The logical motorcycle for him always had been a Harley-Davidson, made in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Harley-Davidson was the successful star-spangled American racing representative on the world stage. Knievel, alas, always made the company’s executives nervous.
“Harley-Davidson was the most conservative company you could find,” Duane Unkefer, advertising manager and promotions director in the seventies, said. “Extremely image-conscious. I said to my boss one day, ‘I wouldn’t mind buying one of those Datsun Z sports cars,’ and he looked at me and said, ‘Well, you’d have to pay for it in yen.’
“You couldn’t wear a beard or long hair if you worked for Harley back then. You’d be fired in a moment. The word the company hated most was ‘hog.’ It hated that entire image of the motorcycle gangs. Fought against it.”
Knievel was small and not very pleasant-looking potatoes to Harley in the past. He was too noisy, too wacky. Harley spent its promotional budget on the racing team. That was the image the company wanted. The number-one Harley logo represented the success of the racing team. Knievel was a circus act.
Until now. The daredevil and the company had landed in a place where they suddenly could help each other.
Knievel had become the one motorcycle rider in America who couldn’t be overlooked. With the movie on the way, with his appearance on all of the shows, he was more famous than all of the Harley racers put together. The company, at the same time, was struggling. The Honda campaign about meeting the nicest people on a Honda had been devastating. Attention had turned to those 150cc bikes, an entirely different look from Harley. Sales were down. Even the racing results were down. Harley was struggling on the track, which was why it had built the new XR750.
Enter Knievel. He sent word through racers he knew that he would love to ride the XR750. He was available now, his deal with American Eagle finished, as the importers of the Laverdas from Italy had gone broke. The business was being liquidated.
The Harley people were interested. Some of the Harley people were.
“I thought it was a great idea,” Unkefer said. “Our dealers were screaming for help. They wanted us to do something to give the brand publicity. They were getting killed by Honda. They loved the idea of putting some Evel Knievel posters on their walls.”
The person who had to be convinced was John Davidson, the Harley-Davidson president, a no-nonsense character who was the grand keeper of the company image. Unkefer and his boss, Charlie Thompson, and vice president Willy G. Davidson, John Davidson’s brother, all argued hard for Knievel. Three against one, the president finally buckled. He did insist that one clause be added to the contract.
“There was a paragraph, a long paragraph, that detailed all the things Knievel couldn’t do,” Unkefer said. “If he went to jail, if there was a public scandal, an arrest for drunkenness, drugs, anything, the contract was finished. He couldn’t spit on the street. There were a lot of ways out of the deal for the company.”
Knievel received a chunk of money, but more importantly received the XR750 and whatever refinements to it that might follow. He was linked into the dealer network and would have local Harley mechanics at most of his events. He would have parts, service, backup motorcycles, at a moment’s notice. He would have things he never had.
He also would have a version of safety. That was the most amazing result of the deal. The every-other-jump crashes would stop.
“I began work with him on his final jump of 1970, then worked with him for the next four years,” Unkefer said. “I never really saw him crash. Some little things perhaps, but he never crashed.”
The XR750 was a revelation. It was faster than any motorcycle Knievel had ridden. After some modifications in the first year, it was lighter than any motorcycle he had ridden. Factory riders on the bike dominated all levels of racing after 1972. Knievel found that he could gauge his speed better, was not surprised when he landed, could survive. This was the kind of bike he should have been riding all along.
“He carried a briefcase with him to all of his shows,” Unkefer said. “One day he showed me what was inside. There were all these rods, all these screws and bolts. They were replacement parts for his body. If he crashed, he could tell the doctors which parts went where if the previous rods had been bent or screws had been lost. There must have been thirty-five, forty pieces in the briefcase. All of them sitting in red velvet.”
His debut with the XR750 was in a show at the Lions Drag Strip outside Los Angeles. He jumped thirteen cars in front of 14,780 people on December 12, 1970. No problem. He had crashed in three of his previous four jumps, the final one in August when he cracked vertebrae, broke his shoulder and hand at Pocono. Nothing here. Nothing in his next two jumps of the new year at the Houston Astrodome. Nothing.
“I’m going to become the first motorcycle rider to make a million dollars a year,” he proclaimed at the Astrodome to start 1971.
Who could argue? For once, his boast sounded reasonable. He was paid $25,000 for the two shows. (“Appearing both nights if he survives Friday’s appearance,” the advertisement read.) Maybe the ticket prices were $2, $3, and $4 to visit the self-proclaimed Eighth Wonder of the World, and maybe Jack Kochman’s Hell Drivers also performed, and maybe there also was a demolition derby and a powder-puff derby, but an estimated 100,000 spectators appeared at the Astrodome over the two days. He had entered his first big-time stadium, and it was full. If he could stay healthy, yes, he could make a lot of money.
And now he could stay healthy.
The first important Knievel moment in the production of the movie with George Hamilton came on February 28, 1971. The script called for Hamilton/Knievel to reflect on his life while preparing for a worldrecord jump of nineteen cars, all American cars, not a Volkswagen or Datsun in the bunch, at the Ontario Motor Speedway outside Los Angeles. The story would jump back and forth from Ontario to the various bits of wackiness that had led to this moment. The finale would be the jump over the nineteen cars.
Filming already had begun at Ontario and on the MGM lot—Hamilton as Evel, twenty-four-year-old Sue Lyon, best known for her role as James Mason’s shockingly underage lover in Lolita, cast as Linda Knievel—and this was the big-money camera shot. Knievel, the real Knievel, was supposed to jump over those real American cars before a sellout crowd of 78,810.
The people had been lured mostly by the first NASCAR Grand National race in track history, the Miller High Life 500, which would be won by A. J. Foyt with Buddy Baker second, Richard Petty third, but Knievel also was an attraction. His jump would take place before the stock car race, which had a $207,675 purse, richest in NASCAR history.
Hamilton spent the time before the jump with Knievel in the trailer/dressing room. The time did not go well. Wild Turkey was involved.
“Knievel was drinking and kept talking about the different things involved in the jump, aerodynamics, ballistics,” Hamilton said. “He went on and on and on. I eventually decided he didn’t give a shit about any of that. He was just getting drunk. That was why he was talking. He was drunk.”
As the time approached to perform the jump, Knievel became skittish. He said that he might not be able to do it. The wind seemed excessive. Wind? Hamilton said there was no wind really. Knievel said the track conditions might not be right. What track conditions? Hamilton said the conditions were exactly what they were supposed to be. Everything was ready. Knievel finally said what he really meant.
He wanted more money to do the jump.
Hamilton was stunned. He pointed out that there was no more money. The budget under Joe Solomon had been stretched as far as it could go. Nothing else would arrive. The cast and crew still had to travel to Butte to film. There was no money. There also was no backup for this day, this crowd. Everything was in place. This was when the jump had to be done.
Knievel, dressed in his leathers already, said at last that maybe they would go outside and take a look at the setup. Then he would decide.
He did have one obvious problem. He h
ad jumped nine cars a day earlier in a practice session at Ontario, and the handlebars had collapsed and he had broken his right hand. The hand was useless, but he did not give that as an excuse.
“How will you jump with a broken hand?” Hamilton asked.
“I’ll tape it to the handlebars,” Knievel said in a tone he would use with a schoolkid. “It’s just logic, George. If your hand is broken, you tape it on.”
When the actor and the daredevil stepped from the big rig, they were surrounded by photographers. The daredevil did not like being surrounded, didn’t like people in his face. He told them to back off. They didn’t back off fast enough. They were photographers. He swung his cane, hit one of them with force. The photographer went down. It was an ugly moment.
“Knievel had different canes,” Hamilton said. “This one really was just a lead pipe. It could do some damage. There had been a thing, too, at the Astrodome where he had used that cane on somebody. It wasn’t nice to see.”
Knievel deemed the conditions right for the jump. Hamilton noticed that both the takeoff ramp and the landing ramp seemed off-center, not where they were supposed to be. Knievel said that was not a problem.
And so he jumped.
Drunk, with his right hand taped to the handlebars, he flawlessly cleared eighteen Dodge Colts and one Dodge van, not a Volkswagen or Datsun in the lot, to set another one of his world records. This one would remain for twenty-seven years until it was broken by daredevil Bubba Blackwell, who cleared twenty cars on a Harley XR750 on April 26, 1998, in Everett, Massachusetts. (Other riders jumped farther, jumped more cars, but on different, lighter equipment.)
Hamilton and the crew were relieved. They hadn’t known what to expect. They had been ready for any result on the jump. They would have been able to adjust.
“I’d seen him get splattered once in Sacramento, so I knew what happened in that situation,” the actor said. “It was a curious thing. He was hurt, and everyone was rushing around, and he looked up at me and winked. Like he was playing a game on everyone else. I couldn’t figure that out.”
The filming in Butte took place a month later, ten days of shots of Hamilton/Knievel kidnapping Sue Lyon/Linda, racing around the Richest Hill on Earth, police in pursuit, robbing stores, causing general mayhem. Locals were hired as extras, some with speaking parts. The director was Marvin Chomsky. He said Knievel made suggestions, but mostly quiet suggestions.
“The one thing he wanted to do was blow up city hall for a robbery scene,” Chomsky said. “I told him we couldn’t blow up the city hall. This was a movie. He said he could get some dynamite. He got some dynamite. I told him we couldn’t blow up the city hall.”
Local characters were hired to play local characters. The experience was pleasant for everybody. The city tried to help. Knievel showed actors the pleasures of the pork chop sandwich and the Montana Mary. Hamilton rode a motorcycle in a bunch of places where Knievel had ridden a motorcycle. He even picked up some Knievel-like injuries on the bike, separating a shoulder while he mastered the art.
“I never liked motorcycles,” the actor said. “I did it, rode the thing at ninety miles per hour, but didn’t like it. You’re always an inch away from death on a motorcycle. Everyone I know who was involved with motorcycles wound up getting hurt. My son eventually lost his spleen on a motorcycle.”
Hamilton rode the bike to the top of various ramps during the movie, part of the filming. He stopped before the takeoff point, looked at the distance to the other side. The thought of jumping on the bike was ridiculous.
“ ‘No way I’d do that,’ ” he told himself. “Say what you want about Knievel, you never could question his balls. You needed big balls to do what he did.”
The movie opened on July 14, 1971, with a premiere at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood. Milius, the screenwriter, went in a limo that was behind George Hamilton’s limo. Hamilton was dressed in character in the white leathers. A block from the theater, his limo stopped. Hamilton stepped out, put on his helmet, and jumped onto a waiting motorcycle. He rode the rest of the way on the bike, straight down the red carpet and onto a ramp. When he stopped, he was surrounded by people, mobbed by fans who wanted to shake his hand, touch him, simply be close.
This was different for him. The character trumped the actor.
“George wasn’t George Hamilton anymore, he was Evel Knievel,” Milius decided as he watched this unfold. “That was the reaction. You could see that he loved it. The attention. This was red meat for him. This was the red meat on his bones. It was the same for Evel.
“George and Evel, they were very well suited for each other. They were a couple of carny hustlers.”
Knievel was in New York, in between his stops at Madison Square Garden and the Lancaster Speedway in Buffalo. He pumped the movie as he went from interview to interview.
“George Hamilton plays me in the movie, but all the jumping stunts I do,” he said. “They’ve got no stunt men to double for me, and they never will get anyone to do so.”
The reviews were not great. The Chicago Tribune, at the bottom of the pile, gave the offering one star, drivel, called it “the slow, dull treatment of one kook’s life.” The Washington Post said, “In order to get to the approximately four minutes (poorly photographed) of jump footage, consider what you have to sit through: 84 minutes of George Hamilton trying to change his image by riding a motorcycle—on top of acting out the neuroses and immature, self-centered activities of Knievel.” The Miami News was kinder: “The film really is an attempt to characterize a real-life folk hero and the subject is fascinating enough to pull it off.” A newspaper in Missouri called the story “a most amusing mixture of snippy arrogance and snappy humor.”
The public seemed to like it okay. The film grossed $2,052,227 in the first twenty-one days of distribution, a solid figure since it was made for $750,000. It would wind up grossing somewhere around $15 million. The message Hamilton wanted to send about the American mind, the peculiar insanity of paying attention to something as peculiar and insane as motorcycle jumping, largely was missed. The way he had been typecast in the public mind was too much to overcome. People mostly focused on whether or not Hamilton should have played Knievel, and more often than not the verdict was that he was too good-looking, too refined, to be a motorcycle daredevil.
For everyone involved, except Knievel, this turned out to be another payday, another project, another number of days at the office. New projects awaited, turn the page. For Knievel, the effects of the movie were spectacular. He did not share in the profits, which bothered him, but the money arrived from other directions. This was the final big bounce off the publicity springboard he had discovered as he rolled across the parking lot at Caesars Palace. His name was wallpapered across America now, splashed on marquees, found in the movie listings in every small town, mentioned in coffee shops every morning.
He had moved into a different level of celebrity. He was no longer the scrappy second baseman, the local congressman, the bit player known only by theater aficionados. He walked with the home-run hitters now, with the Speaker of the House. He was the name on the front of the playbill. Not only had he made the jump to the biggest arenas in the country, accompanied by the requisite boost in fees for his services (charging $15,000 and more for a jump now); he was able to live in an entirely different way.
True to form, he embraced his good fortune and doubled, tripled the bet. The clothes became flashier. The cars—and he always had been a sucker for the top-end cars, moving from Rolls to Rolls, Lincoln Mark III to Lincoln Mark III, making deals for cars even when he couldn’t pay the rent—now became a never-ending string of impulse purchases, Ferraris and Maseratis, a good old Cadillac Eldorado every now and then, cars bought and discarded on a speculative whim. He always had liked golf, ever since his grandfather bought him a set of Wilson irons, but now he was able to attack the sport, bet on it, invent elaborate propositions. He always had liked women and a good night on the town. Well, the nights bec
ame longer and far more expensive.
The money that he never had now went through his hands as if it were on fire. He took the image that John Milius had typed for him, the out-of-control flamboyance, the eat-drink merriment, and not only lived up to it but expanded it. Life imitated art this time. Not the other way around. He was not the small-con character George Hamilton had met that first day at Universal Studios. Evel Knievel was on to the big con now.
“The movie definitely changed his life,” Hamilton said. “He never would acknowledge that, but it did. It’s one of those cases, I think, where if you give credit somewhere else, you feel it diminishes what you’ve done. Do you know what I mean? You like to think that you did everything yourself. He loved the idea of the movie in the beginning, then acted like it was signing an autograph or something. Just another thing. It wasn’t just another thing. It changed his life.”
The actor and the daredevil never had anything to do with each other once the movie ran its course. The daredevil grew to call the actor “kind of a pussy” in discussions. Indeed, he always downplayed the movie. He called the actor “my stand-in.” The actor was not afraid to use the word “crazy” when he talked about the daredevil.
“I had a conversation with his grandmother when we were in Butte,” Hamilton said. “She said that he had been a normal kid until he fell one day when he was ice skating, hit his head, was knocked out. He was always different after that. He didn’t have the same equipment everybody else had. He saw life in an entirely different way.”
If he could make the movie again, Hamilton said, he would make one change. He would play the character even further over the top. He would portray him as more arrogant, more demanding, more everything. Crazier.
A story. Nothing showed Knievel’s rise to a new level of entertainment notoriety better than his trip to New York to play four nights at Madison Square Garden between July 8 and July 11, 1971. He was in the most famous arena in America in the biggest city in America, on display for the most jaded spectators in America. He was a long way from Butte and Moses Lake.
Evel Page 19