The world lost not only an incredible actor yesterday, but a genuinely amazing and rare person. Paul Newman will always be considered the definition of cool. I have to agree. Some of my favorite performances by him are also some of my favorite films: Cool Hand Luke, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Hudsucker Proxy, and Road to Perdition are just a few. He also worked with some of the most amazing directing talent in history: Alfred Hitchcock, John Huston, Robert Altman, Sydney Lumet, Martin Scorsese, and the Coen Brothers.

However, I think that Paul Newman being the definition of cool goes far beyond just being an actor. I’ve learned more and more about him over the years and he always seemed to be an all-around amazing person. Rather than go on all day about how much I’ve enjoyed his films, here’s a short list of things that define what I thought was “cool” about Paul Newman:

• He was part of the legendary Actor’s Studio in New York and his classmates were Marlon Brando, James Dean, and Karl Malden.
• He thought his debut film, The Silver Chalice was so bad that he took out an ad in Variety magazine to apologize for his performance.
• He became a professional race car driver in 1977 and competed in some of the great races including Daytona and Le Mans. He was still racing at 80 years old!
• He had a great sense of humor and often played practical jokes on his friends. He once placed 200 live chickens in Director Robert Altman’s trailer.
• He was a genuine humanitarian who opposed war and strongly supported civil rights. In fact, he even ended up on President Nixon’s “enemies list” which he said was one of his proudest achievements.
• He was a devoted husband to his wife (and actress), Joanne Woodward. One of my favorite quotes by him was always “I have steak at home, why go out for hamburger?”.
• He was the voice of Doc Hudson in the Pixar film Cars.
• He made my favorite popcorn and salad dressing; The Newman’s Own brand has made almost $200 million in profits and he gave every penny of that to charities.

I know there is so much more to Paul Newman than my simple list. But, these were just some of the hallmarks that I will remember fondly. I know his life and work will always be inspirational to me.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 27th, 2008 at 2:46 pm and is filed under Inspiration. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.