Photography by Joe Pugliese/Corbis Outline
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The Tender Trap
By Lewis Beale, January & February 2005
Alan Alda is #!@*% sick of his nice-guy image
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During his rise to fame in the '70s as "Hawkeye" Pierce on the
TV series M*A*S*H, Alan Alda became the poster boy for the sensitive,
in-touch-with-his-inner-woman man. He was a vocal feminist, and films like
The Four Seasons perpetuated his softie persona. But as far as Alda is
concerned, you can take the touchy-feely stuff and shove it. "I recoil
from touchy-feely," he says, responding to the suggestion that he's
just a big huggy-bear with a choice four-letter word.
Decidedly contrary to his
image, Alda airs his sleazy side in The Aviator, Martin Scorsese's
new film about billionaire Howard Hughes (Leonardo DiCaprio), as Senator Ralph
Owen Brewster, who tries to destroy Hughes and his airline, TWA. "He's
a scoundrel and a scoundrel is always the most fun to play," says Alda,
"especially if you can see how, given the right breaks in life, you could
be just like him." This spring, Alda will play another cutthroat cad on
Broadway in David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross.
Could it be that
we've pegged Alda wrong all these years? Is he perhaps not the perfect idol
for men who cry, but instead a hard-boiled actor who cusses a blue streak and
rejects sentimentality? "Alan is a lot more wicked, funny, and salty in
real life," testifies longtime pal Alec Baldwin. Maybe. In a nice-guy sort
of way.
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