1936 – Stuart Erwin
Pigskin Parade
It’s a good thing I’m only reviewing Stuart Erwin’s performance, and not the movie as a whole. I didn’t really care for the movie. As a quirky little musical comedy that bordered on screwball, I think it fell a little flat. The comedy wasn’t that funny, and the music wasn’t that memorable. But Stuart Erwin’s performance was acceptable. Though the part was poorly written, Erwin did an OK job.
The problem is that there was very little to the character. Erwin played a country bumpkin who was so uneducated that he bordered on mentally handicapped. I don’t care how out of touch you are with the real world. You know what a football is. But not this guy. And that’s pretty much all there was to the character of Amos Dodd. He spoke with an affected Texas drawl that was ridiculous. “I’m a-gonna,” instead of “I’m going to,” and “Ah Cain’t” instead of “I can’t.” It felt forced and unnatural, though the accent was even worse coming from Amos’s sister Sairy, played by Judy Garland.
Still, I suppose Erwin was well-cast. He very much looked the part, like he was young, and had a head full of straw. There was only one scene in which he showed any kind of personality. Amos goes to a dance with a girl who he falls for. While there, she ditches him for another guy who gives her a piece of jewelry. Amos is so heartbroken that he is ready to leave college and go home to his farm. You see, it was discovered he could throw melons, and thus footballs, with perfect accuracy. In a mild fit of anger he clears a guy out of his room as he is packing his suitcase. But this was a light –hearted comedy, so things never really got violent.
I’m not saying Erwin’s performance was bad. I’m just saying that the movie was silly, the role of Amos Dodd was silly, and the one dimensional role didn’t really stretch the actor or show off his abilities. And just look at his fellow nominees. Walter Brennan, Basil Rathbone, Akim Tamiroff, and Mischa Auer. Erwin’s roll just wasn’t worth the nomination, especially when compared with them. But this was the first year the Best Supporting Actor category existed, so maybe they were still trying to figure out what to look for. For my money, it wasn’t this.