MALLINation

Malden with Micheal Douglas on Streets of San Francisco

The fact that a younger generation has no idea who Karl Malden was brought home today by the many blank stares from co-workers and at least one name pronunciation that suggested the attemptee thought Malden was a star of the German cinema. What Malden was, was an Oscar and Emmy winning actor whose blunt face and bulbous nose fronted a series of grit-filled humane performances on stage and screen.

I knew him best as the guy who’d pop in at the of newsbreaks on TV to scare you at the consequences of traveling without American Express – “Don’t leave home without it” was his tagline. As I got older I saw him in such classic films as Patton, playing Gen. Omar Bradley as the level-headed counterweight to George C. Scott in the title role, or his Oscar-winning turn in Streetcar Named Desire, or paired again with Brando as the neighborhood priest in On The Waterfront.

In the 70s Malden starred with young Michael Douglas in the cop drama The Streets of San Francisco, a big hit that made him a household name despite his indifference to the television medium. Later, Malden would become  President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences and was a driving force behind the controversial Oscar handed out to Elia Kazan, who directed him in Waterfront and Tin Roof, not to mention the winkingly overheated Baby Doll.

Malden, who was born Mladen George Sekulovich, was 97.