Henry Hathaway and cast members on the set of True Grit
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Henry Hathaway started directing in the early 1930s and though he made movies of all genres, he was particularly associated with Westerns. This allowed him to ride out the 1960s making pretty much the same kinds of movies with the same stars (Gregory Peck, Robert Mitchum) that he had been working with for decades. But shortly after the massive success of Hathaway’s True Grit in 1969 – for which John Wayne won his only Oscar – the director felt he was being put out to pasture by a changing industry. His last film would be Hangup (also known as Super Dude) a work-for-hire that he claimed he took only as a favor to the producer, and which was dismissed at the time as a sop to the Blaxploitation trend - not least by Hathaway himself.
Henry Hathaway and Dean Martin on the set of The Sons of Katie Elder, 1965, Paramount Pictures
SHOW NOTES:
Sources:
Henry Hathaway: A Director’s Guild of America Oral History by Rudy Behlmer and Polly Platt
Henry Hathaway: The Lives of a Hollywood Director by Harold N. Pomainville
Cahiers du Cinéma: The 1950s: Neo-Realism, Hollywood, New Wave edited by Jim Hillier
The Hollywood Professionals by Kingsley Canham
Maggie: A Love Story by John Sanford
Hawks on Hawks by Joseph McBride
“Faberge Tools Up For Sweet Smell of Screen Success,” Thomas Wood, Los Angeles Times, July 9, 1972
“Hathaway, 75, Thinks Young,” Bob Thomas, San Diego Union, April 11, 1973
“‘...I made movies.’ An Interview with Henry Hathaway,” Scott Eyman, Take One, September-October 1974: Vol 5 Iss 1
“The Cinema Scene: Impact of Black Action Films,” Carole Kass, Richmond Times-Dispatch, November 17, 1974
“Elliott Hand-Handling ‘Hang-up’ After WB Sidesteps Brut Film; Gala Preem Launch in Newark” Variety, January 15, 1975
“Super Dude,” Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, September 5, 1975
“Film Festival pays tribute to famed director Henry Hathaway,” The Orange County Register, October 21, 1984
“Between Worlds,” Michael Atkinson, Film Comment Vol 29, No 4, July-August 1993
“Henry Hathaway: Raw Nerve”, Harry Carey, Jr., Films of the Golden Age, April 29, 2009
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Still from Hangup (aka Super Dude), 1974, Warner Bros./Dimension Pictures
Music:
The music used in this episode, with the exception of the intro, was sourced from royalty-free music libraries and licensed music collections. The intro includes a clip from the film Casablanca.
Excerpts from the following songs were used throughout the episode:
Grey River - Holo
Calumet - An Oddly Formal Dance
Kevin MacLeod - Danse Morialta
Kajubaa - The Kishner Method
K2 - One Quiet Conversation
Architect - Order of Entrance
Ray Catcher - Chromium Blush
Flatlands - Talltell
Cloud Harbor - Suzy Textile
Cloud Harbor - SuzyB
Bitters - True Blue Sky
Bitters - Slimheart
Cafe Nostro - Jenner
Migration - Heather
Holyoke - Bus at Dawn
Limoncello - Song at the End of Times
This episode was written, narrated, edited and produced by Karina Longworth.
Our editor this season is Evan Viola.
Research, production, and social media assistant: Brendan Whalen.
Logo design: Teddy Blanks.
Henry Hathaway directs Steve McQueen on the set of Nevada Smith, 1966, Paramount Pictures