The biggest question facing Robert Downey Jr. on the interview circuit in recent days has been whether he’ll return to "Iron Man" for a fourth solo outing in addition to his ongoing adventures in “The Avengers” movie series. Downey seemed to leave the Stark Enterprises door wide open in a chat with Ellen DeGeneres while slamming it shut on David Letterman’s show.
The contradictory superhero talk threatened to overshadow the reason for Downey’s flurry of media activity: to promote "The Judge," a new drama that opens Friday. The film marks his first major dramatic leading role since he became a box office double threat by playing the Marvel comic book character and a butt-kicking Sherlock Holmes. “The Judge” offers Downey, two decades past an early peak for his Oscar-nominated turn in “Chaplin,” a prime opportunity to fully re-establish himself as an actor with iron on the inside, too.
Downey’s serpentine path to lasting success is a story built for Hollywood: He first rose to prominence during the dismal 1985-1986 season of “Saturday Night Live,” as part of a cast that included Anthony Michael Hall and Randy Quaid. Downey became a charter member of the Brat Pack, bringing energy to late 1980s fare like “Less Than Zero” and “The Pickup Artist,” before scoring big in “Chaplin” in 1992. But personal troubles hurt his career, which reached a low point when he got kicked off TV’s “Ally McBeal” a decade later.
Downey, who, in a recent heartfelt tribute to his late mother on Facebook credited her with helping him kick his addictions, has been making up for lost time over the last 10 years. A key, redefining — if a decidedly unflashy and relatively small — role came in 2005’s “Good Night, and Good Luck,” George Clooney’s great film about Edward R. Murrow’s battle again demagogue Sen. Joseph McCarthy. Downey seems to have learned from Clooney, a rare breed of actor who moves seamlessly from big box office flicks to smaller, quality films.
At 49, Downey is tackling perhaps his most grown-up role yet with “The Judge,” in which he plays a lawyer who returns to his hometown and winds up defending his estranged, widowed father, a small town jurist on trial for murder. The title character is portrayed by Robert Duvall, a top actor with a remarkable talent for bringing out the best in his fellow performers.
For Downey, best known to young moviegoers as a member of The Avengers and half of the Holmes-Watson duo, “The Judge” could mark his most important team-up yet.
