Laurence Olivier, Wuthering Heights

as HEATHCLIFF

Naturally, I had to follow up my post on a soon-to-be Academy darling with an even bigger soon-to-be Academy darling. 1939 marked Laurence Olivier’s official star-is-born moment after having had two previously botched attempts at fame in Hollywood. With his (faux?) tan, chiseled jawline and a cleft that looks as though it could swallow you whole with the right camera angle, Olivier was first a heartthrob before becoming the respected thespian known the world over. It is said that Olivier wasn’t above being full of himself when it came to acting and comparing himself to his contemporaries, and he hadn’t much respect for fellow co-star Merle Oberon, whom he called a “silly little amateur”. Now with an ego like that and the fact that he is the Sir Laurence Olivier--the second most nominated male actor in Academy history and the man tied for the most Best Actor nominations--needless to say I came into Wuthering Heights expecting to be astonished by a display of top notch acting.

For the most part, I really did enjoy roughly half of Olivier’s performance—that being I was quite impressed by his line delivery. The man has got such a soulful and heartfelt speaking voice. Olivier speaks with the utmost passion and it’s crazy how he could make the most sonically twisted lines sound like some sort of improvisational poetry to the ear. (re: “You loved me! What right to throw love away for the poor, fancy thing you felt for him? For a handful of worthiness?” or "If he loved you with all the power of his soul, for a whole lifetime he couldn't love you as much as I do in a single day") For example, when Cathy arrives back at Wuthering Heights after having spent quite some time at Edgar’s home, we see Heathcliff gaze at her longingly and ask, “why did you stay so long at that house?” Such a simple question and yet Olivier injects it with the utmost delicate emotion—moments like that I just adored. His recitation and speech is one of the best I’ve heard out of the 1930's. Yet the emoting aspect of Olivier's performance is where he lost me. He doesn’t express himself facially in a manner that matches the fervency of which he speaks. I found him to be curiously wooden at times, a vacant visual contrasted against flowery vocals. I know Heathcliff is supposed to be sulking and scowling a lot of the time, but in the more tender scenes—such as any of the ones where he and Cathy discuss their love, or his very last scene with Cathy—Olivier can’t seem to properly project the meaning of the words onto his face, and it just feels like he's doing a questionable job at showing the simplest feelings of love. At times he's kind of just ogling at Oberon but is too blank for my tastes. It’s as if Olivier doesn’t realize or hasn’t adjusted to the fact that he’s on camera and instead thinks he’s performing on stage and that I’m watching him from the balcony. However, the scenes after Heathcliff has returned where he's being cruel to Cathy or Hindley works wonderfully—I found him perfectly solemn, icy, calculating, and cutting all at once. Despite my qualms, it's still a passionate and watchable debut by a man who would become a legend, and one that gets a firm