Hitting the booze: Why does Hollywood so often soft pedal on its drunks?

Cinema’s depictions of alcoholism are rarely frank or true to life, writes Geoffrey Macnab. But there are a few exceptions

Nicolas Cage won an Academy Award for his role in alcoholism drama ‘Leaving Las Vegas’ (Rex Features)

Hollywood can’t decide whether to censure or celebrate its drunken heroes. It frequently gives awards to those playing alcoholics – but the ways in which they are portrayed are wildly varied. Only occasionally do films show honestly the squalor and destructiveness of the typical alcoholic’s life. It is far more commonplace for their condition to be used as a source of pathos, or of comedy, than to see them soiling themselves or throwing up.

In the silent era, drinking and slapstick often went hand in hand. Charlie Chaplin has many sublime drunken moments in his films: zig-zagging his way home in an inebriated state, putting his foot in the goldfish bowl as he climbs through the window, falling down staircases, slipping up on rugs, dizzy with drink and forlornly trying to hold his balance as the entire world revolves against him.

In comedies, drunkards often behave like holy innocents. Think, for example, of WC Fields as Egbert Souse in The Bank Dick (1940). Wherever Fields goes, mayhem follows but the alcohol shields him from the chaos around him. He blunders through the film in a good natured daze, inadvertently catching thieves, solving crimes and even briefly (in the film’s most surrealistic section) taking charge of a movie when its original director is carted off even more drunk than he is.