BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne

Subject: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 May 07 - 09:19 PM

Marion Morrison, born May 26, 1907. Lotta good films he did. Helluva nice guy too. I am priviliged to have his brand hanging on my wall. A simple JW for those who know brands. TMC has been running a Tribute Week for him. We've enjoyed it.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:01 PM

Sorcha, as a kid Wayne was my favorite actor. I cried buckets at the end of Wake of the Red Witch. Did you know that he named his production company after the clipper ship, Batjac, in that movie?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 May 07 - 10:58 PM

He didn't 'act'...he just got up there and acted like John Wayne. And, no I didn't know that. He did lots more than just Westerns tho.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: mrdux
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:08 AM

His films directed by John Ford -- especially the cavalry trilogy (Ft. Apache, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon and Rio Grande) -- are still among my all time favorites.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:09 AM

Did you know that during the McCarty era he helped to put Actors/Actresses and anyone else wh owas invovled with the film industry that he susected to be members of the Comunist paty, somehow I don't think that they'll be wishing him a happy birthday do you?

As one person that worked in hollywood said to a chat show host Michael Parkinson when he heard that John Wayne was on his show he said if you want to be still my friend ask that bastard why he did it and if it was true, and sure enough Michael Parkinson asked John Wayne this and he said that he thought that he was helping his country, and it was true he did ruin quite a lot of people's lives.

so i don't think he was such a nice guy

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST,Chris B (Born Again Scouser)
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:39 AM

Q: Who killed John Wayne?

A: Burt Lungcancer

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Stu
Date: 26 May 07 - 06:56 AM

The greatest comedy actor ever.

The way he delivered the line 'Truly he was the son of God' in The Greatest Story Ever Told gave me the one of the biggest bellylaughs ever.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST
Date: 26 May 07 - 10:30 AM

John was also a bastard because during the McCarthy era in America he and his fellow Americans helped to ruin people that worked in Hollywood because he accuesed them of being Commuist.

What a shit

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: RangerSteve
Date: 26 May 07 - 11:47 AM

Sorcha said "he acted like John Wayne" - and in "The Shootist", he acted like John Wayne dying of cancer, which he was, onscreen and off.. That must have taken some guts. In my opinion, it's the best Wayne movie of all, and ranks among the best westerns ever.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST,Chris B (Born Again Scouser)
Date: 26 May 07 - 12:57 PM

'Lotta good films he did.'

Yoda on the mudcat we have.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Ebbie
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:20 PM

I like a quote of his: "Every man would like to be John Wayne. Hell, I would like to be John Wayne."

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: guitar
Date: 26 May 07 - 01:28 PM

Big John Wayne was all right as an actor but as a human being, he and his friends during the McCarthy era reported many of their friends and work colluges to McCarthy and friends because they thought that these people were in the Commuist party, thus ruin many lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 May 07 - 02:25 PM

Yes, Didn't care much for his politics, but his films have given me, and many others, a great deal of pleasure over the years. As an entertainer I admired him greatly.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 May 07 - 02:39 PM

His politics were those of his time....so were my fathers. And I agree about the comedy..you have to pay attention. A lot of it was very subtle. I love Hatari!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 May 07 - 02:58 PM

Woodie Guthrie was of 'his time', I prefered his politics Sorcha.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 May 07 - 03:28 PM

Woody Guthrie born 1912. John Wayne born 1907. Charlie Chaplin bornm 1907.

Time is only one element in people's politics, and not the most important one.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 May 07 - 03:44 PM

Couldn't agree more McGrath.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: pdq
Date: 26 May 07 - 03:44 PM

Charlie Chaplin was born on 16 April 1889, in East Street, Walworth, London...

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 May 07 - 03:48 PM

True. Moral - never trust lists on the Internet unless you check them.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 May 07 - 04:14 PM

Yes, he was a right wing, Love Her or Leave Her man....so was my dad. I grew up different tho. Still say he made good films.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Rog Peek
Date: 26 May 07 - 05:24 PM

Couldn't agree more Socha. I think 'The Searchers' really takes some beating.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 May 07 - 06:32 PM

And, PS...I didn't start this thread to argue about his politics. If he were alive, he'd be 100 years old. Can't you leave politics out of anything? The man was a gem, and a gentleman. Like it or lump it.

guitar, I'm getting a bit tired of your snide remarks in lots of the threads. Do you think you could leave off for a bit? Go for a walk, drink a beer, take some meds, whatever.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 May 07 - 07:52 PM

Cat got your tongue, Rog?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: gnu
Date: 26 May 07 - 08:04 PM

Yup. I agree. This thread was obviously started to appreciate the man's work and not his downfalls.

Like ye's don't got none.... come on now, pilgrims! Get those egos in ah cir-cul!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 26 May 07 - 08:09 PM

so big leggie cowboy John might have been a complete c**t in real life


its that depth of dark nastyness behind his eyes
that made him look so magnetic and powerfull on screen

the wifes gone to bed .. got me supply cider in..

now downstairs to watch "She wore a yellow ribbon" DVD


i'm a an aging lefty agit-pop punkfolkrocker

grew up watching John Wayne cowboy & war films on the telly....


bollox to his personal politics


lifes a mess of inexplicable contradictions..

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: RangerSteve
Date: 26 May 07 - 09:51 PM

Red River is on the local PBS station now, to be followed by Rio Bravo. Not his best in either case, but entertaining, nonetheless.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 26 May 07 - 10:14 PM

needed to press pause button to go upstairs for ermm..

drank a lot of cider tonight..

the cavalry have set up a defensive post..

its night and the camp fire is in harmony with the faded sunset..

that girly lovey subplot is slowing the movie down like soggy panted trousers..

not my favourite big john movie..

he's to nice and friendly in this one..


so who today has the john wayne eyes of firm controlled nastyness..


clints too old..

bruce willis..?

kevin costner..??

rusell crowe...???

brad pitt and johnny depp ??.. definitely not !!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: The Walrus
Date: 27 May 07 - 05:55 AM

What was the film in which Wayne played a "House Un-American Activities Commission" investigator?*.
I seem to recall reading an interview with Wayne stating that he was proud to have made the film, but then the film seems to have been quietly dropped as the political atmosphere changed.

Has anyone heard the story of Wayne being boo-ed by wounded soldiers/marines because, although he'd 'won the war' so many times on screen, he'd never served in the forces? Is there any truth in it?

Walrus



* Personal note. This seems to be the only time the McCarthy witch-hunt ever turned up any dangerous communist activity.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: RangerSteve
Date: 27 May 07 - 04:57 PM

Punkfolkrocker - there are no actors to replace John Wayne, or W.C. Fields, Mae West, the Marx Brothers, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, Humphrey Bogart...
I could go on, but you get the idea. The days of character actors are over on the big screen, since they don't put out as many movies as the used to.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Greg B
Date: 27 May 07 - 09:20 PM

Say what you will, the big man sure could sit a horse.

No wonder he walked that way. Bet his back hurt like hell.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: GUEST,a song for tat bastard John Wayne
Date: 28 May 07 - 05:04 AM

TALKING UN-AMERICAN BLUES
(IRWIN SILBER/BETTY SANDERS) (1952)
DOWNLOAD & WATCH FOOTAGE OF AN ACTUAL HUAC HEARING (REAL MEDIA, 274 KB)


Any copyrighted material on these pages is used in "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s)


"I had pictured myself as defending civil liberties," said Illinois' Senator Paul Douglas last week. "And yet," he added, "there is a Communist danger in this country." Douglas summed up the feelings of the other conscientious and sorely troubled men.
For more than two weeks of agonized soul-searching, the Senate had grappled with a problem which the U.S. had never squarely met. And yet, as Douglas pointed out, the country faced an undeniable danger from U.S. Communists who owed their first allegiance to a foreign enemy. In the end, the Senate came down to a debate over two specific ways of holding the danger in check.
One bill bore the name of Nevada's portly Pat McCarran. Actually it had started out as a catchall of five different anti-Communist measures. McCarran had gone to work with scissors and paste, put in a few ideas of his own and laid the result before the Senate. His omnibus bill was a clumsy looking vehicle. Nevertheless it moved. It moved along the path of recent court opinions which found Communism a clear and present danger, branded the basic aims of Communism as criminal in intent. It was aimed at Communists and their organizations and fronts, requiring them to register the names of their members and label their propaganda for what it was. President Truman said that he would veto it as an infringement of civil rights.
Burying their reservations, the McCarran camp decided to accept the Kilgore bill with a few minor refinements. Paul Douglas and other Administration Senators, with a second, over-the-shoulder look at the Communist danger, decided to accept McCarran's measures. The two bills were put together in a bigger-than-ever omnibus bill and passed by an overwhelming 70 to 7 vote.
TIME, Sep 25, 1950


Lyrics as recorded by BETTY SANDERS, vocal, with JERRY SILVERMAN, g, Hootenanny Records (Hoot 103-B), c. 9 Jun 1952 (re-released on Folkways FN-2513)
reprinted in RONALD D. COHEN & DAVE SAMUELSON, Songs For Political Action (accompanying book), Bear Family Records, 1996, p. 201


Early one morning got an invitation
To help Congress out in an investigation;
Man came around a-knocking at my door,
Give me a paper that said what for.
Subpoena, looking for Un-Americans;
Look in the mirror.
Now if you want an invite, here' s what to do,
You got to talk with peace, sing it too;
Visit your neighbors, hear what they say,
Before you know it, you're on your way.
Fare paid! Ride in style. First class!

Well, you brush your hair and you dress real pretty,
You got a date with the Un-American Committee;
Take the stand, they swear you in,
Old Man Wood is wearing a grin.
He thinks he's got you, got a short memory.
Can't recall what happened when they stuck a
Union label on his cantankerous investigation.

"Are you now, or have ever been,
Were you ever sympathetic or interested in...
When did you start, how long did it last,
Tell us all about your interesting past.
Answer yes or no."

"Did you go to a meeting, did you sign a petition,
Did you ever hold an executive position?
Did you make a speech, carry a card,
Did you ever hold a conference in your back yard?"
Fifth Amendment!

Now they were asking questions, but we wouldn't buy it,
Like those union brothers did it, it was time for us to try it;
Added up the facts and the figures historical,
Asked them a question which sounds a bit rhetorical.
Mister Wood -- Are you now or have you ever been a bastard?
You don't have to answer that question if you think
It might tend to incriminate you.

Now Mister Wood, get out of your rut,
Do you swear to tell the truth and nothin' but?
Well, Wood said he would, but we knew he wouldn't
And even if he would, well he damn well couldn't,
But that's Congress for you,
Week in, week out, weak all over.

Now Wood couldn't rest on his laurels,
He tried his best to corrupt our morals;
He talked about Philbrick, Budenz too,
"They're getting theirs, how about you?"

Now I like chicken, I like duck
And I don't object to making a buck.
But I ain't got wings and sure can't fly,
But there's one bird that I won't buy:
That's Stoolpigeon! I'm strictly in the market for doves of peace!

It is known that birds of a feather
Have a habit of flockin' together.
So listen, McCarran, Wood and the rest,
You can't use us to feather your nest.
That's strictly for birds!

So here's the moral without a doubt,
If you want to be free, you've got to sing out.
Sing it loud, sing it atrong,
People are singing a freedom song!
That's my music! Solid with a freedom beat!
So keep singing, and keep fighting!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday John Wayne
From: Big Phil
Date: 28 May 07 - 01:56 PM

RIP - The Duke