I recently watched Oliver Reed in an old Hammer Horror picture called Paranoic, except that it’s not a horror film but a psychological thriller in the Hitchcockian mould, about an upper-middle class family of brother, sister, auntie, who get a spanner thrown in their works when Oliver Reed’s brother (played by Alexander Davion) , who had apparently died 8 years previously, suddenly turns up on the doorstep of their mansion, apparently alive and well. Reed, playing Simon Ashby, a drunken, womanising, boorish, playboy, and a psychotic to boot, is none too pleased at the reappearance of his long lost brother, as it complicates his efforts to get his hands on the family money.

The first thing I noticed about Reed in this film was his youth, Paranoic was made when Reed was 25, and he’s slim, physically agile, and high-cheek boned. My image of Reed (and presumably that of many people of my generation) was of the bloated and beared figure he became in the latter decades of his life, and he didn’t seem committed to his performances – there is little more alienating for a viewer, than watching an actor who doesn’t care about his work – and as such I have always found Reed difficult to love, and never took him too seriously as an actor. Furthermore, I confess I was never quite sure how or why he became a star, and thought that perhaps his name had been made more by his hell-raising reputation than his acting chops.

However, I have had to completely re-think all this after seeing Reed in Paranoic. Here he seems to be enjoying his work, he is alive, his performance is vivid, it’s detailed and precise and he delivers some wonderful lines like; “you’re more stupid than I gave you credit for”, with a bone dry effortlessness, not caring about the effect the words may have on the person they are directed towards, a remark so casual it cant be bothered to summon any proper intent, it’s almost as though he is simply thinking out loud, not quite an insult nor a private joke. Infact, Reed’s entire performance is laced with a laid back irony, as when he refers to the family nurse as; “little miss Florence Nightingale”. And these ironic actions are repeated throughout the film by Reed on behalf of his character in the script, Simon Ashby, and what we witness is a truthful expression of Reed’s lack of concern for the people around him in the film, which is very different to an actor’s lack of concern for the work at hand. Reed also displays genuine power in the film, as when he learns that his attempt to murder his brother by fixing the brakes on his car has failed, he releases an expression which reveals such terror that it is one of the most provocative moments of screen acting I have seen. There is another scene where Reed is getting drunk in some bar, surrounded by tarts and cronies, he suddenly snaps into a rage, grabbing the darts from the dartboard and threatening to kill one of his cohorts with them. Reed is genuinely terrifying here, I cannot imagine what it must have been like for the other actors in the scene, and his face wears an expression of such ugly intensity that he can only have dredged it up from the pit of his soul. This is the Real Mcoy from Reed. Then there is more subtle work from him, as when he slouches on the sofa with a glass of brandy, and decides to stir it up a bit with his auntie, his relaxed physical state and the moment-to-moment detail of his performance reveal that Reed is enjoying his acting choices, choices which are not the result of some directorial conceit (they cannot be), but of Reed’s intuition in response to his understanding of the script.

All too often we see work where the actor is not fully committed, and his performance is broad and bland, it lacks drive, he is merely going through the motions. How often have we heard critics say something like – “oh, he faxed that performance in” – and I’ve heard this comment made about Hollywood stars being paid millions. This “faxing in” of performances, by actors working in whatever milieu, arises largely because the actor does not enjoy the choice he has made, whether that is a choice of how to play the scene, or his choice to accept the job in the first place which he may have done simply for the money (or even his choice to become an actor at all). Either way, the results are usually inferior to those of actors who make choices they enjoy, these actors thrill the audience, and thus their job is done. Therefore, actors have a responsibility to the audience to make choices they enjoy*.

 * When I say enjoy, I mean that the choice excites the actor, makes him want to , gets his blood up, I don’t mean enjoy as in going on a picnic.

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