The Life We Live
Donald Sutherland and 60 years of acting.
Canadian actor Donald Sutherland died on Thursday. His career spanned nearly 7 decades, so the face of the actor you conjure may be from one of his iconic roles. His favourite roles included John Klute in the film Klute, opposite Jane Fonda—-which she won on Oscar for, an award that eluded Sutherland.
Another favourite film for Sutherland was Federico Fellini’s Casanova, where the director had Sutherland shave his forehead and eyebrows and add a prosthetic nose and chin. In 2015, Sutherland wrote an essay about Fellini and his near-death bout with spinal meningitis in 1968. Reborn, or atleast surviving at 33, maybe this contributed to his marathon career.
Portraits of celebrities can be difficult to capture as their likeness remain in our mind from a performance or a time that was relevant to us. The 35 year old actor in Klute is a world apart from the 77 year old President Snow in Hunger Games.
Never a ‘leading man’ are some of the comments about Sutherland in the flood of news stories and obituaries. He was distinctive looking but not frozen into a static object that some actors are molded into.
Donald McNichol Sutherland lives on in his work and his family. An incredible career.