Jack Nicholson screen characters, someone who is "snarly, dumb, smart, noble, rascally—all the parts of 'Jack'" Nicholson went on to win his next Academy Award for Best Actor in the romantic comedy, "As Good as It Gets" (1997), his third film directed by James L. Brooks. He played Melvin Udall, a "wickedly funny", mean-spirited, obsessive-compulsive novelist. "I'm a studio Method actor", he said. "So I was prone to give some kind of clinical presentation of the disorder." His Oscar was matched with the Academy Award for Best Actress for Helen Hunt, who played a Manhattan wisecracking, single-mother waitress drawn into a love/hate
Jack Nicholson "I think that Jack really has very little in common with Bobby. I think Bobby has given up looking for love. But Jack hasn't, he's very interested in love, in finding out things. Jack is a very curious, alive human being. Always ready for a new idea." Nicholson himself said as much, telling an interviewer, "I like listening to everybody. This to me is the elixir of life." Black later admitted that she had a crush on Nicholson from the time they met, although they only dated briefly. "He was very beautiful. He just looked right at you ... I