Kevin Costner, who peaked as a Hollywood leading man in the early ’90s and saw his star wane in the 2000s, is on the verge of a major comeback. As reported by Deadline’s Mike Fleming, the huge success of the History Channel’s “Hatfields & McCoys” miniseries has led to the actor “being courted for a pair of big roles that could bring on a resurgence.”
Fifty-seven now and approaching elder-statesman status, Costner has been offered the co-lead in Kenneth Branagh’s upcoming Jack Ryan film. He would play the recruiter and mentor of Ryan, who, as played by “Star Trek”’s Chris Pine, is a younger version of Tom Clancy’s resolute CIA man, famously played by Harrison Ford in “Patriot Games” and “Clear and Present Danger.”
Costner is also being courted, writes Fleming, by Luc Besson’s Europacorp to star as a government assassin, Ethan Renner, in “Three Days to Kill.” The character, who is gravely ill, seeks to reconcile with his daughter and complete a final mission before he dies. McG (Joseph McGinty Nichol) has been penciled in as a possible director for the French-made English-language production.
Zack Snyder’s Superman movie “Man of Steel,” in which Costner plays Jonathan (“Pa”) Kent, Clark’s adoptive dad, is meanwhile in post-production; it is scheduled to open next June. Diane Lane plays Martha Kent and Henry Cavill is Clark/Superman opposite Amy Adams’s Lois Lane.
Despite the failure of “Wyatt Earp” in 1994, Costner’s loyalty to the Western and its ilk has served him well in his career. “Silverado” (1985) showed his star potential, two years before “The Untouchables” and “No Way Out.” “Dances With Wolves” (1990), though flawed, brought him Oscars for Best Director and Best Picture. The downbeat “Open Range” (2003), which he also directed and starred in, kept the genre alive during one of its periodic slumps and showed how good Costner could be in a battered cowboy hat and with an old timer (Robert Duvall) by his side.
Although the blood feud drama “Hatfields & McCoys” isn’t a Western, being set on the Kentucky-West Virginia border, it is mined from the same materials and corresponds exactly to the Western period, from the Civil War through the closing of the frontier. Costner’s portrayal of William Anderson “Devil Anse” Hatfield, the clan patriarch, is his finest in years.
“As Devil Anse, Costner comes as close to a hero as this piece gets,” wrote Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times. “It is a truly brilliant performance, worthy of an Emmy for the pipe-smoking alone.
“Costner makes this Hatfield as wise as he is ruthless. He appears to be the only character aware of what is actually happening and the only one capable of stopping it, which makes his refusal to do so until it is too late the story’s greatest tragedy.”
The May 28 premiere of the six-hour show was watched by 13.9 million, making it the top non-sports telecast in cable television history, according to Deadline. It earned 22 Emmy nominations, including nods for both Costner and Bill Paxton as Outstanding Lead Actor in a Movie or Miniseries. Best of all, it revealed how an American actor ill-suited to playing a So Cal Robin Hood with blow-waved hair could, 21 years on, excel as a grizzled, grimy bastard with a taste for brutal revenge.