Paul Scofield: An Actor for All Seasons (review)

In this biography of actor Paul Scofield, Garry O'Connor gives a chronological account of Scofield's professional life interspersed with interludes analyzing Scofield's approach to acting, "charting if possible the progress of an actor's soul" (13). O'Connor believes Paul Scofield is a great and mysterious actor and defends this belief by taking on the "isms," as he calls the challenges of postmodernism and poststructuralism, for "heartlessly . . . cutting everything down to size, reducing the dimensions of whatever is unknown and mysterious" (74).

The highlights of Scofield's career, spanning 1940 to the present, include an Oscar for his film role as Sir Thomas More in Robert Bolt's A Man for All Seasons (1966). His 1954 Hamlet was the first British production to travel to the Moscow Art Theatre since the 1917 Revolution. Peter Brook and Paul Scofield's work together in the early 1960s created some of the then young Royal Shakespeare Company's most important productions and Scofield originated the role of Salieri in Peter Schaffer's Amadeus (1979). He was nominated for an Oscar for his role as the noble father of Charles Van Buren in Robert Redford's film Quiz Show (1993). The fact that Scofield has played all of Shakespeare's great tragic roles in major productions for major companies also indicates the quality and range of his talent.

O'Connor lets us know that "this will not be an intimate biography," pointing out again and again that Scofield is not a celebrity actor (13). He guards his privacy closely and because Scofield authorized the biography, O'Connor respects his subject's restrictions. Along with O'Connor's meticulous research, these restrictions define the work.

O'Connor is doubly constrained by his relationship with, and wish to please, his subject. "The art of biography," Virginia Woolf wrote in her essay of the same name, "is the most restricted of all the arts. . . . The novelist is free; the biographer is tied." When Scofield argues that nothing in his childhood affected him, O'Connor willingly agrees and skips over Scofield's childhood in six pages. We are told that the actor's home life is of paramount importance to him but hear almost nothing about his wife or children. The book is ghostwritten by the sensibility of its subject—by Scofield's modesty, honor, and almost stubborn unpretentiousness. O'Connor quotes Scofield on acting: "If you play an entirely good man, you have to find something fallible. . ." (295). Garry O'Connor should have heeded his subject's advice.

O'Connor's need to prove Scofield's greatness means that he misguidedly finds the key to every failed Scofield production anywhere except within his subject. When Scofield's Othello (1980, National Theatre) falls flat it is the fault of director Peter Hall who is "not focused on Paul's performance," and of Michael Bryant's Iago, "wrong from the beginning" (281). This approach does Scofield no justice. A man of his impressive accomplishments does not need to be rescued from the occasional misfire.

When Laurence Olivier says Scofield's 1962 Lear isn't his favorite interpretation, O'Connor accuses him of "indirect bitchiness" and of being "Machiavellian" (174-5). Olivier was certainly not the only one to criticize this particular production. According to O'Connor, Olivier also "sabotaged" Scofield for roles at the Royal National Theatre (178). Yet, throughout his career, Scofield turned down roles. O'Connor conjectures that John Gielgud is spiteful about Scofield because Scofield is not gay (111). Yet Gielgud's analysis of Scofield is hardly spiteful: "a sphinx, [he] . . . won't open up . . . you can't get close to him" (111). In fact, his perception mirrors Scofield's emotional distance with his biographer.

O'Connor's obsequiousness can create some jarring moments. He often refers to his subject as "Paul," at one point writing "over to Paul" to introduce a comment by Scofield (216). But the...