Thoughts: Goodbye Luke

From Anne Thompson at Variety:

I met Paul Newman once, At Cannes. He was there for Mr. and Mrs. Bridge. He was my height, and looked straight at me with his brilliant blue eyes. They were piercing, intensely blue. Almost azure.

After a long battle with cancer, Newman died Friday, at his farm near Westport, Conn. Here's the A.P. obit.

Sure he was gorgeous. Always. But that was by no means the sum of his gifts. Newman was insecure, people who worked with him have said. He wasn't one of those actors who took his gift for granted. He fussed and worried and needed his directors to reassure him and hold his hand. They were always rewarded.

Here's William Goldman from Adventures in the Screen Trade:

Paul Newman is the least starlike superstar I've ever worked with. He's an educated man and a trained actor and he never wants more close-ups. What he wants is the best possible script and character he can have. And he loves to be surrounded by the finest actors available, because he believes the better they are, the better the picture's apt to be, the better he'll come out. Many stars, maybe even most, don't want that competition.

They don't make them like him anymore.