Marlon Brando changed acting more fundamentally than any performer in the twentieth century — A Streetcar Named Desire, On the Waterfront, and The Godfather redefined what screen performance could be. And he despised every minute of it. He called acting a worthless profession, refused his Oscar, gained a hundred pounds out of apparent indifference, and spent his later decades on a Tahitian island trying to escape the art form he had revolutionized.

This episode traces Brando from his alcoholic Nebraska childhood through the Method revolution, the films that changed cinema, the Oscar refusal, and the reclusive final decades of a man who considered his greatest talent a curse.

• The abusive childhood and the Stella Adler training that channeled his rage into revolutionary acting
• Streetcar, On the Waterfront, and the Method performances that demolished the old Hollywood style
• The Godfather comeback, the Oscar refusal with Sacheen Littlefeather, and the political activism
• The Tahitian retreat, the weight gain, the bizarre later roles, and a genius who hated his own gift