Lights, Camera, Action!

In the wake of the recently televised Academy Awards, I got to thinking about movies made about…artists. And you know what – there’s a surprisingly ample number of them. 

There are biopics about the famous, the infamous and the obscure. About realistic artists, abstract artists, historical artists, contemporary artists, even a cartoonist or two…

Welcome to the March edition of Not Your Usual Caricature Artist from Caricatures by Joel.

If you want to be impressed by the sheer number of films devoted to this subject, and perhaps note those you’ve either seen or want to see, check out:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Biographical_films_about_artists

In no particular order, then, here are some fine representatives of the genre:

·       “The Agony and the Ecstasy” – 1965 – Charlton Heston as a burly Michaelangelo.

·       “Lust for Life” – 1956 – Kirk Douglas as the tortured Vincent Van Gogh and Oscar winner Anthony Quinn as Paul Gauguin.

·       “Frida” – 2002 – Salma Hayek as Mexican artist and eyebrow-challenged Frida Kahlo.

·       “Crumb” – 1994 – documentary about R. Crumb, avant-garde/bohemian cartoonist.

·       “My Left Foot” – 1989 – Daniel Day-Lewis as Irish artist/writer, and Cerebral Palsy victim, Christy Brown.

·       “Moulin Rouge” – 1952 – Jose Ferrer as Toulouse Lautrec.

·       “Pollock” – 2000 – Ed Harris as American abstract artist Jackson Pollock.

·       “Rembrandt” – 1936 – Charles Laughton as the famed Dutch painter.

·       “Girl with a Pearl Earring” – 2003 – Scarlett Johannsen as the eponymous “girl” in a famous painting by master of lighting Johannes Vermeer.

And last…and probably least (for this arbitrary, short list)…

·        “How to Murder Your Wife” – 1965 -- Jack Lemmon as fictional comic strip artist Stanley Ford who wakes up the next morning after a drunken bacchanal to realize he’s suddenly married to Virna Lisi.

(Well, you know it’s a comedy if any guy in his right mind wants to do away with Virna Lisi.)

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As for yours truly, no Oscar winners here, but some recent work at a wedding where I at least "immortalized” the guests as if they were stars:

Look for us again the first Tuesday of next month for another Todd-A-O, Technicolor and VistaVision adaptation of Not Your Usual Caricature Artist.