a tiebreaker. At any rate, if indeed this was the reason why Sellers did not win, then all I can say is that the judges did not take the outtakes in the spirit in which they were intended. Yes your post helped a lot. It's the one new thing I learned today (well, I learned something else new from another poster regarding another topic but you rank up there also).
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ragingbull1965 — 10 years ago(December 30, 2015 06:03 AM)
Exactly my point. Many actors could have played Hoffman's role but I honestly cannot think of any other actor of Sellers' generation that could have played Chance. Simply put, he was robbed and nothing can undo the injustice that was done to him.
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flirtatiousbarbie311 — 9 years ago(September 06, 2016 03:09 PM)
Peter Sellers in Being is the definition of greatness. It's moving, so unnerving, and so true. He should have won the Oscar. Plain and simple.
The only actor right now that can play Chance is Steve Carell. He even looks like Sellers.
http://www.complexmuse.com/notoriously-uncensored