Rodney Stephen "Rod" Steiger was an American actor, noted for his portrayal of offbeat, often volatile and crazed characters. Cited as "one of Hollywood's most charismatic and dynamic stars", he is closely associated with the art of method acting, embodying the characters he played, which at times led to clashes with directors and co-stars.
Background
Steiger was born on April 14, 1925 in Westhampton, New York, the only child of Lorraine (née Driver) and Frederick Steiger, of French, Scottish and German descent. Rod was raised as a Lutheran. He never knew his father, a vaudevillian who had been part of a traveling song-and-dance team with Steiger's mother, but was told that he was a handsome Latino-looking man, who was a talented musician and dancer. Biographer Tom Hutchinson describes him as a "shadowy, fugitive figure", one who "haunted" Rod throughout his life and was an "invisible presence and unseen influence".
Education
His mother’s drinking habit not only embarrassed young Rodney, but he often had to pull her out from her drinking holes and then queue up for bread. In spite of that, he attended West Side High School, where he displayed an interest in writing poetry and acting. He also appeared in several school plays.
Fed up of quarreling with his mother, Stieger ran away from home at the age of 16. Lying about his age, he finally enlisted in the United States Navy on May 11, 1942 and underwent two years of training at the Naval Training Station in Newport.
Career
Steiger had made his stage debut in 1946 in ‘Curse you, Jack Dalton!’ a year before he joined Actors Studio. Later he made his TV debut with ‘Telas, the King’ (1950) and film debut with a small role in ‘Teresa’ (1951).
Concurrently, he continued with his stage acting. From 1950 to 1952 he enacted small, but significant roles in plays like ‘An Enemy of the People’ (1950) and ‘Night Music’ (1951) and ‘Seagulls Over Sorrento’ (1952).
Also from 1950 to 1955, he appeared in numerous televisions programs, averaging one per week. Among Steiger's credits were ‘Taste of Ashes’ (1950), ‘Café Ami’ (1951), ‘Ordeal in Space’ (1951), ‘The Window’ (1952), ‘Café Society’ (1953), ‘Raymond Schindler, Case One’ (1953) etc.
However, it was his lead role in ‘Marty’ (1953), which opened floodgate of film offers for him. He accepted the role of Charley "The Gent" Malloy in the 1954 film ‘On the Water Front’. His taxi scene with Marlon Brando later became part of film history.
His next memorable film was ‘The Big Knife’ (1955). In this film, he enacted the role of an obnoxious film tycoon Stanley Shriner Hoff, going to the extent of bleaching his hair to suit the character. ‘The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell’, also released in 1955, was another of his significant work.
His depiction of crooked boxing promoter Nick Benko in 'The Harder They Fall', released in 1956, also earned him critical acclaim. Then in 1957, he got his first lead role; he starred in ‘Run of the Arrow’. Although the film later attained cult status he did not like it.
Contrarily, he enjoyed his star role in 1957 British film ‘Across the Bridge’. In this film, he played the role of a crooked English businessman who flees to Mexico after stealing company funds and then gets into a different kind of trouble. His gripping performance was the highlight of the film.
Steiger also excelled in his 1958 crime thriller ‘Cry Terror’. Although the story contained too many coincidences, his ‘superbly laconic’ portrayal of the gangster Paul Hoplin was highly commended by the critics.
His portrayal of American gangster Alphonse Gabriel "Al" Capone in the 1959 biographical film ‘Al Capone’ was the next feather in his cap. Afterwards he did few more hit films such as ’Seven Thieves’ (1960), ‘13 West Street’ (1962),’Convicts Four’ (1962), ‘Longest Day (1962), ‘Hands Across The City’ (1963) etc. In addition, he also did a Broadway show called ‘Moby Dick—Rehearsed’ during this period.
His career reached its peak in 1965 with ‘The Pawnbroker’, where he played the part of an embittered Holocaust survivor living in New York. Although he failed to get Academy Award for it, he later said, it was best work.
‘The Pawnbroker’ was followed by two other hits; i.e. ‘Loved One’ and ‘Dr Zhivago’ both in 1965. Next in 1967, he co-starred in ‘In the Heat of the Night’, enacting the role of Police Chief Bill Gillespie. The role not only earned him Academy Award for Best Actor, but also accolades from all.
The film was followed by 'The Girl and the General' (1967), ‘No Way to Treat a Lady’ (1968), ‘The Sergeant’ (1968), ‘The Illustrated Man’ (1969)’ and ‘Three Into Two Won't Go’ (1969) before he got his first historical movie, ‘Waterloo’ (1970).
Unfortunately, the American cinema went into a decline from the beginning of 1970s and it had a negative impact on Steiger’s career. Therefore, although he went on making movies, few were as successful as before.
Among the movies made in 1970s, ‘Happy Birthday, Wanda June’ (1971), ‘Lolly-Madonna XXX’ (1973), ‘Last Days of Mussolini’ (1975), ’ W.C. Fields and Me’ (1976), ‘F.I.S.T.’ (1978), ‘Portrait of a Hitman’ (1979) and The ‘Amityville Horror’ (1979) are most significant.
The situation became worse once he underwent open heart surgery in 1979. Although he did many films in 1980s and 1990s, except for ‘The January Man’ (1989), ‘The Player (1992) , ‘The Specialist’ (1994) he did not really get any worthwhile role. His final film was ‘Poolhall Junkies’ released in 2002.
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Membership
Served with United States Naval Reserve, 1942-1945.
Personality
Steiger was one of Hollywood's most respected character actors; Hutchinson described him as "one of Hollywood's most charismatic and dynamic stars". Yet for Hutchinson, Steiger remained "out of sympathy with Hollywood" during his career, believing that accomplished actors often struggle to find challenging films as they got older. Steiger was an "effusive talent" according to Lucia Bozzola of The New York Times, and was particularly noted for his intense portrayal of offbeat, often volatile and crazed characters. After On the Waterfront (1954), Steiger became somewhat typecast for playing tough characters and villains, and grew increasingly frustrated playing the "Mafia heavy or a near-psychopath" during the 1970s, roles which he could play menacingly, but provided little opportunity for him to showcase his talent. Gossip columnist Louella Parsons hailed him as "the Screen's No.1 Bad Man", while the newspaper London Evening News referred to him as "the man you would love to hate if you had the coverage". A 1960 publication by Dean Jennings of The Saturday Evening Post referred to Steiger as an "angry, hot-tempered newcomer of prodigious acting talents, who works best only at emotional white heat", and remarked that he found it "stimulating to carry theatrical fantasy into his private life". Pauline Kael found his performances so powerful that she believed he "often seems to take over a picture even when he isn't in the lead". The journal Films and Filming, surveying his career in 1971, noted that his talent "developed steadily through films good and bad", and that the secret of his success was that he stayed grounded, citing a 1956 interview where he said "I pity the player who can't keep his feet on the ground. It's too easy to trade on success and forget that no performer can stand still."
Physical Characteristics:
Steiger suffered from depression throughout much of his life. He described himself as "incapacitated for about eight years with clinical depression" before his Oscar win for In The Heat of the Night. His career problems from the 1970s onwards were often exacerbated by health issues. He underwent open-heart surgery in 1976 and 1979 and struggled with obesity, though certain roles, such as Napoleon, required him to intentionally gain weight. After the decline of his third marriage in 1979, a deep depression, partly a side effect of his surgery, during the 1980s negatively affected his career. He became increasingly reclusive during this period, often confining himself to his apartment, watching American football for several hours. He said of the experience: "You begin to lose self-esteem. You don't walk, you don't shave and if no one was watching you'd go to the bathroom right where you were sitting". He would lie in bed at night thinking "You'll never act again. Why bother? You're no good". Despite these challenges, Steiger continued to act into the 1990s and early 2000s. In one of his final interviews, he stated that there was a stigma wrongfully attached to sufferers of depression and that it was caused by a chemical imbalance, not a mental disease. He commented: "Pain must never be a source of shame. It's a part of life, it's part of humanity."
Connections
Steiger was married five times: he married actress Sally Gracie (1952–1958), actress Claire Bloom (1959–1969), secretary Sherry Nelson (1973–1979), singer Paula Ellis (1986–1997) and actress Joan Benedict Steiger (married 2000 until his death). He had a daughter, opera singer Anna Steiger (born in 1960) by Bloom, and a son, Michael Steiger (born in 1993), from his marriage to Ellis. In an interview with journalist Kenneth Passingham, Steiger stated that Bloom was "all I ever wanted in a woman", and that "maybe our marriage was better than most because we were both established when we met". The couple bought a home in Malibu, California, a community that appealed to Steiger but which Bloom found boring. They also purchased an apartment in Manhattan and a cottage in County Galway, in close proximity to John Huston's home. Financial considerations led Steiger to sell their New York apartment in the mid-1970s. It upset him greatly when his marriage with Bloom ended in 1969 and that she quickly remarried Broadway producer Hillard Elkins the same year, a man whom Steiger had entrusted to care for her while he was away shooting Waterloo. Steiger was also close friends with actress Elizabeth Taylor.
Steiger was outspoken on McCarthyism. He was particularly critical of Charlton Heston's stance on weapons, and publicly referred to him as "America's favorite fascist". In one clash in a column in the Los Angeles Times, Steiger responded to a letter sent by Heston saying that he was shocked that the American Film Institute had not honored Elia Kazan because of his testimony to the Un-American Activities Committee. Steiger wrote that he was "appalled, appalled, appalled" at actors and writers who had been forced to drive cabs because they were blacklisted and had even committed suicide as a result. Heston did not reply.