John Wayne (1907 - 1979)
As Marion Michael Morrison Wayne held
several behind-the-scenes jobs at Fox before moving in front of the
cameras in the late 1920s. Director John Ford, who had befriended
"Duke" Wayne, recommended him for the lead in Raoul Walsh's 1930
western epic, The Big Trail. Unfortunately he didn't become a star and
Wayne spent the rest of the decade in a series of B-movies at poverty
row studios.
Ford gave him a career break in 1939 by casting him as the Ringo Kid in Stagecoach and the part made Wayne into one of the top box-office stars.
But it was the movies he made at the end of the 1940s that established him as an actor of merit. Howard Hawks emphasized the darker side of Wayne's screen persona in Red River (1948) in which he played a Captain Bligh like character,the inflexible Tom Dunson, who clashes with Montgomery Clift. In She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) in another excellent performance he played the retiring Nathan Brittles : a particularly moving portrait of a man and an era reaching a turning point.
For most of the 1950s and 60s Wayne ambled through a number of mediocre pictures, standard westerns and action movies made watchable, and financially successful, because of his participation. When he had a carefully tailored part and a director at the top of his form, Wayne always rose to the occasion, his greatest films during this period were The Searchers (1956) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance(1962) for John Ford and Rio Bravo (1959) for Howard Hawks.
He won the 1969 Best Actor Oscar for True Grit,a watchable film though not a great one. In his last film The Shootist (1976) he played a gunman dying of cancer, an echo of his real life battles with the disease in his last years. He brought a sincerity to this solemn film, a hallmark of all his performances over almost 50 years onscreen. His acting style might not have been flashy but was perfect for the demands of the medium and his best performances have a depth you don't often associate with him.
Ford gave him a career break in 1939 by casting him as the Ringo Kid in Stagecoach and the part made Wayne into one of the top box-office stars.
But it was the movies he made at the end of the 1940s that established him as an actor of merit. Howard Hawks emphasized the darker side of Wayne's screen persona in Red River (1948) in which he played a Captain Bligh like character,the inflexible Tom Dunson, who clashes with Montgomery Clift. In She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1949) in another excellent performance he played the retiring Nathan Brittles : a particularly moving portrait of a man and an era reaching a turning point.
For most of the 1950s and 60s Wayne ambled through a number of mediocre pictures, standard westerns and action movies made watchable, and financially successful, because of his participation. When he had a carefully tailored part and a director at the top of his form, Wayne always rose to the occasion, his greatest films during this period were The Searchers (1956) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance(1962) for John Ford and Rio Bravo (1959) for Howard Hawks.
He won the 1969 Best Actor Oscar for True Grit,a watchable film though not a great one. In his last film The Shootist (1976) he played a gunman dying of cancer, an echo of his real life battles with the disease in his last years. He brought a sincerity to this solemn film, a hallmark of all his performances over almost 50 years onscreen. His acting style might not have been flashy but was perfect for the demands of the medium and his best performances have a depth you don't often associate with him.
Written content copyright Derek McLellan,2005.
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