The seven ages of Jeff Bridges – Hollywood’s woefully underappreciated leading man

To celebrate 70 years of the star on screen, Geoffrey Macnab looks at the many twists and turns Bridges’ extraordinary career has taken since 1951

Jeff Bridges in ‘Crazy Heart’, the film he finally won an Oscar for in 2010 (Fox Searchlight/Kobal/Shutterstock)

The Company She Keeps (1951) is one of those patchy old Hollywood movies that has long since slipped from mainstream view. It’s a melodramatic thriller about a female con artist (Jane Greer) fresh out of prison who plots to steal her parole officer’s boyfriend. “The whole picture has the flavour of the cheapest and pulpiest romance,” The New York Times dismissed it when it was released 70 years ago. Other reviewers were equally sniffy. No one paid much attention to the baby who Greer briefly cradled in her arms.

This, though, was Jeff Bridges, making his screen debut at the ripe old age of six months. He landed the role by chance. His actor father Lloyd was very friendly with the film’s director, John Cromwell, and had visited him on set. “I need a baby,” Cromwell had told him. “Here, take Jeff,” Lloyd said, blithely handing over his newborn son.

Bridges’ mother Dorothy has a bit part in the film, as does his older brother, Beau, but Jeff wasn’t at all happy about being steamrollered into a movie career before he was even out of nappies. “I never really wanted to be an actor,” he later claimed. “As a matter of fact, I resisted it because it felt like nepotism to me, that I had the door opened for me because of my father. I wanted to be appreciated for my own talents.”