As for Gould liking the character of Marlowe, he did indeed.
He told me he tried to get a studio (I think Universal)
involved in a remake of The High Window which either he or
the studio had access to at the time. That is, of course, the
Marlowe movie most in need of a remake.
As for Gould being able to play hardboiled, the cop movie
Busting and the underrated mystery Capricorn 9, suggest that
in younger days he could handle that. My impression is that
he considered Marlowe more a fast-talking, think-on-his-feet
pro -- a la his MASH character -- than hardboiled. I agree
with that. (The dreamy and passive okay-by-me quality in Long
Goodbye was, I suspect more Altman than Gould. This is borne
out by the Dove readings which probably are the best of the
Chandler audiobooks I've heard. Joe Mantegna makes the
character sound like a Jersey wiseguy. Daniel Massey's plumy
British Marlowe is just plain ridiculous.
I should note that my opinion of Gould may be colored by the
fact that he was one of the better participants in a movie I
wrote, Escape to Athena. And he read, quite well, a short
Marlowe story I contributed to the Raymond Chandler's Philip
Marlowe anthology that celebrated the author's
centennial.
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