John Wayne: A Giant Shadow

by C McGivern

  The young director had acquired the story as an unpublished novel and originally had no intention of casting Duke, “The prejudicial attitudes I had about John Wayne made him just about my last choice for the role, but Warner Brothers wanted him. I reluctantly sent him a copy of the novel enclosing a note telling him I wasn’t looking for a co-producer or co-director, but that I might have a part for him. I flew down to Mexico to meet him. He absolutely disarmed me with his graciousness and warmth.” And Rydell needed Duke; Warner’s had agreed to increase the film’s budget to $6 million if he accepted the part, the largest amount allocated for a film made in the US in 1971 and further testimony to his pulling power, “Wherever his hand falls, the black ink flows, a rare sight these days.” Of all the movies being produced in Hollywood then, only “John Wayne Westerns,” a genre in their own right, were still guaranteeing a sizable return on investment. At the time when the vehicle of stardom was dying on its feet audiences were once again won over by the belief that a Wayne film, however mediocre, was worth going to just for the pleasure of seeing him tie his horse at the hitch rail.

  The director insisted on surrounding Duke with his own crew and young, trendy method actors but he was astonished by the way the star responded, “He worked slavishly with no reservations. We didn’t allow him to use his conventional wardrobe or anything like that. He at first bristled, but soon embraced the challenge and tried to show that he was as good an actor as any of them. In fact he did instinctively what Actors Studio people learn as a craft. He brooded over his role but used to say “pshaw” to our acting talk.”

  Rydell knew Duke had the reputation of chewing up young directors and spitting them back out again, “Once he started a scene calling “action” without my permission. I was at the top of a crane at the time and I yelled down at him, “Don’t ever do that again,” I had completely lost my temper. When he finished the scene he got in his car and left. All the crew assumed I would be gone the next day… I was horrified by my lack of tact. I had told him off in front of a lot of people. I returned to the production office very disappointed with myself. There were four messages waiting for me, all from Wayne. He invited me for dinner. I thought he was going to tell me the film was over. In fact he was the most charming I had ever seen him and from that day he called me “Sir.” He told me I treated him in a way he responded to. I reminded him of Ford. He explained that although he had a reputation for being difficult it was just his way of testing people. If a director was weak he was prepared to walk all over them. He was a constant surprise. Here was somebody I disagreed with on almost every level and yet he was most affable, warm and gracious and I couldn’t help but respond to him.”

  In the film Duke played a character forced to hire a group of schoolchildren to help get his herd to market. Rydell said, “He was a giant both physically and in terms of his work but he wasn’t threatened in any way by working with children. The kids climbed on him like he was a playground, there just for their amusement. They loved him. And their affection was more than returned. He took an interest in each of them, talked to them and offered fatherly advice and unlimited candy.” Duke found them a bonus on that lonely set, he enjoyed working with them and they distracted him and made him smile again. They accepted him as just one of the boys and never treated him as the star. He appreciated it, “In this one I play a sixty year old rancher with eleven kids under my wing and I try to get us all through a cattle drive. No actor in his right mind would try to match the antics of eleven kids on screen. But you know what … it’s been the greatest experience of my life!”

  Throughout the filming of The Cowboys he was plagued by the Press who still found every move he made newsworthy. He sat patiently, if a little bored, through scores of interviews, shrugging aside questions he didn’t want to answer, stringing together words he had often used in the past but which still satisfied most of them, and occasionally enjoying moments of unexpected banter with them. This time it was harder, he felt less inclined to talk, they found him a little distant, and he smiled sadly as he said, “I’ve had the most appealing of lives. I’ve been lucky enough to portray man against the elements at the same time as there was always someone there to bring me the orange juice. I never had to choose between adventure and comfort!”

  Many of the films he made after True Grit rejected any kind of domestic life and were more often about abstinence, and his character in The Cowboys, Wil Anderson, became a focal point for the tragic figure of the man who gives his life for the enrichment of the next generation. He worked hard creating Anderson and was so successful that one writer called the murder scene, “The most shocking moment of violence in the Nixon era. It is as if the Statue of Liberty had been toppled. More than any other, the moment marked the demise of the heroic westerner. From that time on all that remained were fragments of the legend.” Many felt the film might be a fitting last episode for the legendary cowboy. Duke could hardly agree, the whole point of the exercise was to keep working, to create a character and a performance so fine that the studios would continue to see him as a banker despite the difficulty of getting him insured. He was, however, worried about how the death scene would be interpreted by the fans, the studios and the critics.

  Everyone involved in the project dreaded broaching it with him. It called for a brutal fight, witnessed by the boys and ended when he got shot in the back. Rydell planned the bloodiest sequence ever in a John Wayne film, knowing full well how strongly he opposed graphic violence. So far the director had navigated the choppy waters well and had managed to avoid all the pitfalls associated with working with Duke. He put off discussing the scene until the very last moment and finally asked Dave Grayson if he could broach the subject on his behalf. Grayson warned ominously that it would take four men to get Duke into such bloody make-up, three just to hold him down whilst he applied it. Everyone expected the reaction to be volcanic but when Grayson finally found the courage to tell him he was subdued and resigned, “Well, alright. Go ahead. Put the stuff on,” although he added with determination, “But I won’t tolerate bodies opening up and liver flying out all over the place.” On the morning it was to be shot Grayson applied the evil wounds to his face, and slopped blood down the front of his shirt, and when Duke caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror he smiled sarcastically, “Why don’t you put a little more on me?” It hadn’t taken four of them to hold him down; just plenty of free-flowing booze and Grayson recalled Duke was in mellow mood as he left his trailer, “He filmed the entire scene through a drunken haze.”

  Years later Duke still insisted, “He didn’t need that stuff all over me. If you had just seen me bust the guy’s head against the tree you would have realized that he was mad at me. But they made us wet and snotty and the audience is saying, “Wait a minute, what’s going on here?” Before they get into the mood for me to play a death scene, I’ve played it and it’s over. I pleaded with Rydell, “Just take a shot of me in the sand, any goddamn place. Boom, guy goes down, cut.” The reaction of the kids to my death was also wrong and alienated the audience. I think Rydell knows he made a mistake, but hell, I got good money to do what he says. Only one man can paint the picture but it’s kinda sad when you think what it could have been if the scene had only been played right. The audience couldn’t cry because they weren’t in the right mood… I just don’t understand why that happened. But I do know they blame me when it turns out like that. Kinda sad. And I know it could have been so good.”

  His breathing problems worsened dramatically as he struggled through the difficult schedule. Mary said, “He was still in so much pain eleven years after losing his lung. It was really tough for him. I’ll never forget him coughing his way through the dust storms in Santa Fe. His problems with the thin air became serious and any effort caused him to breathe so heavily that the crew were unable to tape his microphone to his chest as it picked up too much wheezing and panting as he struggled. He was in such misery.”

  In fact even those who would not normally
have been sympathetic toward Duke were worried by his dogged insistence on doing several difficult riding scenes himself. Rydell allowed him to continue as long as he could, and turned away when he became so winded he could just about remain standing. It hurt Duke’s pride badly to have to give in but Rydell was happy enough with his consistent performance and felt irritated when other actors’ erratic readings forced him into a re-take, “It took great effort on his part just to curtail his rapid gasping but he always hoped no one noticed how weak he was. His health was the hot topic of gossip amongst the crew and everyone present was acutely aware that he was walking around with just one lung. They were all extra careful where he was involved, anxious to get everything right first time. I did everything I could to lessen the strain on him.”

  Rydell began the project an unwilling admirer but later admitted, “Duke is an individual man, like the character in the film. He was also a stunning shock to me. I went in prepared to do battle, to “handle” him, but I found one of the most incredible professionals I have ever met. He knew he was in alien territory but he was always ready, always listened to reason, he never let our differences get in his way, and because of him we finished way ahead of schedule. As soon as he knew anyone was in trouble he was the first in there, helping out. It’s very unusual for me to be charmed by such a man. But I knew he had to have something to have captured world interest for the past forty odd years. All it took was a week in his company to realize that his qualities are quite remarkable. He is sharp, with a wit and ability to make the most pungent observations. I found myself listening to him and learning. The key to his success, I think, is that he is so secure as a man you don’t have to worry about stepping on his toes. At first I was terrified of him. To begin with he is just so BIG. But he was obviously happy to be working, happy to be before the lens, you could detect the unmistakable eagerness on his face as soon as it was his turn to get up and step into the lights. I guess he was a little frustrated not to have any control over scenes and props but he gave no trouble. It was fascinating to go out in public with him, after all he is one of the ten most famous people in the world. In the middle of meals people would come up to demand his autograph and he was unfailingly courteous, never appearing to resent the imposition on his time or privacy. I never saw him turn one person away. John Wayne is far more flexible than is commonly allowed.” The other stars in the film agreed and Roscoe Lee Brown added, “I came prepared to dislike him but I found an intelligent, courteous and well-read man. He’s literate, genuine, a compassionate human being who can spend hours discussing Shelley and Keats with liberal left-wingers. Duke had everyone eating out of his hand. He was so articulate and sensitive and totally unselfish. The Great Dictator turned out to be a lamb.”

  The critics loved him in the movie, “Old dusty britches can act.” Molly Haskell, the well-known feminist wrote, “The Wayne I shall always cherish is the humbled and softened hero. It is Wayne the gentle patriarch, the last of what I hope is a dying breed, that I love… indeed it is difficult not to!”

  His fans hated it and were unwilling to watch their hero murdered only two thirds of the way into the film. They stayed away and it made little money for Warners but Duke marched on toward the conclusion of the legend, the humbled hero of The Cowboys.

  And ironically, he only managed to survive at all in films set in modern urban landscapes. His fans hadn’t rejected him, they still longed for the image of the loner, righting all wrongs, but not in the setting of the western. The city had become the domain of the outlaw and was where the weak needed the protection of an Ethan Edwards.

  Duke’s first chance at such a role came when he was offered the part of Harry Callahan, in Dirty Harry, the cop who broke the rules in the pursuit of justice. He was busy fulfilling his many other commitments when he turned it down and Clint Eastwood grabbed it to go on to fame and fortune. Wayne came to regret his decision and when he saw the film he knew he had made a terrible mistake, he realized Dirty Harry was John Wayne, removed from the old west and placed down in the city; “How did I ever let that one slip through my fingers?” He attempted to capitalize on the idea, making McQ in 1974, and Brannigan, released the following year. Both films came too late and both were hit hard by the same critics who had so loved The Cowboys, both just scraped a profit, whereas Dirty Harry generated $18 million.

  Even though his last films had made little money he remained immensely popular with his fans, and despite his general decline the seventies saw him awarded honor after honor. He felt grateful and humble and spurred on. His critics had never managed to slow him down, neither could he now sit back in the glow of the accolades. His destiny had never lain in the hands of others, never been a matter of chance, nor luck, but had always had more to do with his own self-belief and fanatical effort, “They offered me $75 a picture and I jumped.”

  Now he was winning awards and earning a million dollars a picture he was no better able to relax than he had ever been. He was not a man to await the next moment, he had always actively hunted each one down. The pursuit had been lifelong, unrelenting and he had chased his fate with a single-mindedness that left little room for anything or anyone else. His strength of purpose, determination and willingness to continue the chase at all cost, were the qualities that separated him from all the others aspiring to Hollywood immortality. He simply had to keep moving and was never happy unless there was a target to aim at, a challenge to overcome. Awards meant little to him and in the early seventies when he was asked why he had wanted to be a movie star he answered, “I didn’t. I wanted to be a director, but they offered me too much money… God… I sometimes made $500.” The interviewer persisted, “But why do you keep working?”

  “M.U.N.Y.”

  “No! How much have you made?”

  “Quite a bit.” Duke hesitated before hanging his head and confessing, “But I haven’t kept a whole lot of it. I’ve been better at making it than keeping it.” It was a sad reflection of how he viewed his situation and when he was asked later why he kept working when he didn’t have to, when he had already won everything, he responded angrily, no longer amused, “What makes you think I don’t have to work? Have you checked my financial statements? If you did, you’d know that if I’m going to continue to live this way, I do have to work. Awards don’t pay the bills. Maybe I should be in a position where I don’t have to, but I’m not.” He continued to suffer the severe cash flow problems that had long plagued his life and by the seventies he was still forced to work hard.

  He even began accepting offers to do television commercials in an attempt to pay the bills that the awards didn’t. He had long disliked the intrusion of television in his career and felt degraded to be forced to accommodate it so late in his life.

  Early in 1977 he signed a deal to advertise a headache remedy in an episode that took on nightmarish proportions. His fans thought the idea of John Wayne needing anything for a headache was ludicrous, and he too felt it tarnished his image. His own identity had been submerged in the “John Wayne thing” long since, he hated the idea of appearing weak before others, and it was not long before he backed out of the arrangement. He promised himself he would never get tangled up in another. It was one promise he broke. He was desperately short of money and feeling very insecure when Great Western Savings approached him offering $350,000 a year to advertise their company. As old age approached and offers of work began to dry up he’d not really slowed down much, he still felt the burning, restless energy and no matter what he told others, it was that, more than a need to earn money, that continued to drive him. He poured himself into one venture after another, including the commercials.

  Pilar was engrossed in her own life and they no longer even shared a bedroom. She told some friends it was because of his snoring, others that he was impotent. Whatever the reason there was very little physical closeness between them anymore and he missed her warmth. Until cancer struck they often danced with each other at home, kissing, cuddling and always holding
hands, oblivious to everything and everyone else. They frequently swam together late at night, or took themselves off to their specially made bed straight after dinner where they changed into silk pyjamas and lay close, watching TV, reading, or just talking and laughing for hours. To lose that closeness was devastating to the man who could never get enough love and affection. But once Pilar had turned to her new religion she could no longer smoke or drink or even share the love they had known in that huge bed, and whether he liked it or not she took herself off to the guest room. He raged that Christian Science ruined their marriage and took all the fun out of his life.

  He was hurt when she drifted away but equally, was too proud to explain how he felt, to ask her to give her religion up or to go back to being his old Pilar. Instead he complained bitterly about small things like the length of her tennis dress, shouting that it wasn’t seemly for the wife of John Wayne to go out in such a short outfit. He felt threatened and insecure but knew in his heart that the changes in her were the direct result of his overwhelming need to work and had little to do with Christian Science. Between 1939 and 1972 he had made an astonishing average of over two films a year, putting in six to nine months of each of those years away on location.

  He often worked sixteen-hour days, attending meetings and conferences, doing vast amounts of promotional work, running his production company and carrying out the day to day tasks required to keep his career up and running. The result had been frequent spells of severe illness, exhaustion and depression, and hardly controlled temper tantrums. He was well aware that he was difficult to handle, extremely demanding, and that his wife and children now found him uncomfortable to be around. But he missed them and wanted them back, and would have done anything for them. He hated the changes taking place in his life and longed for security and continuity. Both Marion and John Wayne, the man and the star, felt lost, tired and unwell.