SMALL PRINT:Just look at this now-poignant Lifecover from 1969. Three of the finest actors of their generations, all good pals, have got themselves dolled up for the photographer. It's Peter Falk, Ben Gazzara and John Cassavetes. Don't they look indescribably suave as they prepare for Cassavetes's great Husbands?With the death of Gazzara on Friday, all three are no longer with us, and the world seems a tad more wan.

Gazzara, who was 81, appeared in quite a few mainstream films. He was also a great theatre actor and originated the role of Brick in the first production of Tennessee Williams's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. You can see him in The Big Lebowski, Anatomy of a Murderand the enjoyable remake of The Thomas Crown Affair.He was super in Dogville.But he will, surely, be best remembered for the handful of films he made with Cassavetes.

The twitchy naturalistic type of cinema the men developed has had a mighty influence on American film. When Cassavetes made Shadows, in 1959, Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift had already done some mumbling, but this class of realism was, in American terms, still a preserve of outre short-film-makers. Collaborations between Gazzara and Cassavetes, such as Husbands, Opening Nightand The Killing of a Chinese Bookie, managed to combine that grittiness with real narrative drive. Chinese Bookieis probably still the best place to go to see both men at their best.