Marlon Brando Once Saw Jack Nicholson as a ‘Threat’
Actor Jack Nicholson was a fan of Oscar-winner Marlon Brando since his youth. But when Nicholson first came onto the scene as an actor himself, it took some time for Brando to warm up to him.
Jack Nicholson didn’t feel comfortable calling Marlon Brando his friend
Brando was a significant influence on Nicholson during the actor’s formative years. The Shining star had been introduced to Brando back in his youth, where Brando’s impression on him was unforgettable. To the point where Nicholson couldn’t get enough of Brando’s performances.
“When I was growing up in New Jersey, one of my summer jobs was working as an assistant manager of a local movie theater. I must have seen every performer of On the Waterfront – twice a night. You just couldn’t take your eyes off the guy. He was spellbinding,” Nicholson once wrote on Rolling Stone.
Nicholson further asserted that Brando had an impact on him even before he decided to become an actor. When Nicholson’s film career took off, however, he formed a close bond with Brando behind-the-scenes. The two eventually even ended up becoming neighbors. But Nicholson still had too much admiration for Brando to define him as a buddy.
“I still don’t feel comfortable calling the man my friend,” Nicholson added. “Hell, he’s Brando – but we shared more than a driveway. As a neighbor, he was perfect, a great guy who was always there for you.”
Marlon Brando saw Jack Nicholson as a threat
Nicholson initially didn’t have Brando’s trust. In his memoir Nicholson (via Business Standard), the actor opened up about his past drug use earlier in his career. His behavior may have rubbed Brando the wrong way before the two became better acquainted with one another. Still, The Departed star believed Brando tried to discreetly show Brando how to operate in the film industry early on.
“He had an antipathy toward talking about his acting. I always felt Marlon, in some elliptical way, was trying to educate me about mine. At first he thought of me as a threat to his home – he was strictly against dope, and he thought I was a criminal,” Nicholson once told The Bulletin. “Once he figured that was not my defining trait, we got friendly, and I learned he wasn’t nearly as reclusive or serious as people thought.”
Why Jack Nicholson turned down his only opportunity to work with Marlon Brando
One of Brando’s most iconic and career defining roles was as Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather. Nicholson was in the running to play Michael Corleone, another iconic role that would later go to Al Pacino. The film would’ve seen Nicholson team up with his onscreen idol, but he turned it down simply because he wasn’t Italian.
“Back then I believed that Indians should play Indians and Italians should play Italians. Mario Puzo had written such a great book that if you go back to it you’ll see so much of what was special about the movie,” he once told Movieline. “There were a lot of actors who could have played Michael, myself included, but Al Pacino was Michael Corleone. I can’t think of a better compliment to pay him.”
