Why We Love Jeff Goldblum: Celebrating 66 years of good GIFs on his birthday
Whether grossing us out in The Fly or tying us in knots in Portlandia, the character we love most is Jeff Goldblum himself.
Jeff Goldblum has held a strange place in pop culture, starring in movies and TV shows that continue to hold our minds captive even years after their release. Born October 22nd, 1952, Goldblum has been thrilling us with catchphrases, intense stares, bow ties, and unexpectedly sexy poses in movies, television shows, and commercials for over forty years. Lucky for us, it doesn’t look like he is slowing down anytime soon.
As a millennial, Jeff Goldblum and his zany characters have been in my entertainment rotation for my whole life. Initially, I thought that the original Jurassic Park movie was where I’d first seen Goldblum. My family was living in Detroit, Michigan at the time and I remember making it up until the scene where the Tyrannosaurus eats someone off of a toilet. (That’s about halfway through so I feel I deserve some credit for bravery.) My sister and I tapped out in fear. While researching for writing this article, I learned that Goldblum was the scientist in the classic science fiction film The Fly, which was a key source for my childhood nightmares and one of two reasons why I hate flies to this day.
I thought about putting a picture of him as the fly here, but I didn’t. You’re welcome.
On Jeff Goldblum’s IMDB page, his first credited acting job is for a 1974 movie called Death Wish where he is billed as simply “Freak #1”. Perhaps this role’s title was a bit of a prophecy for the outsider status, so many of his most loved characters tend to have. He was one of many actors who appeared in Annie Hall before their careers took off. But even here, with only one line, Goldblum displays some of the trademarks that we’ve come to expect: running a hand dramatically through his just-long-enough dark hair and delivering a stammering, casual yet confident tone. Leaning against a wall at a party, he explains into a phone that he has forgotten his mantra.
Goldblum seems to have the good fortune of landing roles that are destined to have a cult-like following of enthusiastic fans. He is without a doubt in the rotation of actors that director Wes Anderson uses, with roles in The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, and even the most recent Isle of Dogs. In Independence Day, Goldblum struck gold again with his portrayal of another quirky, highly intelligent academic.
He’s also forever connected to odd shows firmly planted in internet culture, like playing “Chef Goldblum” in Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie, from the infamously low-budget Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!. On the always-quirky Portlandia, Goldblum has made multiple guest appearances. In a nod to Jeff Goldblum’s two years as Detective Zach Nichols on Law and Order: Criminal Intent, he appeared as the same detective on John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight in a spoof “Law and Order: Civil Asset Forfeiture Unit” episode, along with several long-time members of the cast. Goldblum aggressively interrogates a pile of money and dramatically throws a chair into the wall.
As soon as Goldblum appears in a scene, it is not an uncommon reaction to feel cheerful with a sudden desire to root for his character. Goldblum’s mere presence, whether in-person or just his voice in animated films, makes many people say, “Oh! It’s that guy!” Is he playing himself or is he playing to the characteristics his fans have come to expect? Either way, I find myself always 100% believing that Jeff Goldblum could be solving a hostile alien takeover just as much as I believe he could run an artisanal knot store. If there is some off-beat project gaining steam, I almost expect Goldblum to have a cameo at this point.
One of his more recently lovable string of cameos has been on millennial-favorite Portlandia. Again, Goldblum found a way to be associated with a pop culture phenomenon that was helping hipsters, feminists, and young urban dwellers all over the country laugh at themselves. After living in San Francisco for a year, I found a special enjoyment over his portrayal of The Knot Store owner in season two who helpfully asks his new customers, Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein in character, what they don’t understand about the knot trend. Though the store is covered in more traditional rope knots, his dramatic reveal of a more contemporary knot from the back– some tangled Apple headphones is already over-the-top in its deadpan humor. But, it’s Jeff Goldblum, so of course, he has something to say about it. In a smart, hot pink suit, he explains that “An artist that we work with makes these by jamming them into his pocket” before purring his approval for way longer than necessary.
Of all of the projects Goldblum has tackled, perhaps the best known is Dr. Ian Malcolm, the academic obsessed with chaos theory from the original Jurassic Park movie in 1993. From the first moment we meet him on-screen, Dr. Malcolm seems like a guy who knows more than he’s letting on. He knows something is up, but he’s getting paid, so he might as well enjoy the helicopter ride. Goldblum perfectly embodies the nerdy academic who can crack jokes while telling the capitalists around him why their God-complex theme park just isn’t going to work. For me, Dr. Malcolm is most admirable in his confidence– while others in his position might feel pressured to provide a good review, whether from social pressure in the moment or in the hopes of future kickbacks. Instead, Dr. Malcolm is quick to question the facts. Even his flirtatious explanation of chaos theory using drops of water undoubtedly inspired many copycats on awkward first dates.
While I couldn’t possibly have imagined the infamy that the still shot of Dr. Malcolm lying down with his shirt open would have when I finally worked up the courage to watch Jurassic Park the whole way through, the scene has inspired countless memes, gifs, videos, and art. In the context of the movie, Dr. Malcolm is simply recovering from a tyrannosaurus attack, breathing heavily, sweating from the adrenaline and presumably humid weather of a fictional Costa Rican island. My favorite iteration is a gif where the “dinosaur man” Dr. Grant (Sam Neill) has been superimposed onto Dr. Malcolm’s chest so it looks like he is listening, delightedly, to Dr. Malcom’s breathing.
In The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Dr. Malcolm’s knowing sarcasm is still in full effect. In an early scene, when a camera guy is in awe of several Stegosaurus. Dr. Malcolm all but rolls his eyes saying, “Oh yeah, that’s how it starts. But then there’s running, and screaming.” The plot’s focus on his father-daughter relationship adds humanity and depth to Goldblum’s character that we got to know in the first Jurassic Park movie compared to the first movie where his character joked about being on the lookout for future ex-wives.
Though Goldblum isn’t in the third and fourth Jurassic Park movies, this year’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom brought his character full circle. His brief cameos at the beginning and end of the film show a wiser Dr. Malcolm testifying to Senators on the power and responsibility that comes with genetic manipulation. He argues, “In the last century, we amassed a landmark technological power, and we’ve consistently proven ourselves incapable of handling that power.” When the senators express skepticism and ask him how they’ll be able to tell when the world has gone too far, he explains, “Change is like death, you don’t know what it looks like until you’re standing at the gates.”
In so many of his roles, Goldblum represents the ultimate likable nerd who is at first doubted but is eventually needed to save the day. Perhaps this speaks to a wish many of us outsiders secretly hold– that one day the world might need us too. In his final testimonial monologue at the end of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, Dr. Malcolm warns that, “Our home has in fundamental ways has been polluted by avarice and political megalomania,” a statement that might reflect how many of us feel in the real world today– even without a literal T-Rex roaming the world.
During a Reddit AMA, or “Ask Me Anything,” Goldblum provided a mixture of quirky answers and sage life advice. When asked about the best advice he’d ever received, he said, “fill your days with what you love doing” adding that this should be the opposite of what the main character in Wolf of Wall Street sets out to do. For some people, part of what they love doing is finding new ways to have more Goldblum in their life. Tattoos of the actor’s face and famous scenes became such a phenomenon that GQ produced a video of Jeff Goldblum himself commenting on the tattoos. “I’m not opposed to tooting my own horn,” he says, before going on to rate the tattoos which include one of him feeding a Velociraptor a slice of pepperoni pizza. It takes a special kind of person to be able to look at their likeness blasted onto other people’s skin and still find the humor and lightness in each rendition.
As part of his fun celebrity duties, Goldblum is no stranger to advertising. He’s currently the face of Apartments.com and starred in a Jurassic Park-inspired Jeep commercial during the 2018 Superbowl. During a 2017 interview in Australia, Goldblum revealed that Steve Jobs once approached him to be the voice of Apple. “That was early on, and I did not know it was Steve Jobs,” he said. While Goldblum did do some TV advertising for Apple in the 1990’s as part of their “Think Different” campaign (another bit that has been run through the internet culture mill), it isn’t clear yet how else Jobs wanted to have Goldblum participate in the company.
Some say art imitates life; I say art imitates Jeff Goldblum. The most recent contribution to the world is a striking 25-foot statue in London. The statue features Goldblum in one of his most meme-inspiring roles, as Dr. Malcolm in Jurassic Park. Statue Goldblum is posed in that famous still, lying down with his shirt open. Human Goldblum has taken the art in stride, sharing pictures of it on his official Facebook page with the caption, “Holy Katz! 10/10 GOLDBLUMS”. The sponsor NOW TV stated that they created the statue to in honor of Jurassic Park’s 25th anniversary saying, “To celebrate, we’ve created a Jurassic-sized homage to heartthrob Jeff Goldblum.”
For me, Goldblum’s best-known characters from his biggest blockbusters validate all of the times we wanted to speak up or point out that something didn’t feel right. Dr. Malcolm of Jurassic Park and David Levinson of Independence Day help us feel like we too could live in a world where logic and gut-feelings could override those with power over us. Plus, he can back up his theories with a smile and good hair. To have a character that connects with so many people is impressive, but to have a career with characters we consistently want to root for is what entertainment is all about.
As Dr. Malcolm so famously said, “Life, uh, finds a way” and Jeff Goldblum will no doubt keep finding ways to entertain us for years to come.
