(Mayhew is, incidentally, loosely based on William Faulkner, and Mahoney in his bowtie and mustache is a dead ringer for the man.) With just a handful of scenes, Mahoney creates a character whose magnificence lies well behind him, and contributes mightily to Barton's disillusionment with Hollywood in general and writing in particular. Mayhew is an alcoholic writer whose critically acclaimed modernist novels have, like Barton's plays, attracted the attention of Hollywood, where he's been slumming ever since leaving the South. His first line to Barton, while washing his hands: "Sorry 'bout the odor."
While Barton is still trying to adjust to the Hollywood lifestyle, he encounters Mahoney's character, WP Mayhew, for the first time-a dapper Southern gentlemen puking his guts out in a restaurant bathroom. There, with an enormous opportunity to spread his message and make some good money, he develops writer's block. Barton Fink is the story of a socialist playwright who makes the move from New York to Hollywood just before World War II. As in Eight Men Out, Mahoney does a lot with a relatively small supporting part. The second film-and my favorite Coen brothers movie-that has made me respect Mahoney is his comic turn in Barton Fink. Watch Mahoney in his handful of insert shots in the Game 3 montage, at the emotions he takes the viewer through in just a few seconds of screentime. His pride, his disbelief, and finally his disappointment-who hasn't felt their heart pricked upon hearing "I'm disappointed in you" from their father?-command your sympathy and sadness.
It's tragic, and Mahoney plays it excellently. It's hopeless, and we know it even if he doesn't. During the court case that follows, we see Gleason try to salvage his boys' reputations by standing up for them in the face of all the evidence against them. He goes to his players, tries to get them to open up to them, and when they won't, we see, in a wonderfully subtle performance, his heartbreak. He's proud of them and trusts them, not just to win ballgames but to play to the standard he has seen them set.Īs the World Series unfolds, we see Gleason confronted with evidence he doesn't want to believe. But in his handful of scenes, Mahoney evokes enormous pathos. Mahoney doesn't have a lot of scenes in the film, which gives much more attention to the players involved in the bribery scandal-Eddie Cicotte (David Strathairn), Buck Weaver (John Cusack), Chick Gandil (Michael Rooker), and Shoeless Joe Jackson (DB Sweeney). Mahoney plays Kid Gleason, a veteran ballplayer and now the manager of the Sox. One of my favorite movies-and, in my opinion, the best baseball movie out there-is Eight Men Out, the story of the 1919 World Series scandal that ended the careers of eight players for the Chicago White Sox.
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