RIP, Burt Reynolds
There was a time when Burt Reynolds was, well, the coolest. His masculinity came with self-deprecation that underscored his self-confidence, his aggressiveness made room for some vulnerability. He could pose for Cosmopolitan -- you knew I couldn't leave that out -- and it was just a little romp. Men and women liked him, and -- key to his leading-man appeal -- he came across as someone who really liked women, and not just for a hop in the sack. Women could look at his relationship with Sally Field, onscreen and off, and think, well, if Sally Field likes him. ... He was, in short, George Clooney before Clooney. And he knew how to reach across demographics: appealing to a Southern, drive-in kind of audience in some films; the action crowd in others, and the people who took movies seriously in a third. I was a southerner who loved action movies and good films, so I saw a lot of Burt Reynolds in the '70s: Fuzz, Deliverance, Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex ,...