In defence of Russell part 2: Is Russell Crowe the weirdest working class hero ever?

Part 2 of my ongoing obsession with people named Russell.

A few weeks ago, the new Robin Hood film starring Russell Crowe was released (I haven't seen it). It wasn't long before there was some story about how he blew up at some interviewer after suggesting Rusty had an Irish rather than English accent. I could care less and I find it depressing that whenever Crowe releases a film these days, there is an inevitable story of his bad behaviour (whether that's real or made up).

The reason I'm writing this is that I was thinking about Russell Crowe the other day and it occurred to me whenever shit to go down, he tends to be defending his work. Now I come from a working class background (I still hold those principles and attitudes but through my education and work it'd be insulting to real working class people to call myself that now) and I think it's always a pretentious thing to talk about class. However, one thing people of that class do is take their work and their identity from that work very seriously. And while Crowe isn't working class (he's a millionaire remember), when I hear him talk about his work, his attitude definitely is.

Now if you're not convinced by Crowe you just need to see Michael Mann's The Insider to show just how good an actor he is. But when I think about Russell Crowe's movies, I can't think of one movie where I could say 'he did it for the paycheck' because that guy never gives less than 100%. Even some of my most favourite actors (Pacino/de Niro, I'm looking at you guys) have done some absolute rubbish which they're obviously not into.

So what does this mean? Well, nothing really, but in my mind, Russell Crowe could just be the weirdest working class hero ever...

(That Russell Crowe is behind the resurgence of the Rabbitohs has nothing to do with my thinking here but that's pretty awesome in its own right).

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