Barry Levinson Films | Barry Levinson Filmography | Barry Levinson Biography | Barry Levinson Career | Barry Levinson Awards

Although his most lucrative Oscar-winning film, Rain Man, was set in conservative Cincinnati, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and several points in between, Barry Levinson has never forgotten his roots and is still regarded by Marylanders as the ultimate Baltimore filmmaker. Diner, the film that launched his directing career in 1982, was based in the Baltimore suburb of Forest Park, where he grew up. So was Tin Men, made five years later. And in 1989, at the age of forty-seven, following the success of Rain Man and Good Morning, Vietnam, Levinson was back again in Baltimore, to the delight of the Maryland Film Commission, shooting Avalon.

It could not have been otherwise, since Avalon is based upon Levinson's own family immigrating to Baltimore from Russia in 1914. Baltimore is his city and his most personal films have focussed upon ordinary people he might have met there growing up during the 1940s and 1950s-the youngsters of Diner, the aluminum siding hucksters of Tin Men. Levinson has internalized the values of middle-America and has succeeded most brilliantly when filming stories about characters who live by those values.

If some of the critics were disturbed that Robert Redford's Roy Hobbs was not as seriously flawed as the original character in Bernard Malamud's The Natural, it is perhaps because Levinson's interpretation of the character is governed by assumptions different from Malamud's and because Levinson's orientation is decidedly more optimistic. The fidelity of Levinson's The Natural can be and has been challenged on pedantic grounds. The film might better be regarded not as an adaptation, but as an interpretation that will stand on its own, regardless of its source.

Levinson told the New York Times Magazine that he does not consider himself as a writer or a ?writer-director.? As Alex Ward rightly suggested, however, Levinson can be considered an American auteur who will leave his personal imprint on any project he touches, through sentimental touches (in The Natural or Tin Men, for example), quirky casting, or inspired comedie improvisation. He has an unfailing sense of what might constitute the right touch in a given dramatic situation. ?I don't like other people directing what I write,? Levinson told Ward, "but I don't mind directing something somebody else wrote."

In fact, after moving to the West Coast from American University in Washington, D.C., Levinson worked for over two years as a writer for Mel Brooks on two pictures, Silent Movie and High Anxiety (also making his screen debut as an insane bellhop in the Psycho parody scene). While working with Brooks on High Anxiety he first met Mark Johnson, who later became the Executive Producer of Diner. At that point Levinson had already won three Emmy Awards for his network television writing with the ?Tim Conway Show? and "Carol Burnett Show."

Levinson collaborated with Valerie Curtin (whom he met at the Comedy Store in Los Angeles) on two feature film scripts,... And Justice for All (for Norman Jewison) and Inside Moves (for Richard Donner), before writing the script for Diner. His debut film as director is about young men ?hanging out? in Baltimore over Christmas of 1959, one of them (Steve Guttenberg) enjoying his last days of bachelorhood before getting married. Mel Brooks told him that the script idea resembled / vitelloni, but Levinson had not even seen Fellini's film. Levinson told Stephen F?rber of the New York Times that the Guttenberg character was based upon his cousin Eddie, who ?loved fried bologna sandwiches? and ?slept until 2:30 in the afternoon.? The cast also featured Mickey Rourke and talented newcomers Kevin Bacon and Ellen Barkin. It was the lowest-budgeted ?sleeper? produced by MGM that year. It started slowly after being reviewed in Rolling Stone and the New Yorker, then gradually built a following and staying power. (The president for distribution at MGM/UA referred to it as "Lazarus.") Vincent Canby in the New York Times called it the ?happiest surprise of the year to date,? and Levinson was "discovered."

Levinson also collaborated with Valerie Curtin in writing Best Friends (starring Burt Reynolds and Goldie Hawn) and a remake of the Preston Sturges classic Unfaithfully Yours. The screenplay for... And fustice for All, meanwhile, was nominated for an Academy Award, demonstrating the quality of the Levinson-Curtin team. Levinson also directed the high-spirited fantasy Young Sherlock Holmes, but aside, perhaps, from Rain Man and The Natural, Levinson will best be remembered for his Baltimore pictures, drawn from his own experience and marked with his own special brand of compassionate humor and nostalgia. As a personal filmmaker he is perhaps the nearest American equivalent to Fran?ois Truffaut.

During the 1990s Levinson scored a popular and critical success working with author James Toback on Bugsy, starring Warren Beatty as larger-than-life gangster Benjamin (Bugsy) Siegel and Annette Bening as Virginia Hill. The film was much admired for its snappy dialogue and named best picture of 1991 by the Los Angeles Film Critics, who also voted Levinson Best Director and Toback Best Screenwriter. Bugsy later earned ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director.

In 1992 Levinson misfired with Toys, an odd antiwar fable written by Levinson and Valerie Curtain, starring Robin Williams, Joan Cusack, and Michael Gambon. Levinson had the project in mind for years and was able to direct it after the success of Bugsy. The idea that children can be conditioned by the kinds of toys they are given was workable, but the fantasy was too bizarre to be taken seriously. Levinson also misfired in 1994 with fimmy Hollywood, starring Joe Pesci as a loser and hustler, which was described in Variety as "an oddball attempt to mix offbeat comedy with social commentary."

In 1994 Levinson reclaimed his Hollywood clout with his expert direction of Disclosure, starring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore and adapted by Paul Attanasio from the popular novel by Michael Crichton, who also worked with Levinson as producer. The controversial novel, concerning sexual harassment in the workplace, helped to generate interest in the film. But a far more important collaboration between Levinson and Paul Attanasio started in 1993 on the NBC television police series Homicide: Life on the Street, adapted from Baltimore Sun reporter David Simon's published memoir about policework in Levinson's hometown. The series was hailed by critics as the best police drama on television, giving it prominence over the flashier yet more conventional NYPD Blue. As executive producer of the series Levinson also directed the pilot in 1993 and the season finale in 1995, thus helping Homicide to establish and maintain its quality and authenticity as an outstanding reality-based detective drama. Arguably, the series represents the director's best work since Avalon while setting a new standard for television drama.-JAMES M. WELSH