I'm a great Supporter of...

William Fichtner

And so I continue with my top 5 favorite support actors. Number 4 on my list is the brilliant Mr. William Fichtner.

Unfortunate name yes, but cheekbones so sharp you could cut cheese with and no ham acting in sight (well maybe just a little sometimes).

He appeared in Vanity Fairs list of premier supporting actors. For a while there it looked like he’d make that final step of the way to major role status . But alas, despite scene-stealing performances in films like Ridley Scotts ‘Black Hawk Down’(2001) and the almost perfect ‘Perfect Storm’ (2000) he never quite cut the mustard as far as the big studios were concerned.

Shame really. He’s great to look at and versatile as anyone. I'm wishing for a genius David Lynch casting. Move over Willem Dafoe.

He's not conventionally handsome by any means which is a plus in my book. But he's certainly not ordinary. Support actors are by definition interesting. They act not as window dresssing (no that's for the actresses who play the supportive wife - different topic altogether) but more as a feature wall, always making the leads look better, sharper - good actors by association.

Of course some film makers (Jarmusch, Hartley, Lynch, Jarman, Anderson) make a point of littering their films with support actors. I'm pretty sure that's the secret to their finest work.

Fichter is always at his best when he’s allowed to really own a scene, creating a movie within a movie. Those of you who, like me, watch films like some people listen to music (randomly, often) will know that there are some mornings when your eating your coco pops and drinking your first bucket ‘o’ coffee that 15 great minutes can be all you need to be really memorable on film.

Take his turn as the weirdo cop in Doug Lyman’s neato debut feature ‘Go’ (1999) – a great great movie made up of lots of terrific ensemble acting. Fichtners performance as the predatory and perverted policeman by day /Amway salesman by night is the stand out of the film.

It still cracks me up.

He turned up in Malcom X (‘92), ‘Quiz Show’(‘94) ,Heat (‘95), Strange Days (‘95), Contact (’97) and Armageddon ('98) All of which are on my shelves. He’s also in one of my all time guilty pleasures, ‘Equilibrium' ('02) where Fichtner gets a chance convince Christian Bale that now he’s stopped taking his state prescribed medication and can love again he should try and kill as many people as possible. Coooool.

He’s even appeared in my much loved (will I ever shut up about it) West Wing in the classic episode The Supremes. I won’t go into detail as it is in the season currently been screened here in Australia on the ABC (epsiode 17). It’s hard, no impossible, to steal a scene when that crew of actors is in the room (round or otherwise) but Fichtner is brilliant.

It’s quite a step up from playing Josh Hartnetts dad in Michael Bays dreadful ‘Pearl Harbor’(2001) or the unaccredited voice-over marriage councilor to the plastic fantastic couple ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith’(2005).

We’ll see him this year in Guy Pierces new film ‘First Snow’ currently in postproduction hopefully with more to do than give Don Cheadle an offer he can’t refuse ( ‘Crash' 05)

Oh by the way he was also in a film called ‘Ramona!’ in 1993. Which means he may have said my name once.


Number 5 on the list