Thinking about what makes a good performance

By Sarah Sluis

When an actor is doing a good job, or even a so-so job, their work can be invisible. It can be hard to figure out just what they're doing that makes them so believable, funny, or completely embody the character. Add that to the fact that the Oscars tend to reward the more salient difficulties of the profession, such as gaining weight, looking ugly, or crying/dying/singing/being abused, and acting can seem like even more of a mystery.

That's why it was so interesting to watch THR's video of Eric Stoltz as Marty McFly. Five weeks into production, he was replaced by Michael J. Fox because director Robert Zemeckis felt that, according to executive producer Steven Spielberg, the actor's performance "wasn't getting as many laughs as I hoped."

Watching the footage, you can see that the facial expressiveness just isn't there. The scene at (:28) is the perfect example--McFly leans over the diner counter and sees his (young) father next to him. This is a slapstick-type moment, where you expect an exaggerated, panicked, wide-eyed expression on the lead actor's face. Stoltz totally underacts it. He adds some eye movements toward the end, which struck me as him trying to incorporate some notes from the director unsuccessfully. In general, he has a pretty blank expression on his face, a little too Buster Keaton for the movie's sensibilities, which require McFly to react and be flustered.

I'm sure that the inadequacies of Stoltz were even more apparent on set. I've only been on set in a student film capacity, but even then you can sort the people with acting ability from the people who don't have it. If you say, "Act angry," some people just can't do it. Sure, they can do it in a superficial way but they won't be able to calibrate the tone or intensity correctly--because acting's hard! If there's a shot that requires a simple eye movement or expression, they can't create that feeling with their body. I can see that in Back to the Future--it seems like it's actually quite difficult for Stoltz to be that expressive. His failure is that much more apparent because Fox nailed the scenes so well. Of course, it's important to point out that Stoltz isn't a bad actor, and in fact was nominated for a Golden Globe, among other awards, but he was miscast in the Back to the Future role--that type of comedy simply wasn't within his range.