WARNING: This Article May Contain Spoilers

Born: 6th July 1937

Died: 13th June 2021 (age 83)

Ned Beatty was born in Louisville, Kentucky to Charles and Margaret Beatty. He grew up singing in gospel choirs and Barbershop quartets and attended Transylvania University on a scholarship to sing in their acapella choir – he did not graduate the University. He started acting at the age of 19 and did many theatre roles including the role of Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman when he was 29. Coming later to cinema than many Beatty’s first film role was as Bobby Trippe, in Deliverance in 1972. For those of you who know the film you will know about this bit but for those who don’t this may be a bit of a spoiler and a bit of a shock and I have to say to take the role as his first role Ned Beatty was very brave – his character is told to strip at gunpoint and he is raped by two mountain men; the scene is still referred to as a screen milestone.

Although not really a Ned Beatty film it is of no surprise that a film like Toy Story 3 comes higher in his list than others – 1. Its part of a very watchable set of films and 2. Its one of the more recent films he made (he only made four other films after this including Rango). Talking of Rango I am guessing its his role as Lots-o-Huggin Bear, or Lotso as everyone calls him, that got him the role of the Mayor of Dirt as they both have the same demeaner. Lotso is quite a piece of work and that’s what is so great about animations I can’t see Ned Beatty at 73 playing such a cruel and horrible character his face just doesn’t fit, although he has played bad guys before but in his younger days, but voice acting gives actors the chance to play roles that they may never have been cast as in a live action film and boy his Lotso is bitter and twisted and played to within an inch of pure evil! Next we have Superman (and Superman II which also makes his top five), this was my first introduction to Ned Beatty – not that I knew who he was when I saw Superman for the first time. Ned is Otis, sidekick to Lex Luthor(or LuthOR as Otis would pronounce it), and he, and Gene Hackman (Lex) to some extent, are almost the comedy relief in the film – not that it’s a serious film by any stretch of the imagination – they play off each other so well. Otis is a “moron”, a “ninny” and a “nincompoop” as far as Lex is concerned and it is exactly how he is played. Beatty knows that this is not a dramatic role for him and he plays with it so well. Its such a shame that we don’t get to see more of him in Superman II; he breaks out of jail with Lex but then he is left behind whether this was down to the change in director or what I don’t know but I kind of missed him in the second film. And then we have his third film and his second animation. What makes a good animation isn’t only the style and quality of the artistry but also the voices chosen to portray them and that is why Ned Beatty was a good choice as the Mayor of Dirt (that’s the town not actual dirt) in Rango. He has a voice that puts you at ease and you believe that he has only the interest of the town at heart but there is an underlying hint of a bad guy in there. Right before we get onto his next film I would just like to point out that I do not watch these films in chronological order – if I have a film to hand I will watch it as soon as I can which is probably why I found his role as Doc Long in Charlie Wilson’s War a bit of a disappointment considering I’d seen every other film on this list. It’s a small role, almost too small for someone of Beatty’s calibre, and it’s not even as if it needed a name! in fact I actually wonder if there was a conflict in filming between this and Shooter (they were both released the same year) which meant that Doc Long’s character was cut shorter than the script wanted. All in all I found this a waste of his time and so memorable that I cannot really comment on his part even though I watched it before writing this section!! Probably his most serious role in his top five comes next as Senator Charles F. Meachum in Shooter and the Senator is what I think the Mayor of Dirt could have become! You often find characters that give you a bad feeling as soon as you see them and the Senator is nothing new yet there is something about the way Beatty plays him that makes you think, at first, you’ve got it wrong he’s just a ‘normal’ American politician (its either the way the film makers portray them or the films I watch that makes me think all US politicians are like this)

Although Ned Beatty was never a ‘main star’ of any film I think this is why he was such a talented and versatile actor and its probably why I enjoy his role of Otis in Superman and why I missed him so much in Superman II (although the story doesn’t really have a place for him it would have been nice to have seen more than the few minutes we do). Otis is weak but he is a henchman after all and aren’t they all supposed to be a little or else they wouldn’t be henchmen they’d be the evil genius! But it’s the way he and Gene Hackman play off each other that makes this role so wonderful. There is almost an unspoken love between the two of them as if Otis is his slightly slow, dim-witted brother or something – there has to be something special between them of else why would he keep such an incompetent around! I would hate to think how much weight Beatty put on during the making of Superman as he seems to be eating in every scene it’s a lovely quirk to his character.

Ned Beatty worked prolifically until his retirement in 2013; he received an Oscar nomination for his role in Network (1976) but lost out to Jason Robards (All the President’s Men). He was also nominated for Golden Globes and Emmy’s (even an MTV Movie Award – Best Villain – for his role of Lotso) but the only award he won was a RiverRun International Film Festival award for Master of Cinema – I’m guessing its like a Lifetime Achievement Award – so not for any role he played.

Beatty was married four times and has eight children, some of whom have followed their father into the business. Beatty died from natural causes at his Los Angeles home in 2021 aged 83.