Marlon Brando

Early Brando screen test

When Marlon Brando died in 2004, aged 80, I lost the final member of my revered trio of maverick heroes: Orson Welles (from whom I once sat six feet away in a recording studio but couldn't muster the nerve to meet), Frank Sinatra (whom I saw perform in concert), and Brando (with whom, a la “six degrees of separation, I came within one actor of meeting). Of the three, Brando was my favorite on screen. I first saw him in one of my generation's first "teen movies," THE WILD ONE. Later, when I saw him in VIVA ZAPATA, which I consider one of the finest films ever made, and ON THE WATERFRONT, I became Brando-branded for life. Then there was ONE-EYED JACKS, THE GODFATHER, THE FRESHMAN, and his last meaty cameo in THE SCORE. Those were some of his best films, and he made other great ones, but he made plenty of stinkers, too. Yet despite his poor film choices and roles far beneath his herculean talents, and even after his weight ballooned to epic proportions (like Welles’) and personal life (like Sinatra's) turned to tab fodder, Brando remained an acting hero to me.