Sutherland died yesterday. He’s on my list of “greats.” I’ve been thinking of what was great about him, and I’m going to pick one performance, his role as Calvin Jarrett in Ordinary People.
One of the aspects of Sutherland’s greatness is that he turned in great performances in so many genres by taking up just the right amount of space. Ordinary People had so many good performances: Timothy Hutton, as Conrad Jarrett, the boy who lived when his brother drowned, and then attempted suicide. Mary Tyler Moore, playing against type as Beth Jarrett, the mother who wants to appear to be perfect yet has her world shattered. Sutherland’s reserved performance was, in my opinion, the best of the bunch. He had a tough part to play, an apparently superficial, successful Lake Forest attorney who spouts platitudes in an attempt to keep his family together.
He never intruded on his co-stars performances. But there are two pivotal scenes where the mask comes off the superficial glad-hander Calvin: one is when he has a talk with Conrad about how he’s the stronger kid in the family, and the other, painful, awful scene where he tells Beth that their marriage is over. Each is played with emotion that’s just so much and nothing more, consistent with the self-censorship and oppression of their WASP environment. He inhabited the character — the ability to be Hawkeye Pierce in M*A*S*H, the stoner professor in Animal House, and Calvin Jarrett, showed his versatility and talent.
Contrast Sutherland’s performance with Judd Hirsch chewing up the scenery as Conrad’s therapist. Sutherland could have been supercilious, maudlin or cardboard in his role. He was none of those things, and that’s greatness.
Maxim
Seeing lots of plaudits for Ordinary People. I haven’t seen it since it was released, though I do remember it being devastatingly good at the time.
rikyrah
He was so talented. Never had a bad role. In a crappy movie, he was always the best thing.
RIP🙏🏽😢
lollipopguild
I think the first place i saw Sutherland was “Kelly’s Hero’s” and he was LOL funny.
Suzanne
So, I wonder if I am alone in thinking that he was exceedingly good-looking? I have always thought so.
I thought he was the perfect President Snow in the Hunger Games movies.
Miki
@Maxim: He gave us so many great films/shows. One of my favorites is Don’t Look Now.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Maxim:
Yeah, that’s us. My wife went to see it in the theater 3-4 times back in the day but we’ve never revisited it since
It’s on our list to rewatch sometime in the next week. We’ve also never seen ‘Klute’, now’s the time for that as well.
And from a comment yesterday, watch the “Trust” miniseries where he plays J. Paul Getty. 10 episodes.
HumboldtBlue
M*A*S*H the movie doesn’t really hold up these days. It’s a viciously sexist and misogynistic movie.
The series remains brilliant.
@lollipopguild:
I associate him with that movie as well. He was brilliantly funny.
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
Two of my favorite parts he played were the stoner tank driver (I forget the character’s name) in Kelly’s Heroes, and the Needle, in the Eye of the Needle.
$8 blue check mistermix
@Maxim: For me, a great film is one I remember long after seeing it. The last time I saw Ordinary People was at least 30 years ago and what I wrote about Sutherland’s performance is from memory
One of my other memories is the production design: it’s a cold people living in a cold world.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
Oddball.
Kelly’s Heroes is a) a great comedy, and b) a great film about leadership.
Eastwood’s said over the years it was a far better film before the studio execs made Hutton the director cut 20 minutes from it. That may be so but the released film is great and Eastwood is a putz.
zhena gogolia
@Maxim: I haven’t seen it since it came out, either. It’s on my watchlist, but I do remember it’s very sad and painful, and real life has enough of that these days, so I somehow never get to it.
zhena gogolia
@HumboldtBlue:
I agree. I thought it was hilarious when it first appeared, but I tried to watch it again a few years ago and was sickened by it.
Yutsano
Donald Sutherland birthed a great actor in his son. But Sutherland also had his second marriage to Shirley Douglas. Shirley was the daughter of a man named Tommy Douglas, who is the father of single payer health care in Canada.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
For political nerds, he did a great job as Clark Clifford in “Path to War” (video)
Melancholy Jaques
Three maybe lesser known performances that I enjoyed: Day of the Locust, Backdraft, Pride and Prejudice.
kalakal
He had me convulsed with laughter as Oddball in Kelly’s Heroes.
I think I first saw him in Klute and I’ll never forget Don’t Look Now – though sometimes I wish I could- that film is scary
Sure Lurkalot
@Miki:
Me too, love that movie. Also, Six Degrees of Separation. Both movies have great costars, Julie Christie and Stockard Channing.
HumboldtBlue
@Sure Lurkalot:
I was blown away by that movie, it completely caught me off guard. Will Smith was immense.
Ten Bears
I remember Ordinary People as a young product of a broken home
A cold home in a cold world … homeless was better
Miki
@Sure Lurkalot: That’s the thing about Donald Sutherland for me – mention the movie and I remember it intensely, even if I didn’t especially like the movie (not a fan of Ordinary People – painful beyond the breaking point).
HumboldtBlue
@zhena gogolia:
I did the same thing.
Betty Cracker
I’m so glad you posted this, MM; Sutherland was a great actor and an important figure in American culture, which sucked more in the past than it does now, hence the cringey period pieces, which needn’t sully Sutherland if we’re fair and realistic, IMO. Your analysis is spot on. Thanks!
geg6
That film, Ordinary People, is just devastating to watch. I know people who were children of divorce or who had family tragedies who get PTSD from watching it. It’s quiet and restrained and the three principal actors are just so damn good. And I agree that Sutherland’s part was the best among them. It’s a crime he wasn’t nominated for an Oscar. All three, Hutton, Moore and Sutherland, are magnificent.
I love Sutherland in many roles (Animal House, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Hunger Games and Klute stand out, too). But this was Sutherland really putting his soul into his art. Just amazing.
Cheryl from Maryland
@Suzanne: No, you are not alone. Incredibly attractive and sexy — to use a 70s phrase, he had it going on. The first film I ever saw of his was when I had just turned 13 – it was Klute.
geg6
@Suzanne:
You are not alone. Especially in Body Snatchers. Damn he was hot in that. And yes, the perfect Snow.
Leto
@Suzanne: same, regarding Snow. At first I was kinda skeptical but that quickly went away. He was just so low-key sinister, definitely one who’d slip poison in both of your drinks to eliminate you.
Hilbertsubspace
One must mention “Start the Revolution Without Me” amongst his works. It is certainly unique. Sutherland will be missed.
Delk
Klute.
What’s your bag, Klute? What do you like? Are you a talker? A button freak? Maybe you like to get your chest walked around with high heeled shoes. Or make ’em watch you tinkle. Or maybe you get off wearing women’s clothes. Goddamned hypocrite squares!
WaterGirl
I agree with you, mistermix, about Ordinary People. Such a powerful movie and great acting. I had a very complicated relationship with my mom, and this was an important movie for me. I can still play may of the scenes in my head.
twbrandt
He played the psycho arsonist in Backdraft, a forgettable movie made memorable by his performance.
piratedan
@HumboldtBlue: well, it was 1950s Korea, set in the Army and in the Medical Corps, so while it fails our modern mores, it is likely representative of its time.
Like most really good actors, there was a chameleon quality to him that you could find him believable as the homosexual Private Pinckley in The Dirty Dozen to the professor in Animal House who smoked dope and didn’t mind sleeping with his students. He could do the lead or whatever character role the piece required. Not many can wear their masks so well.
mr perfect
Kate Bush – Cloudbusting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtaTO9NTX34
Mike in NC
He had a small role as a Hospital Corpsman in “The Bedford Incident” (1965) which was set onboard a type of guided missile destroyer which I was assigned to in the early 1980s.
Bex
Also a shout-out to director Robert Redford re Ordinary People. As I remember he got an Oscar for that.
TBone
Sutherland and Brando in one film. Both give stellar performances.
Interview with Donald Sutherland:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=c4pS5mUQyxI
Geoduck
@zhena gogolia: And evidently the original M*A*S*H novel was even worse.
I’ll always admire Mr. Sutherland for being willing to do a 10 second cameo in The Kentucky Fried Movie where his character trips and face-plants in a cake.
NotMax
Couldn’t disagree more about Hirsch “chewing up the scenery.”
His character was meant to be brash, serving as a counterpoint to the closely ordered, indeed sterile, Jarrett household, forcibly puncturing that facade by intruding the messiness, both good and bad, of the real world into the picture.
Ruckus
@HumboldtBlue:
MASH the movie does play well to it’s time frame of the Korean War time, the early 50s.
I was in the USN 20 yrs later in the early 70s and while it wasn’t quite the same concepts of humanity that 20 yrs on, it wasn’t a hell of a lot different. IOW changing for the better but still had quite a bit of road to cover. And while much has changed over the last 50 yrs, and for the better, I’m still wondering if it made it all the way to current day. Of course even normal non military life hasn’t quite made it all the way.
zhena gogolia
@Hilbertsubspace: “But was he a blind man?”
zhena gogolia
@NotMax: As I recall, Hirsch was good.
HumboldtBlue
A Sutherland role that always flies under the radar is his role as the German sleeper agent in Eye of the Needle.
laura
What a wonderful actor. I really liked Invasion of the Body Snatchers. I’m going to add A Dry, White Season, Klute and Steelyard Blues to the mist watch now stack.
WaterGirl
@HumboldtBlue: Eye of the Needle was an excellent film!
HumboldtBlue
WaterGirl
I love his character in Crossing Lines, which is the most recent thing I have seen him in.
prostratedragon
@HumboldtBlue: It’s a viciously sexist and misogynistic movie. That was clear in 1970 to me and a couple of friends seeing it in the theater, notwithstanding some laughs. I was a bit younger, and my thought was, “Huh, so this is the world.” Don’t remember for sure, but it was probably Klute that made me a fan.
@zhena gogolia:
prostratedragon
@prostratedragon:
[AAAARRRRGH!!]
To zhena gogolia: Ordinary People is indeed sad, but a great movie on a family; never sell Redford short as a director.. Sutherland leaves ample room for his fellow players, but without disappearing himself. Many didn’t like the Best Picture it won over Raging Bull, but I think it defensible, no worse than, say, drafting Olajuwon over Jordan, if even that.
zhena gogolia
@prostratedragon: I do remember that it’s much better than Raging Bull.
jowriter
@Melancholy Jaques: The Day of the Locust has barely been mentioned in the many posts here and elsewhere about Sutherland. That was a dark, dark movie from nearly fifty years ago and I can still remember his performance.
Spanish Moss
Thanks for this post. Ordinary People was such an excellent, devastating movie, and he was amazing in it.
prostratedragon
@HumboldtBlue: I sometimes describe looks like his as “not pretty;”a person can be good-looking or handsome without being very pretty.
Would need more sharp lines for “craggy.”
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
No love so far for his stellar performance in Beerfest? Sutherland was great. Gotta quibble with throwing Jud Hirsch under the bus a bit (also great) but Sutherland was a fantastic actor.
TBone
@laura: you might enjoy the interview I posted at #35. It covers much more than the 1989 film, and shows what a great man he was in addition to being a great actor.
Chief Oshkosh
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Funny that you should say that. I’ve actually used that movie as an example of different leadership styles.
Librarian
@zhena gogolia: The Summer Palace, 1789: King Louis, whose tinkering with time pieces did not tell him that his own time was running out; Queen Marie, who tinkered with everything but time pieces – she didn’t care what time it was; but the Duke d’Escargot knew what time it was – his tinkering was well-timed. For the time was 1789!
Librarian
I saw Day of the Locust in high school, in a class where we were reading the novel. What an incredible film, I have never forgotten it.
zhena gogolia
@Librarian: Billie Whitelaw!
Carlo Graziani
Sutherland read an audiobook version of The Old Man And The Sea, by Hemingway. It’s so perfect as to defy description.
I got it on Audible, but it might be available elsewhere, for all I know.
Mike in NC
@Carlo Graziani: Worth looking into. We visited Key West a few years ago and loved the Hemingway Home, where they had the first swimming pool built in the city. Hemingway was also awarded an honorary Bronze Star by General Patton for the assistance he rendered concerning the liberation of Paris.
Betty
@HumboldtBlue: That’s the one I always think of. Just chilling.
currawong
I read a wonderful, heartwarming thread on Twitter yesterday about Donald Sutherland which made me smile about one small incident in his life. If you’re still on the hellsite, well worth a read. Here’s a link to the threadreader of it.
Sister Inspired Revolver of Freedom
No one has mentioned Citizen X so I will. Set in the USSR , where serial killers just don’t exist, loosely , & I mean loosely, based on the real life “exploits” of the so-called Red Ripper, it’s one of the first docu dramas I have ever seen, & probably cemented my love of the True Crime genre. Too bad for me. But, anyway, in the movie, Sutherland plays a Soviet army colonel who is very much a political creature, a kind of semi villain. In what was a fairly flamboyant role, Sutherland was excellent, effortless. Even his Russian accent was great. Too many of these roles so often devolve into caricature. Sutherland played it straight, never taking any liberties. That it was his performance I remember most, in a movie that also had Stephen Rea in the lead, & Max Von Syndow as supporting, tells you how really, really good he was.
Also, too, I thought he was haut! Yes, really! Those piercing blue eyes, that chin & those cheekbones!😁 He could actually rock a beard in a way that I liked. ( I usually hate beards!) He was terrific & he will be missed.😔
Uncle Jeffy
Liked the Ordinary People book a bit better than the movie but the film was great, and Sutherland was outstanding. Wish that Redford would have ended it with the final scene between Conrad and Berger and then the scene where Conrad comes back to Lake Forest to see his friend.
Klute was amazing – my favorite Sutherland film.
Wvng
Regarding his looks, I’m Facebook friends with the actress/author who played Mrs. Herriot in the original All Creatures Great and Small BBC series. She posted that she once almost had a role with Sutherland and she found him devastatingly good looking, sexy, funny. The entire thread was filled with people reminiscing about meeting him in real life; funny, kind, quirky, generous, handsome.
Miss Bianca
@Maxim: late to the thread, but my most lasting memory of Ordinary People was that I went to see it on Election Day in 1980, when I came home to discover that Ronald Reagan had been elected President (I was 17 at the time, too young to vote, but not too young to feel devastated, on top of the depression that that movie had engendered in me.)
Maybe it’s time to give it another try. Or maybe I’ll just take in Don’t Look Now one more time if I want more Donald Sutherland greatness.
Dark Patriot
@WaterGirl: i really enjoyed that show. Glad someone else saw it.