The Hudsucker Proxy is a 1994 fantastical comedy film by Ethan and Joel Coen. Sidney J Mussberger (Paul Newman), the new head of the hugely successful corporate monolith, Hudsucker Industries, in Fifties-era New York, comes up with a brilliant plan to make a lot of money: appoint a moron to run the company. When the stock falls low enough, Sidney and his friends can buy it for pennies, then take over and restore it to its former fortunes. They choose Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins), who has just started in the mail room, but soon, tough reporter Amy Archer smells a rat and begins an undercover investigation of Hudsucker Industries.
The Coens’ sense of the aesthetic is supreme, their knowing references witty to the extreme, and their style all their own. This movie, despite being a box office flop, is packed with delicious highlights but today’s blog focuses on the brilliant performance by Jason Jennifer Leigh. Leigh plays Amy Archer, the hardnosed reporter willing to do anything to get a good story, even going undercover to gain the trust of the über-naïve Norville. In the newsroom, she’s bold, sassy, and will inform anyone listening about her Pulitzer Prize. In a man’s environment, she’s the most capable of the lot and, as we’ll see, she can simultaneously talk on the phone to the chief, type a story, solve crossword puzzles, and fence fellow reporter Smitty with smart, fifties-hip wordplay.
If the concept of the quick-tongued, ace female reporter feels familiar, it should; in the great tradition of newspaper movies, Leigh is channelling a cross between Jean Arthur in Mr Deeds Goes to Town and Katharine Hepburn in Woman of the Year. In this scene, she has inveigled herself into Norville’s office and contrives to win his trust, playing the vulnerable maiden in distress and pretending to be “a Muncie girl”. Then cut to tough Amy in the newsroom, multi-tasking spectacularly and mocking the patsy, Norville. You can be sure her heart will soften in the end, but for now Leigh nails the stereotype character with aplomb.
