< 'I Want You To Ruminate' - The Case for Tracy Letts in 'Ford v Ferrari' - Awardsdaily - The Oscars, the Films and everything in between.
  • About Us
  • Sasha Stone
  • Editor Ryan Adams
  • Clarence Moye
  • Contact Us
No Result
View All Result
Awardsdaily - The Oscars, the Films and everything in between.
  • Home
  • Oscar Predictions
    • Best Picture
    • Best Actor
    • Best Actress
  • Good As Gold
  • Forum
  • AD TV
  • Podcasts
  • FYC Gallery
  • Interviews
  • All News
  • Home
  • Oscar Predictions
    • Best Picture
    • Best Actor
    • Best Actress
  • Good As Gold
  • Forum
  • AD TV
  • Podcasts
  • FYC Gallery
  • Interviews
  • All News
No Result
View All Result
Awardsdaily - The Oscars, the Films and everything in between.
No Result
View All Result

‘I Want You To Ruminate’ – The Case for Tracy Letts in ‘Ford v Ferrari’

by Clarence Moye
December 27, 2019
in featured, FYC, The Case For
4
‘I Want You To Ruminate’ – The Case for Tracy Letts in ‘Ford v Ferrari’

(Photo Credit: Merrick Morton TM and © 2019 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.)

Ford v Ferrari seems to be mostly talked about in awards circles for its tremendous craft work and lead performance by Christian Bale as great racer Ken Miles. Which, in my mind, is a narrow view of the film’s many pleasures. Don’t get me wrong, the crafts are indeed outstanding. The sound design, cinematography, production design, and editing all work in a beautiful symmetry to make the audience feel as if they’re literally in those pulsing, speeding cars. And Bale is as great as he usually is.

But one cog in the great wheel that is Ford v Ferrari is the great, unsung performance by Tracy Letts. In fact, his performance may be one of the most underrated turns by an actor this year, and I urge voting members of the Academy to take a second (or even a third) look at what Letts does in the film. He’s absolutely as critical to its success as leads Bale and Matt Damon.

Tracy Letts is best known for his immense contributions to the theater world. Raised as an actor in Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theater Company, Letts received a Pulitzer Prize  in 2008 for his masterpiece play August: Osage County. He also received a Tony Award for playing George in a revival of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Given his extensive background in the theater, naturally, his performances in film and in television feel muted by comparison to his broader, larger-than-life counterparts. He creates smaller, tightly wound performances.

Perhaps that’s why his work in Ford v Ferrari has gone relatively unnoticed in awards circles. I would also argue that he, among others, suffers from the curse of lead performances masquerading in the supporting races. So many big-named actors this year have arguably given lead performances but are being campaigned in the less crowded supporting races. The side effect of this category fraud is that truly great, truly supporting, performances are pushed aside.

That’s the case with Tracy Letts.

Letts shines as Henry Ford II, the grandson of legendary American innovator Henry Ford. Initially, Letts plays the white guy heavy, the white face of the 1960s Ford corporate environment. His first scene, in fact, is a stereotypical one in which he addresses the underprivileged workers in a Ford assembly line. Things are bad. Times are tough. Their jobs are on the line, even the middle-tier white executives. On the surface, there’s nothing overwhelming about Letts’s early scenes. They’re completely within his range as an actor – the white face of upper management threatening cost-cutting (people-cutting) measures to save a buck. Although if you do want to see what great, subtle acting is all about, watch the scene where Ford demands to know what the people at Ferrari said about him. Just watch what he does with his eyes there.

But you need the earlier factory sequence and this character of Henry Ford II to make the film sing. It sets up a beautifully executed sequence later in the film in which Letts undoes the character.

Halfway through the film, Matt Damon (playing Carroll Shelby) and Bale are threatened by establishment forces embodied by Letts and Josh Lucas (playing Leo Beebe) who deem their experimental Ford racing vehicle too risky and expensive. Letts’s Henry Ford II has become too far removed from the blood, sweat and tears of the car industry. He’s obsessed with numbers and the minutiae of running a major corporation. Shelby knows how to win this fight, though. He has to pull Ford back into the beating heart of this world, behind the wheel of a very fast car. By doing that, Shelby thinks he can keep the operation going.

So, Shelby pulls Ford into the prototype car, buckles him in, and takes him for a ride. And what a ride it is.

Carroll Shelby: You ready?
Henry Ford II: I was born ready, Mr. Shelby. Hit it.

The scene is brilliantly filmed as an interior scene with as few exterior shots as possible. That’s exactly the right way to handle it because Letts carries this scene brilliantly. It’s the only way it would work. Letts’s Ford – shocked by the speed of the vehicle, thrilled by its turns, and probably scared out of his mind – breaks down into a sobbing child. The veneer of the heartless corporate executive has worn away, worn away by good old fashion American ingenuity and drive. And a really fast fucking car.

At a Q&A in Los Angeles, Matt Damon was asked whether or not it was difficult to stay in character and avoid laughing during this scene. Damon said he was so wrapped up in watching the transformation it that never occurred to him to laugh. This is high praise.

Letts’s performance gives us a stripped away Henry Ford II. The number crunching erodes into an emotional appreciation for what Americans can do focusing their best minds on a problem. It’s a Henry Ford who experiences something he more powerful than he ever could have imagined. It’s a Henry Ford reduced to the primal sensations that make up the human experience – fear, love, excitement, and sadness. It’s an experience that, when it’s over, Letts’s Henry Ford wishes he could have shared with his grandfather.

Ford v Ferrari is a classically made and acted American film. Among many things, it’s a story about American greatness – about truly making America Great Again – not through useless slogans or jingoistic attitudes. It’s about winning through hard work and problem solving. It’s about changing the minds of those staid individuals who say, “No, you can’t,” when our heroes (in this case, Shelby and Miles) say, “Yes, we can.”

Tracy Letts deserves an Oscar nomination for Supporting Actor because he embodies that mind shift away from the cold, calculating world of corporate American values toward the rubber-hitting-the-road greatness of old-fashioned American bad ass race cars.

What could be more American than that?

Tags: Ford v FerrariThe Case forTracy Letts
Clarence Moye

Clarence Moye

Clarence Moye is an editor at Awards Daily.

Next Post
Predictions Friday: Last Look Before Those Golden Globes

Predictions Friday: Last Look Before Those Golden Globes

Sign up for Awards Daily's Breaking News

* indicates required

The State of the Race: The Oscars in a Time of Division

The State of the Race: The Oscars in a Time of Division
by Sasha Stone
January 21, 2021
3

The Spirit Awards Push their Date Back from the Oscars

The Spirit Awards Push their Date Back from the Oscars
by Sasha Stone
January 21, 2021
0

Robin Wright’s Performance in Land Could Shake up the Oscar Race

Robin Wright’s Performance in Land Could Shake up the Oscar Race
by Sasha Stone
January 20, 2021
107

Cristin Milioti On What She Spent Hours On Reddit Researching about Her ‘Palm Springs’ Character

Cristin Milioti On What She Spent Hours On Reddit Researching about Her ‘Palm Springs’ Character

Courtesy of Hulu

by Megan McLachlan
January 20, 2021
0

Reframe: Minority Report

Reframe: Minority Report
by David Phillips
January 19, 2021
4

Fernando Garcia Named Executive Vice President of the Oscars

Fernando Garcia Named Executive Vice President of the Oscars
by Sasha Stone
January 19, 2021
1

Sam Feder On How ‘Disclosure’ is a Call for Action for Hollywood

Sam Feder On How ‘Disclosure’ is a Call for Action for Hollywood

(Photo: Netflix)

by Joey Moser
January 19, 2021
0

Monica Levinson On Borat Subsequent Moviefilm’s “Loveable Misogynist” Hook That Drew Her In

Monica Levinson On Borat Subsequent Moviefilm’s “Loveable Misogynist” Hook That Drew Her In

Courtesy of Amazon Films

by Megan McLachlan
January 20, 2021
4

Critics Choice Nominates 2020 Television, Not ‘WandaVision’ (Yet)

Critics Choice

(Photo: Critics Choice)

by Clarence Moye
January 18, 2021
7

The Case for News of the World

The Case for News of the World
by Sasha Stone
January 18, 2021
13

Consider Uggie, Episode 2: Was Uggie an LGBTQ Icon?

Consider Uggie, Episode 2: Was Uggie an LGBTQ Icon?

Courtesy of MUBI/Ariztical Entertainment

by Megan McLachlan
January 18, 2021
0

Hunter Doohan On Adam’s Guilt and Questionable Choices for Showtime’s ‘Your Honor’

Hunter Doohan On Adam’s Guilt and Questionable Choices for Showtime’s ‘Your Honor’

(Photo: Skip Bolen/SHOWTIME)

by Joey Moser
January 18, 2021
0

‘Palm Springs’ Editor Matt Friedman On the Risks They Took with That Montage Scene

‘Palm Springs’ Screenwriter Andy Siara Talks the Film’s Dinosaurs and How Hall & Oates Became the Closing Song

Courtesy of Hulu

by Megan McLachlan
January 18, 2021
1

Join us Facebook

AwardsDaily Crew

  • About Us
  • Sasha Stone
  • Editor Ryan Adams
  • Clarence Moye
  • Contact Us

ADTV Crew

  • ADTV Home
  • Megan McLachlan, Co-Editor
  • Clarence Moye, Co-Editor
  • Jalal Haddad, Senior Contributor
  • Joey Moser, Senior Contributor
  • Kevin Dillon
  • Shadan Larki
  • Ben Morris
  • David Phillips

Follow on Twitter

ADTV Twitter

  • Contact
  • About Us
  • Advertising on Awards Daily

© 1999-2021 AwardsDaily.com

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Oscar Predictions
    • Best Picture
    • Best Actor
    • Best Actress
  • Good As Gold
  • Forum
  • AD TV
  • Podcasts
  • FYC Gallery
  • Interviews
  • All News

© 1999-2021 AwardsDaily.com