Robert Redford - Michael Feeney Callan [246]
In July 2009 Redford married Bylle in a quiet ceremony at the Louis C. Jacob Hotel in Hamburg, confounding those who believed he would never settle. The union is tighter and more secure than any he has enjoyed in his life, but in many ways the doubters are right. Redford remains peripatetic, shifting with the seasons from New York to Santa Fe, from Sundance to St. Helena. Jamie remains in Fairfax, where they often meet. “I try to slow him down,” says Jamie. “I tell him to go back to Sundance, that that’s his destiny, that’s the final frontier.”
Redford well knows it, and to recognize a frontier, as Heidegger says, is to have gone beyond it.
Acknowledgments
It is impossible to adequately thank the many people who gave this book life. What started as a modest project became a ten-year one, reflective of the broad ground covered. Patience and belief became the cornerstones I depended on, and I am grateful to those who stayed true.
I could not have written the book without the input of my children, Corey Callan and Paris Callan, both drama and film students who will, I’ve no doubt, make their marks. Corey’s wisdom and scholarship color every page (especially the annotations). Paris was an equally ingenious adviser, giving me insight and understanding from the beaches of Oahu to the darkest nights in Dublin. I was a distracted father far too often during these years, and I wrap my thanks in sincerest apology. The next one, I promise, will be easier.
The initiator of the book died before it saw the light of day. Susan Hill was an exceptional editor. She was also a loved friend. We worked together on three books, but that was the least of it. It was her conviction that Robert Redford was undervalued, and I hope herein I’ve answered some of her questions about him. Another key contributor who passed away during the writing was the author Francis Xavier Feighan, the best buddy, who took me around the San Fernando Valley of Redford’s boyhood. I’m indebted to him for establishing the network of contacts in Los Angeles and for supplying the linguistic riddles (words were his thing) that made his in-the-field reports so joyfully sustaining. Francis conducted a number of important interviews for this book and opened thirty years of his movie files to me. I miss our afternoons at Jerry’s Deli on Ventura Boulevard.
Thanks to William Armstrong for green-lighting this work to begin with and for publishing my work for so many years. Thanks, also, to the writers John McGahern, Brian Clemens and Anthony Shaffer, who variously edited me, encouraged me and pushed me onward. Also to Philip Hinchcliffe and Chris Menaul, who grounded me in London way back and opened the drama doors at the BBC and elsewhere that were foundational in building this book. I also must acknowledge the early directors of my own dramas, Briann MacLochlainn, Michael O’Herlihy and Martin Campbell, who taught me most of what I know about filmmaking.
Since research for this book spanned two continents, my appreciation goes to a number of people on both sides of the Atlantic who built the bridges. Where I could, I visited every homestead, grave site or movie studio, the better to understand my subject’s journey. Gerald M. Cruthers and Marilyn Cruthers worked tirelessly in Connecticut and Rhode Island to assemble genealogical details and catalog all the residences of the New England Redfords. In Austin and San Marcos, Peggy Tombs scoured the Texan history. At the same time, Karen Cook and Judith Moore worked in Scotland, Birmingham and Manchester, tracing the Redfords of yore. In England, Michael Herbert, deputy registrar of the Manchester Register Office, was immensely helpful. In Los Angeles, Sheila Winston and Lisa Thornberg provided further document research and support and transport when I and my family