Faye on Facebook !

I have just left a message on Faye Dunaway's wall on Facebook! - a friend of mine on there (thats you, Martin Bradley) had become a fan, so I clicked on her page.*

Faye of course has been one of my icons, she is a movie star in the grand tradition - since the late 60s (when I had a still of her goddessy looks then from De Sica's A PLACE FOR LOVERS on my wall) - we loved her as Bonnie and her Vicki Anderson in THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR (the film may be flashy 60s now, but its still a great performance) and she goes the distance in Kazan's THE ARRANGEMENT. I also liked her French thriller for Rene Clement, but it was thrown away here as a the lower part of a double feature (THE HOUSE UNDER THE TREES). Her Milady in Lester's MUSTETEERS films is very ripe and she looks sensational, particularly with that other blonde Michael York. CHINATOWN is as much her's as it is Nicholson's, her Evelyn Mulwray should have won her an academy award. Her Joan Crawford is also amazing, if only the film had been worthy of her. I saw her on stage in London in the '86 run of CIRCE AND BRAVO. Her biography "Looking for Gatsby" is also a great read, and O'Neill's post-oscar photo of her is a classic.

All careers that endure for decades have peaks and troughs and Faye's is no exception. It would be nice if there was another great part for her (like Julie Christie got with AWAY FROM HER - which should have got Julie her 2nd oscar 40+ years after her first; Julie and Faye though embody the '60s and '70s).

It was good seeing Faye getting on famously with Jonathan Ross on his TV show [its on YouTube] here in the UK last year, [unlike the interviewer who needled her about Polanski], Ross is another admirer of hers, but as usual before she could steer the conversation around to the film she was promoting then [whatever happened to that?] she had to go through, once again, how great it was to work with Newman, Redford, McQueen, Nicholson, Brando etc. Most 'civilians' don't have to recall what they were doing or who they were working with 40 years ago or be constantly reminded of their brilliant younger selves (or indeed have their rants on the telephone broadcast worldwide, as per that YouTube clip). Its tough being a working actress in your '60s these days...

[I remember watching Olivia De Havilland at London's National Film Theatre in 1972 watching herself and Erroll Flynn riding in the forest in their 1938 ROBIN HOOD while waiting to go on, and saying how difficult it was to appear before us after that scene, 34 years later. Of course now more than 34 more years have passed and Olivia is still with us in her '90s!]

I now have an early Faye to watch: Otto's long-unseen HURRY SUNDOWN. Faye will be marvellous as usual.

I don't suppose Julie is also on Facebook ....

* presumably if famous people are on Facebook its probably done by their PR people as a publicity marketing tool to keep their names out there - I don't imagine Faye sits at home in the evening reading people's messages ...