Tony Curtis: 1925-2010

Tony Curtis, who died last night at the age of 85, started out as a heartthrob, but he was very much an actor's actor, throwing himself wholeheartedly into whatever role he played. Growing up as Bernie Schwartz in the Bronx, he had thrown himself just as wholeheartedly into the movies he watched in the neighborhood theater - sometimes for ten hours at a time - and in the plays he performed in at a local settlement house. It proved to be training as valuable as that from a conservatory. He retained the common touch when he became famous, and he was known to be a genial, warm man.

Most obituaries will cite Curtis's role in 1959's Some Like It Hot, and others might even remember him for the 1960 comedy The Great Impostor, but I will always remember his role as a bigoted white escaped convict chained to a black inmate - played by Sidney Poitier - in The Defiant Ones, a story of how two opposites overcome prejudice and animosity on the run from the law. It was a groundbreaking movie, and one Curtis was happy to be a part of. In both his acting and in his painting, which he took up later in life, he proved himself to be a man of integrity. They don't make 'em like that anymore. R.I.P.