They say the finest of wines only get bolder and better with age and, if so, Richard Gere is surely one of the most impressive vintages in Hollywood. Since his 1980 breakthrough in Paul Schrader’s American Gigolo (itself recently resurrected or better yet reanimated into a streaming show for the age of zombie properties), Gere has been a metronomic staple in film for much of the ensuing four decades. A leading man thanks to his striking good looks and energetic intensity, he cemented his legendary status in a pair of bona fide classics: An Officer and A Gentleman (1982) and Pretty Woman (1990) – the former of which featured an Oscar-winning turn by the venerable Louis Gossett Jr. while the latter of course catapulted Julia Roberts to a decade-long run as Hollywood’s biggest actress. If he was arguably outshone in his two biggest ever films, the same cannot be said of his impressive output in the new millennium.
Since the turn of the century, Gere quietly and unfussily improved his craft, becoming the understated yet magnetic center of an embarrassment of quality if little seen films. In hidden gems like The Hoax, Richard Shepard’s The Hunting Party, the criminally underrated Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer, and the critically lauded Arbitrage, Gere shines with the incandescence of a performer intimately aware and in supreme control of his considerable powers. Gere has always had inherent range, being one of the few actors who wears hardscrabble blue collar hustling as naturally as he does obscene wealth, but he has added understated confidence and quiet, emotional intelligence to his arsenal. So it’s a shame Hollywood’s major awards are still sleeping on him; with all due respect to Donald Sutherland, Richard Gere is arguably the finest working actor to never have bagged an Oscar nomination. But even that factoid takes nothing away from a legend who continues to dazzle, evolve, and do his best work when the fewest of us are paying enough attention.
Acting Institution: Seattle Repertory Theatre and the Provincetown Playhouse
Some Notable Performances:
- An Officer and a Gentleman
- American Gigolo
- Arbitrage
- Norman: The Moderate Rise and Tragic Fall of a New York Fixer
- The Hoax
