You know, I never actually watched Lovejoy. Saw a lot of ads for it, I grant you. I had A&E in the ’80s. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen an episode. I think it’s entirely possible that the first thing I ever noticed Ian McShane in was Deadwood, and that’s a crying shame. I mean, it feels that way. And then I look at his IMDb page and think that maybe the real shame is that people didn’t entirely know what to do with Ian McShane until he was Al Swearengen, the most appropriately named character in HBO history, and they all figured it out.
At 74, he’s of an age to have been one of those Swinging London types, like Michael Caine. Indeed, the earliest of his roles that I’ve seen, Charlie Cartwright of If This Is Tuesday, It Must Be Belgium, is clearly intended to be that sort—he’s a tour guide who picks up a different girl every trip. His subplot in a subplot-busy movie is the question of whether this trip’s girl will be the one to make him change his ways. Actually, you kind of figure this is how Mr. Wednesday spent the ’60s, not to give too much away about American Gods before it airs, which was one of the reasons I was so glad at that particular casting choice. All those years of hard living leave you looking, well, like Ian McShane.
Who apparently had him quite the little drug habit, too. I’m grateful that he’s come out the other side; from what I can tell, he’s lucky to have done so. Perhaps that’s why he settled into Lovejoy; that was nice, steady work, and if it wasn’t too exciting, well, there’s such thing as too much excitement. He spent the ’90s on television. He started getting steady work there in the ’80s—two episodes of Miami Vice!—and just kept going. I think Deadwood launched him into the public eye again.
Though it seems mostly people want to cast him in watered-down versions of Al Swearengen, which is the danger of finding a role that you embody the way no one else can. I actually kind of liked On Stranger Tides, and I definitely liked him in it, but I’d rather he get more chances like Mr. Sergei Alexander Bobinski in Coraline than just a whole bunch of Scary Old Guys, even if he’s so wonderfully scary. And, okay, not young. I’d really love to see him play an unalloyed hero that the audience isn’t sure they can trust because of how we’re so used to seeing him.
Will I be watching him as Mr. Wednesday? Okay, I don’t have Starz. I’ll probably spring for the Amazon Prime upgrade that will let me watch it; it’s not that expensive, and I’ll have money tomorrow. But his was the casting choice that made me most certain I’d watch it, yes. I tend to be hesitant about adaptations of works I love, because they’re so often done so badly. But anyone who would cast Ian McShane in the role has to understand the book at least a little, to choose so well.
