Danny Huston makes authority look faintly suspect, often by making us attend to how a line is spoken. We rate his controlled supporting performances, though he needs more than a title and one good scene.
Fi1m perspective
In The Naked Gun (2025), Danny Huston's billionaire Richard Cane explains his philosophy to people who have not asked to hear it. Huston plays the man's entitlement straight, which suits Akiva Schaffer's rule that nobody should appear to know they are in a comedy. We laughed at the uninvited philosophising because Cane seems to regard other people's attention as something he already owns. This is a useful comic application of Huston's familiar authority.
His acting breakthrough was the lead in Ivans Xtc (2000), after he had begun directing features with Mr. North (1988). By the mid-2000s, supporting work in films such as The Aviator (2004) and The Constant Gardener (2005) had become central to his career. The appeal is clear in the authoritative or calculating men he is often cast to play. But the script still has to give those men something worth saying.
Fernando Meirelles gives him that opportunity as Sandy Woodrow in The Constant Gardener. Alongside Bill Nighy's Sir Bernard Pellegrin, Huston makes reserve worth watching: the way a line is delivered asks for as much attention as its content. We recommend the film despite plotting that becomes needlessly tangled, and these two help keep its complicated passages watchable. Huston's restraint leaves room to scrutinise Woodrow, rather than having every line announce what sort of man he is.
Horizon: An American Saga - Chapter 1 (2024) shows the limit of relying on that presence. Kevin Costner gives Huston's Colonel Houghton one good scene, but spreads the film's attention across four unfinished stories. There is pleasure in seeing an actor make a small allocation count, but this is not enough to recommend the film. It is hard to settle into a performance when the film is already looking towards its next group of characters.
Being cast repeatedly as compromised or villainous men need not condemn him to repeating himself. We would welcome more comedy after The Naked Gun, provided the scripts let him remain as solemn as Cane. For a fuller evening, start with The Constant Gardener and pay attention to the lines that seem to give the least away.
Biography
Danny Huston is an American actor, director and screenwriter. Born in Rome, Italy, he is the son of director John Huston and half-brother of actress Anjelica Huston. He trained at the London Film School.
Huston is known for film roles including Jack Frye in The Aviator (2004), Nigel in Children of Men (2006), Poseidon in Clash of the Titans (2010), Ludendorff in Wonder Woman (2017), and Richard Cane in The Naked Gun (2025). He has also appeared as Col. Albert Houghton in Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 (2024). On television he has played roles in American Horror Story, Yellowstone and Succession.
His directing credits include Mr. North (1988), The Maddening (1995) and The Last Photograph (2017). He received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Male Lead for Ivans Xtc (2000).
