In anticipation of the Academy Awards, we polled our contributors to see who they thought should win the Oscar. Once we had our winners, we asked various writers to make the case for our selection in each category. Here, Glenn Kenny makes the case for the Best Actor of 2014: Michael Keaton in “Birdman“. Two winners will be announced Monday through Thursday, ending in our choices for Best Picture and Best Director on Friday.
Because almost every actor in Alejandro G. Iñarritu’s
“Birdman” is playing an actor, critics have easily yielded to the temptation to
conclude that the leads, particularly the male leads Michael Keaton and Edward
Norton, are playing some versions of themselves. In Keaton’s case, a
correspondence seems particularly direct: he plays Riggan Thompson, a movie
star whose fame and now-apparently-dwindling fortune was made playing a movie
superhero, the titular “Birdman.” Thompson is, in the movie, going for a shot
at artistic redemption by sinking what’s left of his rep, and a good deal of
his money, into a cockamamie Broadway project, adapting a famed Raymond Carver
book for the stage. The tortured Thompson seems to be trying to make amends
for participating in what Norton’s more “pure” co-star Mike calls “cultural
genocide.” But even as Thompson tries to make good, his gruff, break-stuff
superhero alter-ego dogs his every step.
Keaton’s performance, unspooling in the hard-earned illusion
of a single-take shot, is a marvel of wit, anger, self-effacement, and a whole
lot more. But here’s an interesting thing, and the reason they call it, you
know, “acting:” Keaton is NOT playing himself. (And neither is Norton, but this
piece isn’t about him.) As he’s made pretty clear doing the press for
“Birdman,” Keaton’s not hungry for redemption; he wears his “Batman” past
pretty lightly; he picks his roles according to his interests, not in search of
a self-re-invention milestone. His work as Riggan is more a feat of empathy and
craft than of ostensible self-revelation, despite the scene in which Riggan is
compelled to walk through Times Square in nothing but underwear briefs and
socks. And he’s also funny as hell, which is often how we like Michael Keaton.
