My wife is watching A Face in the Crowd on TCM right now and that movie gave my wife a new

[diabeticman]

respect for Andy Griffith as an actor. She personally believes that this was his best work and wondered why he never did a movie like that again.

[Liberal_in_LA]

1. type casting? maybe popularity of andy g. show ended his chance to play serious roles?

Not sure which came 1st, face in the crowd or at show

[ChisolmTrailDem]

2. I had moved recently and didn't realize that a copy of that movie from Netflix

had gotten packed into a box, rather than put in the mail to send back. This weekend I was going through some of my stuff and ran across it. So, I figured what the heck, may as well watch it again before I put it in the mail, lol.

Love that movie and was shocked when I first saw it and, yes, it did give me a new respect for Andy Griffith too.

[Warpy]

3. I agree with her

He plays a raging asshole who starts believing his own bullshit but who is always human and never a caricature.

Lonesome Rhodes almost evokes a little sympathy at the end because his fall is so far and so hard, especially when it's just starting to dawn on him and Matthau arrives to give the knife a little twist. He's a despicable creep from every angle, but we're left hoping he doesn't go back to the gutter Neal fished him out of. That was the genius of Griffith's acting.

[TDale313]

4. I love that movie.

Still so timely. Of course, thanks to Keith Olbermann, I'll never be able to see it without thinking "Lonesome Rhodes Beck"

[spanone]

5. andy was also great in a movie called 'no time for sergeants'

[TeamPooka]

6. The movie kind of bombed and Andy couldn't get work as a serious actor.

A Face in the Croiwd is a cinematic masterpiece but it didn't do well at the BO back then.
The movie got mixed reviews when it came out in 1957.
The movie kind of bombed and Andy couldn't get work as a serious actor.
So that's why Andy went back to square one and his country boy comedy persona that he was already famous for and did No Time For Sargents in 1958 and developed The Andy Griffith Show after that.
It premiered on TV in 1960 less than 3 years after Face came out.

[lovemydog]

7. Phenomenal movie

As timely now as ever.

[stg81]

8. Lonesome Rhodes

[DeSwiss]

9. ''...and wondered why he never did a movie like that again.''

- Andy is wonderful in this movie, but the reason the movie was both great and bombed can be summed up in one name: Elia Kazan and in particular this aspect of his career at this point in time: HUAC.

And your wife is right, Andy Griffith was great in this movie.

K&R

[unc70]

10. He did a few serious roles

Few movie roles come along for anyone to match his in "A Face in the Crowd".

While Griffith certainly became typecast in lighter roles, he did do a few TV movies that were really dark, "Gramps" and "Under the Influence"

Andy was a local treasure, NC and UNC, and an active progressive/liberal Democrat. We miss him.

[Bluenorthwest]

11. A great film and great performance, followed the next year by his best comic

role as Will Stockdale in No Time For Sergeants, the role that had made him famous first in the live TV version, then on Broadway. It is not to be missed funny.

[Bluenorthwest]

12. A link to an audio You Tube of Andy's early comedy recording 'What It Was

Was Football'.