Hey everybody,
Today I want to talk about Action. Not Action the genre or even the concept, but a specific Action. That is, the character Action in the film West Side Story.
I just recently watched this classic with my wife, and though it’s one of the most beloved musicals in film history, I could barely tell you anything about the music or the dancing or even the plot (I think one of the guys was Puerto Rican?) because I spent all my time thinking about Action.
Action is a member of the Jets, one of the two street gangs vying for control of…something? Look, it’s not really clear. Audiences in the 60’s weren’t really prepared to hear what street toughs did all day, and the opening sequence where the Jets just dance around shooing people away is genuinely one of the most delightful pieces of cinema I’ve ever seen. Either way, as the film progresses, there are several scenes of the respective gangs planning for their conflict or just palling around, and it is during those scenes that we get to know Action.
Action’s real name is Dale, but they call him Action because he’s always ready for action. Not just ready for it, in a constant state of being nearly overwhelmed by it. Every time the opportunity arises to suggest a course of action, Action is all-in for action. Decisive action, immediate action, wild action, this guy just does not give a shit. Action is always down for action. But again, because audiences back then weren’t ready to hear what actions a street gang might actually take, Action almost never specifies what exactly they should do. If this movie were made twenty years earlier, he might have been called Lemme Adam and suggested Slapping a J*p (I don’t want to use or condone racial slurs on the substack, so just google “things Superman says you can do” if you can’t figure out that cipher). If this movie were made twenty years later, he’d have been played by Joe Pesci and shot every single guy that, like, didn’t need to die, man. But in the perfect Goldilocks zone of 1961, we got an Action who had all of the old-timey enthusiasm and the erratic decision making of both of those tropes without as much explicit racism and violence.
Needless to say, I love Action, but I came away from the movie with so many questions about his life.
What if he wakes up off one morning? Not even sick, just a little tired–does he still have to be ready for action that day? Later that afternoon, when he’s lounging with the rest of the ruffians smoking cigarettes they incubated in their shirtsleeves, will there be a point where somebody mentions those lousy Sharks and everyone instinctively pauses and looks in Action’s direction, waiting for him to leap up and suggest they motor or something vaguely boisterous, and there’s an awkward pause as he just shrugs? Did Action choose this, or was he just having an action-packed couple of weeks once years ago and got stuck with a nickname that he now has to live up to every day, like how if you bring one thing everyone loves to a potluck you’re expected to cook that every time people get together?
Consider the reverse: what if Action is truly always ready for action? He explodes out of bed each morning and into bed each night in a fit of uncontainable frenzy. Set aside how exhausting that sounds both to be and to be around, that makes his life even more tragic, because the rest of the gang never doesn’t tell him to calm down. Not once. Every single time Action leaps to the center of the frame to suggest action, one of the other gang members will shout some variation of “Cool it, Action!” and he’ll why-I-oughtta his way to the back of the shot. If you have a friend whose entire personality is suggesting things that you immediately recognize as a bad idea, I have a quick question: why? You know you can decide who to spend time with, right? Maybe Action is more of a mutual party kinda friend, you know, doesn’t get invited to your stuff but it’s not a deal breaker if you hear he’s going to be somewhere.
Action’s famous quote in the film is when he tells an old man: “You was never my age,” a timeless line that encapsulates the struggle of youth that will always be unique to evolve organically under the tutelage of those whose youth was unique to them and their time. It turns out that when Action stops thinking and talking about action, you can glimpse beneath the tempestuous surface of his internal seas to unseen depths that may contain greater truths. But so many will never benefit from them, because Action is all about action, and whether he chose that for himself or it was chosen for him, it’s too late for Action to be anything but Action.
So I say, don’t cool out, Action. Let ‘er rip, beat feet, burn rubber, show ‘em who’s boss. Maybe if we all had a little more Action in us, we’d be able to make a world where the Jets and Sharks could live together in peace.
“why-I-oughtta” is my new favorite verb
I googled it, and Superman suggested you might like this movie, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094612/