Brendan Fraser has risen from his ashes and he has done it in a big way. The protagonist of The Whale has been made tonight with the Oscar for best actor.
Visibly moved, the artist thanked filmmaker Darren Aronofsky for the opportunity to “give me a creative lifeline and drag me onto this ship of yours called The Whale.” He has taken stock of his career, recalling his beginnings thirty years ago, when he had many facilities that “I did not know how to appreciate. Until I stopped having them.” And it is that, “things have not always been easy,” recalled the actor, who in the nineties triumphed after starring in films such as George of the Jungle or The Mummy.
In The Whale, he plays Charlie, a morbidly obese literature professor who teaches online but refuses to show himself to his students through his computer camera. He doesn’t want anyone to look at him or judge him because of his physique. He weighs 272 kilos and is afraid that his appearance will generate rejection. In one last chance for redemption, he tries to reconnect with his teenage daughter and reconnect with him.
“The whale changed me physically and emotionally,” Fraser confessed in a videoconference interview to various international media, including La Vanguardia, days after receiving a standing ovation from the public and critics at the Venice Festival.
Although she grew fat for the role, most of her characterization relies on prosthetics, makeup, and effects. A work of craftsmanship that has been recognized by the Hollywood Academy, as it has delivered the Oscar for best makeup and hairstyling to this film.
Along with Fraser, they were competing for the golden statuette Austin Butler and his Elvis, who recently won the Bafta in this category; Paul Mescal for Aftersun, Bill Nighty for Living and Collin Farrell for Banshees of Inisherin.
