Basehart in Fellini's masterpiece La Strada. (Photo: Cinema Retro archives)
Cinema Retro columnist Herbert Shadrak recently spoke to
Stephanie Kellerman, a friend of the Basehart family and webmaster of The Talented Richard Basehart shrine at www.richardbasehart.com
Cinema
Retro: Was Richard Basehart an actor’s actor? Was his enormous talent only
truly appreciated by other actors?Â
Stephanie
Kellerman: Several actors commented that he was an actor's actor because they
did appreciate his talent, but you would find an argument from his fans saying
that his talent was only appreciated by other actors. As for me... I
appreciated other actors because I liked the characters they played, but I
really didn't have an interest in the actors themselves. With Richard, I
watched him because I was interested in him and how he seemed to make each role
his own. To me, when others acted, they seemed to play the same character in
all their movies, different variations of themselves. They just had different
names. Richard was one of the few actors who could make the roles he played so
believable and the different characters came to life with their own personalities.
CR:
Why was this great actor so unappreciated during his lifetime – and perhaps
even now, 25 years after his death?
SK:
I think that happened because of two reasons. One, he moved to Italy for a
decade and was out of the public's eye in the USA. And two, he accepted the
role of Admiral Nelson in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, with which he will
be forever identified. If
he had stayed in the U.S., I believe he would have become a greater star here.
He is considered a much greater star in Europe. Also, I have received several
comments over the years from people who emailed me at my Richard Basehart
tribute site that they had no idea he had such range as an actor because they
only knew him as Admiral Nelson, and were astonished when they went back and
watched some of his old movies, which by now most everyone has forgotten about.
Incidentally,
we wouldn't have had Richard as Admiral Nelson if he hadn't needed money to pay
off Valentina Cortese after their divorce. She agreed to one last payoff
and Voyage was his chance to get out of making any more payments to
her. That means if he didn't have that expense, he wouldn't have taken the
role and the roles he would have taken otherwise would probably more closely
reflect what he had done in the past.