Craggy Male Stars
I’m so determined to see all the Oscar movies before next Sunday that I subjected myself and my darling husband to The Reader on Valentine’s Day! Cuckoo sex-crazed former concentration camp guard fixates on teenage boy — perfect fare before a delicious but overpriced dinner at the American Hotel in Sag Harbor (where Renee Zellweger and dreamy Dan Abrams, legal guru of NBC, had their first date a couple of weeks ago! But I digress…).
My point in mentioning The Reader is not to muse on Kate Winslet’s Oscar chances (which now seem not-so-certain since she got nominated for this movie and not the other one). It’s to note my preference for craggy male stars such as darling weirdo Ralph Fiennes, who plays the messed-up adult version of the teen boy who slept with cuckoo Holocaust villain Kate. Ralph! (Say it with me: Rafe Fines.) I do love him. And I get to meet another craggy dreamboat this week, at a press event for the Broadway play Impressionism — Jeremy Irons! Loved him since Brideshead Revisited.
Craggy men tend to be foreign, because American stars feel they have to be jocks with perfect hair and teeth to be sexy (wrong). But there’s always my dear Clint. And Sam Shepard! James Taylor, circa 1980. And Chris Cooper. In the junior division, keep an eye on promising cragster Hugh Dancy (even though he’s short; the best craggy men are tall). The guy from Twilight has potential too.
What is the appeal of the craggy man? He’s mysterious yet approachable, intelligent but not a blowhard. I am making this up, and it seems ridiculous even as I type it. But for whatever reason, the Lincoln-esque stars are closest to my heart.
February 20th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
So what would Colin Firth be? And then there’s Clive Owen, but I guess he falls into more of the “American actor jock camp?” Or, are they not even on your “list”?