Hackman, who was found dead this week at the age of 95, was one of the Hollywood’s greatest actors – and one of its least conventional leading men.
What, though, would modern-day Hollywood have made of an actor like Hackman, were he coming of age today?
Adam Driver is often cited as an example of an unusual-looking actor who has managed to become a generational leading man, fronting meaty, interesting films from Michael Mann, Martin Scorsese and Noah Baumbach among others.
Some of the best actors around with less conventional faces – Forest Whitaker, for example, or Paul Giamatti – have endured periods of real creative inertia, long periods where Hollywood failed to produce projects worthy of their talents.
(Think of Robert Duvall, a contemporary of Hackman with a similar “everyman” look about him; the Godfather star became renowned as Hollywood’s “Number one number two”.)
