Michael Douglas: An Ordinary Man

Michael Douglas quickly became synonymous with the popular figure of the man-in-crisis in the 1990s and parallels have been repeatedly drawn between Douglas and suspect notions of the era's zeitgeist. The critics aligning Douglas with zeitgeist notions of masculinity are significant for the credit they allow Douglas in constructing his contemporary characters; it is Douglas who has 'tapped into', 'takes on' and 'reads' the zeitgeist. This chapter complicates the idea of Douglas as an icon of contemporary masculinity by locating the role of the actor in the construction of his characters. In other words, what did Douglas -do- to become paradigmatic of the decade's male in crisis?