American Titan: Searching for John Wayne

by Marc Eliot

  That September 1974, after doing a series of public service commercials for the American Cancer Society—“Get yourself a checkup and send in a check”—Wayne went off to film Rooster Cogburn with Pat by his side, as she was constantly now. Produced by Hal Wallis for Universal Pictures, Rooster Cogburn was shot on location in September and October, in Bend, Oregon, the Cascade Mountains, Deschutes National Forest, and the Rogue River. Wayne received $750,000 plus a percentage of the profits. His costar in this sequel to True Grit was Katharine Hepburn, who received $150,000 plus $12,500 in expenses and a small piece of the net profits (which eventually totaled $100,000). The film had a script by Martha Hyer (writing as Martin Julien) that resembled the 1951 Hepburn/Bogart Huston film The African Queen more than the original True Grit, with Hepburn a spinster version of Mattie Ross and Wayne in the Bogart role, slovenly, coarse. The two got along well during production, despite their political differences (Hepburn was a well-known liberal and champion of women’s rights). They were professionals there to do a job, and they did it the best they could.

  As is the proven rule in Hollywood, sequels cost twice as much as originals and gross half the amount. Rooster Cogburn was no exception. True Grit grossed $35 million in its first domestic release, Rooster Cogburn, released in October 1975, did $18.4 million.

  During filming, Wayne’s old cough returned, not helped by the high altitudes of the Oregon locations, and he soon developed what was diagnosed as walking pneumonia. He was hospitalized once during filming and once after. He had lost fifteen pounds. He also suffered through an inner ear infection, and exhaustion, but managed to overcome all of it, except that cough.

  A month after finishing Rooster Cogburn Wayne checked into Hoag Hospital in Newport Beach to have a knee he had injured during filming corrected. He was never comfortable in hospitals, and this time was no different. He was released a week before Christmas. Although he had given up smoking after his lung cancer, he was back up to a pack a day.

  Brannigan was released in March 1975, and it, too, failed to capture the imagination of the public, barely making back its production costs.

  Wayne was back in the hospital again the same month Brannigan was released, unable to shake his hacking cough. This time he was treated with antibiotics, developed a staph infection, and remained an inpatient for the rest of the month.

  Upon his release, a frail-looking Wayne made an appearance at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion for the April 8, 1975, Oscar presentations, hosted that year by Bob Hope, Sammy Davis Jr., Shirley MacLaine, and Frank Sinatra, telecast live over NBC in America and beamed around the world via satellite. He had agreed to present the Honorary Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement to Howard Hawks.

  Wayne was introduced by Shirley MacLaine, and he received a standing ovation. When the applause died down, Wayne spoke, his voice slightly strained. “Actors hate directors, and then the movie comes out, and they get great notices, and then they don’t hate the director anymore.” The audience laughed appreciatively, recognizing the truth of Wayne’s observation. After he read a list of Hawks’s best movies, he said, “He’s made a lot of actors jump. I’m the director tonight. Hawks! Roll ’em. Get your skinny whatchamacallit out here!” Hawks walked slowly out, thin as ever, his head crowned with cotton-white hair, and the audience rose to its feet. Wayne handed him the Oscar, saying “From movie fans everywhere.” The Grey Fox, as Hawks was known in Hollywood, then approached the mike and said, “I remember visiting John Ford when he became sick and went out into the desert to die. And he said, ‘There’s something I stole from you that tops the whole thing. I won the Oscar but you made a better picture. You’re going to get one.’ ” The audience was puzzled by the reference. Hollywood has a short memory when it comes to who won an Oscar what year. Wayne pointed the way off, stage right. “No, this way,” Hawks said and led Wayne off in the other direction, leaving everyone scratching their heads.136

  Backstage, at the mandatory press conference, a so-called reporter shouted to Wayne, asking him if he was a racist. “You’re mistaken,” Wayne said, angered but not wanting to sound confrontational. The reporter asked the question again and he was hustled out of the room by security guards.

  WAYNE WAS EXHAUSTED BY HIS appearance at the Oscars and began an extended period of convalescence spent mostly alone on The Wild Goose, with an occasional stop at the house in Newport Beach. His downtime ended January 13, 1976, when he reported for the start of production on what would be his 169th and final film.

  The Shootist was directed by Don Siegel from a screenplay by Miles Hood Swarthout and Scott Hale. Cinematographer Bruce Surtees was behind the camera, and the music score was by Elmer Bernstein. It was not a Batjac film, but produced by Dino De Laurentiis and Mike Frankovich, distributed by Paramount domestically and De Laurentiis internationally. Wayne was hired to act in it for $750,000 plus an unspecified percentage of the net to star in the film. His costars were Jimmy Stewart, reuniting the two legends for the first (and last) time since The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, and Lauren Bacall, whom he’d worked with on Blood Alley; Stewart and Bacall each received $50,000 for their relatively small roles.137

  Set in 1901, the film is yet another tale of the disappearing Old West at the dawn of the twentieth century. J. B. Books (Wayne) is an aging gunfighter who visits his old friend, Dr. E. W. Hostetler (Stewart), who tells Books he is terminally ill with cancer. Wishing to die in peace and with dignity, Books rents a room at the widow Bond Rogers’s (Lauren Bacall’s) boardinghouse, where he strikes up a paternal relationship with her boy, Gillom Rivers (Ron Howard). When the town learns of Books’ presence, several gunfighters come to make their reputations by shooting him down. A climactic fight scene ensues, Books kills all his challengers, and then is shot in the back by Murray the bartender, of all people. Gillom then kills the bartender, played by Charles G. Martin. Siegel originally wanted Wayne to shoot Murray, but he refused, telling Siegel that John Wayne would never shoot anyone in the back.

  The film bore more than a casual resemblance to Henry King’s 1950 The Gunfighter, with Gregory Peck in the role of a gunfighter who can never retire because there is always someone out there who wants to make his reputation as the man who outdraws him. It also had something of True Grit in it, the old gunslinger befriended by young Gillom, played by Ron Howard in the Kim Darby role.

  Siegel used the opening sequence of The Shootist to pay tribute to Wayne with a montage from some of his earlier westerns, including Red River, Hondo, Rio Bravo, and El Dorado, in effect melding all his cowboy characters into one iconic figure.

  Released July 19, 1976, it was one of thirty-three westerns made during the United States’ bicentennial year, and among the most popular. From a negative cost of $8 million, split between Paramount and De Laurentiis, The Shootist grossed $13 million domestically, and nearly doubled that internationally. Variety raved about it, declaring that “The Shootist will stand as one of John Wayne’s towering achievements . . . Don Siegel’s terrific film is simply beautiful . . . The entire film is in totally correct balance, artistically and technically . . . It is one of the great films of our time.” Kathleen Cornell of the New York Daily News understood that “[t]his is unmistakably Wayne’s valedictory performance. Only a great actor could have this skillfully delineated performance.” Frank Rich, writing for the New York Post, said, “When Wayne warms up to a role and lets loose with his sour twang of a voice, he can still command an audience’s undivided attention—and he can still wipe most any other actor off the screen.” Newsweek wrote that “Wayne’s proud, quietly anguished performance . . . has a richness that seems born of self-knowledge; he lends the film a tremendous sense of intimacy and a surprisingly confessional mood.”

  That fall, in Boxoffice magazine’s ranking of the nation’s top male stars, Wayne placed seventh, his twenty-fourth appearance among its top ten. The Motion Picture Herald’s survey of theater owners had Wayne at eleventh. According to the survey, the top ten male and female sta
rs of 1976 were Robert Redford, Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Clint Eastwood, Mel Brooks, Burt Reynolds, Al Pacino, Tatum O’Neal, Woody Allen, and Charles Bronson. And then came Wayne, fifty years after his first appearance in Brown of Harvard.

  HIS COUGH, WHICH HAD NEVER completely gone away, continued to get worse, a wet, sticky, grating hack that often bent him over and turned his face red. His voice had been noticeably hoarse during the filming of The Shootist, and after, his weight ballooned. He looked bloated and uncomfortable, and when he finally and reluctantly did go to a doctor, he was diagnosed with congestive heart failure, a complication of a defective mitral valve. He was put on digitalis and digoxin and, to rid him of his excess water weight, the diuretic Lasix. He was also given regular doses of potassium. That spring he was also diagnosed with having an enlarged prostate.

  All the treatments and medications weakened him considerably, but he insisted he was fine and went on a publicity blitz for The Shootist. He appeared at an “All-Star Tribute to John Wayne,” to raise funds for a children’s hospital and also plug the film. He also campaigned for Ronald Reagan during his quest to win the Republican nomination and represent the party in that fall’s presidential election. When Gerald Ford won it, Wayne then actively campaigned for him.

  After the 1976 election (Jimmy Carter won and Wayne promptly sent him a mailgram “congratulating the loyal opposition”), Wayne quietly checked in to Hoag to have routine surgery to relieve pressure on his urethra from the enlarged prostate. He was released from the hospital in time to receive an unexpected invitation from President-elect Carter to attend his inauguration.

  The night of January 19, 1977, he spoke briefly but with great elegance at the preinaugural reception: “Good evening. My name is John Wayne. I’m here tonight to pay my respects to our thirty-ninth president, our new commander-in-chief—to wish you Godspeed, sir, in the uncharted waters ahead. Tomorrow at high noon, all our hopes and dreams to into that great house with you. For you have become our transition into the unknown tomorrows, and everyone is with you. I’m pleased to be present and accounted for in this capital of freedom to witness history as it happens—to watch a common man accept the uncommon responsibility he won ‘fair and square’ by stating his case to the American people—not by bloodshed, beheadings, and riots at the palace gates. I know I’m considered a member of the loyal opposition—accent on the loyal. I’d have it no other way.”

  The applause filled Wayne’s ears with his favorite sound, the freedom of expression. For him, there would be no opposition to that as long as he lived.

  However much longer that might be.

  DURING THE RECEPTION, WHILE PRESIDENT Carter was on the receiving the line of celebrities waiting to shake his and Vice President–elect Mondale’s hands, he broke away to personally thank Wayne for his kind words. It was a warm moment for him. He hadn’t voted for Carter, but he saw something of himself in the new president, someone who didn’t hold personal grudges, who could rise above an adversary to extend the hand of friendship. When President Carter wanted a new treaty with Panama that would grant them a greater measure of freedom and turn control of the Panama Canal over to the Panamanians, the Republicans opposed giving up the canal, but Wayne thought it was the right thing to do and supported Carter on this issue.

  Less than a month after the inauguration, Wayne lost another of his close friends, a charter member of the old guard, when Andy Devine, a veteran of more than four hundred movies, died of leukemia. Devine was buried at Pacific View Memorial Park. After the ceremony, Wayne told his family that was where he wanted to be buried, overlooking Newport Harbor.

  WAYNE STRUGGLED ON, BATTLING HIS ailments, all the while believing he would make at least one more movie. He bought the rights to Beau John, an as yet unpublished novel by Buddy Atkinson he hoped to film with Ron Howard as his costar.

  Early in 1978, President Carter invited Wayne to witness the signing of the Panama Canal Treaty, but he was too sick to attend. His mitral valve had deteriorated to the point where he had to have it replaced. He agreed to have open-heart surgery, an operation that itself might kill him, especially with only one lung to support him during and after it was performed. On March 29, 1978, the night of that year’s Oscar ceremony, where he was supposed to present an award, he was instead accompanied by Michael, Patrick, Aissa, and Pat Stacy (but not Pilar) to Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston to receive a pig’s valve to replace his worn-out one. The three-hour surgery on the seventy-year-old Wayne was performed the morning of April 3, 1978.

  After a brief stay in the hospital, he felt well enough to be released, and by the end of April, he flew back to Newport Beach. All seemed well until he came down with hepatitis, which he likely contracted from blood transfusions during his heart surgery, and by a persistent fever. That May he checked back into Hoag. After this release, he spent most of his time recuperating on The Wild Goose, fighting what had become a new problem, a persistent burning heartburn and severe stomach pains that nothing would relieve. It became so bad that he finally had to check back in to Hoag, where the doctors told him they wanted to remove his gallbladder.

  He didn’t want to have to go through the ordeal of another surgery and toughed it out through December, until the pain became unbearable and he agreed to the operation on January 12, 1979. However, before it could be performed, Wayne’s doctors urged him to transfer the surgery to UCLA. He suspected the worst and told Pilar, who agreed to meet with him at the restaurant she had opened in Newport Beach. They hadn’t seen each other for a while. Pilar recalled her first impression seeing him that day: “He was thin, too thin, and new lines of pain had drawn his face into a mask.” They made some awkward small talk, and at one point Wayne told her how much he had enjoyed their good times together. Then he admitted that he was very sick, that he couldn’t eat anymore, and that he was sure this time he was dying. He made her promise to take care of the kids. She was weeping when he got up and left. It was the last time she saw him in person alive.

  HE THEN CHECKED INTO THE UCLA Medical Center, and exploratory surgery confirmed his greatest fear. He had stomach cancer, and it had metastasized to his lymph nodes. Most of his stomach was removed, and he could only eat very small meals, six a day, to keep his energy up. Upon his release he returned to Newport Beach, where Pat Stacy became his twenty-four-hour nurse. Pilar stayed away.

  One of the last things Wayne did was to make his son Michael the executor of the estate. He reluctantly submitted to radiation therapy, but there was no getting around it. He was riddled with stomach cancer that was eating him alive from the inside out.

  Also, during this time, a bill to award John Wayne a Congressional Gold Medal was introduced in Congress by his friend Senator Barry Goldwater on May 22, 1979. Part of Goldwater’s testimonial included these words: “John Wayne has dedicated his entire life to America and I am safe in saying that the American people have an affection for John Wayne such as they have had for very few people in the history of America.” Maureen O’Hara, who attended the hearings, said, “John Wayne is not just an actor, and a good actor, he is the United States of America. I feel this gold medal should say just one thing: John Wayne American . . . I beg you to order the President to strike it.”

  Others present were Elizabeth Taylor, Kathleen Nolan, who was then president of the Screen Actors Guild, and General Albert Coady Wedemeyer.

  Congress took it under consideration.

  SICK AS HE WAS, WAYNE had one more public appearance left in him he was determined to make. He had been invited by the Academy to present the award for Best Picture. Even if he had to crawl there, he swore nothing and no one was going to stop him making what he knew would be his final public appearance.

  Epilogue

  The Oscar ceremony took place April 9, 1979, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in downtown Los Angeles. The host was Johnny Carson and the presentation was broadcast live to viewers around the world.

  That afternoon, at 4:30, Wayne’s trailer
pulled into the private parking area of the pavilion. Accompanied by his daughter Aissa, an extremely frail Wayne made it to the backstage area, where he received an ovation of appreciation and respect from the other stars and the show technicians and runners. He grinned and said, in a voice choked with emotion, “Hell, I’d have gotten sick before if I knew I’d get this kind of treatment.” He was led by Aissa to a bed where he could rest until, several hours later, he would be called onto the stage.

  At the designated time, Wayne was led to his entrance spot while out front, Johnny Carson made the introduction. He was nervous, more so than usual, as the audience sensed something special was about to happen. A hush fell over the crowd as they waited for Carson to say something. “Last year,” he began, “an American institution stood right here and said some heartfelt words about another American institution.” The light went down and a clip of Bob Hope came up from the year before, the same night Wayne was entering the hospital for his heart operation. “Wayne,” Hope said, with that familiar side-of-the-mouth speech pattern, “we expect to see you amble out here in person next year, because nobody else can walk in John Wayne’s boots.” The lights went up and Carson said, simply, “Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. John Wayne.”

  At first the crowd gasped. Wayne’s weight was down to 160 pounds and he looked thin and frail. His toupee looked too big for his head, and despite wearing makeup, he looked pale as a ghost. The place then erupted in cheers and stood as one as he slowly walked down a curved flight of stairs until he reached the microphone. He waited for the audience to sit before he started speaking, his voice a whisper of what it once was. He stood steadily on his own two feet, his face crinkled into a smile that hid his eyes until he spoke: “That’s about the only medicine a fella’d ever really need,” he said. “Believe me when I tell you that I’m mighty pleased that I can amble down here tonight. Well, Oscar and I have something in common. Oscar first came to the Hollywood scene in 1928—so did I. We’re both a little weather-beaten but we’re still here, and plan to be around a whole lot longer. My job here tonight is to identify our five choices for the outstanding picture of the year (producer) and announce the winner, so let’s move ’em out.” Wayne went on to mispronounce most of the names of the nominees. Michael Cimino came out Michael Chipino; Warren Beatty, Warner Beatty; Paul Mazursky, Paul Masurki.