I Thought We Were Making Movies, Not History

26. A Western, a Comedy, a Drama, and a Caper

26 A Western, a Comedy, a Drama, and a Caper F ollowing In the Heat of the Night, the next release of The Mirisch Corporation (our new corporate name) was Hour of the Gun in October 1967, produced and directed by John Sturges. The story of Hour of the Gun began where John Sturges had left it ten years earlier in his film Gunfight at the O.K. Corral. John had found a book, Tombstone’s Epitaph by Douglas D. Martin, that described the events of Wyatt Earp’s life following the gunfight at the O.K. Corral, most particularly his attempt to revenge himself on the Clantons for the killing of his brother. It seemed like a first-rate idea. If there were still a market for Western pictures, John Sturges certainly was the ideal director to test it. He chose Edward Anhalt as his writer for a script titled The Law and Tombstone. We discussed the idea of trying to reunite Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster in their roles of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday. We didn’t succeed in this attempt, but we still had an option left on the services of James Garner dating back to the time when we had cast him in The Children’s Hour. It seemed a natural idea to cast Jim in a Western, since he had earned his initial stardom in the Western television hit show Maverick. When John and I filmed By Love Possessed, we had come to know Jason Robards Jr. as a brilliant actor, although one with problems. 259 During that production we’d had difficulties a number of times with Jason’s drinking. However, we agreed that he would be ideal for the role of Doc Holliday. I thought we had a great modern combination with Jim and Jason, and you couldn’t have asked for a better director to do the film. We were also fortunate in being able to secure Robert Ryan to play Ike Clanton, the heavy. Clanton had been played by Walter Brennan as sort of an addled hillbilly in John Ford’s Wyatt Earp picture, My Darling Clementine. But in our scenario, Clanton is clearly more of a match for Earp. We began our film by showing the great gunfight at the O.K. Corral , the climax of the previous film, and we hoped that we could make the rest of the film exciting and suspenseful enough to retain the audience ’s interest. Our challenge was to accomplish that, and success or failure would hinge on it. Unfortunately, we did not succeed. Probably also playing a large role in the reaction to the picture was the continued loss of interest by audiences in Western pictures. I was again guilty of thinking that this trend would reverse course and that Westerns, led by a hit picture, would return to favor stronger than ever. I was wrong. As a new generation arose, their interest in Westerns had been satiated, probably by television, and they now embraced the so-called Easy Rider period of moviemaking. America now entered the era of the flower children and the Vietnam War, and somehow or other, as one genre of pictures has followed another, Westerns have still not returned to the favor that they once enjoyed. Unforgiven, with Clint Eastwood, which won the Best Picture Academy Award in 1992, is a notable exception. The Law and Tombstone, now retitled Hour of the Gun, was filmed in Mexico, mainly for budgetary reasons, and there weren’t any special production problems. Supporting roles were played by Jon Voight, Monte Markham, William Schallert, William Windom, Robert Phillips , and Michael Tolan. Cinematography was by Lucien Ballard, editing was by Ferris Webster, and Jerry Goldsmith composed the score. / Our Christmas film, released in December 1967, was Fitzwilly, based on the book The Garden of Cucumbers by Poyntz Tyler, given to me by Isobel Lennart. She and I were always looking for subjects on which we 260 A Western, a Comedy, a Drama, and a Caper / could again collaborate. The Broadway play and film of Funny Girl kept her busy over a long period of time, but at one juncture she read Garden of Cucumbers and was most enthusiastic, thinking it could be a charming romantic comedy. We acquired the rights to the property and Isobel and I had a most enjoyable time working on the script. I am...