Warren Beatty

Henry Warren Beaty (later he would add a “t” to his last name) was born on March 30, 1937 in Richmond (Virginia). The little brother of actress Shirley MacLaine was an excellent athlete from a very young age, and he won a scholarship to the University. However, he decided to drop out of college and follow in his illustrious sister’s footsteps, so he became a student of Stella Adler , a Broadway actress who was considered one of the best acting teachers in New York.

While he was taking classes, he worked in a wide variety of occupations –masonry or pianist in a bar–, until he was offered small jobs as an actor on television and in the theater, becoming a Tony nominee for “A Loss of Roses”.

In the cinema, Warren Beatty arrived, saw and won, as he made his big debut, led by the prestigious Elia Kazan , who was delighted with his photogenicity after giving him a camera test. He decided to give him the lead role in Splendor in the Grass , alongside Natalie Wood , where he played Bud, a young man in love whose father won’t let him get married because he wants him to go to Yale University.

It didn’t take long for her to be offered to star in more films, such as  The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone , alongside Vivien Leigh , Her Own Hell , with Eva Marie Saint , or Lilith , by Robert Rossen . Director Arthur Penn was enthusiastic about her talents and cast her in the lead role of The Haunted , a proper crime drama.

Although Beatty had a great intuition to get involved in quality tapes, the truth is that these were what the big studios considered “arts and essays”, and they did not make a lot of money (not even Splendor in the Grass ). He admired the great classic filmmakers, like Kazan, his discoverer, or Billy Wilder , but they were already beginning to be in the doldrums. And to the arrogant actor, the films they offered him seemed unworthy of his talent. Jack L. Warner asked her to star in the adaptation of “John F. Kennedy and Pt-109”, a successful book by John Tregaskis. JFK himself had declared that he wanted the director to be Fred Zinnemannand Beatty the protagonist. But the young man refused the offer, because he believed that the script was very bad. This is how he made it known to Jack Warner , who replied that he would not work in Hollywood again.

Warren Beatty had a bad experience when he left the What’s Up, Pussycat project in a huff. , because while writing the script, Woody Allen gave more importance to the character he was going to play than to Beatty’s, and also, the producer, Charles Feldman, shoehorned his girlfriend, Capucine, into the film.

After what’s up, Pussycat? –With Peter O’Toole in his place– became a huge box office success, Warren Beatty was very clear that he would from then on assume creative control of his films forever. He found the ideal project, Bonnie and Clyde , but since nobody was financing it, he decided to go visit… Jack Warner!

“I have Arthur Penn, I have a terrific script, I can do this movie for $1.6 million; It will always be a great gangster movie, ”they say he told Warner. He held a grudge against Beatty, but when he was about to send him “for a walk”, he realized that he was a real bargain. Beatty proposed to shoot the tape for a trifle, compared to the 15 million he had spent on Camelot . In the end he accepted, on the condition that Beatty send him the budget in writing and signed by him.

In this film, and again directed by Penn, Beatty nailed his best-remembered role, the lovesick gangster Clyde Barrow, with Faye Dunaway as his co-star. For this film, based on the true story of two famous bank robbers, Beatty was nominated for an Oscar for the first time, not only as an actor, but as a producer of the film, he also received the nomination for best film. Although the film was up for ten awards, it only took two: supporting actress ( Estelle Parsons ) and photography.

Although Bonnie and Clyde was his first great success, and had established him as an icon of the new Hollywood, Beatty continued to look closely at the scripts, and he did not act again until three years later, in The Only Game in Town , directed by George Stevens , one of the classic filmmakers he liked. He then agreed to star in Robert Altman ‘s western The Freeloaders and Alan J. Pakula ‘s excellent thriller The Last Witness in order to raise enough to launch a new project of his crop.

He invested all his earnings in Shampoo , a romantic drama with Julie Christie , where he was a successful hairdresser, who has women at his feet. The film, directed by Hal Ashby , was co-written and produced by Beatty.

Following the crime comedy Rascals and an Inheritance , with Jack Nicholson and Stockard Channing , Beatty made his directorial debut – with the help of Buck Henry – with the delightful heavenly comedy Heaven Can Wait , based on the same play that gave rise to The Late Protest and The Goddess of Dance , both by Alexander Hall . In addition to the fact that the film was very successful, Beatty managed to grab several of the film’s 9 Oscar nominations, since he himself was nominated for the adapted screenplay (with Elaine May), film, director (with the aforementioned Buck Henry), and actor. In the end, the film only won in the art direction category.

History repeated itself again with his second film as director, Reds , an epic chronicle of the adventures of a real character, the journalist John Reed , a witness to the Russian Revolution who, despite his idealism, ends up realizing the harsh reality of communism. This time Beatty grabbed 4 of the 12 Oscar nominations, and won one (director), of the three the film finally won, as it also triumphed in the photography ( Vittorio Storaro ) and supporting actress ( Maureen Stapleton ) categories.

Since then, Beatty has taken it more calmly if possible. In fact, his filmography is quite scarce, since it does not reach two dozen titles in five decades, nor a third of those made by Robert Redford , who started more or less at the same time. And the reception of his films has been irregular. Ishtar – which he produced and co-stars with Dustin Hoffman – was a box office flop, but also creatively. Dick Tracy –adapted from the adventures of a famous comic book hero– achieved good box office figures, and the brilliant Bugsy , directed by Barry Levinson , did not do badly either., where he played Bugsy Siegel, another real criminal like Clyde Barrow. But Bulworth and A Love Affair , a remake of You and I , went unnoticed, as well as Peter Chelsom ‘s Society , one of the great flops of Hollywood cinema of the early 21st century.

In the sentimental field, Beatty has the longest history of relationships ever known in Hollywood. He is credited with romances with many women, many of them quite famous, such as Natalie Wood, Joan Collins , Leslie Caron , Vivien Leigh, Barbra Streisand , and above all Julie Christie, with whom he seemed to be more serious. He also had a romance with Diane Keaton that was decisive when the actress left Woody Allen. When it seemed that Beatty was never going to settle down, actress Annette Bening appeared on the horizon . She not only managed to get her to go through the vicarage in 1992, but she has had 4 children with him, and they are still together. live to see