Barry Miller plays outsiders who can be vulnerable without asking to be liked. We value the complication he brings to an ensemble, though a strong leading performance can leave his quieter work too far in the background.
Fi1m perspective
In Saturday Night Fever (1977), Barry Miller’s Bobby C. is the vulnerable youngest member of the Brooklyn crew. John Travolta’s dancing and uneasy charm draw our attention, but Miller gives us reason to watch the supporting players. We rate him for the uncertainty he brings to an ensemble, particularly when a leading performance is drawing most of the attention. He can make an outsider worth watching without making him especially agreeable.
We felt protective of Bobby C., because Miller makes his vulnerability uncomfortable to watch. John Badham takes the frustrations behind the disco seriously, and Miller’s presence helps keep those frustrations in view even when the dancing is most persuasive. The writing grows heavy, and our sympathy for Bobby C. does not remove that reservation. There is a recurring limitation here, too: Miller’s early film work could be overshadowed by its leads, and Saturday Night Fever is plainly Travolta’s film.
Alan Parker’s Fame (1980) gives him a different use for that unease as aspiring performer Ralph Garci. Humour and pathos belong together in the part, and Miller’s ability to keep both present makes Parker a useful director for him. The Chosen (1981) then gives him an early leading role as Reuven Malter in an adaptation of Chaim Potok’s novel. These parts suit an actor drawn to introspective characters, and allow him to give those characters some strength without pretending that their vulnerability has gone away.
In Francis Ford Coppola’s Peggy Sue Got Married (1986), as Richard Norvik, gesture helps him suggest the passage of time while keeping the emotion restrained. That gives him something more to do with his physical performance than convey the discomfort of being an outsider. Screen credits became sparse after the early 2000s, so the later work offers less evidence of where that approach might have led. Start with Saturday Night Fever, then try Fame for the humour.
Biography
Barry Miller is an American actor. He was born on 6 February 1958 in Los Angeles, California.
Miller's early screen work included television appearances and the film Saturday Night Fever (1977), in which he played Bobby C. He later appeared in Fame (1980) as Ralph Garci, Peggy Sue Got Married (1986) as Richard Norvik and The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) as Jeroboam. On stage he won the 1985 Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his performance as Arnold Epstein in Biloxi Blues. He received a Golden Globe nomination for his role in the television series Equal Justice (1990).
