'Blaze' : By Rita Kempley Washington Post Staff Writer December 13, 1989

Director: Ron Shelton Cast: Paul Newman; Lolita Davidovich Under 17 restricted Compare prices for this movie Find local video stores More movie shopping Save money with NextCard Visa

The great state of Louisiana was scandalized when in the waning of the '50s, Gov. Earl K. Long (Paul Newman), Huey's savvy baby brother, took up with a striptease artist almost young enough to be his granddaughter and as voluptuous as a queen-size bed. Blaze Starr (Lolita Davidovich), a hillbilly girl who could take it all off with the aplomb of Emily Post serving tea, had his ticker skipping beats like a schoolgirl with a jump rope. "Damn, those are a big pair of rascals you've got," says the governor, greed and awe commingled.

Davidovich, the spitting image of the 28-year-old Blaze, would steal the show from many a leading man, but Newman is having the time of his life as the 65-year-old pol. Just as "Batman" ought to be called "The Joker," so "Blaze" would be more aptly titled "Earl." Newman, usually given to a certain constraint, goes full tilt in a ribald albeit thoughtful performance. The hot-tin tomcat of his youth meets the crusader of "The Verdict" in this flamboyant, filibustering tour de force. As a sly old rounder and a wily political strategist, Newman proves plumb irresistible. Of course, it helps that the ugly truths -- like the governor's face and his wife -- never come to light.

Based on Starr's autobiography, "Blaze" naturally has its biases. Blaze, nee Fannie Belle Fleming, is a veritable saint of the pasties, her naked ambitions first uncovered in Washington's own Quonset Hut honky-tonk. "I ain't taking nuthin' off," says Blaze, who thought this was to be her singing debut. Red Snyder (Robert Wuhl), her first manager, persuades the dewy doughnut-shop waitress to undress for patriotic reasons.

By the time she meets Earl Long in 1959, Blaze is top banana when it comes to peeling, ecdysiast extraordinaire, queen of the New Orleans ShowBar. Though still country-sweet and plumply innocent, she has devised a provocative act, taunting her customers and wrapping her black stockings around patrons' flushed necks. A frank, forthright woman given to Peter Pan collars by day, she moves on stage like Spanish moss in a lazy breeze. The governor, a roue of note, is besotted. "Some show you got there," he offers. "A powerful expression of basic human needs."

Virtually all of the governor's utterances are quotable, as honed by writer-director Ron Shelton and drawled by Newman. "They want us to drop our G-strings," confides Blaze, shocked by the management's demands. "The future of civilization at the crossroads," the governor declares. The governor, forever cock-a-doodle-dooing, brooks no nonsense from friends or enemies, but when it comes to Blaze, he is courtly to a fault. "I'd like to introduce you to some of my yes-men and their lovely wives," he says, presenting her as "a performing artist on the local cultural scene."

Though a political scion, Earl was a populist leader who cosseted the voters of the back roads and bayous. "The three best friends the poor people have ever had are Jesus Christ, Sears & Roebuck and Earl K. Long," he declares. Though by no means the most ethical of men, he emerges here as an early friend of the civil rights movement. The film, which takes both poetic and historical liberties, implies that Long's efforts on behalf of black voting rights are what landed him in the Mandeville State Hospital, committed by the Democratic Party bosses.

"Blaze" is Shelton's celebration of politics before television, of the days when private gaffes meant less than public misdeeds. When politics was hands-on, fleshy as stripping, not impersonal as pornography. Like Shelton's last film, "Bull Durham," this one is as colorful as an opening-day crowd. And like Kevin Costner and Susan Sarandon, Newman and the nubile Davidovich make a crackerjack couple.

Sex, the way Shelton presents it and the governor approaches it, is an indoor sport. For that matter, so is politics, and no less seductive for Earl. "Blaze" is a celebration of the sporting life, as zesty as Cajun music and as tickly as a feather boa.

Blaze is rated R

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