Although I haven't gotten a western made yet, there's interest in a western series I've created (on paper). If you'd like to take a look at the sort of things I write, please visit my website, www.henrycparke.com. Thanks for looking!
I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Turner Classic Movies for a short piece about Western movie fanatics. See it HERE.
MY ‘TRUE WEST’ COLUMNS
As Film Editor of TRUE WEST MAGAZINE, every month I explore the world of Western film and television. Below are links to my columns, beginning with the most recent.
On July 30th, 2015, I was the guest of hosts Bobbi Jean Bell and Jim Christina on ‘Writer’s Block’, their L.A. TALK-RADIO talk-show about the art and craft of writing. You can click PLAY to hear it, or DOWNLOAD to download it.
ROUND-UP ON THE RADIO!
Last Christmastime I was a guest on AROUND THE BARN, and had a great time talking about the Round-up, my writing, and Gene Autry’s Christmas music. To listen, click HERE.
Other Stuff I Write
While this blog is strictly about Western stuff, I also write another blog, Stalling Tactics, which is about anything else. If you'd like to read my most recent post, COSTUME DRAMA TRAUMA, go HERE.
CELEBRATE ‘THE COWBOYS’
WITH ‘A WORD ON WESTERNS’ TUESDAY AT THE AUTRY!
It’s been over two years
since Western historian, master interviewer and host Rob Word has held a live A
Word on Westerns event at The Autry!And he returns right on time this Tuesday, May 17th, to
celebrate the 50th anniversary of the classic John Wayne Western, The
Cowboys.Western fans know that May
is the month of the Duke’s birth, and Rob has always found a new Wayne theme
for the Word on Westerns celebration, but he’ll have a hard time topping
this one.For anyone who doesn’t know
the film, when Wayne’s ranch-hands run off after a gold strike, the only way he
can bring his herd to market is to hire a dozen school-boys for his
cattle-drive.Few boys, or men who once
were be boys, have ever seen the film and not ached to be a part of it.
Cowboys
stars scheduled to attend include:Robert Carradine, who plays Slim; Nicolas Beauvy, who plays Dan, the kid
with glasses that Bruce Dern terrorizes; Alfred Barker Jr., who plays Fats; Steve
Benedict, who plays Steve; Stephen R. Hudis, who plays Charlie Schwartz; and
Sean Kelly, who plays Stuttering Bob.A
Martinez, who plays the outsider cowboy Cimarron, planned to attend, Word
explains, “But he got a job in Vancouver, and he said, ‘I’m really anxious to
get back to work.’ The COVID has been tough for everybody. So he came to the
house and we shot an interview,” part of which will be shown at the event.
And don’t think Rob has
taken the last two years off.With no
live events, he became even more committed to posting weekly videos on his Word
on Westerns YouTube page, interviewing so many Western filmmakers from both
sides of the camera.And all through
COVID, “we've never missed a Sunday, and it's been over a hundred shows now.I'm using more clips and more stills. It
takes 30 to 40 hours a week, every week. There is no break, there is no
vacation.”
And the fans are
appreciative.His 9 Stars Over 90
Share Hollywood Secrets has been watched more than 279,000 times since
posted.Among his many great ‘gets’, Rob
has recently posted an interview with the great actor – and villain of The
Comancheros – Nehemiah Persoff, “and then he passed away in April. But I'm
so lucky to not only have talked to him, because he was a wealth of wonderful
memories, but he got to see the episode. He’d written his autobiography, and at
the end of the Zoom, he says, ‘Hold that book up one more time!’ And so I held
it up.Then he calls and says, ‘I sold
150 copies that day!’He was just
thrilled. I'm so glad that he saw that.”
The celebration of The
Cowboys will be Tuesday, May 17th, at The Autry, in the Wells
Fargo Theatre.Doors open at 10:30, and
the program begins at 11 a.m.I hope to
see you there!
Here’s a link to the Nehemiah
Persoff interview, which will lead you to over 100 more!
PIONEERTOWN INTERNATIONAL
FILM FESTIVAL May 27th - May 29th!
The movie town located in
the San Bernadino Desert, where hundreds of Western films and TV episodes were shot,
will play host to the Pioneertown International Film Festival from Friday May
27th through Sunday May 29th.The first of what is planned as an annual
event, it was an unavoidably long time in the making.“It's been about five years since we started this
idea,” festival founder Julian Pinder recalls.“We did all kinds of legwork, launched a website and announced the
festival; and about a month later, suddenly the whole world was shut down. We're
really happy that we survived COVID.”
Back in 1946, Western
movie villain Dick Curtis, Roy Rogers, and the band Sons of the Pioneers pooled
their resources and bought the 32,000 acres of desert that started out to be
the movie town of Rogersville, before it was decided to name the ranch after
the band.Unlike other movie towns, this
one was built with not just facades, but practical buildings, and real motel accommodations,
so crews could actually live there during production rather than
commuting.Hopalong Cassidy wing-man
Russell Hayden joined in, and soon he was shooting the Judge Roy Bean series,
Gene Autry was shooting The Gene Autry Show, and Duncan Reynaldo and Leo
Carrillo were filming The Cisco Kid on the lot.
Nearly 70 years later,
the joint is once again jumping, and featuring a remarkably eclectic mix of Western
films and entertainments.Events will be
happening at five venues: The Desert Willow Ranch, The Historic Soundstage, Pioneertown
Motel, Historic Red Dog Saloon, and the Super X Ranch.Among the films being screened are a double
bill of “Acid Westerns” directed by Monte Hellman and starring Jack Nicholson,
and presented by their daughters; Buck and the Preacher, starring and
directed by Sidney Poitier and co-starring Harry Belafonte; the premiere of a
documentary about the Durango Kid films; and From Dusk Till Dawn,
introduced by producer and special effects creator Robert Kurtzman.
Pinder notes, “The
traditional classic westerns obviously were made to be seen on a big screen. We really wanted to reintroduce folks to these
great classics like they should be seen. So we partnered with Paramount to
screen some of their recently restored westerns.”
There are plenty of new
films as well.“Inglorious Serfs is
a Ukrainian Western that was made in the last couple years. And the director,
because of the war he's been exiled in the U.S., so he's able to come.”There will even be the premiere of the much-anticipated
The Last Manhunt, produced by Jason Momoa.Inspired by the same events that were the
basis of Tell Them Willie Boy is Here, this version is based on the oral
history of the Chemehuevi tribe and, Pinder notes, “The Last Manhunt was
shot actually all around Pioneertown.”
And in a wonderful sort
of homecoming, there will be a performance by the current Sons of the Pioneers,
fronted by Roy’s son Dusty Rogers, and peopled by sons of the sons.And if that isn’t your musical taste, there
will also be a performance by The Dandy Warhols.
VALLEY RELICS MUSEUM
PRESENTS MOVIE HISTORY OF THE SAN FERNANDO VALLEY MAY 28TH
On Saturday, May 28th,
from 4 ‘til 6 p.m., Hollywood Film Historian Dennis R. Liff will share a Powerpoint
Presentation about the movie-making history of the San Fernando Valley.Joining him will be special guest Darby Hinton,
a busy and talented actor, and so well-remembered for playing son to Fess
Parker on Daniel Boone. To learn more, go here: valleyrelicsmuseum.org
INSP’S ‘DUKE DAYS OF MAY’
CONTINUES!
I hope you’ve been
enjoying the Duke Days of May on INSP, but if you’re a little late to the party,
you happily have two more weekends left in May, including Memorial Day Weekend,
and 14 more John Wayne movies to watch on INSP. And
there are quizzes and contests going on.Check out their Facebook page for details!
ONE MORE THING…
Obviously, it’s been a
long time since I wrote a new Round-up – last July, to be specific.This has caused some readers to ask questions
like, “Hey Henry, did you fall off a cliff or something?”Happily, no.The fact is, in addition to writing the Round-up, I’ve been the Western
Film & TV Editor for True West magazine for about seven years, and starting
this past September, the INSP Channel hired me to write regular articles for
their blog.So, while I haven’t been
writing the Round-up much, I’ve been writing about Westerns elsewhere.
I’m going to be updating
this Round-up post next week, and I’m going to add links to all of the articles
I’ve written for True West, and INSP in the last six months or so, as well as
links to the Writer’s Block podcasts, where I do an update on the Western film
biz on the first Thursday of every month.
Happy Trails!
Henry
All Original Content
Copyright May 2022 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved
DANIEL RADCLIFFE GOES
WEST IN MIRACLE WORKERS: OREGON TRAIL!
For two seasons, former
Harry Potter portrayer Daniel Radcliffe, and co-star Steven Buscemi have
starred as an odd pair of angels in the series Miracle Workers.It’s
about angels that are sent down to Earth to perform miracles, and convince God
not to destroy the planet. It’s based on the novel What in God’s Name,
by Simon Rich.It sure sounds to me like
It’s a Wonderful Life meets The Horn Blows at Midnight, which are
two of my favorite comedies.
The first season was set
in heaven.The second season was set in
Europe during Medieval times.And happily,
season three is set in the Old West, on the Oregon Trail! Incidentally, this is Steve Buscemi’s first
Western since Lonesome Dove. The
new season premieres this Tuesday, July 13th, on TBS.Here’s a peek!
IDRIS ELBA’S THE
HARDER THEY FALL COMING TO NETFLIX THIS FALL!
Idris Elba is a Brit, but
he surely must love Westerns!In 2017 he
starred as a gunslinger in Stephen King’s futuristic Western THE TALL TOWER.In 2020 he starred in the contemporary
Western CONCRETE COWBOY.And this
fall he’ll be starring in his first historic Western, THE HARDER THEY FALL.He plays Rufus Buck, and when his sworn
enemy, Nat Love, played by Jonathan Majors, learns that Buck is getting out of
jail, he pulls his old gang together to run Buck down.Most of the characters are based on real
people – in addition to Buck and Love, there’s Stagecoach Mary (Zazie Beetz),
Bill Pickett (Edi Gathegi), Cherokee Bill (LaKieth Stanfield), Jim Beckworth
(R.J. Cyler), and Delroy Lindo as Bass Reeves.When I posted about this on Facebook, I got some angry responses from
readers who assumed that heroic figures like Stagecoach Mary, Bill Pickett and
the great Bass Reeves are portrayed as members of Nat Love’s gang.I don’t know if they are or they aren’t.Here’s a peek.
Incidentally, Harder They
Fall is directed by another Brit who must love the Western genre.Jeymes Samuels, who has many film music
credits, previously directed the 2013 Western, They Die By Dawn.While, at 49 minutes, it’s short by today’s
standards, that’s close to the average running-time of Western Bs of the ‘30s
and ‘40s. For some reason, I'm not being allowed to upload the link, but the whole movie is available on Youtube under its title.
WALTER HILL TO DIRECT DEAD
FOR A DOLLAR!
There was great
excitement at the Cannes Film Festival for Dead for a Dollar, a new
Western in pre-production, co-written and to be directed
by Walter Hill, and to star Willem Dafoe and Cristoph Waltz!Hill, a marvelous writer and director whose previous
Westerns have included The Longriders, Geronimo, Wild Bill, and the pilot
for Deadwood, has not made a Western since his excellent 2003 miniseries
for AMC, Broken Trail.
Dafoe hasn’t done a
Western since his uncredited role in 1980’s Heaven’s Gate, but Hill
directed him in Streets of Fire.Waltz will be making his second Western, his first being Quentin Tarantino’s
Django Unchained, and just like in Django, Waltz plays a
legendary bounty hunter.Willem Dafoe is
his sworn enemy.I gave a brief summary
of the plot on Facebook: "Waltz is hired
to go to Mexico and rescue the kidnapped wife of an important industrialist," and though I gave no more details, many readers cut to the chase and said it
sounds very much like a remake of Richard Brooks’ The Professionals.The more you know of the plot, the more it
does.But Walter Hill is a great and
original talent, and I am sure he will do something wonderful with it.
STARDUST TRAIL – by J. R. Sanders
A Book
ReviewBy Henry C. Parke
I love STARDUST TRAIL,
the new mystery novel by J. R. Sanders.It’s his first in a series featuring private detective Nate Ross, and I’m
happy to say J.R. is already hard at work on the next one.It belongs to that sub-genre, the Hollywood
murder mystery, which is exceptionally hard to write.That’s because in addition to all the already
necessary skills for a mystery writer and a novelist, one must also write
knowledgably about the film industry, specific studios, and particular
real-life characters at a chosen moment in time.Stuart Kaminsky, with his Toby Peters books,
and Andrew Bergman, with his two Hollywood and Levine mysteries, have succeeded
where most have failed.J.R. Sanders has
joined this select group, as he strides confidently into the world of Raymond
Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.
And, in an exhilarating change
of locale, Sanders has placed Stardust Trail not at any of the seven Majors
– MGM, Warner Brothers, Paramount, Universal, et al – but at Republic, the
greatest of the Minors, the thrill factory where Gene Autry and Roy Rogers
reined (or should that be reigned?)!It’s
where John Wayne made his name, and the Duke actually makes a guest appearance
in the novel, not the Stagecoach star Wayne, but a younger star in the
beloved B-Western series of films, The Three Mesquiteers.
I recently had the chance
to talk to J.R. about Stardust Trail.
Author J. R. Sanders
HENRY:
I’m a sucker for a well-written
Hollywood mystery anyway, but you really had me hooked the moment that I
realized the kidnap victim was Max Terhune’s ventriloquist dummy, Elmer
Sneezewood,
J.R. SANDERS:
That was a lot of fun to
tinker with that. Actually, it's a supposedly true story. Years ago I was
touring the Autry Museum in L.A., and they had Elmer on display down in the
movie and TV Western section. And there was a little placard next to it that
told that back in the ‘30s, someone had stolen Elmer and sent either sent, a
ransom note and supposedly the ransom was paid. $500 is the figure that sticks
in my head.
HENRY:
I read your previous
book, Some Gave All, about real Western lawmen. And knowing that you've
been a law man and a private detective, I figured you were mainly a true crime
writer. So I was surprised to see that you'd written a novel.
J.R. SANDERS:
I've never really tackled
(fiction) before, other than a children's book years ago, that I don't really
count as a serious fiction. But it was always in the back of my mind that I
wanted to do, and particularly a detective story. That's what I enjoyed reading
over the years and I always thought it would be fun to take a shot at it.
HENRY:
Your detective, Nate Ross,
has a very interesting background. Was he inspired by any real person?
J.R. SANDERS:
Not at all. I just wanted
to do a character in the vein of the old classic Chandler, Hammet sorta
detective, but go with a little harder edge and maybe a little bit more
backstory.
HENRY:
Has your law enforcement
and detective background been helpful in writing the book?
J.R. SANDERS:
I guess maybe, in the
broad brush strokes. But really policing was so very different back in the ‘30s
that I actually had to spend a lot of time looking at old law books and police
manuals and things like that from the ‘30s, the California penal code from the ‘30s,
just to get an idea of how different things were, both in terms of the law, in
terms of police procedures, how crimes were approached.It's a lot more sophisticated nowadays.
Policemen worked a lot less with ready access to backup back in the day. So in
some ways it was more hazardous. Although in some ways it’s more hazardous now:
just different hazards.
HENRY:
You mentioned some
already, but what writers have influenced you, whose mysteries have you
enjoyed?
J.R. SANDERS:
Well, Raymond Chandler,
Dashiel Hammet, any of the old Black Mask writers from back in the day.Most of those names are pretty much unknown
to the average reader now, but people like Lester Dent, Raoul Whitfield. James Ellroy, he's kind of a, an industry unto
himself. He's got a definite signature style and he's always interesting
reading, always entertaining; I always learn something. I'm a big fan also of
Michael Connelly. I'm about halfway through the Bosch books now. Not as far as
I should be, but I've watched the entire Harry Bosch series. It's phenomenal. It's
for my money, the best police series that's ever been made.
HENRY:
Why did he decide to set
your Nate Ross mystery at Republic Pictures?
J.R. SANDERS:
Most of my writing
background has been based in or around old west history because it's just
always been a fascination of mine. It's always been a topic that I've studied and
been interested in. So I just thought that it would be neat to sort of combine
the traditional detective story with a Western story, or at least a story with
Western trappings and setting it in the ‘30s, in the era of the B westerns. It
just seemed like a natural to go with Republic. Republic, isn't usually dealt
with in those stories. Republic was never exactly poverty row, but it wasn't
MGM either. It was kind of a farm team in a lot of ways.
HENRY:
With most Hollywood
behind-the-scenes stories, whether it's books or movies or TV, my main gripe is
that the writers either don't care or really don't know their turf; what the
studios were like, how filmmaking actually works. But your stuff is spot on. Did
you do a lot of research?
J.R. SANDERS:
Well, thank you.I did. I had to, because I'm far from an
expert on any of that. I've watched the movies, but as far as the technical
aspects of movie making, especially in the ‘30s, I didn't really know a whole
lot going in,
HENRY:
It was a kind of a thrill
reading the book and imagining myself at places like Fat Jones’ Stable, or
Gower Gulch, when the Columbia Drugstore was there, and the movie ranches.Did you actually visit any of those locales?
J.R. SANDERS:
I did.I’ve been to Vasquez Rocks many times over
the years, but made a particular visit just with this book in mind. Not much has changed other than the freeway blasting
by it. With Gower Gulch, there's nothing left. Although there is a nice little
strip mall that they've actually named Gower Gulch; with sort of a Western
false-front look to it.
HENRY:
I didn't know there was a
Sardi's on this coast. So that was very interesting to find out that you hadn't
made that up.But how about the
Hackamore Club? Is that your invention?
J.R. SANDERS:
Well, yeah, just complete
fiction. I had read about a couple of honky-tonk type bars that the B-movie
Cowboys frequented, but there wasn't really anything on the scale of a
full-blown nightclub, but it just seemed like a neat touch that, if there wasn't a place like that, there
should have been.
HENRY:
I thought the movie
within the novel, also called Stardust Trail, was just right, because it
was just the sort of overreaching kind of thing that Herbert Yates would do for
a while. Those overblown musical westerns, where you wanted to yell at the
screen, "Enough dancing! Shoot someone!"
J.R. SANDERS:
Since it was going to be
set in late ’38, I had wanted from the beginning to deal with the making of Stagecoach
(1939).But again, not wanting to get
into the major studio sort of a milieu. I didn't want Stagecoach to take
center stage, and deal with all those name actors. John Wayne dropping him in
as sort of a peripheral character, I enjoyed it. I would not have wanted to,
probably wouldn't have had the audacity, to try and make him a central
character,
HENRY:
But he contributes. And it's
such a nice choice to put him in there when he was a Three Mesquiteers
star and on the verge of being something big. I liked that a lot.
J.R. SANDERS:
Well, thank you. I
enjoyed that probably as much as anything in the book, because it was just such
a different view of John Wayne than you typically get. I've seen him portrayed
in fiction here and there over the years, but it's always John Wayne, the icon,
and it was kind of fun to go back and deal with him at a time when he was
really still Duke Morrison.
HENRY:
What's up next for Nate
Ross?
J.R. SANDERS:
Actually, I'm sitting
here as we speak working on the second Nate Ross novel.In this book dealing with film piracy,
chasing a gang of bootleggers who are duplicating Hollywood films and selling
them over the border in Mexico. It’s called Dead Bang Fall.And it's due out in March.
HENRY:
As a Republic fan, do you
have a favorite B Western star or a series?
J.R. SANDERS:
It's in the book; The
Three Mesquiteers.John Wayne and Max
Terhune, those were just such fun movies.Fluffy and nothing you could take too seriously, but they're just a kick
to watch.
HENRY:
One last question.Where did the title Stardust Trail
come from?
J.R. SANDERS:
There was a quote I ran
across in my research from (Gene Autry’s sidekick), Smiley Burnett. In his
later days, he was out at one of these events, signing 8 X 10 glossies, selling
them for ten bucks a pop. Somebody criticized him for that. And his response
was, "You can't eat stardust."
... AND THAT'S A WRAP!
L.Q. Jones portrait by Steve Carver
from Western Portraits
Please check out the July/August 2021 issue of True West, featuring my article and interview with one of the nicest bad guys you'll ever meet, L.Q. Jones.
Happy Trails,
Henry
All Original Contents Copyright July 2021 by Henry C. Parke -- All Rights Reserved
The TCM Festival began
today, Thursday, May 6th, at 5 pm Pacific time, 8 pm Eastern time,
with West Side Story.The real
one, not the one that hasn’t opened yet.For the second year in a row the Festival is, of necessity, virtual. They have a terrific line-up of films, both on
TCM itself, and on HBO Max.HBO Max is
doing it as a so-called ‘hub’, which apparently means that they list all of
their programming, and you can watch any of it whenever you wish, not just
during the four days of the festival, but for the entire month of May.
Following West Side
Story, TCM has gathered three of the film’s stars for a reunion: Rita Moreno,
who appeared in a lot of Westerns TV series in the 1960s, often playing an Indian;
George Chakiris; and Russ Tamblyn, who of course starred in Seven Brides for
Seven Brothers, as well as the Spaghetti Western Son of a Gunfighter.
The Western offerings are
a little light this year. Friday morning
at 8:45 Pacific time, TCM is premiering a 4K restoration of Irving Berlin’s
musical Annie Get Your Gun, from the original Technicolor negative.It
should look great, but it’s a rather stagey musical, and while poor
Betty Hutton, the rushed replacement after Judy Garland was fired, works like
crazy to please, it’s pretty disappointing.
Saturday morning at 7,
Pacific time, it’s arguably Sam Peckinpah’s finest Western, Ride The High
Country, starring Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea, and introducing Mariette
Hartley. (Mariette was such a wonderful discovery that two years later, Alfred
Hitchcock would also introduce her in Marnie.) The ideal supporting cast
includes James Drury, LQ. Jones, Warren Oates, John Davis Chandler, John
Anderson, R. G. Armstrong, and Edgar Buchanan. HBO Max will be featuring John Ford’s The
Searchers, which will include a discussion by Ben Mankiewicz and Bruce
Springsteen.That’s it for Westerns.For the whole TCM Festival schedule, go HERE.
‘WILD WEST CHRONICLES’
PRODUCERS TELL ALL!
Every couple of years, a
cable channel announces a new series with a title like Old New True Legendary
Outlaws Lawmen Gunfights of the Old West.They’re usually okay; they throw a little income to western movie-town operators,
reenactors, and historians.They’re also
interchangeable and forgettable.When producers
Craig Miller of the INSP Network, and Gary Tarpinian of MorningStar Entertainment
got together, men who specialize in documentaries and reality shows, they might
have done something awfully similar.In
fact, they meant to.Gary calls it, “How
we went from non-fiction to fiction in three shows.”
They were well into
preparing just such a show, Craig recalls, “When Gary sent over a short list of
the expert historians and authors that he wanted to use.And these people are great, literally the
world's greatest experts on the West.But
you know what? I've seen them in three or four other series already. So why do
we want to do this? Is there a way to not use talking head experts, and still
do a docu-drama?”
Byron Preston Jackson plays Bass Reeves
Another concern was, “we
needed to stay on-brand for INSP, which means to not leave the 1800s.”Craig explains, “Our viewers like to surf
into INSP and get lost in the old West. And every time you put a talking-head
historian in there, you're snapping them right out. So I called Gary and I
said, what if we had a frontier reporter? And instead of talking-head experts, they're
interviewing eye-witnesses to the West's most notorious events?”
Gary liked the idea, even
though, “We were going to shoot (our experts) in about a week at The Autry. My
partner thought I'd lost my mind when I said to her, we've been wanting to get
into ‘scripted’ (shows) for a long time.”
From The Real Lone Star Ranger
Craig remembers, “Gary, a
stickler for accuracy and truly an expert on the West, came back with was the
solution.He said, ‘there was a real guy
who did this. His name was Bat Masterson.’”
What they’ve created with
Wild West Chronicles is a lot less like those previous documentary
series, and a lot more like the half-hour Western anthology series of the
1960s, like Zane Grey Theatre and Death Valley Days.Actually a good deal like Stories of the
Century was meant to be, had it stuck closer to the actual history.
“I knew we would be
pretty good at it,” Gary says. “We are
very well equipped to tell a story that's based on a true story, with real
people, in a certain time period, faithfully reproduced, based on our research,
and tell the story accurately. Because when you're doing non-fiction, that's
what you do.We've taken creative
liberties, no doubt about it. We weren't there, so we're putting words in their
mouths. But other than that, we're trying to tell the stories accurately and to
show how much we love this world and these people, these characters.”
In Wild Bill Hickok and the First Quick-Draw Duel,
flirtation, and a gold watch...
Another problem they
avoided while moving away from the standard talking-heads docudramas was to not
be a ‘greatest hits’ show: so far at least, they are NOT doing Jesse James and
Billy the Kid and the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.“I'll let you in on a little inside baseball,”
Craig shares. “When we first created the concept, we actually focus-tested
three of the episodes and almost unanimously, the respondents said what they
were interested in were stories they had never heard, about little-known
characters of the West. Or if we were going to tell the story of a famous
character, they wanted it to be a little-known story about that famous
character. We intentionally kept our format to a half an hour. Because we don't
want to do a birth-to-death biography of each character. We just wanted to take
one slice of life, one story. And then that also allows us to do multiple
episodes with the same characters.”
“Exactly,” Gary agrees. “And
we think the audience is going to love it, because we're going to have the same
actors play those people. For example, one episode we have a coming up is on the
death of Dora Hand, in Dodge City, at the hand of Spike Kenedy. And one of the
guys in the posse is Bat's deputy Bill Tilghman. And later on, Bill Tilghman's
one of the Three Guardsmen (of Oklahoma), going after Bill Doolin. So it's the
same actor.And Bass Reeves -- there are
so many great stories we can do with him, how we used his head to capture
people, the story of him going after his own son, who was involved in domestic
violence.It has been particularly
enjoyable working with INSP. Diversity is very important to us at Morningstar; my
partner is not only a woman, she's Chinese. We met in film school at Loyola
Marymount here in LA, and we’ve always felt that it's important to send a
proper message and that just meshed perfectly with what the network wanted to
do. That same focus group (said) we'd like to hear more about black cowboys,
and women.In season one we've been able to do Bass
Reeves, Stagecoach Mary.We're doing
Elfego Bacca, probably the most famous Mexican-American law man. (Pioneer
doctor) Susan Anderson.”
...lead to a showdown.
Craig adds, “This sense
of diversity also includes the types of stories.Because this is an anthology series, it
allows us to do a wider spectrum of stories from the West. For instance, the
last episode this season is on Charles M. Russell, the cowboy artist, and
probably not something you're going to see in a traditional series that’s all
Jesse James and Billy the Kid. It allows us to paint, no pun intended, a more
accurate picture of what the West was like.”
Wild West Chronicles
stars Jack Elliot, who doesn’t look or dress much like Gene Barry (who starred
in Bat Masterson from 1956 to 1961), but looks a lot like the
photographs of the real lawman-turned-journalist.The episode Dr. Susan Anderson – Frontier Medicine
Woman, airs Friday at 9 p.m., Pacific Time.On Sunday at 2:30 p.m., Pacific Time, Bat Masterson & The Dodge
City Deadline, Part 1, premieres.
Jack Elliot as Bat Masterson
If you’d like to read
some of Bat Masterson’s actual writing, his collection, Famous Gunfighters
of the Western Frontier is available from Dover Books, and other
publishers.
JUST ONE MORE THING...
COMING SOON – DUELING BILLY
THE KIDS!
Emilio Estevez, who was unforgettable
as Billy the Kid in 1988’s Young Guns, and 1990’s Young Guns II, has spread the
word that he’s coming back!Screenwriter
John Fusco, who wrote both Young Guns films, is hard at work on Guns 3:
Alias Billy the Kid, which Estevez will direct as well as star in.And this week the Epix Channel announced an
8-part limited series about Billy, to be written and produced by Michael Hirst,
of The Tudors and Vikings fame.Updates
on both projects coming soon!
AND THAT’S A WRAP!
And please check out the
May issue of True West, on newsstands now. It features my interview with author
Paulette Jiles, whose News of the World is the basis for what many – including me
– consider the best film of the year!
Happy Trails,
Henry
All Original Contents
Copyright May 2021 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved
On Wednesday, February 24th,
season two of The Ultimate Cowboy Showdown returns to INSP.Some of the best working cowboys from around
the country compete in teams and as individuals in a wide range of challenges –
riding, roping, driving cattle, and complex relay-races.Country music legend Trace Adkins is once
again the host and, with the input of experts in various specialties, the
ultimate judge, and Trace sends at least one competitor home every week. This
time the field of competitors is larger – fourteen instead of a dozen – and the
already valuable winnings are bigger as well: the last man standing wins a
$50,000 herd of cattle, a Rawhide Portable Corral, an Arrowquip Q-Catch 87
Series Cattle Chute, not the mention the coveted Ultimate Cowboy Showdown belt-buckle,
and a lifetime of bragging rights.
I had the opportunity to
talk with Trace Adkins about the new season, and also spoke with Jennifer
Hudgins, one of this season’s four female competitors.
HENRY
PARKE: Back in 2019,
I visited you on location in Alabama. And now the shows moved to Texas. Why the
move?
TRACE ADKINS: They just wanted to do it in a different
place this time. And we had a lot, a lot open ground out there in Texas that we
could utilize.
HENRY
PARKE: How did the
change of locale change the show?
TRACE ADKINS: We were planning on shooting it in March, and
then COVID happened. We finally got
everything figured out, how we could do it during COVID. That took until the
1st of July. So doing this show in Texas in July was challenging, I'll tell you:
it was hot.
HENRY PARKE: I'll bet. Were you folks all quarantined?
TRACE ADKINS: Yeah, once everybody got there, the first day
everybody took tests, and then quarantined, and when all the tests came back
negative, we just stayed in our little bubble and did our thing.
HENRY PARKE: What's the best part of doing the show?
TRACE ADKINS: Just the opportunity to watch these
professionals at work. I mean, it's still amazing to me. There are still
working Cowboys in this country that still do it, the old school way. And it's
just really fun to watch.
HENRY PARKE: Has the success of season one changed the
kind of competitors you get?
TRACE ADKINS: Yeah, and I knew that it would. As I went
around last year, after the first one came out, I ran into a lot of cowboys
that were like, “You didn't have no good cowboys on there! I could do that.”
And I was like, come on, we're gonna do another one. You can throw your hat in
the ring and see what you got. Nothing against the contestants that we had the
first season. But, once you got down to that cream of the crop last year, those
final four we had; we started out with 14 of that caliber at the very beginning
of this season. So it was a horse of a different color this year.
HENRY PARKE: On every show, after the elimination
competition, you send at least one cowboy packing. In addition to being the host,
you're also the ultimate judge. When you question the competitors in the arena before
announcing your decision, are you actually making your final determination
based on their answers? Or have you
decided who's going out before you come out and tell them?
TRACE ADKINS:It was different; it could go two ways.Either I would go into the arena at sundown
pretty much having made up my mind, and then it was going to be up to them to
fight, to stay, or to say something that was going to change my mind. Or
sometimes I would go in not knowing who was going to go, and not even leaning
toward anybody. And then it was totally up to them as to how they conducted
themselves in the arena, as to who was going to go home. It was always my
decision.
HENRY PARKE: Your father was a rodeo cowboy. Does this
show bring back a lot of memories?
TRACE ADKINS: Well you know, he quit riding before I was
old enough to remember. I think my mother probably told him he needed to stick
with that good job, and stop chasing those rodeos around. But he was a good
horseman: he was the real deal. I know
that he would've really enjoyed this show.
HENRY PARKE: Did you ever
compete?
TRACE ADKINS: No.
HENRY PARKE: If you were as young as the contenders that
you have on the show, what competitions do you think you'd have done best in?
TRACE ADKINS: Probably just the strong back and the low
skill level type chores. (laughs)
HENRY PARKE: In the first
episode of this new season, someone says that it's pasture cowboys versus arena
cowboys. Is that accurate?
TRACE ADKINS: Yeah, some of it. But the way that the
competition was structured, nobody really had the upper hand because the tasks
were so varied.
HENRY PARKE: How life-changing do you think winning the
herd, the ranch equipment, and of course the buckle, can be?
TRACE ADKINS: Oh, I think it means a great deal to these
folks. That's why they just poured their heart and soul into trying to win. It
was very, very important to them.
HENRY PARKE: Was there anything you learned from season
one not to do in season two?
TRACE ADKINS: That's been the case and throughout most of
my career: the best lessons I've learned have been what not to do. But I don't think in this case that was
applicable.
Incidentally, I also
spoke to Trace about his Western movie career – you can read about that soon in
True West. He has two more Westerns in
the can, Old Henry and Apache Junction, and is currently shooting
a third, The Desperate Riders, in Nashville.
I watched the first three
episodes of the new season of Ultimate Cowboy Showdown, and saw Jennifer
Hudgins get roughly stomped on by a large calf, that left her hurting.
Jennifer Hudgins
HENRY PARKE: How are you feeling? The trampling that you
took looked pretty rough.
JENNIFER HUDGINS: It was pretty rough, and I was pretty sore
right after, but I'm good now.
HENRY PARKE: Very good. Pretty early on, someone makes the
point that the competition in a sense is arena cowboy versus pasture cowboy. Is
that true?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: In a lot of ways, it kind of was. You know, so many of the challenges were kind
of geared towards the arena, and the pasture cowboy is kind of a little
different game.
HENRY PARKE: Where do you fit in?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I'm definitely more of pasture cowboy
rancher. I'm not that much of an arena
cowboy, and haven't been for several years.
HENRY PARKE: What exactly is a cow boss?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: A cowboy. Most people refer to the cow boss
as the guy who kind of runs things on the ground. The cow boss is the person
you're going to look to when you're gathering cattle, when you're sorting in
the pens; day-to-day, hands-on type operations like that.
HENRY PARKE: What’s a top hand?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: A top hand would be somebody that sure enough
good at what they do. Good horseman, good cowboy, knows how to handle cattle
the correct way. Keep things quiet and get things done efficiently.
HENRY PARKE: Do you know how much competition there was to
make one of the 14 spots in the show?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I really don't. At one point I heard that thousands
of people applied and sent in videos, but I never heard an exact number.
HENRY PARKE: How did you audition? Did you send in a
video?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: They called me. A friend of mine had given
them my information and they reached out to me and then we did a Skype
interview. I did two or three Skype interviews, I believe.
HENRY PARKE: Did you do anything special to prepare for
the competition?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: Not really. I wouldn't say I did anything
that I don't really do all the time. I just tried to really prepare mentally
more than anything.
HENRY PARKE: How do you prepare mentally?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: Sometimes you just have to put your big girl
panties on and get your game face on and know you're going down there to win. And you're going to be competing against
people that are just as good or better than you. You really don't know. And you
just have to get yourself in the right head space.
HENRY PARKE: Sometimes there's touchiness us about
terminology. Do you prefer cowboy, cowgirl or something else?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I prefer the term cowboy. There's nothing
wrong with the term cowgirl, but when you say it, people automatically picture
in their head like you're a rodeo queen type person. And while that's fine,
that's not who I am. I'm day-to-day doing a man's job in a man's world, and can
do it just as well as they can. So I feel like I should be on the same level.
HENRY PARKE: As a dad of a daughter myself, I love what
you said about working with your dad being your daycare. Tell me a little about
growing up with your dad in the cattle business as a kid.
JENNIFER HUDGINS: You know, my dad has been in the cattle
business my entire life. He is
definitely old school cowboy all the way to the core. And he's a tough man. He
expected a lot out of us growing up. From the time I was little bitty, he took
me along with him. He might be catching wild cattle for people, and he wasn’t
going to put me in harm’s way. He'd tell
me, “Stay right here on the back of this pickup, and do not get off for any
reason.” And by gosh, I stayed there. I'd have my crackers and my pop and toys
and just play there, as long as it took. Now on the days I could go, I had a
pony, and that pony knew to stay right behind my dad and I just went everywhere
they went.
HENRY PARKE: Growing up, what sort of things were you
learning to do on your ranch?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: We learned a little bit of everything. My
dad, he's pretty versatile. He knows how
to run a cow calf operation. He knows how to run yearlings. And we did all that
my entire life. I grew up learning how to ride a horse, how to gather cattle, how
to rope, how to sort, learning how to do all those things correctly and keep
the cattle quiet. We learned to process cattle the right way. I have a younger
brother, and any aspect of ranching, we grew up watching my dad do that and we
just tried to mimic him.
HENRY PARKE: Well now forgive me, because I'm a Brooklyn-born
city slicker, so there's a whole lot that I don't know about cowboying. I
didn't know you're not supposed to ride your horse in front of somebody, but I
sure learned it from the show. Why not?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: That's a big no-no. You don't ever ride in
front of another person like that. It's a major respect thing. When you're out
there gathering cattle, everybody has their spot and everybody needs to stay in
their spot. Because if we go to try and jump ahead, then we're leaving holes
for the cattle to get away from us. And by riding in front of another cowboy,
you're basically saying, you're not doing your job, so I'm going to ride up
here in front of you, cut you off because I feel like I need to be here, and
you don't. It's incredibly disrespectful.
HENRY PARKE: From the brief biography I read, work-wise it
sounds like you have a pretty full plate. Why did you decide to enter this
competition?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I was kind of back and forth on whether I
really wanted to do it or not, because you just don't know what to expect. I'd
never in my life done anything like that. I had seen the previous season of the
Ultimate Cowboy Showdown, but I was a little leery, but then my dad kind of
pushed me and was like, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. You go down there and win it and you've got
$50,000 worth of cattle, and that's a big deal.
HENRY PARKE: And the equipment that comes with it must be
very valuable,
JENNIFER HUDGINS: Like the portable set-up pen, those can be a
game changer, that can open opportunities for getting more land where there
weren't pens available, and not having to invest a bunch of money right off the
bat in building a full set of pens, because you have that portable corral.
HENRY PARKE: The show starts with 14 contestants, 10 men
and 4 women. Have you made any friendships?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I really got to know Morgan and have a lot of
respect for her. She comes from a
totally different part of the country (Shell, Wyoming), and the way they do
things and the way we do things here in Oklahoma are vastly different, but I
had so much respect for the kind of cowboy that she is. I got to be really good friends with Ora (Brown)
and JP (John Paul Gonzalez) and we still keep in touch. We still talk two or
three times a week. Really good guys, good family men. And I will cherish those
friendships for life.
HENRY PARKE: I'm pretty sure you made at least one enemy
with Tyler Kijac.
JENNIFER HUDGINS: Yeah, Tyler is probably not my favorite
person, but at the end of the day, this happens when you're ranching and you
have guys come day-work for you. Sometimes there's a class clash of
personalities, like in any job in an office setting, or in the middle of the
pasture gathering cattle. Sometimes things get heated, you have somebody that
doesn't really know what they need to be doing, and they can't take direction
and it generally will get you in a bind. And that happened many times with
Tyler. He's not a pasture cowboy. He doesn't know how to read cattle. He's not
ever in the right spot when you're gathering or sorting. And so that causes a
problem for everybody trying to work with him. And I did get in the middle of
him a few times, but when it's all said and done, I just leave it there. I
don't carry it with me.
HENRY PARKE: Have you ever tried out for any other TV
reality show?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: No, I have not. But yes. I love reality TV. I
probably watch more reality TV than anything.
HENRY PARKE: Were you disappointed that there was no rose
ceremony?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: At the end of the day when Trace calls us all
down there to the arena and sends someone home, that was a pretty intense
situation at times. They didn't need to
give me a rose. I was happy to go sit on the fence. (Note: if Trace tells you
won’t be eliminated, you go sit on the fence.)
HENRY PARKE: How does cowboying in Texas compares with
Oklahoma?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: I would say there's a lot in common. The way they do things there is very similar
to the way we do things here. It gets
really, really hot in the summertime and it was that way there. Extremely hot. So
you kind of have to work around that, so you don't stress the cattle and you're
not overworking your horses. The heat does come into it.
HENRY PARKE: How did you like Trace Adkins?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: He was really, really intimidating at first.
He's such a big guy and he has such a deep voice. When he first walked up, I was like, Oh my
gosh! A very commanding presence. But after the first few days, when we were
around him a little bit more, he really seems like a good guy. He joked around
with us a time or two, kind of laid back and pretty easy going for the most
part. But when, when he gets down there in that arena at elimination time, he
means business.
HENRY PARKE: Can you tell me anything funny or interesting
that happened that we might not see in the show?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: When I got trampled by the calf, it ripped my
pants pretty much completely off of me on one side. So I don't know how much of
that will actually be on the TV because, literally, my whole butt is hanging
out and here it is like our first immunity challenge. That was something that
you just have to laugh about it and go on; you can't change it.
HENRY PARKE: Did you learn anything of value from your
competitors?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: There were a lot of things that I took away
from the competition. I have a lot of
respect for some of my fellow competitors that they are outstanding arena cowboys.
They're good at what they do, and being able to watch them in their element
when we had that type of challenge, you can really take a lot away from that.
Maybe they don't do what I do, but that doesn't mean they're not good at what
they do.
HENRY PARKE: Looking back, is there anything you would
have done differently in the competition?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: After it's all over with, you can always see
your mistakes. I think there's some things I would've done a little differently.
Maybe thinking things out a little longer instead of just reacting.
HENRY PARKE: Were there any big surprises?
JENNIFER HUDGINS: Going into it, I don't think any of us were
prepared for how mentally, emotionally and physically exhausting it would be. We
know we have to work hard, because we do every day. But being in that situation,
you’re away from home, away from the people that you care about that, are your
support system. And you're thrown in with all these strangers in this
competitive environment. It can be very, very mentally challenging at times.
And I don't think any of us were prepared for that.
Several European nations
have had a long association with Western filmmaking – Germany, Italy,
Spain. But France is among them. True, many Spaghetti Westerns were international
co-productions that included French financing and therefore some French cast
members. But aside from a pair of
Brigitte Bardot films, 1965’s Viva Maria, and 1971’s The Legend of
Frenchie King, there are very few Westerns from French filmmakers. So I was surprised and delighted to learn
that Samuel Goldwyn Films had acquired a new French Western, Savage State, which
is now available On Demand and Digitally.
It’s the story of a
French family in Missouri at the start of the Civil War, who make the tactical error
of allying with the Confederacy. They
quickly determine their safety demands that they return to France as quickly as
possible. They hire a mercenary to lead
them, and find themselves confronting not only Union soldiers, but the former
associates of their mercenary. The cast
includes Alice Isaaz, Deborah Francois, Kevin Janssens, and Kate Moran. With striking exteriors, from town to forest to
snow-covered fort, and elegant interior sets, particularly a ballroom where a
celebration goes startlingly all to Hell, Florian Sanson’s art direction and
Christophe Duchange’s cinematography combine to make one of the most beautiful
Westerns in recent memory.
Writer-Director David
Perrault first garnered admiration for his 2013 film Our Heroes Died Tonight,
a 1960s crime drama about a man who
leaves the Foreign Legion to drift, reluctantly, into a career as a masked
wrestler. Savage State is a heavily atmospheric film,
sometimes almost dream-like, and with that dream-like feel are some apparent
lapses of logic. I had the pleasure of interviewing
Perrault, and learning about his passion for the genre, and his adventures
making Savage State.
HENRY
PARKE: I was surprised to learn that Savage State is not your
first Western – that was No Hablo American.
France has produced great filmmakers since the Lumiere brothers, but not
usually Westerns. Why have you chosen
this genre twice?
DAVID PERRAULT: I love westerns since I was a child. I
had a Super 8 projector, and one of the 3-minute reels was the Indian Attack in
John Ford's Stagecoach. Much later I discovered his films and he remains
the greatest American filmmaker for me. Even though in writing and filming Savage
State, I tried to forget all of those classics and move towards something
almost radically opposed. We cannot redo what has already been done, it is unsurpassable!
HENRY PARKE: Is there
actual history behind your story? Were
there French nationals in the U.S. who thought it best to leave when the Civil
War broke out? Are your characters based
on real people? Or are they your invention? DAVID PERRAULT: While writing the screenplay, I
researched French settlers during the Civil War. The demand for neutrality by
Napoleon 3 during the conflict is very real, for example. On the other hand,
the characters are completely fictitious.
HENRY PARKE: I thought
you actually shot in the U.S., but IMDB says you filmed in Canada, France and
Spain. Have you been to the United
States, specifically the American west? DAVID PERRAULT: Yes, that was the challenge of making
people believe in the United States by filming in such different places. My
wife has an American aunt so it's a country that I know well. But I know it
especially through the films and in particular the classics of the Hollywood
golden age.
HENRY PARKE: I believe
your previous film, Our Heroes Died Tonight, while period, was not so
long ago, and was shot in town. Savage
State, by contrast, is set 150 years ago, in a foreign land, requiring all
manner of difficult-to-find costumes and props and locations, and was filmed in
three countries, on two continents. What
were the biggest challenges? What sort
of unexpected problems did you have to overcome?
DAVID PERRAULT: The biggest challenge was the weather.
You never knew what to expect. In Canada, for the final shootout scene, it was
snowing and extremely cold. The team was going crazy in these extreme
conditions. The guns, the kerosene lamps, the filming equipment… everything
started to freeze. The camera was covered with a survival blanket, but the
optics froze too!
HENRY PARKE: The film is
beautifully lit and shot, wonderfully atmospheric, sometimes almost
dreamlike. What look and mood were you
going for? Do you storyboard
extensively?
DAVID PERRAULT: No storyboard. I am an extremely visual
person, I have the film in my head and when I arrive on the set I adapt to the
actors, to the weather. At one point in Savage State, we see the convoy going
through the haze, it was not planned, but I jumped at the chance to make an
iconic shot. Overall, I wanted it to have a gothic feel, close to fantasy
cinema. As you say, the film is constructed as a daydream, sometimes
nightmarish. This was really the line I wanted to follow.
HENRY PARKE: You have
such a strong cast, so many talented women.
Is it hard to find performers who are convincing in historical
stories? Can you say something about the
casting process?
DAVID PERRAULT: I wanted to create a very strong group of
women on screen. So I chose actresses from very different horizons to create
relief. During the casting, I am very sensitive to the voices and the way they
go together. It's a very musical way of working.
HENRY PARKE: I understand
why the smugglers were masked during crimes, but why were they masked even when
sitting around the campfire, and presumably eating?
DAVID PERRAULT: It's an unrealistic bias that takes part
in the nightmarish and hallucinatory atmospheres that I wanted to give to the
film.
HENRY PARKE: Do you have
plans for your next movie? Is it a
Western?
DAVID PERRAULT: It's not a western, nor a movie. It's a
TV show about dreams precisely.
DVD REVIEWS
DON RICARDO RETURNS – or,
if Zorro and the Cisco Kid had a baby…
With his story The
Curse of Capistrano published in 1919, Johnston McCulley created Zorro, the
prototype for the swashbuckling Mexican hero in Westerns for years to
come. Douglas Fairbanks played him to
great success the following year, and he would later be portrayed by Tyrone
Power, Guy Williams, Alain Delon, and twice by Antonio Banderas, among others. McCulley would continue to write until his
death in 1958, and many of his stories were turned into movies. He was only credited with one produced
screenplay, ironically based on another writer’s famous character: Doomed
Caravan (1941), starring William Boyd as Clarence Mulford’s Hopalong Cassidy.
In 1946, P.R.C. released Don
Ricardo Returns, original story by McCulley, about a wealthy young
nobleman, Don Ricardo (Fred Coby), who is Shanghaied, and when he escapes and
returns to Monterey, learns that the culprit, his cousin Don Jose Luerra
(Anthony Warde), has had Ricardo declared dead, and is trying to claim his
property, and woo his intended, the lovely Dorothea (Lita Baron, aka
Isabelita), who is handy with a sword herself.
While the film is itself a poor cousin to 20th Century Fox’s Mark
of Zorro (1940), and Fred Coby is no Tyrone Power, it is an entertaining 63
minutes, with good dialog and swordplay.
Look quick, and Fred Coby looks like Tyrone Power.
That's the San Fernando Mission behind them.
Rather than being
studio-bound, director Terry O’Morsemakes ample and effective use of two historical landmark locations, The
San Fernando Mission, and the Andres Pico Adobe, both of which are happily
still standing, and open to visitors.
Of particular interest is
that the screenplay is co-written by Renault Duncan, the nom de plume of
actor Duncan Renaldo, famous for his portrayal of O. Henry’s the Cisco Kid in
eight movies and 157 TV episodes.
Renaldo also was associate producer on the film. He would go on to write three more
swashbucklers, Bells of San Fernando (1947), The Lady and the Bandit
(1951), and The Highwayman (1951), all with cowriter Jack DeWitt. Don Ricardo Returns is available from
Alpha Video HERE. https://www.oldies.com/product-view/8366D.html
THE PHANTON PINTO –
my first car
I’ve always had a
fondness for Westerns made during World War II, where the characters were
simultaneously fighting range wars and Nazi spies. In the tiny budget Phantom Pinto, when
rancher Wade (Milburn Morante) balks at selling apparently worthless land for a
high price to German accented Kurt Hank (Sven Hugo Borg), he turns up
dead. Wade’s daughter (Dorothy Short) is
eager to sell, but dad’s old confidante Jim (Dave O’Brien) and Wade’s 10-year-old
son Buzzy (Robert “Buzzy” Henry) smell a rat, or maybe a Schweinhund,
and
discover Hank and his minions want the land to mine valuable deposits of
strontium! Jim says that’s something
used to make fireworks, but the remarkable thing is that this film was released
in May of 1941, long before the U.S. entry into the war, and Strontium 90 is a
radioactive isotope produced during nuclear explosions! I don’t know who screenwriter E.G. Robertson
was listening to, but it was someone who talked too much!
Buzz Henry as a kid.
So cheap and crudely made
that it seems more like an early 1930s rather than ‘40s film, it even features silent-movie
style open-air sets pretending to be interiors, the most appealing thing about
it is Buzzy Henry. A talented for-real
child cowboy, in addition to riding and roping, he gets all the best lines: “Get
along there, you un-American polecat,” and “C’mon, Mr. Hand-kisser! You’ve got a date with Uncle Sam!”
As an adult, Buzz Henry
would become a much in-demand stuntman and stunt coordinator, and was
second-unit director on Our Man Flint, The Wild Bunch and Macho
Callahan, and in 1971 was doing the same job on The Cowboys when he
was killed in a motorcycle accident, at age 40.
The Phantom Pinto is available from Alpha Video HERE.
