RIP, Robert Redford ...

 I don't have much time before work, but the NYT just reported that Robert Redford died and I literally gasped.

I had tremendous respect for this man, not just as an actor, but for his political, environmental, and animal rights activism, his creation of the Sundance Film Festival (and the Sundance channel) to feature indie movies so that new talent to be heard and seen in film - and the way he lived his life - like an old rancher out West.

As for his acting, he could play the Ken he looked like. He could play a cold or warm character. He could play it tough and scary or soft and romantic. He had that rare combination of tough and tender.

Who can forget that final scene in The Way We Were, when Kate (Barbra Streisand) and Hubbell (Robert Redford) have a chance meeting in NYC, and she brushes his hair out of his face out of old habit, and he softly takes her hand, in fond memories - the way he looks at her, the way they look at each other, in a final goodbye?

This still image doesn't do it justice. 

His look said: 

"Our lives are so different, we never could have been, but I will  always remember the way we were. Thank you."

And hers is the same, both knowing they will likely never see each other again.

And less seriously and importantly - at least in my mind, Robert Redford and Paul Newman are still, to date, two of the most ruggedly handsome/sexiest movie stars of all time!

RIP, Sundance  ... thank you ...