In the opening scene of Robert Greene’s new documentary Actress, a woman in a red party dress and high heels stands before a carefully lit kitchen sink, washing and drying dishes in dreamy slow motion. The dramatic lighting and deep color saturation suggest that most empathetic channeler of women’s dramatic fantasy Douglas Sirk, while our brunet subject—shown strictly from behind in her cinched-waist dress—recalls the domestic eroticism of Anna Magnani, archetypal housewife of seething passions.
This woman is Brandy Burre, and if her name doesn’t immediately ring a bell, her face will for all fans of The Wire, the revered HBO series that for two of its five seasons featured Burre in the role of Terry D’Agostino, the savvy political consultant who engineers Thomas Carcetti’s mayoral victory while engaging in slumming-snob sport sex with Detective Jimmy McNulty. She was terrific…
