Even if Frances McDormand did nothing but make movies with the Coen brothers, she'd be one of our most compelling actors.
Give or take Meryl Streep, she gets the best roles available for her age group, and because she's always been a character actor, the richest part of her career may be the past couple of decades. Even when she thinks she's bad — she said she didn't know what she was doing in a damsel-in-distress part in "Darkman" — she's still fascinating.
But it's the Coens who know how to utilize her talent best. McDormand has said she automatically says yes when the St. Louis Park natives — her husband Joel and his brother Ethan — ask her to appear, which means she plays big roles and small roles, smart people and doofs, elegant ladies and down-at-the-heels stragglers.
Hollywood could be said to have a certain type of McDormand role — women who are steely, resourceful and smart — but the Coens cast McDormand as if she can play pretty much anyone. And they're right: a weary schemer in "The Man Who Wasn't There," a dimwitted social climber in "Burn After Reading" and, coming next year, the murder-minded Lady Macbeth in Joel Coen's "Macbeth," with Denzel Washington in the title role.
I can't wait to see McDormand's take on that character, who can be interpreted in so many ways. Will she be a manipulator? A survivor of trauma? A madwoman? Whatever choices McDormand makes, they're bound to be revealing and original.
That's been true since McDormand interpreted a character who could have been called the femme fatale of "Blood Simple" but who was much more human and grounded than those femmes tend to be. McDormand always brings unexpected dimension to her roles, whether it's her deep dive into HBO's "Olive Kitteridge," in which she fully embodied a character that lovers of Elizabeth Strout's book thought couldn't be captured on film, or even her government wonk in "Transformers: Dark of the Moon," a part that was more about a paycheck. Of course, she's outstanding in both of her Oscar-winning performances, although the rest of "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" has aged badly.
McDormand walks a fine balance, capturing relatable characters you instantly feel you know but who also remain mysterious, keeping secrets from us that only the actor knows. In movies such as the rock drama "This Must Be the Place" or the adventure "Aeon Flux," she's cast because directors know she can bring intelligence and grit to a role that doesn't look like much on the page. But when she has great material, as she does in these seven, she's at her secretive best.
