Audie L. Murphy Memorial Website Message Boards

Yeah, he could've played the outlaw in Yuma very well too-I think it would've looked a bit like the Utica Kid from Night Passage, but with a gang of his own.

I've never quite gotten around to seeing the remake-the reviews made it sound kind of baroque and melodramatic in a way that didn't seem like it would work with the story, and the cast aren't people who I feel a passionate need to watch in anything and everything they choose to make.

I agree that Crowe and Murphy have some similar personality traits and have been attacked for behaviors that aren't all that unique in Hollywood, but are seen as easy tagets because of their outsider status. Crowe's temper, like Murphy's before him, has certainly given his critics a lot of ammo, though!

Christie and Ann,
Both of you hit the nail right on the head !!!!, Christie, I can so easily visualize Murphy in the
Older Brother Bogart Role... Perfect !!! Murphy would have definitely walked away with an Oscar
on that one... Ann, Murphy and Crowe together in the remake would have made for a much
better movie. I still like the original Yuma over the Remake, simply because I don't think
Christian Bale lived up to the part. I think Murphy would have won at least an Oscar Nomination
on that one also. As has been posted before, we should have been Audie's agents !!!! Take care
everyone.. Stay safe. Just my thoughts.. Shirley Jean.

A few odd comments from an odd moderator/fan.

Christie, I somehow missed your Sabrina suggestions. I quite agree.

I recommend the 2007 remake of 3:10. I'm still not sure about the change in the ending, but I get why it was done that way.

I am a late-comer to Mr. Crowe's work, like Christie; the adds I saw didn't encourage me to see his films. I first heard about him through the publicity for Gladiator, and didn't want to see another version of Kirk Douglas doing Spartacus. I passed on A Beautiful Mind, to be honest, because it scared me to think about it. Writers, like actors, have to be at least a little bit schizophrenic, because we are both storytellers, just approaching the tales from different angles. I was intrigued by Master and Commander, and might have gone, but had just moved to SA and didn't know of anyone to go with. I did see 3:10, because I had liked the original so much. Thought he made a superb villain.

But this fall I was working on a short story that a publisher/editor friend had asked me to write for her newest anthology, Forever Travels. The entry had to have something to do with traveling. I decided to write a fictionalized version of my great-great grandparents trip across the Atlantic in a schooner built by my great-great grandfather, in 1838, "From Belfast to St. Joe, 1838, A Travelogue." I've done some sailing, but mostly in modern-day fiberglass sloops, and was having a hard time picturing what it would be like to sail in one of those old, romantic tall ships. So, I watched Master and Commander, not to see Russell Crowe, but to experience the feel of those old sailing vessels. i decided he was a better actor than I had given him credit for, and started watching his old stuff. Actually, I learned that I had seen him before. I went to see The Quick and the Dead because I thought it was going to be the Louis L'Amour book. boy, was I disappointed, but I did think the actor playing the gunslinger-turned-preacher character was quite well done. I just didn't care enough to check the credits, and there was nothing in that character to connect him with Maximus Decimus Meridius. See, I've now seen that one too, and Oscar or no, it's probably my least favorite.

Back to our hero. I've always thought he was underrated, and would get royally ticked every time someone said he always played the same character. He brought something unique to each. Think of films made back-to-back: Tumbleweed's Jim Harvey and Gunsmoke's Reb Kittredge; or better yet, Yancey Hawkes and John Gant. Another thing he has in common with Mr. Crowe, who, of course, has never been to war, and is not a real hero in the sense of Audie Murphy, although his (Crowe's) childhood poverty and some of the accompanying experiences almost came close. Audie Murphy was another actor who never played the same character twice.

Ann

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"He endured the shame of being sent home a living trophy to the blood and death of too many friends"
A Myth in Action: The Heroic Life of Audie Murphy
http://www.annjoiner.com

I agree. My personal hot-button is people who claim that he basically only turned in good performances when there was an above-average director involved. It's true that Huston managed to coax him out of his comfort zone and get him to express his characters' emotions in a more obvious way, a way more typical of the actors of that time. But really, my impression is that he generally gave perfectly solid, if understated, performances so long as the character made sense to him. That was something that "Drums Across the River" really brought home to me. His character Gary gets caught in the middle of some complicated politics, but has a very clear-cut arc, in terms of what he thinks at any given point in the story and why he does what he does when he does it. And Murphy was really good and conveying what's going through this guy's head (I particularly like his reaction on learning that the old chief had his own son executed for killing Gary's mother). And guess what? Not an auteur in sight, just good old Nathan Juran, piecing his low-budget projects together as quickly as he can.

I'm not sure I've actually seen him auto-pilot his way through a role, yet. He seemed kind of jaded and distant in Comanche Creek and Trunk to Cairo, like maybe he didn't want to be there, but in both cases the attitude works pretty well for the character involved.

Hi Christie,
You make some very good points, all of which I agree with except one. I don't think his acting
was "distant" in Comanche Creek. Exactly the opposite I would say. Very down to earth especially
with all the actors in that movie. Now I do agree with you on "Trunk to Cairo", however, I really
got the feeling that he felt very awkward in that movie. Maybe because it was sort of "Campy"
007, and very "low budget", and Audie might have felt "Out of his element" ? Don't really know, and
can't quite put my finger on it, but yes, you are right, "distant" or "Auto-Pilot" are good words to
describe his very stiff demeanor and "distant appearance"responses to some of the actors or
action sequences in "Cairo" movie. But then again, I have to keep telling myself, it was the 60's and
mid to late 60's, his personal/family life had really gone through the ringer, not to mention his
finances with the 7 Day War in the middle east wipeout... It was amazing that the guy could keep
going at all, let alone "E-MOTE" and remember lines !!!!! For whatever reason, I can see a "Sadness"
in his eyes that wasn't there before. Maybe it is just my imagination, who knows. But from all the
books I have read, I also understand that Audie was going through some major health issues at the
same time, and was often in "Physical" pain to boot. But I happen to think that Comanche Creek
was one of his better movies, but not so Trunk to Cairo. Just my Thoughts. Shirley Jean.

I think his acting abilities really showed in the TV show "The Man". The way he went from shy to manic and back was seamless. He really scared me in that show.

For someone who never really had any acting lessons he did a great job with the roles given him. I don't think he ever did anything half-way. Given a chance he could have been great in any number of roles which we've already discussed. Universal seemed to use him until heroes were no longer the thing in Hollywood. When the anti-hero came along Audie wasn't needed anymore and they let him go. It's a shame, he could have done so much more in my opinion.

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Betty

Betty, I agree whole heartedly... The TV show "The Man" was very very exceptionally good acting,
bordering on 'Greatness". Absolutely, he scared the daylights out of me. After watching that DVD, I can now well understand why Audie said in real life, "My Shrink made an appointment with his own shrink after seeing me one time !!!! Or words to that effect. Just My Thoughts.. Shirley Jean.
No Slight meant towards Audie at all. I am just glad he was on 'Our Side" during WWII.
SJP.

Betty said:

You hit it on the head with that one, Betty. I wholeheartedly agree. As Rollo May said in The Cry for Myth, we started making the villains the heroes. Now, Murph could play a villain as well as anybody, and I've heard many actors say that playing the bad guy is a lot more fun, but we turned some kind of corner during the mid-sixties that we've been struggling with ever since. Our repressed "dark side" seems intent on popping into our consciousness, I guess, and making a mess of things.

Ann

_________________
"He endured the shame of being sent home a living trophy to the blood and death of too many friends"
A Myth in Action: The Heroic Life of Audie Murphy
http://www.annjoiner.com

Ann, Also Very Very True. It seems like since the mid to late 60's the good old USA has never
been able to "Put Humpty Dumpty Back Together Again". Shirley Jean.

I once saw a review of Trunk to Cairo, which described Murphy as playing the role of the main character "with all the dash and verve of a sullen waiter." Which is , but I think kind of missing the point: the hero's cover story in Cairo is that of a washed-up academic taking a shady job because he can't do anything else, and his actual personality is a fairly pragmatic, no-frills secret agent, very different from the more frivolous James Bond types. Wherever that dour, mildly sarcastic attitude is coming from, it works fairly well for the character, imo.

I think a lot of Murphy's career problems in the sixties and late fifties were demographic. His original fanbase consisted of three groups: people who just plain liked him as a cowboy screen personality; preteens and early teens who strongly identified with him because of his youthful appearance and the more playful, childlike aspects of his personality; and people who just had a voyeuristic curiosity about him due to his exploits in the war. THAB satiated the third category and made them uninterested in him, and the second category kind of outgrew him, or at least wasn't interested in the kinds of movies he made in an effort to "grow" his screen image in the late fifties. Which left the first category, which is basically who he was making films for in the sixties.

His other problem was I think that he was precisely the kind of personality many of the big-name directors wouldn't care to work with. People like John Ford were abrasive on-set tyrants, whose reputations were built on the idea that no actor could stand up to them. This was how they kept your ordinary Hollywood prima donnas in line. Why would they want to work with someone who absolutely wasn't afraid of them, and who tended to react harshly to situations where he thought people were trying to push him around? The directors who did get along with Murphy seemed to mostly be people who understood that you needed to be firm but calm with him in any creative dispute, because in a battle of threat displays, you would totally lose every time.

Good points, Christie. And in a more general sense, this was the time period where many of the big stars were going independent, rather than signing a contract with a particular studio. It would mark the end of the power structure where the John Fords could intimidate actors to that extent. Actors would have more voice and control.

It's too bad, because Murph had a reputation for being a "one-take actor," who could get it right pretty quickly, unlike some of the prima donna's who insisted on doing take after take.

Ann

_________________
"He endured the shame of being sent home a living trophy to the blood and death of too many friends"
A Myth in Action: The Heroic Life of Audie Murphy
http://www.annjoiner.com

I quite agree with you both. As for Trunk to Cairo, it is among my favorites, for several reasons. Of course pretty much any movie I watch with Audie is my favorite of the day But I felt that he was very effective in T2C. True, not very James Bond-ish; but the low key performance was what that particular role needed. I liked that it was a departure from the usual westerns, and it also has a personal, though indirect, memory for me; the "saddle on the banister" episode was while he was away filming T2C.

In case I didn't tell y'all about it, one of the times I was at Audie's house visiting with Pam, he had left his saddle on the handrail to the upstairs, and the skirt (that's the back end of a western saddle) was getting all bent from hitting the post. I told Pam that she should probably move it so it wouldn't be permanently damaged. Sorry, no pics of the saddle, but I vividly remember it. Fairly new, dark tan leather with a basket weave pattern. I guess Audie put it down there temporarily as he was coming home from a last ride before going out of the country, and then he simply forgot to move it as he was getting ready to leave.

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Eva Danø

Boy Eva, I wish I had your memories. Pretty cool to know the two of them that well. Thanks for sharing with us.

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Betty

I wish I could remember more

When he died it hurt so much that I purposely blocked out everything, and only snippets (such as the saddle incident) have come back in full force.

It would also be nice if I had pictures from some of my visits, but at the time I felt it would have been an unwelcome intrusion. I am convinced that the main reason both Audie and Pam accepted me is because I NEVER behaved in their presence like a star-struck fan. No asking for autographs; no posing for pictures, etc.

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Eva Danø

Well.....I guess I'm going to have to respond on this thread because Ann just mentioned my favorite actor "of current time" Russell CROWE. I agree with Ann about there being similarities in their acting style. Russell is pretty laid back and so was Audie. Russell, as Ann said, doesn't kow-tow to the Hollywood crowd. I'm so glad because I really like him alot! And also, they are both looked at as Hollywood bad boys!

Now to what movie I think Audie would have been good in, but wasn't cast, was THE FASTEST GUN ALIVE, which starred Glenn Ford (another of my favorite actors of times gone by). Of course, Glenn Ford could play those nervous characters very well (remember him in Ransom?). With Audie's fast-draw expertise and the subtle, unassuming swagger, he would have been GREAT in TFGA.

***Teri