Bruce Willis's man-of-few-words mode — which he stayed in for most of his career — made it difficult for audiences to see that he wasn’t fully there anymore. mattzollerseitz writes
Illustration: Ryan Melgar Bruce Willis’s stardom began in a boardroom at ABC in 1984. The network’s top executives had gathered to discuss Moonlighting creator Glenn Gordon Caron’s desire to cast the lead male role of David Addison with Willis, an ex-bartender from New Jersey whose only notable credit was a guest spot on Miami Vice.
But by the time Willis retired from acting in March owing to aphasia, a brain disorder that affects speech and cognition, he was best known for playing exceptionally violent men of few words in the tradition of Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson, and the two ’80s action superstars to which his early persona had offered an alternative: Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger. His transformation was among the most drastic in pop-culture history.
From left: 1985–89: Moonlighting. Photo: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images1988: Die Hard. Photo: 20th Century Fox/Getty Images From top: 1985–89: Moonlighting. Photo: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images1988: Die Hard. Photo: 20th Century Fo... more From top: 1985–89: Moonlighting. Photo: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty Images1988: Die Hard.
Willis turned out to be perfect for a variety of reasons, including his human-scale machismo and his credibility as a quick-thinking problem solver.
From left: 1994: Pulp Fiction. Photo: Moviestore Collection Ltd/Alamy Stock Photo1995: 12 Monkeys. Photo: Universal Pictures From top: 1994: Pulp Fiction. Photo: Moviestore Collection Ltd/Alamy Stock Photo1995: 12 Monkeys. Photo: Universal Pictures With the one-two punch of Pulp Fiction and 12 Monkeys, the bifurcation of Willis’s screen persona became pronounced. Over the next decade, he would alternate men who love to talk with men who barely speak. M.
Willis embraced his own caricature by appearing in two of Stallone’s three Expendables tentpoles, which were the action-adventure equivalent of those old K-tel record-and-tape sets: every star who has ever done an action movie in one collection. Arnold Schwarzenegger! Jean-Claude Van Damme! Wesley Snipes! Jason Statham! Chuck Norris! Jet Li! Dolph Lundgren! While the films gave tasty morsels to bit players, they were cash machines for aging idols.
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