At this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Gladiator 2 actor Paul Mescal might have given the most unintentionally revealing quote of the week when commenting on Hollywood and the “alpha male” characters that once defined it. While promoting The History of Sound, a period romance between two men in which Mescal stars alongside Josh O’Connor, the Irish actor confidently proclaimed that cinema is “moving away from the traditional, alpha, leading male characters.”
That sound you heard was John Wayne, Humphrey Bogart, and Sean Connery collectively groaning in their graves.
Sylvester Stallone as Dwight ‘The General’ Manfredi in Tulsa King (2022), Paramount Plus
Mescal’s remarks came during a press conference for The History of Sound, a film set in 1919 that follows two men who travel New England recording folk music while discovering a romantic bond. The film has been dubbed by some as a spiritual successor to Brokeback Mountain, a comparison Mescal quickly (and smugly) dismissed as “lazy and frustrating” — though he did admit, almost comically, that the only real similarity was that they “spent a little time in a tent.”
Paul Mescal says comparing his gay romance “The History of Sound” to “Brokeback Mountain” is “lazy and frustrating.”
“When I look at ‘Brokeback Mountain,’ it’s dealing with the idea of repression. This film is fundamentally pointed in the opposite direction.” pic.twitter.com/uSEQMwyodN
— Variety (@Variety) May 22, 2025
“I personally don’t see the parallels at all,” Mescal said, to the laughter of the press corps. “[Brokeback] is a beautiful film but it is dealing with the idea of repression. I find those comparisons relatively lazy and frustrating… our film is a celebration between these men’s love, not the repression of their sexuality.”
Paul Mescal as Lucius in Gladiator II (2024), Paramount Pictures
In other words, it’s not like those other stories with tragedy and struggle — this one is about softness, silliness, and the joy of eight Jolly Ranchers a day. Again, that is not an exaggeration. Mescal spent part of the press conference fondly recounting how he and O’Connor bonded by eating eight Jolly Ranchers a day during filming.
“There’s a microcosm to our relationship that I think of Josh and I think of Jolly Ranchers,” he said.
If that doesn’t sum up the industry’s evolving view of masculinity, nothing does.
Paul Mescal as Lucius and Pedro Pascal as Marcus Acacius in Gladiator II (2024), Paramount Pictures
Let’s be clear: There is absolutely room in cinema for vulnerability, complexity, and nontraditional portrayals of male characters. But when actors begin cheerleading the displacement of the classic masculine archetype altogether, that’s not evolution — it’s eradication. Mescal isn’t merely arguing for diversity of stories; he’s framing the alpha male — the rugged, dependable, protective archetype — as obsolete.
Hollywood has been trending in this direction for some time. Gone are the days when action heroes and stoic leaders dominated the big screen. In their place? Conflicted sadboys, hapless tagalongs, and, apparently, candy-obsessed folk song archivists.
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – FEBRUARY 28: Pedro Pascal speaks onstage during the Mandalorian special launch event at El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, California on February 28, 2023. (Photo by Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Disney)
Mescal’s quote is not just a glimpse into The History of Sound — it’s a window into the industry’s broader attitude toward masculinity. What used to be heroic is now problematic. What used to be aspirational is now seen as archaic. And what used to be a pillar of storytelling is now something to be deconstructed, reimagined, or altogether discarded.
And let’s not ignore the irony. While Mescal was championing the softening of men on screen, the same Hollywood machine is busy reviving franchises that were built on the backs of those very alpha males — Indiana Jones, Wolverine, the Top Gun, the list goes on. They want the name recognition, not the archetype. The shell remains, but the soul is being rewritten.
(L-R): Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) and Helena (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) in Lucasfilm’s INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY. ©.
Paul Mescal may think he’s part of a cinematic revolution against Alpa Male characters. But to many moviegoers, it feels more like an erasure. Not of a specific type of story, but of something deeper: the idea that strength, stoicism, and self-sacrifice have a place in the male identity.
If that kind of masculinity is truly on the way out, it won’t be because audiences demanded it. It will be because the people writing the scripts and controlling the cameras decided it for them.
And that’s the real history of sound being written in Hollywood today.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton star in Skydance Productions and Paramount Pictures’ “TERMINATOR: DARK FATE.”
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