Cast: Luther Whitney, Clint Eastwood; President Richmond, Gene Hackman; Seth Frank, Ed Harris; Kate Whitney, Laura Linney; Bill Burton, Scott Glenn; Tim Collin, Dennis Haysbert; Gloria Russell, Judy Davis; Walter Sullivan, E. G. Marshall
NOTES
In order not to burden this book with excessive annotation these notes identify only those quotations from Clint Eastwood that are drawn from secondary sources—largely from books, magazines and newspapers to which, over the years, he has granted interviews. All unattributed Eastwood quotations in the text are taken from interviews the author conducted with him either in the fall of 1991, on the set of Unforgiven, or during the period 1993 to 1996, when this book was in active preparation.
I have not cited brief quotations from reviews where I have used only a phrase or two as a way of summarizing the general critical response to a particular film.
PROLOGUE
1 an uncomplicatedly nice guy: Richard Jameson, “Pale Rider,” The Weekly (Seattle), February 12, 1986.
2 beasts of burden: John Updike, In the Beauty of the Lillies, p. 321.
3 America’s daunting ideas: Janet Maslin, “Good and Evil in a More Innocent Age,” The New York Times, September 14, 1994.
4 He says very little to you: Interview with Gene Hackman, September 18, 1991. By and large: Interview with Morgan Freeman, October 21, 1991.
5 Zen and the art of control: Interview with Tom Stern, June 2, 1993.
6 He’s not an exclamation point: Interview with Saul Rubinek, September 17, 1991.
7 someone’s violated his world: Interview with Meryl Streep, October 19, 1994.
8 Eastwood has an uncanny urge: Thomson, “Forgiven,” The Independent (London), August 22, 1993.
9 Oh, yeah, it’s easy: Quoted in Norman Mailer, “All the Pirates and People,” Parade, October 23, 1983.
10 There’s a rebel: Quoted in Gerald Lubenow, “Rebel in My Soul,” Newsweek, July 22, 1985.
CHAPTER ONE
1 What an American: Norman Mailer, “All the Pirates.”
2 My dad was Scots-English: Ibid.
3 Did you once describe yourself: Quoted in John Vinocur, “Clint Eastwood, Seriously,” The New York Times Magazine, February 24, 1985.
4 the first one at a party: Interview with Ruth Wood, November 26, 1995. All subsequent quotations from her are drawn from the same source.
5 made out of Prince Albert cans: Arthur Knight, “The Interview: Clint Eastwood,” Playboy, February 1978.
6 I come and go like The Whistler: Ibid.
7 I was terrific: “The Barbara Walters Special,” ABC Television, June 15, 1982.
8 He went to the drive-in: Interview with John Calley, May 4, 1994. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
9 although I rebelled: Wayne Warga, “Clint Eastwood: He Drifted into Stardom,” Los Angeles Times, June 22, 1969.
10 If a kid could ask: Interview with Fritz Manes, August 11, 1994. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
11 drew like crazy: Bob Blumenthal, Jazz Times, September 1995.
12 the last bastion: Ted Gioia, West Coast Jazz, p. 60. I have drawn on this volume for much of my description of the jazz scene in California in the 1940s and 1950s.
13 They never heard of him: Quoted in Ralph Ellison, “On Bird, Bird-Watching, and Jazz,” in Shadow and Act, p. 228.
14 Parker operated in the underworld: Ibid., p. 227.
15 a grim comedy of racial manners: Ibid., p. 225. 46 There’s a little guy right inside: “Barbara Walters Special.”
CHAPTER TWO
1 enhanced their appreciation: Milton Friedman, “Why Socialism Won’t Work,” The New York Times, August 13, 1994.
2 This man has had: Quoted in Lennie Niehaus, “The Measure of the Man,” in Clint Eastwood Tribute Book, ed. Schneider, p. 14.
3 We hit it off: Quoted in Iain Johnstone, Clint Eastwood: The Man with No Name, p. 13.
4 The dramatic art is a collective art: Michael Chekhov, To the Actor, p. 41.
5 a way to help actors: Quoted in Foster Hirsch, A Method to Their Madness, p. 341.
6 reaching out to your partner: Quoted in Hirsch, p. 341.
CHAPTER THREE
1 I just lacked the look: Quoted in Lorenzo Caracaterra, “Dirty Harry Comes Clean,” Video, May 1985.
2 starlets and studlets: Interview with Jack Kosslyn, August 29, 1994.
3 I thought I was an absolute clod: Knight, “Interview.”
4 I didn’t know what I thought: Terri Lee Robbe, “Life without Clint,” Us, February 16, 1982.
5 very intense: Interview with Brett Halsey, September 23, 1994. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
6 authority: This and subsequent evaluations of Clint’s participation in the talent program are from internal Universal International memoranda, June—October 1954, in Clint Eastwood’s possession.
7 That’s the kind of control: Interview with Robert Daley, August 1, 1994.
8 He was always straight: Quoted in Michael Neill, “Chatter,” People, May 26, 1986.
9 found myself becoming: Clint Eastwood and Richard Schickel, “Director’s Dialogue,” presentation at Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis, September 5, 1990.
10 Its sole interest: See Bob Thomas, Joan Crawford, p. 162.
11 it was hard: DeWitt Bodeen, “Clint Eastwood … a Fistful of Fame,” Focus on Film, Spring 1972.
12 wouldn’t make any impact: Quoted in Lorenzo Caracaterra, “In Like Clint,” New York Daily News Sunday Magazine, August 12, 1984.
13 The first year of marriage: Quoted in Minty Clinch, Clint Eastwood, p. 29.
14 Kardell’s background is recounted in Joe Hyams, James Dean: Little Boy Lost, p. 150.
15 a skinny-legged kid: Interview with Wayne “Buddy” Van Horn, June 2, 1993.
16 Please be advised: Jack Baur to Joseph Dubin, Universal interoffice communication, September 22, 1955.
17 Some of my friends: Earl Leaf, “The Way They Were: Clint Eastwood,” Rona Barrett’s Hollywood [circa 1972].
18 He had tried to get in: See Clint Eastwood, “Directed By …,” in John Boorman and Walter Donohue, eds., Projection 4½, p. 56.
19 Oh, I hated it: Mailer, “All the Pirates.”
20 You want to get rid of anger: Interview with Robert Donner, August 3, 1984. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
CHAPTER FOUR
1 I haven’t believed in anybody: Burt A. Folkart, “Charles Marquis Warren, Western Writer,” Los Angeles Times, August 13, 1990.
2 No other type: Richard Slotkin, Gunfighter Nation, p. 348.
3 The scaling-down process: Rita Parks, The Western Hero in Film and Television, p. 153.
4 at once supremely powerful: Slotkin, p. 383.
5 heavy, ponderous, slow: Interview with Ted Post, July 25, 1993. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
6 I love him: Arnold Hano, “How to Revive a Dead Horse,” TV Guide, October 2, 1965.
7 A Sunday supplement: “TV Notes: At Home with Clint Eastwood,” New York Daily News Sunday Magazine, May 22, 1960.
8 almost as badly: Knight, “Interview.”
9 He had this thing: Robbe, “Life without Clint.”
10 I’m not shooting orders: Knight, “Interview.”
11 I was never very realistic: Robbe, “Life without Clint.”
12 What he wanted: John Updike, “Baby’s First Step,” in The Afterlife, p. 251.
13 Sex is a small part of life: Quoted in Michael Munn, Clint Eastwood: Hollywood’s Loner, p. 40.
14 I kept thinking: Bernard Weinraub, “Even Cowboys Get Their Due,” GQ, April 1993.
15 Having the security: Knight, “Interview.”
16 You do 250 hours: Ibid.
17 didn’t direct much: Eastwood and Schickel, “Director’s Dialogue.”
18 Like any other actor: “This Cowboy Feels He’s Got It Made,” TV Guide
, February 4, 1961.
19 Calm on the outside: Hank Grant, “On the Air,” The Hollywood Reporter, July 7, 1961.
20 the fifty-first of the 143 episodes: Nancy Nalvin, The Famous Mr. Ed, p. 272. Other background information on this TV show is from the same source.
21 It was thirteenth: This and other ratings figures are from Hano, “How to Revive a Dead Horse.”
22 It was just about the worst: Munn, p. 45.
23 I didn’t know: Ibid.
24 It was not until Leone: See Johnstone, p. 35.
25 But he also remembers: Interview with Leonard Hirshan, November 9, 1993. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
CHAPTER FIVE
1 I became decisively enchanted: Quoted in Pete Hamill, “Leone: I’m a Hunter by Nature, Not a Prey,” American Film, June 1984.
2 Publishing houses came out: Ibid.
3 In recent years: Pauline Kael, “Yojimbo,” in I Lost It at the Movies, p. 242.
4 the form had become: See Pauline Kael, “Saddle Sore,” in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, pp. 38–46.
5 The western hero as a classical archetype: Andrew Sarris, “The Spaghetti Westerns,” in Confessions of a Cultist, p. 387.
6 the western had been killed off: Christopher Frayling, Spaghetti Westerns, p. 100.
7 The West was made by: Ibid.
8 They are only borrowing: Quoted in Michael Blowen, “Appreciation: Sergio Leone, Outsider’s Insight,” Boston Globe, May 2, 1989.
9 like a religion: Quoted in Frayling, Spaghetti Westerns, p. 15.
10 The man of the West: Quoted in Frayling, Spaghetti Westerns, p. 120.
11 the strange look: Quoted in Peter B. Flint, “Sergio Leone, 67, Italian Director Who Revitalized Westerns, Dies,” The New York Times, May 1, 1989.
12 are less transcendental heroes: Sarris, “Spaghetti Westerns,” p. 388.
13 the remnants of a code of behavior: Kael, Kiss, p. 240.
14 no great moral purpose: Donald Richie, The Films of Akira Kurosawa, p. 148.
15 the first great shaggy man movie: Kael, Kiss, p. 239.
16 The Catholic dichotomy: Robert C. Cumbow, Once upon a Time: The Films of Sergio Leone, pp. 220, 221.
17 irredeemably condemned: Quoted in Frayling, Spaghetti Westerns, p. 130.
18 very much the grizzled Christ: Richard Corliss, “Sergio Leone,” in Richard Roud, Cinema: A Critical Dictionary, vol. 2, p. 618.
19 not only a delirious descendant: Ibid., p. 618.
20 his unbridgeable distance: Edward Gallafent, Clint Eastwood: Actor and Director, p. 17.
21 I take the real life actor: Johnstone, Clint Eastwood, p. 37.
22 In real life, Clint is slow: Quoted in Frayling, Spaghetti Westerns, p. 146.
23 In reality, if you think about it: Quoted in Hamill, “Leone.”
24 Fritz Manes remembers: Manes interview
25 was always there: “Clint’s Kid,” People, November 15, 1993.
26 I guess we never had: Quoted in Douglas Thompson, Clint Eastwood: Sexual Cowboy, p. 155.
27 I have tried to make an appointment: Quoted in Clinch, Clint Eastwood, p. 277.
28 We looked at film: Interview with Del Reisman, November 17, 1993. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
29 Crackerjack western: “Hawk,” “Per un Pugno di Dollari,” Variety, November 18, 1964.
30 memories of the Monogram-Mascot: Richard Jameson, “Something to Do with Death,” Film Comment, March-April 1973.
31 Leone has been tossed back: David Thomson, “Leone, Sergio,” in A Biographical Dictionary of Film, 3rd ed., p. 438.
32 seamless contradictions: Corliss, “Sergio Leone,” p. 618.
33 My story turned: Quoted in Ashley Dunn, “Cowboy Villain Lee Van Cleef Dies,” Los Angeles Times, December 17, 1989.
34 utter shock: Quoted in Hano, “Dead Horse.” Unless otherwise noted, this and other quotations about Rawhide cast changes are drawn from this source.
35 In the first show: Hal Humphrey, “If Rawhide Fails, He’s Big in Europe,” Los Angeles Times, September 16, 1965.
36 It had been the network’s only show: Bob Thomas, AP Newsfeature, February 11, 1966.
37 a fine, sensitive actor: “El Cigarello, Now Gary Cooper,” Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, December 11, 1966.
38 as an interruption: Sarris, “Spaghetti Westerns,” p. 388.
39 That’s like a Hawaiian pizza: Interview with Eli Wallach, May 11, 1993. All subsequent quotations from him are drawn from the same source.
CHAPTER SIX
1 Don’t say you haven’t been warned: Bosley Crowther, “Back in the Saddle Again,” The New York Times, November 2, 1966.
2 Cowboy camp of an order: Bosley Crowther, “Screen: ‘A Fistful of Dollars,’ ” The New York Times, February 2, 1967.
3 deadpanned spoof: Bosley Crowther, “A New Western Anti-Hero,” The New York Times, February 5, 1967.
4 the pleasures of the perfectly awful movie: Judith Crist, “Plain Murder All the Way,” New York World-Journal-Tribune, February 2, 1967.
5 taking the western at its word: Ethan Mordden, Medium Cool, p. 199.
6 The fact that this film: Bosley Crowther, “Screen: ‘For a Few Dollars More,’ ” The New York Times, July 4, 1967.
7 The Burn, The Gouge and The Mangle: Renata Adler, “The Screen: Zane Grey Meets the Marquis de Sade,” The New York Times, January 25, 1968. Reprinted in Renata Adler, A Year in the Dark, pp. 23–24.
8 The temptation is hereby proved: Charles Champlin, “‘Good, Bad, Ugly’ Playing Citywide,” Los Angeles Times, January 12, 1968.
9 Leone’s skillful camera work: “Cinema: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,” Time, February 9, 1968.
10 No, don’t you do it: Post interview.
11 Is this the way: Quoted in “Clint Eastwood’s Stock Hits New High,” United Artists press release, 1968.
12 gentle and tender lover: Joan Mellen, Big Bad Wolves: Masculinity in the American Film, p. 270.
13 the year’s grisliest movie: “New Movies: Hang ’em High,” Time, August 23, 1968.
14 in these exacerbated times: Kevin Thomas, “‘Hang ’em High’ Playing Citywide,” Los Angeles Times, August 8, 1968.
15 I want to be in the picture business: Interview with Leonard Hirshan, November 9, 1993. The entire account of Hirshan’s early meetings with Lang is drawn from this source, as are all subsequent quotations from Hirshan.
16 you get into a rut: Clint Eastwood, “The Padrón,” Film Comment, September-October 1991.
17 jocular fatalism: Andrew Sarris, “The Pro,” Film Comment, September-October 1991.
18 I didn’t get a job offer: Quoted in Sarris, “The Pro.”
19 surprisingly modest: Don Siegel, A Siegel Film, p. 297
20 Sounds ominous: Ibid., p. 297
21 I hate the script: Ibid. I figured you didn’t like it: Ibid.
22 centered on the conflict: Joel Doerfler, Boston After Dark, July 14, 1970.
23 Some of these guys: Eastwood, “The Padrón.”
24 worked well under pressure: Ibid.
25 He always used to joke: Ibid.
26 He doesn’t require: Quoted in Christopher Frayling, Clint Eastwood, p. 81
27 You can’t push Clint: Quoted in David Ansen, “Clint: An American Icon,” Newsweek, July 22, 1985.
28 It’s too obvious: Quoted in Siegel, Siegel, p. 310
29 a joke told by someone: Vincent Canby, “Screen: Sheriff Eastwood,” The New York Times, October 3, 1968.
30 Fast, tough and so well made: “Cinema: Blood Sport,” Time, November 5, 1968.
CHAPTER SEVEN
1 We are like boxers: Bridget Byrne, “Around L.A.: The Beguiled,” Los Angeles Herald-Examiner, June 7, 1970.
2 Where Doubles Dare: Quoted in Melvyn Bragg, Richard Burton: A Life, p. 196
3 I’m just going through the motions: This incident is recounted in Gene Siskel, “Clint Eastwood: Long Overdue Res
pect Makes His Year” Chicago Tribune, June 9, 1985.
4 bunch-of-guys-on-a-mission: Quoted in Chris Willman, “Celluloid Heroes,” Los Angeles Times Calendar, March 26, 1995.
5 Eastwood would just stand: Ibid.
6 Why did you pick: Quoted in Bernard Drew, “Brian G, Hutton: I’ve Made it, Baby,” The New York Times, March 23, 1969.
7 Elsewhere, other lunacies: This incident was recounted in the author’s interview with Tom Shaw, January 10, 1995.
8 pieced together by: Joshua Logan, Movie Stars, Real People, and Me, p. 211 All of Logan’s other recollections of this production are drawn from this source, pp. 211–25
9 Not since Attila the Hun: Donald Zec, Marvin: The Story of Lee Marvin, p. 162
10 If I’m going to make mistakes: Eastwood and Schickel, “Director’s Dialogue.”
11 he hardly seems: Pauline Kael, “Somebody Else’s Success,” The New Yorker, October 25, 1969. Reprinted in Pauline Kael, Deeper into Movies, pp. 32–39.
CHAPTER EIGHT
1 one who you believe is a nun: Quoted in Frayling, Clint Eastwood, p. 7
2 My men have become: Ibid., p. 9
3 seemed to be much more concerned: Ibid.
4 an attempt to keep: Stanley Kauffmann, “Stanley Kauffmann on Films,” The New Republic, August 1, 1970.
5 It’s kind of The African Queen: Quoted in Warga, “Drifted into Stardom.”
6 It’s hard to feel: Quoted in Stuart M. Kaminsky, Don Siegel: Director, p. 229
7 she was a doll: Don Siegel, Siegel, p. 335
8 There are to be no changes: Ibid., p. 324
9 He can dream up: Quoted in Wayne Warga, “Anything for Art in ‘Mules for Sister Sara,’ ” Los Angeles Times, April 6, 1969.
10 A movie lover’s: Roger Greenspun, “Screen: ‘Two Mules for Sister Sara’,” The New York Times, June 25, 1970.
11 You’ll find the conversation: Meriel McCooey, “A Faceful of Dollars,” Sunday Times Magazine (London), August 17, 1969.
12 Actors have their bag: Warga, “Drifted into Stardom.”
Clint Eastwood Page 73