Summary
TO SAY that Alec Baldwin has aged well is to employ a non- standard usage of the term. He does not look younger than his years and since the days of Hunt For Red October and Beetlejuice, the raven hair has greyed, and the sharp planes of his saturnine features have softened and thickened. But right now he is at the peak of his powers and when he arrives at the John F Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Massachusetts, freshmen who are too young to remember his incendiary ten-minute rant in Glengarry Glen Ross flutter with excitement. Baldwin is in town to address Harvard students and the effect he has on the gathering is almost Clintonesque; wherever he directs his chlorine-blue gaze, they swoon a little.
At one point, Baldwin could have been a candidate either for Oscar voters or political glory, a choice that hadn't faced an actor since Warren Beatty stopped making good movies. Combining glamour and political conscience, Baldwin was the left-wing's Mr Right. George Clooney's career could easily have belonged to him - both men are strenuously democratic, darkly handsome, bright, well-read and engaged. When he co-hosted the Oscars this year, the best gag was Baldwin's long, resentful staring match with nominee Clooney in the front row.See the full content of this document
Extract
Smart Alec
The difference between the two is that while Clooney appears laid- back, after bad career choices and some catastrophic confrontations, Baldwin has a more transgressive reputation as a turbulent hothead. Admittedly, his latest bombshell is not some impulsively-tossed grenade. In two years time, Baldwin says he will be giving up TV - and perhaps acting - for good.
"I've been doing what I've been doing for 30 years," he says. "I've done a lot of films and TV shows and there hasn't been a lot of downtime. When you get older, you think about other things you might have done. It sounds a little...See the full content of this document
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