Dear Jeff Goldblum,
I feel that this letter has been a long time in the making, but it is imperative at this time of crossroads in your life that I get some important things off my chest. In the words of Conan O’Brien, “the eye always goes to Goldblum.”
+/- Nostalgic Musings
Three Humble Reccomendations
1. 2009’s Adam Resurrected looks to be shaping up well for you. I’m extremely interested by both the subject matter and the prospect of a Jeff Goldblum/ Willem Dafoe dual ticket. I’m not too familiar with Paul Schrader as a director, but the man wrote The Last Temptation of Christ, Raging Bull, and Taxi Driver, so I’d say he’s got some credentials.
2. While Life Aquatic may not have served as the heralding reintroduction that I had hoped for, I still believe that it was a very interesting and well-suited avenue for you, and I would love to see you explore it further. Who knows, as much as Wes Anderson tends to reuse his cast members, there might just be a part for you in one of his future films.
3. Finally, I know that you are a serious actor, but if you still have that stomach for it I believe there may finally be room for you to return to the magical summer movie blockbuster realm. It may seem like a stretch to some, but you have a proven track record of likability, and hell, if Robert Downey Jr. can be reborn into the good graces of hollywood, then I’d say that there’s probably room for you too. Leave Geena Davis at home though. But seriously, it would seem to be that in a Hollywood where the comedic circles of thought are currently divided into two polar camps, with the excessive shock value of the Apatow/Rogen camp on one side, and what has become the inanely numbing repetitiveness of the Ferrel/Stiller camp on the other, that the art of quirky, subtle, oddball humor that you have come to represent is something that is completely lost on them. As always, we need more Goldblum.
Well, allow me to start with my earliest recollections of your career. Like many kids of my generation my first introduction to the quirky Pittsburgh native named Jeff Goldblum was as Dr. Ian Malcolm in 1993’s Jurassic Park. I listened Dr. Malcolm’s take on chaos theory without knowing exactly what he was saying, but even as a child I knew. I knew there was something very strange about that weird actor Jeff Goldblum.
Via the continued successes of Independence Day and The Lost World: Jurassic Park, you were able to cement yourself in my young mind not as just some oddball supporting character type, but as a “big time actor”, or at least what I understood one to be. Your quirks played very well against more sobering cast members, and provided for some very subtle humor that is both hard to write, and even harder to fake.
Later, with the the advent of your iMac marketing campaign in the late 1990s, your presence had shifted away from just my favorite summer movies, to an almost omnipotent state by which you were now invading my living room as well. These commercials not only showcased that endearing wit and quirkiness that I had already grown to love, but they also confirmed a sneaking suspicion that had begun to mount after seeing your successive movies..... and that was that you were in real life just as strange as the characters you portrayed on screen. A very weird man indeed.
And then the dreamed died. Or so i thought. You see, I was old enough to know that with the exception of your movies being shown on TV, that your visibility had seemed to completely disintegrate. Coincidentally, this was also about the time I became aware of 1986’s The Fly, of which I was quite disgusted. To this day I still can’t shake off that last sequence where Geena Davis blows your brains out with a shotgun. Thanks for that.
However, thanks to Saturday Night Live (which for our younger readers is a program that used to be funny), we were provided with at least one bit for the Jeff Goldblum highlight reel, by way of Will Ferrel’s hilarious rendition of Cubs announcer Harry Caray.
Despite briefs moments of Goldblum gold through the beginning of the new millennium, I once again found myself disgusted with the lack of presence of a figure who had always proved to be so entertaining throughout my childhood. And then, in 2004 it seemed that the skies had opened up and God was smiling down on us all. Reintroduced to you by your role in Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, I marveled not only at the fact the all the subtle quirkiness seemed to still shine through after all those years, but that the sense of humor seemed to have matured with me to an intriguing new level. With Life Aquatic I thought to myself, “Jeff Goldblum fits perfectly into the tone of this movie,” and I was excited at the prospect of not only a continuation in that vein, but of a second golden age for one of my favorite actors.
But atlas, perhaps it wasn’t in the cards. I waited and waited for the amazing follow up role to match the greatness of Life Aquatic, but it didn’t come. And then, in 2007, NBC brought me “Raines”, and I thought, “OK, this isn’t what I wanted for Goldblum, but I’ll give it a shot.” Seven episodes in it was canceled, and so were my dreams. You deserved better.
However, I know that somewhere Jeff Goldblum is still out there. From time to time I still see him on classic appearances on shows like Conan that leave me in stitches, and it for this reason, that I would like to humbly put forth a few points of advice for one of the greats. Jeff, the country needs you:.