The Only Major Actors Still Alive From Field Of Dreams

You don’t often see the great movies coming. Sure, some classics swagger their way into theaters (like “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” did in 2023), but take a look at the vast majority of the movies on your favorites queue and you’ll see titles that arrived with very little fanfare. Warner Bros. didn’t expect “L.A. Confidential” to take off like it did, and Columbia Pictures was absolutely stunned when “The Shawshank Redemption” rebounded after a disappointing theatrical release to become one of the most beloved motion pictures in the history of the medium.

Then there’s Universal and “Field of Dreams.” Kevin Costner was a movie star in 1989 on the strength of “The Untouchables,” “No Way Out” and “Bull Durham,” but two of those three hits were adult-skewing entertainments that traded heavily on his sex appeal (and — avert your eyes, Zoomers — sex scenes). “Field of Dreams” was … really, what in the heck was “Field of Dreams?” A fantasy about some dead old baseball player’s ghost turning up in an Iowa farmer’s cornfield, which prompts the guy to plow under his crop and construct a regulation-size major league baseball field? Who asked for this?

No one, save for the possibly dozens of fans of W.P. Kinsella’s little-known novel “Shoeless Joe.” But positive reviews, word of mouth, and that twinkle in the eye of Mr. Costner turned “Field of Dreams” into the sleeper hit of Spring 1989. And in those pre-internet days, there was no one around to spoil the ending’s big tear-jerking surprise.

By the time “Field of Dreams” hit the home entertainment market, it was well on course to become the dad movie to end all dad movies — one that reminded viewers it was never too late to mend fences with their old man. It’s a movie with iconic actors playing what have become iconic players — and, alas, we’ve lost some of those legends. Burt Lancaster (Archibald “Moonlight” Graham), James Earl Jones (Terrence Mann) and, way too soon, Ray Liotta (Shoeless Joe Jackson) have left us. But the three actors with whom we begin the film’s journey are still very much alive.

Get ready to feel really old. Little Gaby Hoffmann, the precocious former child actor whose Karin Kinsella nearly buys it in the third act by choking on a hot dog, is now 42 years old and playing grown-up characters because, much as none of us wants to admit, we all get old and eventually, like Burt Lancaster, die.

“Field of Dreams” was Hoffmann’s big-screen debut, and she hit the ground running with a string of kid roles that turned her into a big-screen surrogate for many a Millennial. Her early movies were significant if not particularly good (e.g. “Uncle Buck,” “Sleepless in Seattle,” and “Now and Then”), leading to a string of teen turns in much better movies like “You Can Count on Me,” “Volcano” (yes, “Volcano”), and the seriously underrated “Strike!” (aka “All I Wanna Do”). Hoffman later took a break from Hollywood in the mid-2000s to work in New York City theater, then returned to bounce back and forth between films and television. Hoffmann’s best work to date can be seen on series like “Transparent,” “Girls,” and “Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty.”

Amy Madigan made a blistering debut in 1982 as a prisoner who fights to keep her newborn baby in “Love Child,” prompting critics and moviegoers to wonder where the heck this 32-year-old whirlwind had been. Hollywood immediately thrust her into supporting parts in a string of very good movies, leading to a 1985 Best Supporting Actress nomination as Gene Hackman’s daughter in the underseen “Twice in a Lifetime.” (I’d argue she also deserved one the year prior for her portrayal of McCoy in Walter Hill’s superb “Streets of Fire.”)

Madigan was and still is, at 74 years old, a spitfire. That energy is on full display in “Field of Dreams” (especially during her confrontation with the book-banning mother at the school board meeting, a scene that shouldn’t be as relevant today as it is), and exploded twofold later in 1989 when she reunited with her onscreen daughter Hoffman in “Uncle Buck.” ’89 also saw Madigan earn her thus far only Primetime Emmy Best Actress nomination for her portrayal of attorney Sarah Weddington in the critically acclaimed NBC TV movie “Roe vs. Wade” (she lost to co-star Holly Hunter). Additionally, Madigan has a good deal of cult cred for her performance in the short-lived HBO series “Carnivàle.”

The man who famously got cut out of the Baby Boomer classic “The Big Chill” (he’s the dead friend who brings everyone together) managed to pull it together and have a fairly respectable career, no? Costner’s breakout role was supposed to be as the boisterous gunslinger Jake in Lawrence Kasdan’s throwback Western “Silverado,” but when it underperformed the actor had to wait until 1987 for the one-two critical-commercial combo of “The Untouchables” and “No Way Out” to be declared an honest-to-god movie star. Coming on the heels of “Bull Durham,” the baseball-themed “Field of Dreams” transformed Costner into the flesh-and-blood embodiment of America’s pastime. Indeed, more people probably associate him with the sport than they do folks who actually played the damn game!

What has Costner done since bringing “Shoeless” Joe Jackson to Iowa? He won Oscars for Best Picture and Director the following year thanks to his Indigenous Americans saga “Dances with Wolves,” earned Warner Bros. a boatload of cash in “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” romanced Whitney Houston despite sporting a rough-looking Caesar cut in “The Bodyguard,” attained pro golf immortality as a hacker on a dream run at the U.S. Open in “Tin Cup,” and ate it at the box office with his $80 million sophomore effort as a director, “The Postman.” Costner’s had his ups and downs since then, but as he’s proved via his lead role in Taylor Sheridan’s “Yellowstone” series, he exemplifies all that is admirable and detestable about America as vividly as James Stewart or John Wayne.