The Coen clan: keeping it in the family

"I guess I end up playing eccentric guys in Joel and Ethan's movies," John Turturro says.

"But, you know, everybody in their films is eccentric. That's just the way they are. Even George Clooney. Look at him in O Brother, Where Art Thou?He's crazy."

True enough. Since the Coens arrived in Cinemaland with Blood Simplein 1984, they have persuaded a tight band of talented actors to keep returning for ever- greater weirdness.

Frances McDormand, Joel's wife, is the most common recidivist, having turned up in six of the brothers' films. She won an Oscar for her turn as a peculiar police officer in Fargo.

Steve Buscemi,whose asymmetric features reek of Coenness, has managed an impressive five films (six if you include the Coens' episode in Paris, je t'aime) and was particularly impressive as the dumb crook in Fargo, the dumb bowler in The Big Lebowskiand the gay bookie in Miller's Crossing. Steve is, surely, the epitome of Homo Coen.

George Clooney,twitchy in O Brother Where Art Thouand Burn After Reading; suave in the disappointing Intolerable Cruelty- did some of his best work in the Minnesotan wizards' pictures.

Holly Hunter, an old pal of the boys, turned up briefly in Blood Simpleand then starred in Raising Arizona. It was another 13 years before they were reunited in O Brother Where Out Thou?,but, happily, the film turned out to be an easy-going delight.

Who have we forgotten?

Well, John Goodmanis almost in the McDormand-Buscemi class, having racked up an impressive four Coen movies. Look for him in Raising Arizona, O Brother, Barton Finkand, most memorably, as (it is said) a heightened version of right-wing director John Milius in the mighty The Big Lebowski.

A shout-out should also go to the stoic work put in by reliable old Richard Jenkinswho - quietly, impressively - has plugged away in the last three Coen films.

What a repertory company. A vein of American gothic runs through all those personalities. Handsome men like Clooney seem faintly monstrous.

Cuddly fellows like Goodman look ever so slightly murderous. Everybody makes everybody else look like a very singular class of deranged genius.

One question does niggle though. Turturro, McDormand, Clooney, Buscemi, Hunter, Goodman, Jenkins: were they always a bit peculiar or did working with the Coens make them that way?

Could the directors do the same for a Julia Robertsor a Will Smith? Hell they made Brad Pittseem odd in Burn After Reading,so anything is, I suppose, possible.

GEORGE CLOONEY

FRANCES McDORMAND

HOLLY HUNTER

STEVE BUSCEMI

JOHN GOODMAN

RICHARD JENKINS