The Brief (But So Bright) Half-Decade Peak of Ryan O’Neal

In the year 2023, it might be hard to grasp how big of a star Ryan O’Neal was from 1970 to 1975, but I’m going to give it a try. 

O’Neal toiled away in guest spots on episodic television from 1960-65 before catching his big break as a key player on the popular ABC nighttime soap opera Peyton Place from 1965-69. When Peyton Place ended in ‘69, O’Neal got his first shot at movie stardom, playing the lead in an adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s caper drama The Big Bounce. The film was a disappointment, but that setback proved temporary for O’Neal when he landed the role that made his name with Arthur Hiller’s weepy drama Love Story in 1970.

While it’s easy to argue that Love Story hasn’t aged well, there is no denying what a massive success it was at the time. Based on the novel by Erich Segal, Love Story, a star-crossed romance about a wealthy Harvard student (O’Neal) who finds love with a working class woman (Ali MacGraw), despite his disapproving father, only for her to succumb to cancer, quickly became one of the most successful films in the history of cinema. One’s take on the film can be defined by how they respond to the movie’s most famous line: “Love means never having to say you’re sorry.” Either you choke up at the thought of it, or you think it’s one of the stupidest things you’ve ever heard. There really is no in-between.

Impossibly sentimental, and polarizing to critics, the film not only made bushels of money, but also scored seven Oscar nominations, including best picture and best actor for O’Neal (his only nomination). After Love Story, O’Neal was as hot as the freshly risen sun, and the next few years would be incredibly successful for the young and remarkably handsome actor. 

In 1972, O’Neal connected with director Peter Bogdanovich (himself coming off of his breakthrough film The Last Picture Show) and Barbra Streisand to make the delirious comedy What’s Up, Doc? While almost no film could touch the financial success of Love Story, Doc was a humongous hit in its own right. Inspired by the films of Howard Hawks (particularly Bringing up Baby), Bogdanovic, O’Neal, and Streisand proved to be a perfect onscreen combination. 

Essentially a caper film about a mix-up of four plaid bags (one containing precious jewels, another with government secrets, a third with igneous rocks, and the fourth with unknown contents) in a San Francisco hotel, What’s Up Doc? transcends its delightfully silly plot by being so expertly helmed by Bogdanovich and due to the terrific chemistry between its co-stars. I would argue that What’s Up Doc? is the last great screwball comedy ever made. I’m not even sure it’s close.

Bogdanovich and O’Neal wasted no time building on their success, working together again the next year on the depression era road dramedy Paper Moon. Starring O’Neal and his prepubescent daughter Tatum as grifters who may (or may not) be father and daughter on screen, Paper Moon, filmed in lustrous black and white, kept the hot streak going for both men. O’Neal slipped right into the film’s time period with great ease, while also letting Tatum shine in her own right. In fact, Tatum O’Neal became the youngest Oscar winner ever when the Academy selected her as best supporting actress at just ten years of age. 

The next year, the great Stanley Kubrick came calling and casted O’Neal as his lead in the historical epic Barry Lyndon, based on the novel by William Makepeace Thackery. Lyndon was a legendarily troubled shoot that lasted 350 days, and Kubrick’s penchant for innumerable takes brought O’Neal to misery. 

While the film was well reviewed for its technical aspects at the time, and did receive seven Oscar nominations, many critics found O’Neal to be miscast as an 18th century Irish gold digger. However, time has been kind to both the film and O’Neal, and the numerous revised appreciations of the film now often end with Barry Lyndon being hailed as a masterpiece. 

Coming off of four very successful critical and commercial hits (even counting the reservations some critics had with Barry Lyndon), O’Neal seemed poised to have a Newmanesque career. He had proven himself in drama and comedy as well as in contemporary and period pieces. However, the remainder of the ‘70s were a bumpy ride for O’Neal. 

A third collaboration with Bogdanovich in 1976, Nickelodeon, was poorly reviewed and barely released. Richard Attenborough’s World War II film A Bridge Too Far was a financial success, but reviews were modest, and the film’s large ensemble didn’t give O’Neal (or hardly anyone in the cast) the opportunity to stand out. 

The absolute nadir of the decade for O’Neal would follow the next year. In need of a hit, O’Neal filmed Oliver’s Story, a sequel to Love Story, that bombed at the box office and received excoriating reviews. The only uptick of the late ‘70s for O’Neal could be found in the last year of that decade with The Main Event, a romantic comedy that re-teamed O’Neal and Streisand. The film was a box office success, and one might have thought that O’Neal would have found more quality opportunities after coming off of a hit, despite The Main Event’s soft critical notices. 

But it all ended right there. 

The remainder of O’Neal’s career contained nary a hit and rarely a positive critical note. His last lead in a Hollywood film was in 1989 with Chances Are, a mediocre romantic comedy co-starring Cybill Shepherd (whose career was also boosted by Bogdanovich) that came and left theaters quickly that year. 

After that, O’Neal became more known for his stormy relationships with Tatum and long-time companion Farrah Fawcett. Tatum struggled with addiction (a fact likely exacerbated by Ryan’s estrangement from Tatum), and O’Neal and Fawcett became tabloid items due to his affairs and volatile behavior. The two split in 1997, but reconciled in 2001, and in a case of life horribly imitating art, O’Neal was at Fawcett’s bedside when she died from cancer in 2009. 

After Fawcett’s death O’Neal acted sparingly, with his final credit being on the procedural drama Bones, which ended in 2017.

It seems incredibly strange that O’Neal never had anywhere near the sort of comeback that John Travolta enjoyed. He was handsome, talented, and versatile, but it wasn’t to be. 

That does not change that oh so brief peak run from 1970 to 1975. For just a flash of a moment, O’Neal was the biggest, most in-demand movie star in the world. His legacy may be truncated, but how could anyone argue against its significance? When adjusted for inflation, O’Neal’s four great successes earned the following box office dollars:

Love Story: Nearly $1.4 billion.

What’s Up, Doc?: Just shy of a half a billion dollars. 

Paper Moon: $218 million 

Barry Lyndon: $184 million

He may not have shined for long, but he certainly shined bright. 

Ryan O’Neal died on December 8, 2023. He was 82 years old.