John Wayne _ The Man Behind the Myth - Michael Munn [21]
he called himself that after a newspaper described him as “The Cowboy From Yakima.” From the early 1920s, he was appearing in films, usually playing a cowboy and always performing his own stunts. He virtually invented stunt work for Westerns and eventually went on, during the 1950s and 1960s, to become the greatest director of action sequences in the history of motion pictures, especially after creating and directing the most exciting moments from the famed chariot race in the 1959 version of Ben-Hur.
Nat Levine demanded hair-raising action all shot on a skintight budget to be completed in twenty-one days, and Canutt worked closely with the writers to help develop the story lines and action.
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Wayne up at four in the morning and they drove out to the location in the Antelope Valley. En route Levine told Wayne the story line, such as it was. The plot hung on the antics of a traveling carnival in which Wayne would play the stunt flier who delivers many thrills and spills and finally reveals the true identity of the heavy known as the Eagle.
Arriving at the location, Wayne met the director Ford Beebe, his costars, and Yakima Canutt. Canutt told me, “My job was to beef up the action and double Wayne in the more dangerous shots, and to also play one of the villains alongside my friend Bud Osborne. I’d not met Wayne before but Bud had worked with him a number of times. I asked Bud what kind of fellow Wayne was, and he said,
‘Yak, you’ll love him. He’s a great guy, and when it comes to ribbing, he’ll hold his own—even with you.’ I had a reputation as a bit of a practical joker.
“On the first day of shooting, Bud introduced Wayne to me, and he was very friendly; said that he was glad I was going to double for him because he’d heard a great deal about me. He seemed to know all about my achievements in rodeo as well as my stunt work.
“I decided to test Bud’s claim that Wayne could take some ribbing, and on the second day I told Bud to tell Wayne that I was a spy for Nat Levine. When Bud told him, I was standing nearby, making notes in a little book. I saw Wayne look over to me, see what I was doing, and then he shook his head in disbelief.
“A bit later I went over to him and asked how everything was going. He just looked at me and said nothing. I took out a pack of cigarettes and offered him one. He gave me a real dirty look and said,
‘No, thanks,’ and walked away.
“After keeping this up for the first week I got Bud and another actor to take Wayne behind the set for a drink. I came walking around the corner just as Wayne was taking a slug, and he saw me looking at my watch and making a note in my little book. That was all he could take, and he blew his top. I ran away as fast as I could, and as soon as I could I got Bud to tell Wayne that it had all been a joke. Wayne just burst out laughing even though the gag was at his expense. He later told me, ‘I’m glad it was just a gag, Yak, but you’ve left yourself wide open.’ After that we were always trying to 21184_ch01.qxd 12/18/03 1:42 PM Page 37
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outgag each other, and there was never a dull moment when we were together in a picture.”
Filming Shadow of the Eagle proved arduous. Each of the twelve episodes had more action than plot in them, and each episode had to end on a cliff-hanger. Athletic ability was more important than acting skills, with only one day in the week off, and no time for any kind of formal lunch break. One night they worked until midnight, after which most of the company, including Wayne and Canutt, decided to bed down in the desert for the night rather than go back to Los Angeles.
Wayne, sitting by a fire, was drinking whisky from a bottle.