Do you think stereotypically attractive men make better actors

Cafe Society
1

What I mean is that male actors who I consider very good actors are also actors who have a wide range of characters they can play believably, and who also have an intensity about them that I find appealing. In my experience these characters tend to be men considered very stereotypically attractive.

Jake Gyllenhaal, Christian Bale, Leo DiCaprio, Jamie Foxx, Daniel Day Lewis, Michael Fassbender, Heath Ledger.

There are other male actors who are considered extremely attractive who I do not find to be particularly exceptional actors.

Pierce Brosnan, Brad Pitt, the Hemsworth brothers, George Clooney, etc.

Where am I going with this? I am wondering if male actors who are stereotypically seen as ‘heartthrobs’ feel an urge to develop their acting skills by taking the trade more seriously so they do not get pigeonholed into a list of rom-coms. Do the Heath Ledgers and Jake Gyllenhaals worry they will be typecast into rom-coms, and as a result they work hard to become better actors with more intensity and a broader range? Christian Bale probably has more intensity as an actor than any other actor I can think of. Gyllenhaal plays a wide range of characters believably, as did Ledger.

It is kind of like the male equivalent of when an attractive woman gets upset that nobody cares about her for anything other than her appearance, so she works on developing other aspects of herself (some talent, some aspect of her personality) to not be seen as a 1 dimensional stereotype? Or is it just that you can’t be a leading actor unless you are attractive, and of the 100+ attractive leading men, a handful will be (to me) exceptional actors?

There are/were some character actors who I liked for their wide breadth of work and their intensity. Philip Seymour Hoffman, John C Reilly. But compared to leading men, I can’t really think of many who I feel have the same intensity or ability to play a wide range of characters believably.

Do handsome leading men also produce some of the best actors, or are they on average no better than character actors in their abilities?

2

I think you’re underrating Pitt.

You may be on to something. I mean, nobody’s going to cast Steve Buscemi as the suave seducer who beds rich women, but somebody would presumably cast a really handsome actor in that role – yet that handsome actor can presumably compete with Buscemi to play a twitchy and off-putting stammerer, so he gets chances to show range.

That said, I’m pretty sure it can be overcome. F’rinstance, while I don’t think that Dustin Hoffman is way up there in looks, he’s way up there in range.

3

Paul Giamatti. Mark Ruffalo. Average looking guys who are first rate actors.

4

So do I. Pitt is a fine actor.

5

Heath Ledger ain’t so talented or pretty anymore.

I prefer the more “everyday” looking actor. Paul Giamatti, Gary Oldman, people like that.

Sometimes the first role I see someone in, though, blocks me from seeing their range.

Mark Ruffalo, for example. The first thing I saw him in was “You Can Count On Me,” and he was so good as Terry that I still see Terry in him whenever he does another role. Even in The Avengers movies.

6

I don’t think handsome actors are any better than regular joe actors. Handsome people tend to get lead roles, gain visibility, and get more opportunities, more experience, and improve their skills. Ordinary looking folk get character roles, small parts but lots of them, their IMDb pages tend to be really long, gain experience, etc, with the same result.

There are many actors who are bad, and their physical appearance has no correlation. I don’t think any conclusion can be drawn.

7

I would think that if anything the opposite might be true. A handsome actor can get a certain way through their career on looks whereas a “character” actor has nothing if they can’t act. There should be more motivation for the ugly actor to be good at acting.

8

There’s a sort of reverse psychology going there.

You can’t play a handsome guy unless you’re handsome.
Often, the leading role is supposed to be handsome.
If the leading role is not specified to not be handsome, it will likely go to someone who by Hollywood standards is at least “average”.
Guys who are average both by Hollywood standards and by normal ones will get sold as superhandsome as soon as they get a leading role. It appears to be a collocation, with many reporters: if they say “leading man”, they need to put “handsome” in front (C’mon, Jaws Reynolds? I like John Cusack, but model looks he ain’t got. And so forth. Hell: Cage! And I don’t mean Luke!)

The same phenomenon happens with singers. Dude is the singer in a band? Handsome leading man, of course, it doesn’t matter if he looks like a cross between a bulldog and an alligator.

To get a leading role and not be sold as handsome, you need to look like Danny DeVito, Jack Nicholson or Tommy Lee Jones. You need to have looks that no amount of Photoshop can fit into the conventional mold. And given some of the people I’ve seen being called “handsome” or “gorgeous” when hell no, I suspect you may need a publicist who specifically says it’s not allowed.

Other than that, what GuanoLad said.

9

If you did, you’d have said, “Sweet Christmas!”.

10

I agree. If new actors Handsome Hank and Average Alan are starting out, Hank might find it easier to get jobs in commercials and bit parts on sitcoms and other small roles that don’t require much more than a pretty face. With those small roles Hank is able to network a bit more with people, and get a bit more exposure while Alan has to hustle more to get any work. And with the more experience Hank probably does get better at acting as he’s able to practice his craft more.

There is also the promotional work that goes along with most movies. Let’s say there’s a new movie and both Hank and Alan audition and either one would be an excellent choice. But it’s not just the movie that’s being made, in order to promote the movie the stars will need to go on talk shows and be charming, go to junket interviews, be interviewed in magazines and have photoshoots (maybe have some shirtless pictures as well?) and be on posters put up everywhere. If Hank is a charmless void when not acting, then that will hurt him, but otherwise he’s at an advantage for the promotional activities, and that could help him get chosen.

Attractive actors still have to have talent and luck in order to keep their career going, but they are at an advantage in getting their careers going and getting some big roles. But they can also be at a slight disadvantage in getting miscast in roles because they are attractive stars. Brad Pitt is a good example of someone who has been chosen for a role because he’s a big star and super attractive instead of him being the right choice. If he was merely above average looking instead of gorgeous, he’d have had more roles like 12 Monkeys where he was really great, and fewer roles like Meet Joe Black which was just not good.

11

If we’re talking about the hunky Marty Allen, then yes - stereotypically attractive men do make better actors.

(gee thanks, spell check, for red-lining the perfectly fine “stereotypically”)

12

I would think unremarkable looking or homely people would have to make an effort, become very good at their craft. Why not? (I was never a raving beauty and had to try harder at everything in life. Whereas some ‘hot’ bimbo had the world stumbling over itself to give her whatever she wanted.)

It’s funny, we were just discussing good looking actors last night, they seem to be much more frequent in the last, oh, ten years, maybe more. When you look back at old tv shows, the supporting characters were ‘old’ and ordinary looking, if not downright homely. (The mailman, the shopkeeper, the insurance man). Like Gale Gordon on the Lucy Show, he had a job for life even if he wasn’t a star.