with this performance as the perfect romantic leading everyman, and his wonderful one eyed, one legged viet vet in cuttersway, i expected great things. what happened?
royalty in exhile
He has become a bit part and TV actor, but he is still there, 3 movies coming out this year.
One of his other great perfomances was in The Trip to Bountiful.
"Janis, how can I get it if she won't come out of her A-frame?"
Saw him not long ago on Law & Order...he's around...
share Remember, he was the governor of Illinois (and Sarah Tancredi's doomed father) on "Prison Break."
I have a feeling he's always going to be remembered as the father of a large brood who kept leaving his son Kevin behind on holiday vacations!
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He was also really great in "Cat People" with Nastassia Kinski.
shareHe was in the Guardian, and some bits in Sopranos and others.
I loved him in Chilly Scenes, this is one of my favorite movies.
He has gotten a bit large these days. He needs to take up
running again, like in the end of Chilly Scenes.
Another great Heard role was in 1977's "Between The Lines", playing the star writer of a floundering Rolling Stone type mag.
Visit my alter ego at:http://www.writingup.com/user/stu_pitt
I remember watching Between the Lines a few years back, but I agree--John Heard was great in this movie.
And when I'm sittin' real close to the wide, wide screen, I feel like it's happening to me
glad to see someone else mention BETWEEN THE LINES - a wonderful film by the same director of CHILLY SCENES - Heard is a terrific actor - he had his demons - he got heavy - but he works all the time - and yes - it wasnt a "bit" part on SOPRANOS - he had a great multi-epsiode story as a dirty federal agent who meets quite a demise.
shareWELL IF YOU TYPE HIS NAME ON THIS WEBSITE IMDB YOU CAN GET A CHRONOLOGY OF HIS CREDITS???
share
One could politely say "he's now big in the movie industry".
He was in the "Sopranos" for a while, and the movie
"The Guardian" and one of my favorites "Mindwalk" the
Mont St. Michelle version of "Dinner With Andre".
He was a great actor, particularly in "Chilly Scenes of
Winter".
As some one else pointed out, he'll probably always been known as the Home Alone Dad.
Which is too bad. He's kind of that rare anomaly, a character actor that can play an idiosyncratic lead.
After this and Cutter and Bone though, you really get a glimpse of a talent that hasn't been utilized in the way it should. Maybe movies like this just didn't get him enough steam to move on to more meaty roles.
Hell, he's probably just happy to have an acting career for thirty years.
Great movie, though, isn't it?
Gabba Gabba Hey
I'm glad someone mentioned "Mindwalk," because John is his sexiest there (even though it's not a romantic role). He's a terrific actor who's built an incredible career out of many diverse roles.
shareBill ?
John, of course. I'm prone to doing that, unfortunately.
shareThere is John Heard ...
John Hurt, the chest-burster from Alien
and William Hurt from Altered States
... maybe you got them confused? ;-)
Yes, I'm always getting John Heard and William Hurt mixed up, but at least I know Paxton from Pullman when it comes to Bills. ;-)
shareWhen I think of Paxton I think "We're getting our asses kicked here" - Hudson in Aliens or more recently the Mormon bigamist. Pullman ... not sure I associate with one memorable roll, maybe President in Independence Day.
sharewith this performance as the perfect romantic leading everyman, and his wonderful one eyed, one legged viet vet in cuttersway, i expected great things. what happened?
I think he's doing the narration on at least some of the recent television commercials for Michigan tourism, the "pure Michigan" ads. If it's not him, it sure sounds like him.
shareSeemed like "Cat People" was his one big bid for mainstream star status--leading man in a high-profile movie for which he got notably buffed out. Maybe that wasn't a pleasant experience, or maybe because the movie didn't do as well as expected he didn't get similar followup offers. In any case, he seemed content to go right into B movies, supporting parts and TV projects, which in any case probably afforded him a wider character range than he would have gotten as a 30-ish male movie star. He certainly is an excellent, versatile actor. Who knows, if "Cutter's Way" and "Chilly Scenes" had actually been commercial successes (as opposed to total, barely-distributed flops that then won significant cult followings), he could have been the next DeNiro or Pacino or whatever. Maybe he didn't really want the pressure.
shareExcellent perspective. John Heard is brilliant in every film of his I've seen (particularly this one), but he always struck me as more of an everyman than a superstar. He's built a respectable career with dozens of supporting roles and a few leads, and I suspect he just didn't want the trappings of enormous celebrity. Plus, he was often mistaken for Bill Hurt, who was much more willing to grab the spotlight.
He's continued to work and reach his fans, and I suspect he's content with that. I certainly am.
I just heard he got a bit part in "Sharknado" a Sci-Fi movie about sharks sucked up in a tornado and rained down on unsuspecting towns folk. LOL ... so much for great things. I think it has to do with the fact that he looks like a whale now. I saw him playing a corrupt cop I think on the Sopranos. I really liked Chilly Scenes of Winter and Mind Walk ... both are impossible to find on DVD now but good movies.
shareFunny, we were just discussing Heard's career. The NY Times carried the obit of Carolyn Cassidy. She wrote the memoir that the film "Heart Beat" was based on and was played by Sissy Spacek in the film. John Heard played Jack Kerouac. Heard had many chances to become a star in the 1970's and it just didn't take. I was a theatre undergrad at this time. Heard was a darling off-broadway, and appeared in many Public Theatre shows. It seemed he was being groomed for great things. A professor of mine was a hotshot lighting designer with Broadway credits and Tony nominations. He lit many of these plays and knew inside stuff which he freely discussed. I recall hearing that Heard was rather self-destructive and had a bad drinking problem. I also vaguely recall that he and Margot Kidder were married for something like 10 days around the time of "Superman". Go figure....
shareThanks for the story. Two of my favorite movies starred Heard, Chilly Scenes of Winter and MindWalk ... is that a coincidence? After his youthful explosion, he seems to have settled into mediocrity. Still, both those movies were sheer genius ... I wonder if they were just another job to him?
shareI take exception to "mediocrity." Actors face incredible burdens, both internal and external, that shape their careers in ways that most of us can't understand. They walk a fine line between needing to access these incredibly strong and painful emotions while also having to live an ordinary life (rent/buy a home, cook dinner, have relationships, get along with the other incredibly intense actors you call your coworkers). Couple that with the incomprehensible competition for roles (the estimate is that only 5% of all trained actors find work, and even if 50% of those who are trained are so-so, that's still a lot of competition for every role), and you've got the recipe for an erratic career path.
He's a brilliant actor -- and, it seems, an actor with integrity -- for whom no niche was really every found. Not an uncommon story. Keep in mind that there's never a big audience for the emotionally/psychologically truthful, non-action-packed movies that he excels in -- another compelling reason for him to have been unable to carve the niche he would have liked (or that we fans would have liked for him).
"All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people."
Saw him in the Wall St. revenge fantasy "Too Bit To Fail" ... he is almost that big now.
He played a really sleazy Wall St. CEO, but he is hilarious ... the movie is kind of fun.
It was nice to see John Heard, but I wish he would get into shape and make some
good movies again.
Chilly Scenes of Winter is like my favorite movie, technically, and he carried the whole
movie at such a young age. Amazing talent. And of course the never-mentioned
Mindwalk!