Richard Boone: A Knight Without Armor in a Savage Land

I've loved Richard Boone since the first time I saw him in Big Jake.  I realize that's a rather odd first-viewing impression, considering he's the bad guy... but none of that mattered.  He just had a certain charisma and presence and strength and power and intelligence that I was instantly attracted to.  It's also hard to find a villain who is a truly worthy adversary for John Wayne, and Richard Boone filled that role with ease.  I always looked for him in movies, but it wasn't until twenty years later that I finally got to see a Have Gun, Will Travel episode.  If I hadn't already loved him, that show would have done it.  The show is so well-written, so tight in its half-hour time slot, and Paladin... well, Paladin is magnificent.  Full of depth and nuance and laughter and anger and deadly competence.  He quotes classics in every other episode, goes to the opera, and helps those in need.  If I was in trouble, I'd wire Paladin, that's for sure.

I've always wanted to know more about him, so I picked up this biography by David Rothel.  It's not a normal biography, in that it doesn't tell the story of his life.  Instead, it's a composite image, composed of facts about his life, quotes and poetry from him, interviews with family and co-workers, and a viewer's guide to his movies and television shows.  The format makes for a very quick read.  The interviews were my favorite part, and I would happily have read more of those.  I liked the ones from his family best, as they were the most informative, but the various people he worked with also provide glimpses into the working man as a nice balance.

And I love him even more after reading this book.  I read a quote somewhere from someone who had said he was a lot like Paladin, and he really is.  Extremely intelligent, loved the arts, painted and wrote, worked hard, played hard, didn't put up with baloney from anyone, and supported his family and friends.  I loved reading about how much he loved children, and the charity work he did for them.

There are only two of his poems included, and I wish there were more... at the same time, I'm happy there aren't, because they are devastating to read.  The two included were ones he had written during WWII, in which he served in the Navy as a aerial gunner.  He suffered severe PTSD after the war, and wouldn't fly in a plane until fifteen years after the war ended.  The poems... There's a quote in the book from actor Jan Merlin that I particularly liked.  He said, "One of my favorite people to work with was Audie Murphy; I worked with him several times.  We never mentioned the war.  He had his European war and I had my Japanese.  What was there to talk about?  If you were in it, you knew about it; if you weren't, then you'd never understand.  It's as simple as that."

And that sums up the power of the poems.  The world of fear and death Richard Boone describes so fiercely and emotionally is one I hope I'll never understand.  But that does not make those poems any less powerful.

I really enjoyed this glimpse into his life (and also into the lives of the people who were interviewed), and I respect his talents as an actor even more.

The War Lord (1965)

I watched this movie set in medieval times for only one reason... okay, two reasons. 1) to see Richard Boone sword fighting, and 2) curiosity. Alas, I was gypped of number one! It appears his character favored either a mace or a flail. Damn. I've seen him fence in Have Gun-Will Travel, but I wanted to see him swinging a broadsword around. Yeah, I'm shallow like that sometimes, but I do so love my sword fights.


This was a movie that took itself a bit too seriously. Charlton Heston is the titular War Lord, and Richard Boone played a good guy for once, as his right-hand man. Guy Stockwell (Dean Stockwell's older brother!) played Heston's younger, ambitious brother, and Rosemary Forsyth was the maiden who captured Heston's heart. There's little plot to this one. Our War Lord, after serving the Duke for twenty years, is rewarded with a tower and a lousy, swampy chunk of land nobody else wants. But he's an honorable man and intends to hold it for the Duke against the Frisian (Viking) invaders. He falls for Ms. Forsyth, who is quite beautiful, and he evokes droit de seigneur on her wedding night to claim her for himself. (Although in his defense, he does offer to let her go before he even touches her, but she's fallen for him by that point and stays. Typical -- cue eye roll.) This causes the villagers to retaliate by deliberately inviting the Frisians back to attack the Normans. Big fight results.

The battles were by far the best part. Heston and Boone and their handful of soldiers are literally defending one lone tower against a horde of clever barbarians. The scenes are well done and quite tense. Battering rams, siege engines, catapults, fire, swords, arrows... they threw it all in. Richard Boone had one lovely scene where he rappelled down the back side of the tower to grab a sunken anchor out of the moat, and then climbed back up a rope to the top of the tower again -- with the bad guys shooting arrows at him, and a battering ram threatening to bust down the castle's front door. I was on the edge of my seat. Good, tense stuff.

The rest of the film, however... the movie is like an uneasy combination of old school romantic epic and the more modern violent realism of the late 1960's films. It's a bit uncomfortable to sit through at places. And as much as I love Richard Boone, it's a little weird seeing him in Medieval England (though no weirder than seeing him as Pontius Pilate in The Robe). He does wield a very mean club and can bark orders better than just about anybody, and I absolutely want him guarding my back in a fight. Charlton Heston belongs anywhere, anytime, so he was fine, but ye gods, the filmmakers were aiming for accuracy, so everyone's sporting those god-awful medieval bowl cuts that make everyone look like unattractive. There was some really nice dialogue in the film, and some really nice delineation between the life of the Normans and the life of their vassals, and what exactly it meant to survive in a world structured that way. Heston is honorable to the end, and... well, I'm not exactly sure what happens after "the end" popped up on screen, as it left things a bit hanging as far as the fate of one character. Hm.

Favorite scene (beside any time Richard Boone went into action, which kind of goes without saying), is when a wounded Charlton Heston leaned his head against Richard Boone's shoulder for comfort... just because that is an image I never expected to see in my life, and I'm still boggling over it.

A man without armor...

I've been watching the 4th season of Have Gun-Will Travel (this show is absolutely, without a doubt or even a close challenger, my favorite Western television series ever, and Paladin my favorite Western TV hero). To my delight, they just had what we would probably call today a crossover episode -- the writers combined HG-WT with Jules Verne's Around the World in 80 Days! Paladin helped Phileas Fogg et al get to Reno from San Francisco.

When I was young, I must have read my copy of Around the World in 80 Days a hundred times and then some. I absolutely loved the book. It's actually the only Jules Verne book I truly love. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and Journey to the Center of the Earth made great movies, but I don't particularly enjoy either book. Around the World, however, is a fabulous book, and I have yet to see a movie version I like.

The thought of Paladin and Fogg together makes me rub my hands with glee... unfortunately, the concept was far better than it played out, and it was a very disappointing episode (the only disappointing ep of the season so far). Fogg was made out to be a bit of an idiot, which is not at all how he is in the book. Paladin and idiots never mix well, because he does not suffer fools. Now if Fogg had been more true to his book character, the two of them butting heads would have been most enjoyable. Instead, we get Paladin saving Fogg's hide when it shouldn't have needed saving to begin with. Weak story. An odd side plot about some Colonel (who was in civilian clothes) challenging Fogg to a duel was the main conflict in preventing him from keeping to his rigid schedule, and it never worked right. It was played for laughs, without being particularly funny. I think the ep was aiming for a stiff upper lip British stereotype humorously clashing with Old West pragmatism/violence, instead of a real story. Too bad, because this could have been a great episode.

Makes me want to re-write it, naturally, into the episode I wanted to see.

Day 12 → Whatever tickles your fancy

German raspberries! Far and away my favorite candy. Love them!

And I could watch What's My Line clips of mystery guests all day long. These just never get old, and they never fail to make me smile and laugh.

This one was new to me, however, and has the bonus of having Van Heflin on the panel! I love that Richard Boone's wearing his Paladin outfit. Funniest question: "Are you associated with a horse?" And I love Boone's reaction after one of the contestants asks if he's James Arness. Too funny.



(hm, doesn't seem to fit too well in my journal, sorry 'bout that.)

Nano report, or how not to get your word count for the day

Do you remember the first CD you ever bought? I do. Of course, for me it was a big deal because I come from the LP era. I didn't get my first CD until I was in college. It was Jerry Goldsmith's Rio Conchos, bought in person on my first visit to Intrada, best soundtrack store ever. It was the first CD I ever bought, and I didn't even own a CD player yet! Made a tape of the album off a friend's CD player so I could listen to it that way. It's still one of my favorite Goldsmith scores, and I've listened to it hundreds of times.

I've wanted to see the movie forever, but, never managed to catch it on TV when I had TV, and it's still not out on DVD to my knowledge. But, tonight, lo and behold... Netflix suddenly has it available for instant viewing! This being the month of Nano, finding procrastination of such a calibre is an opportunity not to be wasted! So, naturally, I just spent two precious writing hours watching it.

Three things:

1. There's a reason Richard Boone is one of my top ten favorite actors of all time.
2. There aren't words powerful enough to describe how much I love Jerry Goldsmith's music.
3. If there were no movies left on the planet but Westerns, I'd be perfectly content.

I was not disappointed in this movie, and if it ever comes out on DVD, I will probably buy it. Story's interesting and has plenty of action. It's quite violent, but not gruesomely so. But really, I was watching for Richard Boone. He just makes me grin and grin. He's perfect in roles like this. He plays a great character here. A Confederate Major who comes home from the war to find Apaches have tortured and murdered his wife and daughter. Sinks into hate and a bottle and revenge. Almost a cliche, but in Boone's hands the character becomes quite complex. His acting rounds the character out, gives him depth where another actor might not have. He lets you see his character's pain behind the flippancy and his inhumanity, and then, his remembered and regained humanity and honor. He gets the best of the dialogue throughout, and the best scenes. His character goes through a subtle redemption arc, and his scene with the dying woman and baby really got me. Really, he's the only character in the film who gets to do anything meaty, but I don't mind that.

Stuart Whitman plays the sort of upstanding hero. Sort of. (After all, it's his character's mistake that puts the rifles into the bad guys' hands.) I like Stuart Whitman, I do (Comancheros!), but really, does he ever do anything in any of his films? Jim Brown is quiet, but where Whitman is a bit flat, Jim Brown always has presence, and he gets a few nice moments. Edmund O'Brien -- hee! He's always solid, particularly playing whackos. Speaking of whackos, Timothy Carey sneaked in, in an uncredited role. in this one. But the guy is instantly recognizable, and while he's not playing a dangerous loony in this one (in fact he was surprisingly normal and low key), he's still has that loose cannon quality that always makes him a bit freaky. Every time he pops up in a film where I don't expect him, I kind of sit on the edge of my seat waiting to see what he's going to do. 'Cause you just don't know with him.

So, I'm happy, and I've nicely avoided writing tonight. Which is okay, as I wrote a bunch of notes this morning before work and I'm still digesting the new direction I want to take the story.

Though, I can't tell you how weird it is watching a movie for the first time when you know the score inside out and backwards but nothing about the movie. Always a bit surreal.

"You said no rules, Colonel."

Hollywood Dreamland just posted a marvelous series of posts detailing his ten favorite actors, all amazing actors with great films under their belts. He had a little segment in each where he listed the first movie he saw for each actor, and his favorite movies for each of those actors. Made me really curious which was the first movie I'd seen my own favorite actors in. So, I thought I'd jog my memory and record it for myself here. I'm woefully behind in posting movie reviews and other things, so I'll ease myself back into posting this way. Favorites are always interesting to me because they're so subjective, and sometimes quite fickle. It's always intriguing to see how lists change over time.

Writing these out also made me realize that with the exception of William Holden and Dana Andrews, the movies I love my favorite actors for are all made in the 1950's on. Which then naturally led me to contemplating which 1930's and 1940's stars would be my favorites, without considering any of their films made after 1949. I'm still thinking about that, actually, and will post a list of those later.

• William Holden

First Movie I saw him in: The Horse Soldiers when I was a kid. Really, if I'd never seen him in another movie, it wouldn't have mattered. This is the William Holden movie for me, the one that imprinted on me and gave me the cynical, charming, smirky William Holden I love above all his other characters.

Three Favorite Movies: The Horse Soldiers, Sunset Blvd., Alvarez Kelly
Honorable Mention: Texas

• Lee Marvin

First Movie I saw him in: No idea. This could be any one of a dozen when I was a kid. It was probably a Western like The Comancheros or The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, or possibly Donovan's Reef. There's no moment where Lee Marvin's movies aren't in my memories, where his name wasn't known and his face and voice and swaggering walk not instantly recognizable. He always stood out from the crowd for me.

Three Favorite Movies: The Dirty Dozen, The Professionals, Paint Your Wagon
Honorable Mention: Cat Ballou

• Dana Andrews

First Movie I saw him in: No idea here either. Probably Battle of the Bulge or In Harm's Way or Airport 1975 when I was young... but he was just a guy with a name I really liked back then. The first movie I saw him in where I sat up and paid attention was Best Years of Our Lives in Sept 2005.

Three Favorite Movies: Fallen Angel, Where the Sidewalk Ends, Swamp Water
Honorable Mention: Best Years of Our Lives

• Ralph Meeker

First Movie I saw him in: The Dirty Dozen when I was a kid. But I never saw him as more than the guy with the funniest, most-quotable lines in one of my favorite movies until I saw Kiss Me Deadly in April 2008. Then he leaped from the just plain cool balcony, to the oh wow, where have you been all my life center stage.

Three Favorite Movies: The Dirty Dozen, Kiss Me Deadly, The Naked Spur
Honorable Mention: Jeopardy

• Sam Neill

First Movie I saw him in: The Hunt for Red October, 1990, which launched the biggest (and still unrivaled) movie actor crush of my life.

Three Favorite Movies: The Hunt for Red October, Dead Calm, Jurassic Park
Honorable Mention: Reilly: Ace of Spies

• Ewan McGregor

First Movie I saw him in: The Phantom Menace, 1999

Three Favorite Movies: A Life Less Ordinary, Brassed Off, Revenge of the Sith
Honorable Mention: Young Adam

• Joel McCrea

First Movie I saw him in: Sullivan's Travels, Sept 2008

Three Favorite Movies: Ride the High Country, Ride the High Country, and Ride the High Country. Really, I should drop McCrea off my favorite actors list, because despite the fact that I've been hunting down all his movies (a requirement to make my favorite actor list), really, no other movie of his has yet come close to matching his performance in Ride the High Country. In his early days, he made a ton of romantic comedy movies, and those just aren't my thing. They're fun for a one-time viewing, but they won't make a repeat viewing list for me, and favorite movies are ones you watch over and over.
Honorable Mention: Dead End - There I named something else!

• Aldo Ray

First Movie I saw him in: The Green Berets, sometime in childhood, but David Janssen was the guy who stood out at the time. First movie I paid attention to Aldo in was God's Little Acre, Dec 2005

Three Favorite Movies: Battlecry, We're No Angels, What Did You do in the War, Daddy?
Honorable Mention: Nightfall

• Richard Boone

First Movie I saw him in: It was either The Alamo or Big Jake, sometime in childhood. I remember waiting through The Alamo just to get to his big scene towards the end, cuz I liked him so much.

Three Favorite Movies: Big Jake, Have Gun-Will Travel series, The Alamo
Honorable Mention: The Tall T

• Vic Morrow

First Movie I saw him in: Combat! back in the early 90's. Not a movie, but that's okay. I knew his name because of his tragic death long before I actually saw him in anything. I didn't sit up and take notice until I started re-watching Combat! in 2004.

Three Favorite Movies: Combat!, Men in War, Cimarron
Honorable Mention: King Creole

20... er 10 Favorite Actors

So a 20 favorite actor meme is now making the rounds, and since I'm about to head out on a business trip, I thought this would be a good way to cheer myself up.

As I did for the 20 fave actresses meme, I'm actually only listing 10. Not that there's a shortage of actors I adore. Quite the contrary, I could ramble on for hours on all my favorite men, but I'd rather keep it focused on the ones at the top, the ones who are little more special than the others. Of course, the word "favorite" can mean so many things, so what I did for this particular meme was list thirty or so actors that I really really loved, then I ranked them accordingly to how loudly I'd whoop and how widely I'd grin if they turned up unexpectedly as a guest star in a "Route 66" ep, then I picked the ten at the top. Seemed a fair enough way to figure out who was important to me. The results surprised me a little, as some I thought for sure would be on this list, when I put 'em to this particular test, I found I didn't care quite as much as I thought I would. And vice versa.

So...

1. William Holden -- said it all already :-D

2. Lee Marvin - Yep, Lee Marvin beats out everyone else for second place. Like William Holden, I've loved him for as long as I can remember. Nobody, but nobody can play mean quite like he can, or play a good guy, or do comedy, or sing -- all while keeping that wonderful sexy swagger, and with that wonderful voice. He elevates every movie he's in, and if he's around, he always has my full attention.

3. Dana Andrews - Ah, Dana. It's hard to articulate what he means to me. There are some people who change your life, even if you haven't met them, and he's one of them. He conveys so much with those handsome eyes of his, and he has that smooth voice that never fails to melt me. He gets my full admiration and respect like no one else. More than anything in the world, I wish I could have heard him sing opera. I don't even know which opera roles he studied and sang, which opera was his favorite. His daughter told me that at the end, when he was suffering Alzheimer's and couldn't remember anything else, he was still singing opera in Italian. That makes me cry from both sadness and a strange sort of joy, that he still had that. Because love of opera is something I understand with every fiber of my being.

4. Ralph Meeker - Yeah, he's way higher on the list than I thought he might be, but man oh man, do I love him. I've seen him play pretty much all types of roles, and I like him best when he's playing morally ambivalent characters. He does Grey oh so very well, and as we well know, I'm a huge fan of Grey!

5. Sam Neill - Sam Neill was actually my first true actor crush as an adult. The first time I saw The Hunt for Red October, he completely stole my heart. There's very few movies he's made I haven't seen.

6. Ewan McGregor - He simply can play any role and make you believe in him. I can't think of any current actor I love quite as much as him.

7. Joel McCrea - four things I've learned to appreciate from watching McCrea: 1 - How well some men can wear clothes. I used to think Dana Andrews was the best dressed man in a suit. Nope, I'm afraid McCrea cleanly stole that award away. I almost never pay attention to clothes, or how well a suit or tux actually fits a guy... until McCrea made me notice without even trying. 2 - How good a guy looks after getting dunked in a river. 3 - How important romance is. 4 - And how there's nothing quite as attractive as a truly good man.

8. Aldo Ray - I think he's my all-time physical ideal. If I was ranking actors solely by how lustworthy they were, he gets top slot. Love his brawny build, love his raspy voice, love how easily he laughs, love how often filmmakers get him out of his shirt...

9. Richard Boone - I was a little surprised at first to see him beat out so many of the others to make this list, but really, it's no surprise. I've adored him since the first time I saw Big Jake. Paladin is one of the coolest characters ever put on television, but he'd be nothing if he wasn't played to perfection by Boone. Richard Boone is a great combo of intelligence, honor, swagger, and meanness (when he wants to be). He intimidates the hell out of me, but there's nobody I'd rather have at my side in a confrontation. Like all the guys on this list, I think a movie is better if he's in it.

10. Vic Morrow - A good-looking, fine actor, but more than that... from watching him in films and on television, I've learned so much about how to write a story. That sounds odd, but it's true. There's a lot of acting in writing (at least for me), and Vic Morrow is one of those actors who, for whatever reason, I feel on a visceral level, and the things I've learned about acting from studying how he says his dialog, how he physically carries himself in different roles... he taught me, more than anyone else, how to completely become (and believe in) something I'm not, and that carries into my fiction writing every single day.