Robert Duvall: Power Performer

IN THE HIERARCHY of a movie, the lead actor is at the centre but sometimes character artistes become almost as important and that was the position that Robert Duvall (1931-2026) eventually occupied. You might remember The Godfather for Al Pacino and Marlon Brando, but the understated presence of Duvall as Tom Hagen, the consigliere, is also now immortal. That was not the role which won him the Academy Award, even though he was nominated. He got it 11 years later in 1984, as the lead in Tender Mercies. Altogether, he was nominated seven times for the Oscars, four times for supporting roles.

Duvall began his acting career in 1962 in a film that didn’t have a single line of dialogue. He played the reclusive Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird, the movie based on the iconic novel. In the 1950s in New York, he was sharing rooms with Dustin Hoffman and Gene Hackman, all strug­gling actors who would go on to win Oscars. Small roles in movies turned to bigger parts, until by the mid-1970s he was getting lead roles.

He never became a major ‘star’ like his erstwhile room­mates but was a constant in pathbreaking movies. He also directed The Apostle to critical acclaim. It is a testament to his longevity that his final Academy Award nomination came in 2014 for The Judge when he was 84 years old, four decades after his first one. His last movie, The Pale Blue Eye, came out in 2022, at the age of 91. When he passed away on February 15, it was after a long full life immersed in cinema.