How Come Every Time Kevin Comes Around...?

I’ll be honest, I don’t think much about Kevin Costner. But when I do, it’s almost like a gentle, if puzzling, reminder of days of yore. A time when people my age were kids, En Vogue ruled the airwaves, and our moms rented Dance with Wolves so many times that they began to look at us strangely, as if to say “Are you really worth sticking around on the East Coast when the frontier is just out there, offering more natural beauty than a brat like yourself could ever imagine?” And if that weren’t bad enough, our dads and stepdads were subjected to similar visual scrutiny. My mom would look at my dad, who’d be snoring right through the part where Two Socks gets shot, and replace him in her mind with a reclining Costner, rugged yet comforting, grizzly yet bland.



At age 12, this is unacceptable. It’s the early 90s. We had guys like Christian Slater at our disposal. HDs with exotic-sounding names like Johnny Depp, River Phoenix, Keanu Reeves. These guys are young and angry and do exciting things like get arrested and smoke during interviews. They do NOT wear khakis, and they do NOT father legitimate children. With these other much more appealing options readily at hand, why WHY do my mother’s eyes become glazed during the naked swimming scene in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.

The Costner Effect, as I’ve thought all these years, was felt only by middle-aged, white, suburban women, and only during a several-year span that began with The Untouchables and ended with Waterworld.* It was a mysterious phenomenon that happened, fizzled out, and embarrasses us when spoken of. If he was America’s Sweetheart, then America blushes and says “SHUT UP!” whenever her friends bring it up.



Then why, when Kelly got Bull Durham from Netflix, did I notice my own jaw becoming slack during Costner’s moment at bat? Is it my weird affinity for baseball movies?** Or does ol’ Dances with Wolves just have something in that receding hairline and expressionless eyes that we only grow to love when we reach maturity?***

Astounded with myself, I did a little research that can only be described as “lazy” and “slipshod.” I asked my ladyfriends to give me their overall impression of KC and felt sure that I would receive an overwhelming response of “You mean Mom’s gross fantasy?” I did get a few of those (and one “Who?”), but the majority of the responses contained the following words and phrases:

Sexy
Rugged
Old but hot
Brokeback Mountain

Seriously? Do we suddenly like this guy? Or did we always like him but were just reluctant to admit it to our moms?



Taking my research one notch up to “half-assed,” I checked out kevincostner.com, which didn’t get me anywhere. The guy claims to design his own website, and his “Tatanka” organization is just plain hysterical, if only for the reason that it refers to a moment in DWW where Costner imitates a buffalo to get a point across to those wise and mysterious savages, the Sioux.**** His current Marlboro Man image is a little ungainly, and it’s hard to imagine that he’s been honing his acting talents out there ropin’ cattle or whatever it is he does. The whole page smacks of somebody looking desperately for work, anything, ANYTHING to ward off the shameful taint of faded celebrity.



I can’t find anything sexy about this, and though I’m admitting that the glimmer of understanding I felt with my female peers for that one second during Bull Durham was very real, I’m not sure where his appeal comes from. By all other accounts, the guy is a joke. A nondescript face, average Joe body, a ridiculous Robin Hood English accent, and that voice, oh that voice! The sound of the unobtrusive but distinct buzz of the fluorescent lights and/or air conditioning at my work that I don’t even notice is so loud until it’s been turned off.



But maybe that’s what it is. Maybe it’s the reassuring Midwestern boringness that gives Costner his special touch with the ladies. After all, in Field of Dreams, he’s really just right for the role, which requires someone quiet, even-keeled, and slow to react. This demeanor makes people believe in him, even when the words he’s saying don’t make sense. We trust him as a person to never leave us, to stay firmly planted in the Great Plains and in Middle America’s hearts, and to make sure the purple mountains and fruited plains or whatever are still hanging out, being all American. He’s the keeper of the dream and the lover of the game, and I’m OK with that.



Although, maybe we can develop some kind of house arrest system to keep him on the prairie. The last thing we need is another Cruise or Gibson rattling around out there, speeding around and distributing pamphlets. We need someone wise to police the ground between East Coast and West Coast, and hopefully in the oblivion that I imagine that vast expanse to be, he won’t get so lonely that he’ll become a zealot for some ridiculous religion. Stay boring, Kevin. We don’t need any starlet drama, and we don’t need flagrant quotes. We just need to know that our ex-boyfriend still cares about us, steadfast and determined to protect us even though we abandoned him long ago and don’t really feel that guilty about it. Sometimes relationships just run their course, Kevin, and we think you’re a great guy, but we’ve grown as a people, and your way of life isn’t enough for us anymore. Yes, yes, Josh Hartnett is a perfect gentleman, and we promise we’re happy. We’ll always remember the good old days, Kevin. It’s enough to know that you’ll never change. No, no, stop, We don’t want to play a game of catch for old times’ sake, Kevin, seriously. We’re not going to wear that mitt. We…we just need to go. This is getting a little creepy.



*This period contained a very pleasant moment of harmony for my mother and I, when Kev starred in The War, a film that also featured a very young Elijah Wood, for whom I was nursing a disturbingly powerful obsession at the time.

**The Natural is effing amazing and stars Robert Redford, whose relationship with America, when her friends bring it up, causes America to do a lot of drunk dialing.

***I’ll be 26 this year and that blows my mind. It seems like the oldest age ever, and I’m a little worried that after Kevin Costner will come a desire for Mel Gibson, and that is, frankly, not allowed.

****Again with the Robert Redford, excuse me, but I know that Redford named his Sundance company/estate/festival after his role in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, but again, he’s ROBERT REDFORD and he’s allowed.