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About The Oregon statesman. (Salem, Or.) 1916-1980 | View Entire Issue (May 3, 1957)
Palance Avoids 'Menace Roles To Become Star By JOHN BETKLEft HOLLYWOOD, May t - Jack Palance. t km fascinatingly malevolent features in kin quick fame h film, has brushed Mid the mask of brutality aad won stardom by sheer lorco of SCtiBg-. The planed far, evilly glinting (yea aad the air at menace owed more to make-up men and studio lighting experts than to nature And now the patent en them ti about to expire. Whir. U the way Palance trhimes with balance wants it. Over the lonj haul Its ability, so freak looks, that counts. Television has named Palance the top actor af the year. The movies rate him a solid bet for highest honors. And the critics sre running out of laudatory ad jectives to describe his perform- snces. No longer is Palance confined to wearing the black hat of the bad man in Westerns or crammed into the narrow limits of a hired killer's role. His last appearance, as a bril liant film producer la the. tele vision drams, ,The Last Tycoon." made no concessions to Palance i appearance. He s the good guy in s forthcoming Western, and plays a difficult dual role in a movie shout to be released. (Mdtty la His Prafeeaiea To the general public, however Pslanoe. J7, seems something of in oddity in the acting profession The fact that a msn who looks like s prixeftghter which he once wss should be sn extraordinarily sensitive, crestive actor is con trsry to the widely held belief that sctors should look ' like well, actors It as s belief held even by Palance. back in the days when he a a towering. 115-pound teen ager driven by a deep desire to find some means of expressing Himself. "1 always wanted to express myself through words." he said Rut I thought I win ton hig In be an actor 1 could see myself knorkmg over taMe I thought acting wan lor little, faggnty guy An a remit, he turned to athlet in. where his site and his ability to knock things down were Isr Irom a handicap He starred In lootball and basketball In high school at Haselton, Pa., and start ed boxing as an amateur. A football scholarship sent aim ts the UniTsrsity at North Caro lina. fastball Carter Eaee A ahoulder Injury ended Pa Isnca'a football career la his sophomore year, and after finish ing the term be left college to be come a professional fighter. "When I went into fighting." be recalls, "my thoughts were vague. It waa aa If I were looking through the wrong and of the binoculars Way off there ia the distance was the fight gams. Bat 1 still had sn urge, to express myself either physically or mentally and I was surer of myself physically." Fighting may have satisfied Pilance'a urge for self-expression, but It did little for him otherwise Hn purees ranged between 1100 ind (400. His nose was broken, set, broken, re-set and broken igain. (Later, plastic surgery un did the damage.) When the United States entered World War II. be wu glad to quit the ring and ap ply for aviation cadet training. Iajareel ia Tralatag Crash Be waa com missioned as a bomber pilot, but a training crash just before he was to go overseas caused Injuries that ended hla mil itary career and made the further pursuit of pugilism a risky under tsklng. Stilt yearning for self-expression Palance went hack to college this time to Stanford University, where the mental finally caught up with the physical In hit devel opment and the Idea of acting took firm bold. A big break came when Palance got the Job at understudy to An thony Quinn la the road company of "Streetcar Named Desire." Though be performed the meaty Kowolskl role only twice during Quinn illnesses, he showed enough so that when Marlon Brando kad to leave the Broadway company, Palance replaced him. And when Elia Kazan, director of "Street car," moved ta Hollywood the fol lowing year to make "Panic In the Streets," Palance went with htm. K fully Meaerlag Rates His chilling portrayal of an un derworld killer wen immediate renpowe from the movie mak ers, and Palance moved on to equally menacing roles in "Sud den Tear," and "Shane," for each of which he won an Academy Award nomination. Movies, television and a success ful appearance an Broadway la "Darkness at Noon" have kept Palance busy aver since, and of the thre forms of the drama, be prefers live television because It offers him s variety of roles. 1 like the ides of giving a eon Unuooa performance bat I woo Mn t want to tie myself down to one part for yesr, which is what happens if yon get a hit on Broadway," ha explains. 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