The ubiquity of Paul Newman endures, from his iconic performances in films like “Cool Hand Luke” and “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” to his charity food line Newman’s Own, to his voice performance in Pixar’s “Cars.” But what of his wife and longtime creative partner, Joanne Woodward? You might know his famous quip about their long-lasting marriage, “why go out for hamburger when I have steak at home?” — but for an actress whose impact on the craft of screen acting was as Earth-shattering as fellow Actors Studio classmate Marlon Brando, Woodward’s legacy remains somewhat obscured by Newman’s starshine luster.
Taking its name from a moniker bestowed on the couple by their good friend Gore Vidal, Ethan Hawke’s mosaic-like six-part docuseries “The Last Movie Stars” not only chronicles the life, work, and everlasting love of Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, it sets out to balance the scales. To show that without Joanne Woodward, there would be no Paul Newman the icon, Paul Newman the sex symbol, or Paul Newman the man. It shows how their stories are inexorably linked together.
Early in the fifth episode, Hawke discusses with his daughter Maya Hawke his struggle to figure out what this project is really about. “Is it about what a stud Paul Newman is, or is it about how women get demolished by a male-driven culture?” he posits. Maya reminds him of some relationship advice he once gave her: there are always three people in a relationship and that the relationship is the third person, a creation of the two people together. This becomes the thesis of the project.
Brought on board by one of Newman and Woodward’s children, director Hawke waded through a ton of archival material, from home videos, television appearances, and even their films to craft their story. The key in all this material was an abandoned memoir Newman had been working on in the ’80s. He hired his friend, screenwriter Stuart Stern, to interview everyone in his life, including directors like Sidney Lumet, George Roy Hill, Martin Ritt, Arthur Penn, and Elia Kazan, co-stars like Robert Redford, and even his ex-wife Jackie.
These transcripts are brought to life like a radio play through voice performances. Some in the voice cast had direct relationships with Newman and Woodward, others with Hawke. Laura Linney, who was mentored by Woodward early in her career, voices Joanne, while George Clooney voices Paul. While each is effective, you never quite forget you’re hearing actors speak their words, especially when contrasted with archival footage of their actual voices.
The relative anonymity of the directors featured allows the rest of the voice cast a bit more leeway, with wonderful vocal performances from Bobby Cannavale, Josh Hamilton, and Tom McCarthy. The most impactful of these voices is Zoe Kazan as Newman’s ex-wife Jackie, whose clear-eyed assessment of the dissolution of their marriage, and then eventual death by drug overdose of their son is truly sobering.
Through the six episodes, Hawke traces how Newman and Woodward met, their ascension to movie star status after her Oscar win for “The Three Faces of Eve” and his breakthrough roles in “Hud” and “The Hustler,” and the creative and romantic ups-and-downs of their five-decade long partnership. He expertly weaves footage from their films that, when paired with the memoir audio, takes on autobiographical layers, unearthing them like an archaeologist finding these layers hidden in plain sight. We see this in the electricity in their first collaboration, “The Long, Hot Summer,” and in the bittersweet complexity of their relationship in the obscure drama “Winning.”
While the doc’s exploration of Newman’s superstardom in the 1960s is strong, Hawke’s careful examination of how motherhood affected Woodward’s stardom is raw and powerful. In one stirring interview, Joanne reveals that despite her love for her children, had she known what it would do to her career, she might not have had them. She channels this rage into her collaborations with Newman as director in films like “Rachel, Rachel” and especially “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds,” a role that haunted her home life. Hawke also gives special attention to Woodward’s television work, for which she earned nine Emmy nominations and three wins. Much of her television work, which pushed social and political boundaries, is not widely available in the streaming age, whereas most of Newman’s films are. Unfortunately, this continues to perpetuate the inequality of their status within the zeitgeist.
This imbalance, among other factors, weighed heavily on their marriage. Unlike the many projects about famous people that come with a stamp of approval from their estate, “The Last Movie Stars” is not afraid to show the complexity of truth. There is no desire to perpetuate a fantasy, to print the legend. The family is fully on board with exposing the difficult times and hard work that went into the success of the subjects’ long marriage.
Working over Zoom, Hawke is clearly a skilled interviewer, pulling honest conversations from Newman and Woodward’s family members. Stephanie, Newman’s daughter from his first marriage, speaks candidly about the pain he caused her mother by having an affair with Woodward for five years before their divorce and his remarriage. But she also speaks lovingly about how Woodward worked hard to blend their families.
Newman and Woodward’s daughters openly discuss both the intense sexual passion their parents shared, but also how miserable much of their home life was, including revealing what it was like living with a father who was a high-functioning alcoholic. Their daughter Melissa directly addresses this aspect of the doc, sharing that she feels a little guilty dismantling the idea that their marriage was a simple happily ever after, but that the work they put in to make it last deserves more credit than that.
Not only does Hawke use Zoom to conduct interviews, but this method also allows for a peek into his creative process. There is a real joy in seeing his passion as he tells Newman and Woodward’s story to his creative collaborators over the video app. You feel the appreciation they all have for Newman and Woodward as innovative artists, but you also see the power of sharing stories directly with each other. The power of conversations. The power of wading through living history.
The patchwork quality of archival video and film clips combined with Zoom footage adds a warmth to this project that the smoother Ken Burns-style documentary can never achieve. Who wouldn’t want to see Ethan Hawke and Martin Scorsese share a laugh while an image of Gene Tierney in “Leave Her To Heaven” is clearly visible on Marty’s bookshelf?
The final episode uses two films to tie up their creative and personal achievements: “The Color of Money” and “Mr. and Mrs. Bridge.” Newman finally won his Oscar for the former, while the latter was the last of 16 film collaborations between Newman and Woodward. In each, their artistry reached a pinnacle, and Hawke argues, so did their growth as people. Each project was not a ploy for awards or money, but about their dedication to the craft. When asked by a television reporter around this time if she loved the same things about Newman now as she did when they first met, Woodward replies she didn’t love him when they met. They didn’t know what love was. They had to grow up together to know what it really means.
In the final episode, Zoe Kazan asks Hawke what he learned about himself while making this documentary. Before revealing his answer, Hawke cuts away to interviews with Newman and Woodward’s grandsons, who share stories of love, not of fame. As the series ends, Hawke’s voice reads the words of Tennessee Williams, “We are saved only by love.” And so it was for Paul and Joanne, whose body of work is more than just the films they made and awards they won. It is the life they built together that will remain their greatest legacy. I suspect it is through this lens Hawke reflected on his own life, and this is what we’re meant to learn from his journey. [A]