I could have bought him a beer (two). I should have bought him a beer (two).

But no.

Was there ever anyone cooler than Paul Newman? He was so cool that his extravagant looks almost didn’t matter. Almost. The Hollywood legend died last week at age 83.

The first Newman scene I can remember was in “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” made back in the dark ages, 1956. Newman (taking over for James Dean) played another of my favorites, the ever-tough Rocky Graziano, who used to be a star on the Friday Night Fights, sponsored by Gillette razors, if I remember correctly.

It was late in a round where Graziano was being pummeled by another fighter and the referee wanted to stop the fight to save Rocky’s life. He walked to Graziano’s corner and asked, as was the fashion, “What’s your name?”

Newman, channeling Graziano, peered through swollen eyes and said through bloody lips, “Gimme a hint.”

Cool.

He was so cool on “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” that he actually turned down Liz Taylor in her prime, as she walked around in her underwear. Of course in the Tennessee Williams play he was a gay football player, but we forgave him for that.

He was of course fabulous in “The Hustler,” then “Hud,” in which we forgave him again for raping (sort of) Patricia Neal.

I parted company with those who loved “Cool Hand Luke,” which I found to be tortuous, even without the egg scene. If memory serves (rarely), I left a Dorchester drive-in because I hated it so.

“Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” will be one of my 10 top movies lifetime and “The Sting” was another classic. I have seen both dozens of times and would watch either if it aired tonight.

But my favorite of all, for some reason was “Hombre,” based on a novel by Elmore Leonard and featuring Newman as a blissfully violent retired Indian sheriff. It’s not even listed on most Newman collections.

I also loved “The Verdict,” the movie that should have won him the Oscar, but didn’t. He played a reformed (sort of) drunken Boston lawyer, set up by the Catholic Church in a hospital suit. He loitered around smoky Boston barrooms and drank Bushmill’s Irish whiskey. When he discovered her betrayal, he punched Charlotte Rampling. She had it coming and we forgave him yet again.

All right, “The Color of Money” was a weak remake of “The Hustler” but we got to stare at Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio.

Cool? Let me count the ways. He turned his back on Hollywood and lived in Westport, Conn. He supported liberal politicians such as Eugene McCarthy and ended up on Richard Nixon’s enemies list. He raced cars. He stayed with the same woman for 50 years. He made fabulous products like salad dressing (best ever), popcorn and spaghetti sauce and donated the money, roughly $250 million, to poor children.

Cool.

One summer, a pair of musicians named Greg Naughton and Mike Maguire (the real one) needed a place to hide out for the summer and play the area bars. I let them stay at Cobb Manor, but had to charge them more for playing music on the deck late at night.

One day, “Joanne” called for Greg, something about a New York rehearsal. He explained, laughing, that it was Joanne Woodward, who was going to direct him in an off-Broadway revival of Clifford Odets’ “Golden Boy.” After he left, he invited Blue Eyes and me to New York for the closing night and the cast party.

Did we go? Is Wall Street doomed?

In the audience that night were Woodward, Cicely Tyson, Rob Morrow and others I cannot remember. I promised Blue Eyes that Newman would show. She believes hardly anything I say and this did not make the cut.

When the first act ended, I went back to the small bar for a beer. Before I could order, this guy beside me ordered two Buds, one for each hand. It was Newman. If I were more clever, or clever at all, I would have insisted on buying for him. But I was in shock, regardless of what I told Blue Eyes.

I could have told people forever that “Paul” and I were so close that I bought him “a couple of Buds” in New York.

But no.

I was never that cool.

Send complaints and compliments to Emmet Meara at emmetmeara@msn.com.