My Favorite Performances By An Actor in the 1960s

Back in January, I posted a list of my favorite performances by an actress in the 1960s, and a couple of weeks ago, Mary Field challenged me to come up with a similar list of actors. Ms. Field has posted her own list of the top ten greatest acting performances here. Nothing so ambitious for me — I can barely narrow down the top ten performances of any given year — but here is a short chronological list of my personal faves from between 1960 and 1969.

Jack Lemmon (The Apartment) — his finest non-drag performance, maybe his finest, period. And in one of my all-time favorite movies, too.

"Mrs. MacDougall, I think it is only fair to warn you that you are now alone with a notorious sexpot."

James Cagney (One, Two, Three) — not one of Billy Wilder's better-known comedies, but Cagney's performance is finger-snapping good and Katie-Bar-The-Door quotes him every time we go to a baseball game.

"You know what the first thing is I'm going to do? I'm going to lead the workers down there in revolt!

"Put your pants on, Spartacus!"

Tony Randall (Lover Come Back) — My favorite Tony Randall performance, here playing a millionaire CEO living in the shadow of his late father.

"You don't realize how completely he dominated me ever since I was a little boy. Just once I spoke back to him. He cut a switch from a tree and gave me such a whipping, in front of this girl. It was a shattering experience."

"Pete, all kids get whippings."

"But I was twenty five! The girl was my fiancée!"

Robert Preston (The Music Man) — True story: in law school, my pals and I learned all the words to "Marian the Librarian" and sang it to a girl. Named Marian. Who was an undergraduate librarian. Sometimes life just serves it up to you on a platter.

"Oh, my dear little librarian. You pile up enough tomorrows, and you'll find you are left with nothing but a lot of empty yesterdays."

Steve McQueen (The Great Escape) — technically, my favorite performance here is by Steve McQueen's motorcycle, but he's the one riding it, so ...

"Are all American officers so ill-mannered?"

"Yeah, about 99 percent."

The entire cast of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb — you know, a friend once confessed she watched this movie and didn't understand why it was supposed to be a comedy. We're not friends anymore.

"Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed. But I do say no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops. Uh, depending on the breaks."

The Beatles (A Hard Day's Night) — if you have to ask, I can't tell you.

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, yeah. The lads frequently sit around the telly and watch her for a giggle. One time, we actually sat down and wrote these letters saying how gear she was and all that rubbish."

"She's a trendsetter. It's her profession."

"She's a drag. A well known drag. We turn the sound down on her and say rude things."

Michael Dunn (TV's The Wild, Wild West) — maybe the greatest television villain ever. My favorite, anyway.

"I thought you were dead."

"Oh, no, Mr. West! I'm afraid I shall never die. Death is too ordinary. The humiliation would kill me."

Charlie Brown (TV special A Charlie Brown Christmas) — reaching deep for pathos, comedy and blistering insight into the emptiness of our consumer-driven culture, this round-headed kid really brought it.

"How about cats? If you're afraid of cats, you have ailurophasia."

"Well, sort of, but I'm not sure."

Paul Newman (Harper) — I like Paul Newman. I like his movies, I like his pizza, I like his salad dressing. I like everything there is to like about Paul Newman. Except Paul Newman. How do you account for that? I kid. But I do like Paul Newman.

"What do you do this kind of crummy work for, anyway?"

"What, are you trying to be funny? I do it because I believe in the United Nations and Southeast Asia, and — you think it's funny if your life depends on what goes through the Panama Canal? What about the English pound? I'll tell you something — as long as there's a Siberia, you'll find Lew Harper on the job."

"Are you putting me on?"

"Jeez, I don't think so. "

Lee Marvin (The Dirty Dozen) — Katie-Bar-The-Door once gave me this movie as a Valentine's Day present. No wonder I love her!

"I owe you an apology, colonel. I always thought that you were a cold, unimaginative, tight-lipped officer. But you're really quite emotional, aren't you?"

Zero Mostel (The Producers) — probably one of the three most quoted movies when my pals Muleboy and Bellotoot get together.

"Oh my God!"

"You mean 'oops,' don't you? Just say 'oops' and get out! "

Hal 9000 (2001: A Space Odyssey) — saw this in the theater as a kid in 1968, and I say, while a lot of computers turned in fine work in the 1960s, particularly the Robot on Lost in Space, the Hal 9000 topped them all.

"I'm afraid. I'm afraid, Dave. Dave, my mind is going. I can feel it. I can feel it. My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it. I'm a... fraid."

The Katie-Bar-The-Door Awards (1957)

If you're anything like me, you see the year "1957" on a post and you immediately think, "Oh, yeah, the year Auburn won a national title in football."

What? That's not what you think of? Hmm, strange ...

PICTURE (Drama)
winner: The Bridge On The River Kwai (prod. Sam Spiegel)
nominees: A Face In The Crowd (prod. Elia Kazan); Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (prod. John Huston); The Incredible Shrinking Man (prod. Albert Zugsmith); Paths Of Glory (prod. James B. Harris and Kirk Douglas); Sweet Smell Of Success (prod. James Hill); 12 Angry Men (prod. Henry Fonda and Reginald Rose); Witness For the Prosecution (prod. Arthur Hornblow, Jr.)

PICTURE (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Funny Face (prod. Roger Edens)
nominees: A King In New York (prod. Charles Chaplin); Love in the Afternoon (prod. Billy Wilder); Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? (prod. Frank Tashlin)

PICTURE (Foreign Language)
winner: Det sjunde inseglet (The Seventh Seal) (prod. Allan Ekelund)
nominees: Donzoko (The Lower Depths) (prod. Akira Kurosawa); Il Grido (prod. Franco Cancellieri); Kanal (prod. Zespól Filmowy "Kadr"); Kumonosu-jô (Throne of Blood) (prod. Akira Kurosawa and Sôjirô Motoki); Letyat zhuravli (The Cranes Are Flying) (prod. Mikhail Kalatozov); Le notti di Cabiria (Nights Of Cabiria) (prod. Dino De Laurentiis); Smultronstället (Wild Strawberries) (prod. Allan Ekelund)

ACTOR (Drama)
winner: Tony Curtis (Sweet Smell Of Success)
nominees: Lee J. Cobb (12 Angry Men); Kirk Douglas (Paths Of Glory); Henry Fonda (12 Angry Men); Andy Griffith (A Face In The Crowd); Alec Guinness (The Bridge On The River Kwai); William Holden (The Bridge on the River Kwai); Rock Hudson (The Tarnished Angels); Charles Laughton (Witness For The Prosecution); Toshiro Mifune (Kumonosu-jô a.k.a. Throne of Blood); Robert Mitchum (Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison and The Enemy Below); Sidney Poitier (Edge of the City); Victor Sjöström (Smultronstället a.k.a. Wild Strawberries); Max von Sydow (Det sjunde inseglet a.k.a. The Seventh Seal)

ACTOR (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Tony Randall (Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?)
nominees: Fred Astaire (Funny Face and Silk Stockings); Gary Cooper (Love In The Afternoon); Frank Sinatra (Pal Joey)

ACTRESS (Drama)
winner: Guilietta Masina (Le notti di Cabiria a.k.a. Nights Of Cabiria)
nominees: Marlene Dietrich (Witness For The Prosecution); Deborah Kerr (Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison); Patricia Neal (A Face In The Crowd); Tatyana Samojlova (Letyat zhuravli a.k.a. The Cranes Are Flying); Joanne Woodward (The Three Faces Of Eve)

ACTRESS (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Audrey Hepburn (Funny Face and Love in the Afternoon)
nominees: Doris Day (The Pajama Game); Rita Hayworth (Pal Joey); Jayne Mansfield (Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?)

DIRECTOR (Drama)
winner: Ingmar Bergman (Det sjunde inseglet a.k.a. The Seventh Seal and Smultronstället a.k.a. Wild Strawberries)
nominees: Federico Fellini (Le notti di Cabiria a.k.a. Nights Of Cabiria); Stanley Kubrick (Paths of Glory); Akira Kurosawa (Kumonosu-jô a.k.a. Throne of Blood and Donzoko a.k.a. The Lower Depths); David Lean (The Bridge On The River Kwai); Alexander Mackendrick (Sweet Smell Of Success); Billy Wilder (Witness For The Prosecution)

DIRECTOR (Comedy/Musical)
winner: Chuck Jones (What's Opera, Doc?)
nominees: Charles Chaplin (A King In New York); Stanley Donen (Funny Face); Frank Tashlin (Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?); Billy Wilder (Love in the Afternoon)

SUPPORTING ACTOR
winner: Burt Lancaster (Sweet Smell Of Success)
nominees: Red Buttons (Sayonara); Errol Flynn (The Sun Also Rises); Sessue Hayakawa (The Bridge On The River Kwai); Curt Jürgens (The Enemy Below); Walter Matthau (A Face In The Crowd); Adolphe Menjou (Paths of Glory); Tyrone Power (Witness For The Prosecution); Jack Warden (12 Angry Men)

SUPPORTING ACTRESS
winner: Kay Kendall (Les Girls)
nominees: Bibi Andersson (Det sjunde inseglet a.k.a. The Seventh Seal and Smultronstället a.k.a. Wild Strawberries); Joan Blondell (Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?); Mitzi Gaynor (Les Girls); Carolyn Jones (The Bachelor Party); Elsa Lanchester (Witness For The Prosecution); Kay Thompson (Funny Face); Ingrid Thulin (Smultronstället a.k.a. Wild Strawberries); Miyoshi Umeki (Sayonara)

SCREENPLAY
winner: Clifford Odets and Ernest Lehman, from the novella by Ernest Lehman (Sweet Smell Of Success)
nominees: Pierre Boulle (later accredited to Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson), from the novel by Pierre Boulle (The Bridge On The River Kwai); Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano and Tullio Pinelli (story and screenplay), Pier Paolo Pasolini (screenplay), from the novel by Maria Molinari (Le notti di Cabiria a.k.a. Nights Of Cabiria); Stanley Kubrick, Calder Willingham and Jim Thompson, from the novel by Humphrey Cobb (Paths Of Glory); Ingmar Bergman, from his play (Det sjunde inseglet a.k.a. The Seventh Seal); Ingmar Bergman (Smultronstället a.k.a. Wild Strawberries); Reginald Rose, from his teleplay (12 Angry Men); Billy Wilder and Harry Kurnitz (screenplay), Larry Marcus (adaptation), from the play by Agatha Christie (Witness For The Prosecution)

SPECIAL AWARDS
"Jailhouse Rock" (Jailhouse Rock) music and lyrics by Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller (Song); What's Opera Doc? (Cartoon Short); James Wong Howe (Sweet Smell Of Success) (Cinematography)