Tony Goldwyn as Carl in 'Ghost'.Image via Paramount Pictures
By
André Joseph
Published 2 hours ago
André Joseph is a movie features writer at Collider. Born and raised in New York City, he graduated from Emerson College with a Bachelor's Degree in Film. He freelances as an independent filmmaker, teacher, and blogger of all things pop culture. His interests include Marvel, Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Robocop, wrestling, and many other movies and TV shows.
His accomplishments as a filmmaker include directing the indie movie Vendetta Games now playing on Tubi, the G.I. Joe fan film "The Rise of Cobra" on YouTube, and receiving numerous accolades for his dramatic short film Dismissal Time. More information can be found about André on his official website.
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Longtime character actor Tony Goldwyn has a generational divide when it comes to public perception. For today’s audience, he is beloved as President Grant on ABC’s Scandal and the current Manhattan DA Nicholas Baxter on NBC’s Law & Order. But for the older crowd, he will always carry the infamy of playing a dead man’s traitorous friend, Carl Bruner, in Ghost. Now both segments of the moviegoing public can watch the 1990 blockbuster for free on Tubi.
Ghost was the rare case of a major Hollywood release where nearly all the out-of-the-box choices resulted in an overnight cinematic classic. The casting of Dirty Dancing’s Patrick Swayze opposite a brat pack-labeled star in Demi Moore and America’s funnywoman, Whoopi Goldberg, were just one of those strange choices for a supernatural drama mixing elements of romance, crime thriller, and buddy movie tropes. Even the directing task being given to Airplane! and The Naked Gun co-creator Jerry Zucker proved he had versatility beyond helming laugh-out-loud spoof comedies. The mixture of genres, as well as its overly sentimental moments, created a divide among critics upon release, with Ghost holding a 76% score on Rotten Tomatoes. It not only defied the critics by becoming the highest-grossing film of the year but also landed two Oscar wins for Goldberg and the original screenplay by Bruce Joel Rubin. In the 36 years since its release, Ghost remains one of the most talked-about movies of the ‘90s due in part to Goldwyn being the perfect symbol of evil opposite Swayze’s compassionate heavenly hero.
What Is 'Ghost' About?
New York City banker Sam Wheat (Swayze) has everything, including a beautiful artist girlfriend, Molly (Moore), and a loft apartment in the Tribeca area. One fateful night, an attempted mugging by street thug Willie Lopez (Rick Aviles) results in Sam getting fatally shot. Now a ghost unable to be seen or heard by the living, Sam witnesses Molly in mourning while his best friend and colleague Carl (Goldwyn) subtly attempts to woo her.
By tracking down Willie following a break-in at Molly’s apartment, Sam is saddened to realize his death was not a random mugging, but a robbery orchestrated by Carl to get bank account passwords as part of a drug money laundering scheme. To stop Carl’s plans and save Molly from danger, the slain banker seeks help from con artist psychic medium Oda Mae Brown (Goldberg), who is the only living person who can hear him.
Goldwyn’s portrayal of Carl is far from a dastardly villain with maniacal laughs and over-explaining his motivations. For a movie where the emotions are played on the ground level instead of heightening the tone to absurdity, the actor takes a measured approach to the best friend-turned-heel archetype by breathing enough life into Carl to make him not be a stock antagonist. Through his early interactions with Sam and Molly at work, as well as assisting with their move into the loft apartment, Carl’s good-natured attitude towards the couple is masked by jealousy. He resents his best friend’s success and desires more, as evidenced by his reaction to a red Ferrari outside the bank in one scene. Upon his friend’s death, not only is Carl’s desperation to pay off his debts more clear in Sam’s eyes, but his attempts to charm Molly also reveal just how much he tries desperately he wants to be in Sam’s shoes.
‘Ghost’ Was a Double-Edged Sword for Tony Goldwyn’s Career
Right up to this point in his career, Goldwyn was primarily a television actor with one major film role as a random victim of Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives. For the audiences only familiar with the top three billed actors, the future voice of Disney’s Tarzan saw his career take off immediately while pigeonholing him as a popular cinema baddie in the process. Goldwyn recalled to Yahoo! Entertainment in 2020 how Ghost’s box office success resulted in people on the street giving him the cold shoulder.
“I was shocked and stunned by how much people hated my character. I was doing a play in New York when the movie first came out and was a giant hit. I went into a restaurant, but the waitress refused to seat me. I was eventually given a seat, and she took my order in a very rude way. Then she was staring at me and, after a few minutes, came over to me and said, ‘Are you an actor?’ And I said yes, and she said, ‘You’re in that movie, aren’t you? I knew I hated you, but I couldn’t figure out why!’”
In the time since landing the breakout part, Goldwyn’s ability to lace sincerity and immorality played into the unique elements that made Ghost a versatile blockbuster swinging for the fences. Though he continues to bring similar aspects to future roles both good and evil, the actor’s representation of man’s self-centered pursuit of wealth remains more relevant today than it was in 1990.
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Ghost
Like Follow Followed PG-13 Drama Fantasy Mystery Romance Thriller Release Date July 13, 1990 Runtime 127 minutes Director Jerry Zucker Writers Bruce Joel RubinCast
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Patrick swayze
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Demi Moore
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Ghost
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Tony Goldwyn
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