UdeMan: Jeff Bridges

I'm rooting for him to win Best Actor for his role as Bad Blake in "Crazy Heart", even though the Oscars are hype and mirrors, and that Golden Globe win was sweet enough.

Just like nominee Christopher Plummer, recognition for Bridges is long overdue.


Jeff Bridges has been one of my favourite
screen actors since he was the vulnerable boy discovering life in "The Last Picture Show" in 1971. He was twenty-one.

To create the lead character in "Starman" in '84, Bridges took what he called "grace training", dance and t'ai chi, and this enhanced fluidity stayed with him.

Suave and lost in "The Fabulous Baker Boys", stoned and stolid as The Great Lebowski: Bridges will dazzle with his considerable glamour or submerge it completely to become the guy you'd walk by in the parking lot.

He said, "Most cynics are really crushed romantics: they've been hurt, they're sensitive, and their cynicism is a shell that's protecting this tiny, dear part in them that's still alive."

A Jeff Bridges performance is like listening to jazz. You think you hear the beat, then think the player is off, then
realize he is on and you're off. In "Crazy Heart" he's a master soloist, lifting a clichéd story with his risks and riffs.

Shown above, Bridges at the "Crazy Heart" premiere with his wife of 33 years, Susan Geston.

In 2006 Bridges said, "In the 28 years we've been married, we've done 50 movies together. I say 'we' because Sue deserves a credit too. I'm the guy who makes the buck, but she's the one who takes care of everything else. I really am more in love with her than ever."