( CNN ) -- What must it be like to step to the plate for your first appearance as a major-league baseball player and knock a grand-slam home run into the far reaches of the seats in Yankee Stadium ? Or to walk onto a National Football League field for the first time in your life , receive a kickoff while standing in the end zone , and return it 103 yards for a touchdown ? Very few people know that feeling -- the feeling of , against all probability , achieving magnificence on the very first try . But Andy Griffith did . When he died earlier this month at the age of 86 , most of the obituaries and remembrances were centered on his role as the lovable , quietly wise Sheriff Andy Taylor in the long-running television series `` The Andy Griffith Show . '' Which only made sense : that program , and that character , were so popular that when people hear Griffith 's name , they almost automatically also hear in their heads the peppy , whistling theme music from the show . He , and the show , symbolized a sunny America that thrived on common sense and good intentions . Yet , in the minds of some of us , Griffith 's crowning achievement came at the outset of his career , the first time he appeared in a motion picture . The job he did was so stunning -- and so directly opposite in tone from the Sheriff Andy character that would later define him -- that watching the movie today is a revelation . The movie was called `` A Face in the Crowd . '' Those of you who have seen it are likely nodding your heads in appreciation right now ; those of you who have n't are in for a treat . You thought you knew how good the guy was at his job ? Just wait . You wo n't have to wait long . As part of a tribute to Griffith 's career , Turner Classic Movies is presenting a special airing of `` A Face in the Crowd '' Wednesday at 8 p.m . ET . TCM and CNN are corporate siblings , but I would be recommending `` A Face in the Crowd '' to you if I 'd heard it was being screened in a church basement , or in the most rundown revival theater on some desolate downtown corner . Released in 1957 , the movie told the story of Larry `` Lonesome '' Rhodes , a drifter we first see in a rural Arkansas jail cell . He is interviewed by a small-town radio reporter played by Patricia Neal , and the film follows his rise to radio , and then television , stardom , and what eventually transpires . Griffith made audiences love him as the kindly Sheriff Andy of Mayberry ; as Lonesome Rhodes , he had the courage as an actor to dare audiences to hate him . You can not take your eyes off him . In his May 29 , 1957 , review of the movie in the New York Times , critic Bosley Crowther wrote that screenwriter Budd Schulberg and director Elia Kazan had managed to `` spawn a monster not unlike the one of Dr . Frankenstein . '' And as you watch the first-time movie actor Griffith , Crowther wrote , `` you know you are in the vicinity of someone who has white lightning for blood . '' Budd Schulberg was on a remarkable three-year run at the time ; between 1954 and 1957 he had a hand in three unforgettable movies about the dark side of American life : `` On the Waterfront '' with Marlon Brando , `` The Harder They Fall '' with Humphrey Bogart , and `` A Face in the Crowd . '' As laceratingly first-rate as Schulberg 's writing and Kazan 's direction were , the film would not have worked had the lead actor failed to be convincing as a person whose hungers were so self-centered and all-consuming that he would do anything and step on anyone to get what he wanted . Griffith pulled it off seamlessly : As you watch him , you understand how the smiling , aw-shucks , I'm-just-a-country-boy Lonesome Rhodes could cynically use the then-new medium of national television to become as powerful as the president , while privately holding his viewers in utter contempt . Griffith looms physically large , and his menacing grin springs from the screen ; this is , at its core , a horror movie , and Griffith plays it as such from the first frame in which we see him . The movie did only tepid business upon its release , and -- in retrospect , this is astonishing -- was not nominated for a single Academy Award . The next year Griffith starred in the amiable military comedy `` No Time for Sergeants , '' and by 1960 `` The Andy Griffith Show '' was on network television and he was on his way to sweet , gentle fame , under blue skies and white clouds . As America says goodbye to him , and to his worthy acting career , I hope -- especially if you have never seen it -- that you 'll take the time to watch him in `` A Face in the Crowd , '' filmed before his own face had become universally recognizable . You 'll not only be honoring his life . You will be doing something that none of us , when given the opportunity , should ever pass up : . Witnessing greatness . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Andy Griffith .
Bob Greene : When Andy Griffith died , most recalled him as the aw - shucks Sherriff Sam Taylor . But a stunning performance he gave earlier in his first film was the highlight of his TV role . In ` ` A Face in the Crowd '' Griffith played a drifter - co - star , an oily , monstrous character . Greene : Griffith made the film ; you should see it to understand how good it was .