"Charlton," I'd say as I watched Spartacus over and over again.
"That Carlton Heston sure is good looking," she'd say.
He was. It was hard to pick which role I liked him in more, although it was between The Greatest Show on Earth and Spartacus for me. I never was convinced he was Moses, even when he held up the Ten Commandments. If Moses had looked like that, I just don't think anyone would have ever wanted to leave the desert.
But back to Carlton- I mean Charlton. That was the problem with living with my grandmother. After a while you started to make the same mistakes. I'd be with a friend and say Carlton or one of her Irish sayings and they would look at me funny. Like when I said "He's so good looking he's dangerous."
I suppose that was true and is true of celebrities in general. We tend to ascribe more to it when a celebrity picks up a cause than when one of us plain folks does. So when they speak up for any cause, they receive publicity and the cause becomes "blessed by their presence", so to speak. I knew Heston supported the NRA.
But I hadn't seen these photos of him marching in support of civil rights at a MLK rally, nor did I know he had picketed a whites only restaurant down south in the early 60's.
[In the NY Times photo, Heston is shown carrying a sign that reads "All men are created equal- Jefferson" in front of the Anna Maude cafeteria back in 1963. To the left is a police officer with his arms folded. Behind him are other protestors, carrying signs that can be partially read to say "God is love" and "...communism...by..ending racism". To the right of the photo, African-American women stand, clapping.]
So now, I must say, this is my favorite role for him. I'm not going to discuss why he chose to participate in these events or why he stopped and didn't participate in more civil rights causes. I'm just going to post the photo up as another image of that Carlton Heston, an epic movie star who died of Alzheimer's at the age of 84 with a curmudgeonly reputation, and let readers decide for themselves what to do with it.
2 comments:
It sucks when men we'd rather had one dimension have many.
If only actors could be as simple as the characters they play.
-Brad
www.SimplyOneLife.org
With privileges come responsibilities. When actors put themselves out as supporting a cause like the NRA and people don't agree, they have to take their lumps. They know it will generate publicity. That's why they are doing it!
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