‘YELLOW ROCK’ COMPOSER RANDY MILLER ON SCORING FOR WESTERNS

The Western movie YELLOW ROCK has won international awards, national awards, film festivals, awards from cowboy organizations and awards from Indian organizations (you can read my review HERE if you missed it).

Starring Michael Biehn, James Russo and Lenore Andriel, directed by Nick Vallelonga, co-written and co-produced by Lenore Andriel and Steve Doucette, the making of this small but powerful movie should be an inspiration for anyone trying against all odds to get a film made.  It’s also a damned good movie, and thought-provoking.  Recently, composer Randy Miller’s   score, by turns beautiful, haunting and relentless, was released on CD by Intrada.  It’s a worthy addition to your western soundtrack collection, as you’ll hear from the audio clips you’ll find at the end of this article. 

I recently had the pleasure of talking in-depth to Randy Miller about YELLOW ROCK, his other soundtracks, his favorite composers and scores and, perhaps most enlightening, the nuts and bolts of how motion picture scores, big-budget and small, are created. 

HENRY PARKE: Many times I’ve been in a cutting room, looking at dailies or a rough-cut, and everything looks stilted and hollow, and you think, this is not a movie.  This is obvious actors speaking lines.  Then you put a temporary piece of music behind it, and it suddenly comes to life, and you think, “Oh my God, it is a movie!”  What is it that music brings to film, that makes such a difference?

Randy Miller conducting during the recording of

the 'CONTAGION' score

RANDY MILLER:  That’s a good question.  And that music – by the way, we call it ‘temp’ music – is really important.  This is not the answer to your question, but I’ll get to that.  The temp music is probably the last creative element that’s brought to a movie.  The story’s been written, the actors have acted, the editing’s underway.  But a whole new element is created, and that’s the score.  And that brings so much; it can bring something that’s not at all on the screen.  For example, there might be a scene where it’s very quiet, it might be just the peaceful forest.  But if you put in threatening music, then something scary’s in the forest.  That’s bringing something that doesn’t even exist into the scene.  That would be one extreme; the other extreme would be giving exactly what you see, just highlighting it.  Give you an example; in YELLOW ROCK, there were wolves.  You see the wolves, and if you bring threatening music along with the wolf, it’s going to heighten the feeling that’s there.  And the other thing you can do would be where you intentionally do the opposite, for comedy.  For example, you have a comedic scene, and you play serious music against it; it’s the opposite of what you see, but it becomes funny.  It’s a contrasting.  The music coming in at the end, by the composer, gives the director a whole other ‘color’ to work with, along with the dialogue and sound effects; it’s a whole ‘nother sort of  palette to bring to the film.  And it’s huge, as you know.

HENRY: At what age did you become interested in music? 

RANDY: I started piano lessons around 8 or 9, and played through high school; picked up clarinet somewhere in junior high, 6 or 7^th grade.  My mom was a professional singer, so I was always around it, and she was always performing different places up in the Catskill Mountains of New York.

HENRY:  What kind of music did she sing?

RANDY: She did show music; semi-legit Broadway.  Mostly show songs, but some opera, some operetta.  And when she settled down to have a family, she still worked.  She worked all over the country when she was younger.  But when she settled down in upstate New York, she worked in the hotels around the area.  So I was always around that, and at some point in my early twenties I actually started accompanying her.  I went to music school when I was 18; I went to Berkeley Music School in Boston.  At that time I was more interested in theatre music, Broadway music, as an orchestrator.

HENRY: So you’re an East-coaster like myself.

RANDY: Yuh, I’m from Ellenville, New York, near the Catskills.  It’s an hour and a half from New York City, near Kingston and Woodstock and all that.  I have a degree in composition from Berkeley.  Then I started arranging some show-things, but I got into more contemporary arranging for records, and a little bit of film work.  I was working on a record in Miami,  as the string arranger and conductor; then I came out here.  I had the opportunity to do some work in the film end of things, and I ended up moving here (to Los Angeles). 

HENRY:  So you weren’t planning initially to be a film composer.

RANDY:  No, I wanted to be an arranger for Broadway. 

HENRY:  Is that something you’d still like to do?

RANDY:  I have had a chance to do it, which has been fun.  Occasionally projects come by that are based on the Broadway tradition, and every chance I get to do it, it’s just a lot of fun.  It’s very limited; if that’s all you do, you really have to be in New York, fight your way into the inner core of that stuff.  I never tried to do that.  I got involved with film music, I stayed with it, and I’m glad I did.  Once in a while I do get to do that kind of (Broadway) stuff, and it’s always a blast. 

HENRY: What were big musical influences on you as a young guy?  Whose music impressed you?

RANDY:  When I was probably nineteen, The Rite of Spring, by Stravinsky.   I remember putting headphones on, and listening to that, and going, “I have no idea what I’m listening to.”  I have no idea how Stravinsky composed that.  I don’t understand it, but it’s just unbelievable, amazing music.  

HENRY:  It caused riots when it was originally performed.

RANDY: It did; and as you know, this is the centennial, this year.  It was a hundred years ago this spring when it was performed in Paris.  There are a lot of performances all over the country right now, because of that.  The Rite of Spring had a big effect on me.  Actually, a couple of years before, I went with my mother and father to see a revival of THE KING AND I on Broadway.  Yul Brynner was in it, and most of the people (from the original cast) were in it, although they were quite a bit older than when they first did it.  And that really hit me; that was amazing.  I was listening to my hero back then, who was Robert Russell Benet, an orchestrator for all of Rogers and Hammerstein and many other people, and I got really interested in what he was doing.  The music of THE KING AND I is still among my favorites, probably because it imprinted such a strong impression on me, what he was doing as an orchestrator of Richard Rogers’ music.  The simple themes of the songs that he turned into this beautiful score.   When I was a real kid, from ten to eighteen, I was mostly into show songs, with my mother playing these things.  I wasn’t that much into it until I went down to Broadway.  But I was listening to the contemporary rock of the day, a little jazz.  But it really didn’t hit me until those two events guided me.  I’m trying to think what film music influenced me – you were mentioning DR. NO[1], which of course had the James Bond Theme, that great theme.  I guess it would be John Williams and Jerry Goldsmith.  Those two guys in the ‘70s and ‘80s just made so much great music.  PLANET OF THE APES for Goldsmith, and then STAR TREK; and for Williams, everything – STAR WARS and JAWS.  So once I started hearing that stuff, that was something I got really interested in, even though I understood when I heard those things, what they were and how to do it.  I’m not saying I could do it, but I understood it, where with Stravinsky I couldn’t understand what he was doing, and it took music school for me to figure it out, from a compositional point of view.

HENRY:   That’s interesting.  It’s sort of like, as a writer, you read novels, and you can follow what’s going on.  And then you read Hemingway, and suddenly it’s like you’re starting from page one all over again. 

RANDY:  Yeah, it’s the best!  Even to this day, when I hear things that I don’t understand, how is this composer doing this, that’s the most interesting stuff.  Even if it’s not sophisticated, difficult music.  It could be just a rap guy that’s doing really cool rhythms; whatever it is, when it’s something that I don’t really know how to do, that’s the kind of thing that kind of draws me to try and understand it.  

HENRY:  What was the first film or TV project that you composed for?

RANDY:  I did a lot of student films in Boston, at Berkley, but when I came out here on that CD project, as a string arranger, I ended up going to school at SC for graduate studies in film scoring, so at that point I started doing a lot of student films at USC, UCLA, and AFI.  I learned a lot there, but as important, I met filmmakers, and I’m still doing things for a few of them; a few of them have had real careers, and I’m happy to have met them at that period.  I met a French horn player on a student film, and she was working for a big Hollywood composer named Robert Folk at the time.  She hired me as a courier to bring him some CDs and things.  I only worked for her for one day, because I went to his house, and it was such great timing.  He happened to be working on a film, and he needed someone to do some pop music, and he hired me that day to work on the film, CAN’T BUY ME LOVE.  That was the first time.  I was doing ‘source music’, which means it’s coming from an (on-screen) source, like a radio, TV, CD-player.  That was a fairly big studio film, so that was a great experience, even though it was source music.  I think the first time I did my own score, not working for someone else, was probably a horror film – THE BOY FROM HELL or DR. HACKENSTEIN or WITCHCRAFT (laughs), they were all from 1988.  I think THE BOY FROM HELL was the first.  It was a low-budget horror film that had a satanic edge to it.   Not much money, but it was great, to get your own project, and be the person responsible for all of it.  I had some experience at that point working for Robert Folk and other composers, so I was coming in prepared.  But very little money and very little time, and unfortunately it wasn’t a great film, but I always do the best I can with the music, and that’s an interesting thing, because you can do your best, no matter what; even if the film is not a great film, you can still turn in your best effort. 

HENRY:  And you can certainly take a film that is not ideal, and improve it tremendously with the music.  Especially genre stuff; horror and noir things, what you can do with the suspense and tone.

RANDY: Absolutely.  You’re absolutely right.  And what we were saying before, that the music comes so late in the process, and it really can make a difference.  With YELLOW ROCK, which is a good film, but an underfunded film – they didn’t have a lot of money to work with.  Steve Doucette and Lenore Andriel really stepped up to the plate, as they say, and funded the music much more than you would expect from the small budget that they had.  Because they agreed with me that the film was really great, and could be that much better if we had the resources to record a score that sounded theatrical, instead of a score that might be okay on TV, but wouldn’t really play in movie theatres.  I think that was a great example of them agreeing that music could really elevate the film.  And in a relatively inexpensive way.  When you think about it, you can bring in some more name actors, that’s going to help sell a film of course, hopefully they do great performances; but the cost of the score isn’t that much when you look at all the other elements of filmmaking.        

HENRY:  How did you get involved with YELLOW ROCK?

RANDY:  Lenore and I met through a mutual friend who lived where we live in Old Topanga, maybe ten years ago.  Lenore had written a couple of scripts, not YELLOW ROCK, and was actively trying to get the films made.  She ended up getting this one made, and I think she wrote the script fairly quickly.  When she got this one underway, she called me, because we had talked about doing something together, and asked if I wanted to do it, and I said, “Yes, sounds great!”  I mean, to combine Westerns and Native Americans and the supernatural, all these things – it’s a great project to work on.  And that’s how it started.  She had something of a rough assembly (a rough-cut); she sent it over, and we started working together. 

HENRY: I was wondering if YELLOW ROCK is your first western score.  You scored PIRATES OF THE PRAIRIE – is that a western? 

RANDY:  It’s not, but it had western elements.  It’s a pirate movie, but due to an unusual twist in the story, it ends up in Nebraska. So there was western music in there, quite a bit, even though it was a comedy really, an action comedy for kids.  There was western music in AMARAGOSA, which was a beautiful documentary that takes place in the Mojave Desert.  DREAM RIDER had some western music in it because it took place in Colorado.  But this is the first full-on western I’ve ever done. Maybe I’m wrong about this, but hasn’t there been a resurgence of westerns in the last five or six years?

HENRY:  I certainly think so.   Of course I’m so focused on it that it’s a little hard to judge.  But I do think there really is resurgence.   And there’s a huge loyalty; there are many people who are terribly eager for the next western project, which is very encouraging as I keep trying to write it.  (laughs)

RANDY:  When TRUE GRIT came out a couple of years ago, and 3:10 TO YUMA, it seemed like a couple of them in a row; I don’t think Lenore did hers thinking about this at all.  I think it’s just the way it happened.  I didn’t really expect to do a western because there weren’t really that many of them for the last ten or fifteen years.  And then good luck came my way, and I got a chance to work on one.  It’s a pleasure.

HENRY:  While I’m a very big fan of movie music, I don’t know much about the process.  So you were sent a rough cut, and what do you do then?  How do you approach it?  Do the filmmakers tell you what they want, or do you tell them what they need? 

RANDY:  All of those.  We mentioned temporary music.  The temp score; in the case of YELLOW ROCK, the film came in with some music placed in some scenes, and not in others, where we all though there needed to be music.  So the rough cut comes in.  When you’re sitting down with the producer or the director, you’re discussing the music as it relates to the film, and the temporary music is very useful, even if it’s wrong.  If the music doesn’t fit, it’s instructive: you know what doesn’t work.  If it works really well, that’s instructive as well, but at the same time filmmakers say, don’t be tied into that.  Bring your own creative expression to that.  And of course I appreciate that, as most composers do.  That’s not always the case; some filmmakers tell you just do what’s there, and that’s a scenario that nobody likes.  When there’s no music, it’s almost the best situation, because then you’re free to do what you feel should be in the scene without any bias towards hearing something, getting used to the temp music.  It’s also pretty dangerous, because then you’re really taking a stab at it.  You don’t know what the filmmakers really intend for music.  So in that kind of scenario, when there’s nothing there, I would ask Lenore, what do you want the audience to feel?  I wouldn’t ask her what kind of music should it be.  Should it be guitars or strings?  I would never ask that.  I would ask what you want the audience to feel in the scene.  If there’s temp music there, I would play the scene without music.  And suggest entrances -- entrances and exits are incredibly important in music.   Because you may not want the audience to feel the music is coming in.  Just slowly creep it in.  Or you may want them to feel it coming in.  It takes a lot of skill and a lot of experience to get that right.  Same thing when the music goes away at the end of a scene.  So we would sit down and have lengthy discussions. 

With YELLOW ROCK we spent two or three seven-hour days going through the movie, because you can speak about one scene for an hour.  And if there are fifty scenes (that need) music, it can take many hours to go through.    After we’ve discussed the scenes, I start working on the music. I can away from the film and working on scenes, main title scenes and sub-scenes; it could be a theme that deals with a romantic angle, or a chase motif.  Sometimes I will just work on these themes or angles or motifs, away from the film, but with the film in mind.  Other times it’s write-to-picture.  It depends on the schedule.  If you have no time, sometimes you have to get right into working on a scene.  So however you decide to work on the music, you end up demo-ing – and when I say demo I mean synthesizers; the keyboard has any instrument you can play, to make a demonstration.   Recordings of what either the themes are, to play away from the picture, or actually score the scene, with music you’re writing for that specific moment.  You turn them in to the filmmakers; get some sense of if this is what they like.  And they may love it, they may hate it. 

HENRY:  Now speaking of synthesizing them, in lower budget films, it’s rare to have original scores these days.  I’ve come to expect a lot of synthesized music when you have one.  But your score is clearly ‘real’ and full orchestra.  How many people were involved in playing your music?

RANDY:  You’re right.  There was a full string section, which is maybe fifteen.  Which is actually not a full string section, but it’s good-sized.  Four wood-winds, two French horns, trumpet, trombone, a lot of guitar parts, many different kinds of guitars; everything from mandolas, mandolins, acoustic guitars, steel and nylon strings.  A lot of authentic Indian percussion, orchestral percussion, piano.

HENRY:  Speaking of Indian instruments, what were you using, to give the Indian feel to the music?

RANDY:  Mostly it was percussion and woodwinds.  And in the woodwind area we used native American wood flutes, which are transverse flutes, ones that go sideways, made of bamboo and wood.  We used ocarinas, which are South American woodland-type sounds.  Even things from India, real India, called a bansuri, but it kind of has a Native American sound.  In the percussion we used frame drums, which are the main instrument of many native cultures.  It’s basically a frame around a drum with a skin in the middle, in all kinds of sizes.  Wind chimes, shaker-type sounds, rattles.  Everything was acoustic, along with western-sounding instrument, which also blended nicely; like a concert bass drum, or tympanis.  I also used Japanese taiko drums, which is a giant drum with a frame around it.  It’s a great sound that blends in nicely with the real Native American sounds.  We went to great lengths, and the producers, Lenore and Steve, said your samples sound great, the percussion.  I said it would sound that much better if we replaced it with real percussion, and they went for it.  And my God, I’m so appreciative of that.  So we ended up replacing everything.  I don’t think there’s any synth; just a few little sound effects. 

HENRY:  You’ve worked on very large, and small, budget movies.  From a music point of view, what difference does the budget make – how do you approach them differently?

RANDY:  That’s a good question.  There’s no difference in the amount of effort I put in.  Because the score has to stand on its own, and be well-written and hopefully well received.  In smaller-budget films I tend to have to do everything myself, just because there’s no money.  Even in the case of YELLOW ROCK I ended up orchestrating everything, and I did have a copyist, which is great, but a lot of times I may have to do some copying myself -- copying of the music for the musicians.  So you’re time-crunched because the work-load is bigger, because you don’t have the funds to hire some support people, like other orchestrators or arrangers.  On the small-budget projects, if you know it’s heading right towards home-video, or even the TV, you can do all the work on synth, and you’re kind of writing that way; writing music that you know will sound pretty good on synth, or good enough.  On a bigger-budget project, if you think it’s going to go theatrical, you have to start thinking, how am I going to make this music sound right in a theatre?  How is it going to support a big space with several hundred people watching it at the same time? 

HENRY:  You’ve composed in a lot of genres.  You’ve done a lot of horror, a lot of comedy.  Do you have any particularly favorite scores that you look back on and think, that’s my best, or my favorite genre you like to work in?

RANDY MILLER:  Here’s the negative side.  I won’t say names, but there was a certain horror movie.  The first one had got some attention; on the second one they put a lot of money in, because they wanted to go theatrical.  And as is typical with sequels, you know how they really go over the top?  This one was really awful; it was just disgusting.  It was just spectacle for the sake of spectacle.  And it was not a pleasant experience for any kind of creative filmmaking, for me to watch this kind of filmmaking being done.  It was disgusting – and I like good horror films.  Scary films, like the original ALIEN; now that’s scary. 

HENRY:  There’s a huge difference between scary and revolting.

RANDY:  That’s a great word – this was revolting; and I’m proud of what I did with the music.  I think I did a really good score, it was well received.  But I felt like I would never want to work on another film that disgusting.  I felt like I was putting something out in the world that’s just so negative. 

HENRY:  And you have to watch it so many times. 

RANDY:   On the other extreme of that was AMARGOSA; Todd Robinson was the director of that, and it’s a beautiful film, beautifully shot; Kurt Apduhan the DP, got an Emmy for it.  Real positive, interesting story, and I was real proud of what I did on that.  And there were several like that, YELLOW ROCK included.  That had a lot to do with the genre, which was such a different combination.  SHANGHAI RED, another small film, dealing with issues in China. 

HENRY: Tell me, would you like to do another Western?

RANDY:  I’d love to.  Maybe one of your filmmaker friends out there will email me. 

HENRY:  As we jumped right into this interview, I don’t think I told you how much I enjoyed your score.  I think it’s terrific.  And because I collect western soundtracks, I’d heard so much.  Rarely do I hear something that I like, where it’s not derivative of Elmer Bernstein or Ennio Morricone.  But yours doesn’t sound like other people’s work.

RANDY:  Thank you, I really appreciate that.  And as you just mentioned, there’s a real strong history of excellent film composers doing great scores – and those are two of the best, that you mentioned.  Even to be in the same paragraph is quite a compliment – thank you for that. 

HENRY:  Who did you consider the great film composers, that we haven’t talked about?

RANDY:  Some of the original ones, going way way way back.  People like Max Steiner, with KING KONG: that was one of those scores that really affected me; oh my God, this is someone who’s done something from nothing.  He was fantastic – he did so many great scores.  Bernard Herrmann, all the amazing things he did with PSYCHO and JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH.  I mentioned Jerry Goldsmith of course.  Most of the film composers of the golden age, back in the forties, they were all so good, they were classical composers.  Franz Waxman, that whole bunch that came over from Europe, during World War II and settled in Los Angeles.  These were serious concert composers, enormous talents.  Really an amazing period of time, because they were all so good.  Even people like Leonard Bernstein, who was American, but that whole period of time in the forties and fifties, there was unbelievable talent. 

HENRY:  Do you have any particularly favorite Western scores?

RANDY:  From the last twenty years, I’ve always been very fond of SILVERADO, by Bruce Broughton.  I think that score brought a resurgence for composers to go hey, this is a contemporary Western score.  It had nothing to do with a contemporary setting, it’s just that it was a composer writing in the ‘80s as compared to the ‘60s or ‘70s; his take on Westerns, and it’s a great score.  I know Bruce, and was always a big fan of his, and that score.  Tremendous, fantastic score.

HENRY:  Is there a major difference approaching a score, if the movie has not yet been shot, versus when you’re working with a rough cut?

RANDY:  That’s a really good question.  I’m not sure if it’s a really big difference, but it’s an interesting one.  On a big film that I worked on, an Oliver Stone film called HEAVEN AND EARTH, Kitaro, who is a recording artist, brought me in to work with him on the music; and he wrote 90% of the music, I wrote 10%.  But I worked on all the music.  Kitaro really was not a film composer at that time; he was a Japanese recording artist.  And Oliver was very smart; he got us together before the film was even put together – they were shooting a little bit, but there was nothing to look at.  And he gave us a year to write the score, instead of three weeks, which can happen.  He figured, let’s get these guys working on the music.  So Kitaro would write a theme, some kind of a motif. And I would take it and develop it into more of a film score; extend it, orchestrate it, and give it contours that a scene might need.  And we would send it to him, and he would comment – he likes this, he doesn’t like this – so eventually, when the film started coming in, we would take those pieces and start contouring them for the scene.  Sometimes we had to start from scratch, but other times they would just fit in.  It was nice because it gives you more freedom not to look at anything, to kind of use your imagination.  Oliver was a big fan of the usage of music in film.  He actually had Warner Brothers finance a huge recording session with us, probably a 100 piece orchestra -- that’s very rare -- just to experiment with themes.  You practically never hear of that.  They had nothing close to a final cut, and he just wanted to hear what these things would sound like in their biggest, fullest form.

HENRY:  I take it you liked working with Oliver Stone.

RANDY:  Yeah; well, he’s an interesting character, terribly smart, but when you sit down to work with him you have to follow his every thought process; he’s going from one thing to the next very quickly.  It could have to do with the film, it could have to do with his daily life, with his experiences in Vietnam, or anything – you just have to go with him.  He’s quite an amazing filmmaker.  Even when I’m working away from film, when I’m working on a record, or something that’s not visual, I find it kind of refreshing not to constantly sit there and look at something.  Closing your eyes and just doing music for music’s sake. 

HENRY: You know what Sergio Leone had Ennio Morricone do for THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY?  He composed the score before they shot anything, and he played it on the set to pace the actors.

RANDY:  Boy, that’s a filmmaker who has a deep appreciation of music.  And what a great story!  What a great composer that he picked to do that with.  I didn’t know that.  Studios really do bring in composers way too late.  What we get paid, whether it’s a dollar or a hundred thousand dollars, we’re getting paid to do a job.  And sometimes we’re paid to do it in three weeks; we would be more than glad to get the same amount of money and have four months.  It would only make it all the better, but unfortunately post-production schedules are not structured that way.  It would be great if we could be hired months before, come up with some music – all composers would jump at the chance to do it that way.  Lenore brought me in as early as she could, which was really nice and early, and I was very pleased about that – she gave me time to complete the score, and do the best job I could.  As a matter of fact she pushed back some of the schedule to give me time. 

HENRY:  Is the YELLOW ROCK score you’re first soundtrack to be put out on CD?

RANDY:  No, I’ve had several.  Intrada.com, they’re the website that specializes in film scores, and they’ve released several others of my scores, including the one I mentioned, AMARGOSA. There was a miniseries called SPARTACUS – not the new one.  This was from Universal and high quality.  HELLRAISER 3 has come out; PIRATES OF THE PLAINS has come out.  THE SOONG SISTERS, a very big Chinese film, it won a lot of awards – the score won awards – that’s out as well.  That’s another score I did with Kitaro.  I’ve probably had ten CDs out.

HENRY:  It must be nice to know that people are sitting down to listen to your music, on purpose, and not just hearing it while watching the movie.

RANDY: I hope so; you always hope people feel that way.  Hopefully they do enjoy it away from the movie. 

To hear samples of music from Randy Miller’s YELLOW ROCK score, visit the Intrada Website HERE.

      

And here’s the trailer for YELLOW ROCK, which is available at Amazon.com and elsewhere.

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[1] I’d told Randy that when I was 8 years old, I’d begged my parents to buy me the soundtrack from DR.NO.  The real reason I wanted it was for the pictures of Ursula Andress on the cover, but while ogling them, I listened to the music, and became hooked on movie soundtracks. 

CONFIRMATION ON JAMES FENIMORE COOPER’S HOME

If you read last week’s Round-up, you know that while back in New York City last week, I tried to find the home of the LAST OF THE MOHICANS author, and could not locate the plaque I had so often seen in the 1970s, at the St. Mark’s Baths.  I sent an inquiry to the James Fenimore Cooper Society, and have just received a response from Hugh MacDougall, Corresponding Secretary:

“You are quite correct. Cooper lived at 4 St. Marks Place (pictured in your attachment) for a time after his return from Europe in 1833. Specifically, he lived there from May 1, 1834 until May 1, 1836 (May 1 was the standard period for leases in New York to begin and end). He, and sometimes his family also, made a number of trips to Cooperstown during that period, as he arranged to buy back and remodel his old family home (Otsego Hall) originally built about 1800 by his father William Cooper.

“Below is a picture of the building from p. 272 of Mary Phillips, “James Fenimore Cooper” New York: John Lane, 1913. It is clearly the one you photographed.”

In 1913

A century later, in 2013

I’ll have to contact them again, to see if they know what happened to the plaque, and what its text said.

CINECON 49 OPENS THURSDAY

The 49^th Annual Cinecon Classic Film Festival will open on Thursday, August 29^th, with the first screening at 2 pm at the Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre.  They feature a wonderfully eclectic schedule of movies, with plenty of silent shorts and features, Our Gang comedies in French, musicals, comedies and dramas.  The special guest for this year’s festival is Shirley Jones.  Among the screenings of particular interest to Western fans is Friday’s 4:55 pm showing of RAMROD (1947), from Luke Short’s story, directed by Andre de Toth, and starring Joel McCrea and Veronica Lake.  And Sunday at 10:50 am it’s SUTTER’S GOLD (1936), about the 1849 discovery of gold in California, starring Edward Arnold as Sutter, with Lee Tracy and Binnie Barnes.  For details, visit the website HERE.

3-D EXPO KICKS OFF WITH 60^TH ANNI. SCREENING OF ‘HONDO’

From September 6^th through the 15^th, the 2013 WORLD 3D FILM EXPO III will be held at the glorious Hollywood Egyptian Theatre.  The first movie to be screened will be the terrific HONDO, starring John Wayne, Geraldine Page (nominated for an Oscar) and Ward Bond, and directed by John Farrow.  The Duke’s daughter-in-law and Batjac Executive Gretchen Wayne will do a Q & A about the film’s preservation.    

On Friday, September 13^th at 3:30 pm, WINGS OF THE HAWK, Budd Boeticcher’s western set against the Mexican Revolution, starring Van Heflin, Julie Adams and Noah Beery Jr. will screen, and Julie Adams will be present for a Q&A and book signing. 

Among the actors making personal appearances during the expo will be Piper Laurie, Lea Thompson, Louis Gossett Jr., and producer Walter Mirisch.  Go HERE for a complete schedule.

DON'T MISS THE 'LONGMIRE' SEASON FINALE ON MONDAY NIGHT!

Is it just me, or does it seem like season two had just started, and it's already finale time?  LONGMIRE, like HELL ON WHEELS, has a ten-episode season.  I was just checking the numbers on shows in the old golden days, for comparison purposes.  CHEYENNE only had fifteen episodes its first season, RAWHIDE had 22.  WAGON TRAIN had 39, which I think was the average, and THE REBEL only ran two seasons, but produced 76 episodes!  Not that I’m complaining – I just want more of a good thing! 

DEFENSE OF 'THE LONE RANGER' FROM ACROSS THE POND

Davy Turner is a British Round-up Rounder who keeps us up-to-date on what Westerns are playing on TV and in theatres in his country.  Having heard the complaints about THE LONE RANGER, when he finally got to see the movie, he filed the following report:

"WHAT the blazes were the US film critics moaning about!!! The Lone Ranger is EPIC...it contains, classic western scenarios, fabulous western settings (you can't beat Monument Valley....ask The Duke)...superb special effects, the work with the two railways is incredible...and the script is both serious and funny. Johnny is terrific and 'not' just another Cap'n Jack parody..Armie is playing the role fine in the Destry becomes tough role and the message about how the Native Americans were so poorly treated is also covered in the movie plot. The 'how' John Reid became 'The Lone Ranger' is almost original to the TV series...BUT...this film deserves to be seen by everyone...western fans and Johnny Depp aside...it's a great summer blockbuster movie with 'heart'.When the William Tell overture kicks in (the second 'real' time)..your heart just soars. Two thumbs up pardners  Thanks to my daughter Em for coming specially to take me ...the horses were enough for her I guess  (OK so the rabbits were a bit weird! )" 

Incidentally, when I shared his comments on Facebook, they were echoed by others in England, the U.S. and Germany.  It was a very enjoyable film.  It's a pity the critics had their knives out before they even saw it.

THE WRAP-UP

That's it for this week!  Next week I'll be telling you about the coming RAMONA DAYS celebration, and either book or DVD reviews -- depending on what I manage to finish!  Have a great week!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents Copyright August 2013 by Henry C. Parke -- All Rights Reserved

VIRGINIAN PT. 4, ALMERIA, NEW CISCO KID,

THE VIRGINIAN Part 4 – James Drury on Jumping the Shark!

 

VIRGINIAN cookies!

 

On Saturday, September 22^nd, hundreds of fans, and eight stars of THE VIRGINIAN television series gathered at The Autry to mark the 50^th Anniversary of the show, which had returned to the airwaves that very day via INSP.  This is the 4^th and final part of my report on those events.  One of the day’s high-points was a panel discussion, moderated by one of the premiere writers on the Western movie, Boyd Magers, of the WESTERN CLIPPINGS magazine and website: http://www.westernclippings.com/

Here is the second part of that panel’s highlights.

 

BOYD MAGERS: Jim, what do you think that Clu (Gulager) brought to the show?

 

JAMES DRURY: A unique and palpable sense of danger and mystery.  You never knew what he was thinking.  You almost never knew what side of the law he was on, because he’d never dig down on one side or the other until he was damned clear which was right and which was wrong.  It was such a joy and a pleasure to work with him.  He constantly threw bolts of lightning at you, and you’d try to catch them and throw them back.  I’ll never forget working with Clu, and what he brought to the show was a whole new dimension, and I mean that sincerely, and you should have won an Academy Award for some of that stuff.  This man, he’s such a pleasure to be around, and he doesn’t even know it. 

Drury, Shore, Gulager and Clarke

 

BOYD:  On the other side of the coin, what happened in the last year?  All of a sudden Doug McClure’s got this big mustache, and Lee Major’s on it, and you’re not on enough.  They changed the title (to THE MEN OF SHILOH) and put Stewart Granger in there. 

 

JAMES:  They gave the show a new look, and everybody kind of signed on to it.  I got myself a new horse and a longer gun.  (big laughs from the audience) From a 5 ½ inch barrel to a 7 ½ inch barrel.  Longer sideburns.  Much bigger hat.  A sense of accomplishment or…a sense of entitlement – let’s put it that way.  I smoked cigars on the show.  And I just mowed down anybody with my firearms.  But the thing is, we all thought it was a good idea at the time; it was a terrible idea.  And the worst of the terrible ideas was putting Stewart Granger in the same position that Lee Cobb had occupied, that John McIntire had occupied, Charles Bickford had occupied; that John Dehner had occupied.  These were truly great western actors.  Stewart Granger came in and decided that he was going to be the big star of the show:  fired my crew, fired my Academy Award-winning cameraman, got all new people.  He pissed off everyone in the entire organization.  And he sunk the show.  So thank you, Stewart, wherever you are. 

 

BOYD:  Don told me a very interesting story about Charles Bickford.  Why don’t you tell it?

 

DON QUINE:  Charles Bickford, as most of you know, was a very handsome copper-haired actor. He was working at MGM, up until he got in a fight on a film there.  And someone said, ‘We don’t have to put up with this any more, Mr. Bickford.  You’re fired.’  And he was a very good businessman.  What he did, there was a vacant lot right on the corner of Culver, that faced MGM.  And he bought that corner lot, and he bought a couple of old junker cars, and put a huge sign up there that said Charles Bickford’s Used Cars.  (big laughs from the audience)  And about two weeks later he got a call from MGM saying, ‘We’d like to buy that property from you.’  He said no thank you.  They offered more; he said no thank you.  After about the fifth offer, they offered him a lot of money, he said okay.  When he got fired out of MGM he couldn’t get a job in the business, and he started working these real low-grade B movies.  There was one in which he had to play a lion tamer (EAST OF JAVA, Universal 1935).  And he still had his wonderful copper hair.  They said, ‘Mr. Bickford, would you mind giving us another shot?’  He did two or three more shots with this lion he was supposed to tame.  They said just one more shot, and he said, ‘This is it.  I’m not doing any more after this one.’  He went in and the lion mauled him – almost killed him.  He was in the hospital, and his hair turned to silver.  And that was the end of Charles Bickford the leading man.  As a character actor he went on to be nominated for Academy Awards several times (for SONG OF BERNADETTE (1944), THE FARMER’S DAUGHTER (1947) and JOHNNY BELINDA (1949)). 

 

Don Quine

 

 

Boyd Magers then gave members of the audience a chance to ask questions.  The first man wanted to know if any episodes, which were shot in eight days, ever went over budget.

 

JAMES:  There were a couple of episodes that went to twelve days.  And it was almost an atomic explosion at the top floor of The Black Tower (the executive building at Universal.).  Couldn’t have that, so we didn’t get those directors back, and we didn’t get those writers back.  We made most of the shows in eight days, and one time we tried to make one in seven days.  And we made it in seven days, and then they came in and said, ‘We’re going to make the next one in seven days.’  And I said, ‘No you’re not.’  The first year the pattern budget was, believe it or not, $130,000 a week to make an eight day show, a 90 minute show.  The show was a big hit, so they said, ‘Well, we’ll just cut $12,000 out of the budget, take that $12,000 arbitrarily and put it in our pocket.’  I said, ‘No you won’t.’  They tried these things from time to time, but no, they didn’t.  They said the Universal Studio Tour took precedence over production.  They were allowed to come anywhere they want to come.  And I said, ‘No, you’re not.’  We had a scene, with bank robbers, where there was a big explosion – they blew the bank.  After a short time, bank robbers came out, piled on their horses and took off up the street just as fast as they could go.  Within moments a posse was formed; while they were forming, there was a buggy-wreck; horse went clear over on his back, and the buggy went over his back.  In the meantime, in the center of the shot, I’m having a love-scene with Angie Dickinson!  And they run a tram through the back of the shot!  (nasally) ‘If you look to your left…’  I got in the car and I went home.  I said, ‘When you get rid of the tram, I’ll be back.’  They said, ‘We can’t do that.’  I said, ‘Yes you can.’  I had to do that two years in a row, go home because of the tram.  And the third year they kept the trams completely away from THE VIRGINIAN set, and we never had any more problems with it. 

 

ROBERTA SHORE:  We also used to do two shows at a time, to reach our (budget) goals.

 

JAMES: I appeared in five episodes in one day.  Five units were shooting.  It was a logistical nightmare, and it could not be done, but we did it.  And I sure never had more fun in my entire life. 

 

A woman in the audience asks Clu and James which episodes they did their best work in.

 

JAMES:  There were great episodes, there were great scenes, there were great moments.  But it’s difficult to isolate any one.  I was pretty satisfied with most of the work.  I was delighted with some of it, and I was disappointed in a little bit of it, so if you’ve got a series going for nine years, and you’ve got that kind of a record, you don’t have to stand back for anybody.  That’s how I feel about it. 

 

CLU:  I can’t top that answer.  That’s very honest, from an acting artist.  He was trying to analyze how an acting artist can evaluate his work, and you really can’t.  You have to let other people evaluate your work.  I know that I wasn’t on the VIRGINIAN much.  I came in the third year and (producer) Frank Price was, as I said, a good friend.  I said Frank, I’m hungry, I need work.  I have two children, a wife and a home.  He said okay, so he put me on as the Deputy Sheriff.  Before that, the first or second season I did an episode where I played a deaf mute.  A deaf mute; I said, boy, this is going to be home free!  I don’t have to memorize a damned thing!  I got on that show the first day, and I realized it would be the hardest job in acting that I had ever, or would ever, have to do.  It was almost impossible.  I’ll tell you why:  I didn’t have to remember words, but all of my actions, my looks, my feelings – everything had to be memorized.  I couldn’t come up there and ad-lib and improvise with other actors, they would have said, ‘What are you doing?’  I can’t believe, to this day, how hard it was.  I could never ever duplicate the difficulty of that.  I liked that episode, because of the intensity I had to muster; I had never done to that degree even on the stage.   That was my favorite episode because I just liked the whole experience of it. 

 

A woman in the audience asked for favorite stories about the horses the actors rode in the show.

JAMES:  The horse that I was privileged to ride for the first eight years, Jody, 7/8^th quarter-horse, 1/8 Appaloosa, was a unique horse – and I’ve never seen another horse do it, before or since: if his head was between Boyd and I, and we were having a conversation, if Boyd said something, his ears would go over there and listen.  (audience laughs)  If I said something they go over to me.  This didn’t just happen once in a while, it was in every conversation.  For eight years, that horse knew what was going on. 

 

SARA LANE:  I used to hang out with the wranglers.  One of the most special things was the first year I rode big old buckskin named Buck, a sound, sensible horse, but not a very special horse.  And in the second season, James had a horse that I think he had trained up for himself, named Easter Ute. 

 

JAMES:  He wasn’t big enough for me.

 

SARA:  And somehow I got to ride Easter Ute.  This was a reining horse, and if you were a horse-crazy kid, you could never have afforded a horse (like this).  I trained all my own horses, which means not much, and the pleasure of loping up to your mark, and just kind of sliding into it, having a horse totally sensible, patient, that will wait, and then turn you around – it’s sort of like having a hot-rod car if you’re a young boy.  It was too much; I was so honored to have an animal like that as a partner.  Another one was a 17 year-old stallion.  This horse had been trained to be in a movie called PEPE (1960) with Cantinflas, and had been trained to sit on a pool table – I don’t know how they managed that.  By the time that we got him, he was quite a handful, but that was a wonderful experience.  My poor welfare worker probably didn’t know what we were doing.  She kept me away from the boys, which was not important, because everyone was so protective on the set.  It’s a girl’s dream, to be around wonderful people and wonderful horses. 

 

DIANE ROTER:  My first day on THE VIRGINIAN I was not the horsewoman that Sarah was. 

 

SARAH:  She was an actress; I wasn’t. 

 

DIANE:  I did have a lot of experience as an actor, but not much on a horse.  I was on a horse, and they had just started the (Universal Tour) trams, which was Jim’s favorite thing.  So I’m out there with the wranglers, getting some experience on a horse, and a tour guide on a megaphone said, really loudly, ‘Oh, there we have an actor riding a horse!’  And as soon as he said that the horse went – (she does a braying sound) – and that’s the last thing I remember.  I woke up in the ambulance for a minute, and then I woke up in the hospital.  So I was okay, but I had a concussion and a sprained back.  I was back at work pretty soon, but my back was pretty sore.  And I got back on a horse – I know it’s cliché but it’s true: you get back on a horse.  And the horse must have just sensed something, like, ‘Oh boy, I’ve got one.’  I got on that horse and he took off.  I was scared to death, because this horse was going, going, going, and I was really scared.  And guess who saved my life, literally: Doug McClure.  I looked over and there was Doug, and he just stopped the horse, got me off.  I mean, he was the real thing. 

 

GARY CLARKE: Diane just reminded me of a story about Doug.  Jim and Doug and I were doing the Rose Parade (New Years Day in Pasadena), lining up on Orange Grove Street, and there were all these old, very expensive mansions, and all the people had opened up their homes to us, so we could go in while we were waiting.  We would go in, grab a cup of coffee or a donut.  We were inside when they called us, and I had tied my horse up to an iron rail, a railing that went up the front porch to this mansion.  ‘Alright THE VIRGINIAN – they’re ready.’  And I ran out toward the horse that I had only met about fifteen minutes before.  He reared, and the feet came up in the air, and I said first he’s going to kill me, and then he’s going to end up in South L.A.  And out of the blue came this person with a red cape with a big ‘D’ on it, and it’s Doug McClure.  And he wraps his arms around the horse’s neck, bites his ear, and the horse stops like that.  And I swear I heard that horse say, ‘Okay Doug!’  He’s got one arm around the horse’s neck, the horse’s ear in those eighty-four teeth of his, and with his free hand he’s putting the bridle back on.  He stepped in front of the horse, and looked at it, and said, ‘Don’t ever do that again.’  The horse said, ‘Okay Doug.’ 

 

BOYD:  How about the credits, that opening scene, where Jim and Doug and you had to ride?

 

GARY:  Yes.  They were testing my mettle.  Jim and Doug and my stunt guy were the only ones that knew I couldn’t ride, but they wouldn’t tell anyone, because they liked me.  I thought I’d have time to learn how to ride, but I never took advantage of it – there was always something else to do.  Well, the first shot of the first show of THE VIRGINIAN was Jim, Doug and me herding fifty horses.  Camera-car, fifty horses, first Jim.  Jim had worked on a dude ranch, had been born on a horse, I think.  Camera-car took off, horses took off, Jim took off.  It was something, just incredible, and those horses did just what you wanted them to do.  Cut!  Doug’s up; incredible, and he could still smile while doing it.  So I am up next, and what is that phrase you used?  Sh*tting in the pants?  Because nobody knew – and I’m talking to my stunt-guy and his dad, and they’re kind of laughing.  ‘We’ve got just the horse for you; we want you to meet Babe.’  I looked at Babe and said, ‘She looks okay.’  Babe started laughing.  Fell on the ground and rolled, and I know she said, ‘Are you kidding?’  So it’s time for me to go.  All I had done is practice mounts, how to get on the horse and not look ridiculous.  And the assistant director came up and said, ‘You want to ride up to the start-point, Gary?’  ‘No, I’ll walk.’  So I walked up praying, and Jim and Doug are watching.  So I jump up – I’d been practicing one of these mounts – it’s the one where you jump up, stick your left foot in the stirrup and swing your right leg over.  And if you don’t do it, you’re either dead, or close to it.  I did it, and it worked, and the director just happened to be looking my way as I settle into the saddle, and he goes (thumbs up).  So I’m talking to Babe, and I say, ‘Okay, whatever you want – carrots, apples, whatever, for the rest of your life.  Please get me through this shot.’  Cameras are lined up, horses are lined up, I’m lined up.  I said, ‘Babe?’  She says, ‘I’ve got it covered.’  Action!  And we’re off!  I jab my spurs into Babe, (audience groans) probably the smartest thing I could have done.  She takes off, and it’s perfect; so much so that I let go of the horn.  (laughter)  Did I say something wrong?  So I’ve got the reins in my left hand, and the horses are doing just exactly what Babe wants them to do.  And Babe starts cutting in and out, closer to the camera.  They couldn’t use stunt doubles, because the camera would move in and out, to prove that Jim knew how to ride a horse, and it was truly him, and it was Doug, and it was Gary.  But I said to Babe, ‘What are you doing?’  She said, ‘Shut up – this is for your close-up.’  So we finished the shot, they say, ‘Cut!’  And I aim the horse toward Del and my stunt-man Gary Combs, and everything’s gone quite well.  I’m reining in, and then my beloved Babe starts (he makes lurching, bucking motions).  So I grab the reins, I jump off like I know what I’m doing, and the director comes running over, ‘Gary, that was sensational!  Jim, Doug, why couldn’t you do it like that?’  (big applause)  It all went well, and Del and Gary say to me, ‘Good job.’  I say, ‘But why was Babe doing this?’  (He does the lurching motion).  ‘You’re supposed to stop the horse with the reins, you pull in on the reins, and you did that well.  But when you do that, you don’t grab the horse with your spurs!’  Big lesson, well learned.

 

Roberta Shore with me

 

 

ROBERTA:  I wasn’t injured, but I was scared to death of horses.  I was not a horseman; I had one lesson before I started the show.  Lee J. Cobb and I were the laughing-stock of the cutting-room floor because there was so much distance between us and the horses we were riding. 

 

A man in the audience asks the female stars about how long it took them to feel like part of the VIRGINIAN family.

 

DIANE:  I have to say that Clu made a very big impression on me before I was on THE VIRGINIAN.  I consider him my mentor in a lot of ways, because I knew Universal was interested in me, they had offered me a contract, and I was going to take a screen test.  I didn’t know it was for THE VIRGINIAN – I think it was before it was known that Roberta (Shore) had gone off into that marital sunset, so to speak.  And the head of talent at Universal, Monique James, set a time for me to meet with Clu, and he would go over the accent for me, which was actually for a test for TAMMY.   I knew I wasn’t testing for Tammy, because all of the other girls were blonde, and they had southern accents.  And I had barely lost (my accent) – my first language was French, and I still had a slightly different way of speaking.  I met with Clu and he was just the ultimate professional, great coach, and he put me on the phone with his mother-in-law, was she from Georgia or Arkansas?  And went over the accent with me, and it was great.  And after that I found out that I was up for THE VIRGINIAN, and it was wonderful – I felt very integrated right away.  For one thing, people said that they shot more than one show at one time, and ironically, Roberta shot her last show at the same time as I shot my first show.  So we were on the set at the same time.  It was great to be able to see Glenn Corbett’s eyes for one thing, and I’m thinking, oh, she gets to go off and be married to him!  It couldn’t have been more seamless, it was great, and I already knew Clu and felt so comfortable with him, and so safe, and Jim, there’s no way not to feel safe with Jim around.  Randy, what can I say.  People ask me this question a lot.  In the opening credits, Randy says something to me, and I laugh.  And people ask me, what did Randy say to make you laugh like that?  Do they ask you that?

 

RANDY BOONE: Welllll…nope.

 

DIANE: Well, they ask me that, and here’s the truth.  Randy didn’t have to say anything.  He would just have to stand next to me, and I would start to giggle and laugh.  I was just pretty overwhelmed with his charm, I was sixteen or seventeen.  And it looks like he tells me a pretty funny joke, but he really didn’t have to do much.  It was a great experience for me. 

 

SARA:  I think, with my tenure on THE VIRGINIAN, they had cast you first, I think, and then I had a screen test with Don (Quine).  And it’s my fancy that we looked alike and got along so well, and then I did so much better than I might have done without him.  That same week I thought I had gotten a commercial for yogurt.  I was pretty sure that I had that one, but I was so scared that I hadn’t done well on THE VIRGINIAN test, because that’s the one I wanted.  And when I got the word, everyone was so kind, and it was kind of like coming into a new family.  We were all new together, but we were a substantial block, and treated so nicely, welcomed so warmly.  You know more about the process than I do, Don, because he was definitely there before me.

 

DON QUINE: Well, I don’t know the process of hiring, it comes in different formats, but I remember very distinctly how impressed I was with the idea of being able to play with Charles Bickford, because he was an actor who I greatly admired.  And he told me, when Frank Price introduced us, that he and wife were big fans of PEYTON PLACE, which I was on for six months, and he liked my character.  I was kind of a hot-headed kid who got into a lot of trouble.  So we got along tremendously well, got to know him personally, and had dinner at his house quite a few times.  When Sara was cast as my sister, she was just the sweetest little thing, I felt like her brother almost immediately.  It was great, the three of us, Charlie and Sara and I.  And doing the show, me and Jim – he was The Virginian, by the way – he ran Shiloh, and there was this sense that if anything went wrong, go to Jim, he’d take care of it, end of discussion.  And Doug as Trampas, always made you feel totally taken care of, protected; sweetest, most wonderful guy in the world.  So it was a terrific experience for us, we felt extremely grateful and welcomed. 

 

A woman in the audience asked if there were any guest stars the cast couldn’t stand, and if any real injuries had to be written into the show.

 

ROBERTA SHORE:  Most of the people who came on the set I was just in awe of, especially Bette Davis.  Vera Miles was my all-time favorite, but there was one person who’s dead, so he won’t know about this.  Forrest Tucker.  Of course, I was very young, and I was not quite as naive as everyone thought I was.  But he used to bring nude pictures of his wife to show to the crew, remember that, Jim?

 

JAMES:  I never got to see them. 

 

ONE OF THE OTHER MEN:  I’ve got some left over here.

 

ROBERTA: Anyway, I just thought that was so tacky. 

 

James Drury takes a moment to introduce a friend in the audience, actor Jon Locke, who appeared in four episodes of THE VIRGINIAN, including one where Robert Redford guest-starred as an escaped convict. 

 

JAMES:  He swings at Redford with the butt of a Winchester, and I stop him just in time, or we’d never have had BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID. 

 

JON LOCKE:  I’d just like to say tonight, Jim, that you are the man.  Let me put it this way; he wanted to take a show to the guys in Vietnam, to entertain them, and we did.  And it was a joy to be in THE VIRGINIAN, and to work with all these wonderful characters here. 

 

Boyd introduces one of James Drury’s favorite leading ladies, Jan Shepard.

 

JAMES:  1962 was a banner year for me.  I got to work with Jan Shepard in a movie called THIRD OF A MAN.  You never saw it, never heard of it, it didn’t go anywhere.  But it was an incredibly memorable experience, what we did, what we tried to do in that picture.  We really did pull it off, and Jan and I started right there with a professional relationship that’s lasted through all the years, and I consider her one of my dearest friends, and her husband Roy, and I’m so glad to announce that I’m going to have dinner with them Sunday night.   (note: they also appeared together on a RAWHIDE, a GUNSMOKE and five VIRGINIANS.)  In1962 I did THIRD OF A MAN with Jan Shepard, I did RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY with Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea, and I signed for THE VIRGINIAN – I don’t know how lucky one guy can get in a year! 

 

Jan Shepard

 

 

BOYD:  And you’re going to get to see THIRD OF A MAN on Sunday night, and that’s all due to Maxine Hansen.  I couldn’t find it, Jim couldn’t find it: Maxine found it.  (Maxine is Executive Assistant to Mrs. Gene Autry, and put together THE VIRGINIAN event.)  All I did was call up Maxine and say, “You know, this is the 50^th anniversary of THE VIRGINIAN.  I wonder if The Autry would be interested in doing something.”  She said, “That’s a wonderful idea!”  And she called me back in about thirty minutes and said, “Let’s do it.”  So we’ve been working on it for seven-eight-nine months, and this is it.

 

JAMES: I just want to thank the incredible generosity of The Autry organization putting together this extravaganza here.  From all over the country, wherever we came from, and making it happen.  And Maxine is the one who did that, along with Boyd, and my hat’s off to both of you. 

 

REPORT FROM THE ALMERIA WESTERN FILM FESTIVAL!

 

Lenore Andriel with festival judge and Spaghetti Western

Legend Dan Van Husen

 

Fans of westerns, spaghetti and domestic, gathered this weekend in Almeria, Spain to celebrate, and to visit the hallowed ground made familiar to us by Leone and Corbucci, by Eastwood and Nero, and several great friends of the Round-up were there to screen their fine new movies.  The beautiful and talented star, co-writer and co-producer of YELLOW ROCK, Lenore Andriel, sent me this report from the front! 

 

 

How many times have you seen these mountains?

 

 

“We're having the time of our lives and our premiere yesterday (Friday) was mucho bueno! The people here 'have the fever for Yellow Rock' and we're swamped with pics with them and signing autographs!  It is truly gorgeous here, the festival and people who run it are incredible, the food delicious, and we're in heaven!”

 

HELL'S GATE dir. Tanner Beard, Lenore,

HEATHENS & THIEVES editor Dan Leonard

 

 

On Sunday, last day of the festival, filming began there at historic Fort Bravo for OUTLAWS AND ANGELS, with Robert Amstler and Lenore.  All of the accompanying photos are courtesy of Lenore and YELLOW ROCK. 

 

Lenore and Robert Amstler filming OUTLAWS & ANGELS

 

 

NEW ‘CISCO KID’ IN DEVELOPMENT

 

I’ve got good news and dubious news.  The good news is Salma Hayek (Ugly Betty) and Lauren Shuler Donner (X-Men) are developing a new version of “…O. Henry’s Robin Hood of the Old West, the Cisco Kid!” for C.B.S.  The dubious news is that they’re “re-imagining the iconic Latino character” into the present day.  Written by THE SHIELD’s Diego Gutierrez, Cisco is now a Marine returning from Afghanistan, as is his sidekick, not Pancho, but Sam.  When Cisco witnesses his father’s murder, he and Pancho – I mean Sam – solve the case, and go on to help the oppressed in The City of Angles (no, I didn’t mean ‘angels’).  

It’s being described as in the vein of LETHAL WEAPON, which Ms. Donner’s spouse, Richard Donner did very well with.  Ms. Donner has done very well in her own right – her various Marvel Comic movies, X-MEN and all of their spawn, have grossed more than $4 billion worldwide.  I understand that Hispanics are considered an under-served TV market, so I certainly see the appeal of reviving Cisco.  I’ve loved all the Ciscos, from Warner Baxter to Cesar Romero to Gilbert Roland (my favorite) to Duncan Renaldo (okay, my other favorite).  Jimmy Smits didn’t do badly, either.  But when you remove Cisco and Pancho – I mean Sam – from their distinct time and place, I don’t what you’ll have left, besides LETHAL WEAPON with an accent.  I guess we’ll find out.

 

 

UPDATES  -- VIRGINIAN-RELATED

 

DON QUINE’S OTHER WESTERNS

 

Don Quine, Stacy Grainger on THE VIRGINIAN, had confirmed to me in our interview that his only other western role was in a RAWHIDE episode.   After the interview ran, he emailed me, “I was going through some old photos and came across one that had me in a cowboy outfit where I was a member of an outlaw gang in the ‘Foley’ episode of 20th Fox's LANCER TV series. So I was in three, not two, westerns.”  I just received a photo of him in the role, and he looked so handsome I thought I’d share it with you.

 

DIANE ROTER CATCHES MY FREUDIAN SLIP

 

Diane Roter on RAT PATROL

 

After my interview with Diane Roter, Jennifer Sommers on THE VIRGINIAN, appeared in the Round-up, she sent me a very generous email, but she did catch an error on my part.  “I got a real kick out of reading that I played a French courtesan on RAT PATROL... there is a similarity to the words, but I actually played a teenaged French partisan (a resistance fighter) in an episode called THE DOUBLE JEOPARDY RAID. 
Interestingly enough, however, I once did play a (16 year old mentally disabled Egyptian) prostitute in JUSTINE, directed by George Cukor and based on The Alexandria Quartet by Lawrence Durrell.”

 

GARY CLARKE’S SECRET IDENTITY

Gary Clarke, Steve Hill on THE VIRGINIAN, told me that, post-VIRGINIAN, he’d enjoyed working for producer Andrew J. Fenady in his series HONDO, and credited his performance as Captain Richards with, years later, helping him land his role in TOMBSTONE.  But he still had a bone to pick with Fenady.   “He almost ruined my writing career. Because I gave him an outline for a show that I think would have been terrific. I handed it to him. And he took it, and handed it back, and said, ‘Gary, you’re an actor. Act. Let the writers write.’”  Gary was so concerned that he’d be ‘found out’ as an actor that he wrote several episodes of GET SMART under a nom de plume, and even went to the office in disguise.  “I never saw Andy after that, to tell him, so if you see Andy, tell him for me.” 

 

When I told the creator of THE REBEL and producer of BRANDED and HONDO the story, he was amazed.  “I didn’t mean to discourage Gary.  But everyone in the show was giving me scripts, including Ralph Taeger (Hondo), and we were already full up!  I just wanted him to take it over to BONANZA!”

UPCOMING EVENTS

 

‘DUST BOWL DAYS’, LAMONT CALIFORNIA  OCT. 20^TH

 

Those with a hankerin’ for the good ol’ days known as the Great Depression can experience an antique car show, country music, square dancing, food (not much – it is the Depression), historical exhibits of Dust Bowl pictures, artifacts, memorabilia, and tours of Weedpatch Camp, where migrant workers were housed.  At Sunset School.  Learn more at 661-633-1533 x 2105, or visit HERE

 

GHOST TOUR, SIMI VALLEY Oct. 5-28

Guided walking tour of sites where historical ghosts tell stories of Chumash, pioneers, and eccentrics who once lived in the Valley. Friday-Sunday nights, Strathearn Historical Park. 805-526-66453  Or go HERE .

 

WILD WEST WEEKEND, MOORPARK  OCT. 20-21

 

Wild West entertainment will include stunt ropers, bullwhip demonstrations, roping range, fiddlers, a flea circus, and ‘sidewalk swindlers.’  It’s at the Underwood Family Farms.  805-529-3690 or go HERE .

 

That's it for this week's Round-up!

 

Happy Trails,

 

Henry

 

All Original Contents Copyright October 2012 by Henry C. Parke -- All Rights Reserved