Hollywood legend John Wayne is regarded as one of the movie industry’s biggest stars but he was once frozen out by director John ford, and this could have wrecked his illustrious career in the silver screen .
Unlike most big Hollywood actors in the 21st century who have always been desperate for a big break in the industry, Wayne never intended to become a star.
He became an actor after breaking his collarbone ended his college football career, and after filmaker John Ford awarded him many minor roles in movies, he gave him his breakout role in 1939 film Stagecoach.
Wayne’s role as Ringo Kid in Stagecoach led to other filmmakers casting him in major films, including Raoul Walsh, who cast him in the western thriller Dark Command.
Ford previously supported Walsh casting Wayne in the 1930 film The Big Trail, but the filmmaker wasn’t pleased when he gave him a much bigger role in Dark Command, according to actor Henry Fonda, Far Out Magazine reports.
In Michael Munn’s book John Wayne: The Man Behind The Myth, it is stated Henry Ford once said, “Duke Wayne loved Ford, and I’m sure that from time to time, Ford loved Duke.
“But Ford was just so jealous when Raoul Walsh beefed up Duke’s career after Stagecoach [with Dark Command].”
Wayne later started working with other filmmakers, but once this began to dry up, Ford cast him in various minor roles, doomed projects, and terrible B-movies from the 1940s to the 1960s.
Fonda said, “It was just unforgivable, and I know that Ford made him pay for it by letting him stew in films that really kept Duke out of the so-called A-list of stars for a long time.”
“There’s no doubt in my mind that Ford could have helped Duke anytime he wanted. But he didn’t. He let him suffer in those B Westerns for years.”
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Despite having a lot of dire roles in Ford’s films, the actor still remained an icon of Hollywood’s golden age.
His role in the 1969 movie True Grit, which was directed by Henry Hathaway, won him a Best Actor Oscar and is widely regarded by critics as one of the highlights of his career.
Wayne’s role in Stagecoach has been hailed as his finest work and boasts a perfect 100% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
In 1995, the United States Library of Congress recognized its “cultural, historical, or aesthetic significance” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.
The film catapulted the legendary actor from B-movie actor to A-list star, with Ford predicting at the time, “He’ll be the biggest star ever because he is the perfect ‘everyman.'”
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.the-express.com ’
