Rawhide TV (1959-1966)

[cigar joe]

Just begun to watch Rawhide season 1 on DVD and Its pretty much what I remember, the better episodes are the ones that stay out on the plains, the more melodramatic ones concern the towns the drovers visit. I'm about to episode 4 so far.

Of course Eric Flemming as Gill Favor trail boss is the star of the show, Clint Eastwood as Rowdy Yates is the ramrod, the rest of the major cast is Paul Brinnegar as Wishbone,  Steve Raines as Jim Quince, Sheb Wooley as Pete Nolan, Rocky Shahan as Scarlet, Robert Cabal as Hey Soos, and Janes Murdock as Mushy Mushgrove the "cooks louse".

The rest of the casts over the years have quite a few actors from SW's notably for one Lee Van Cleef who was in a few episodes.

The second episode "Incident at Alabaster Plain" features the origin of the colt revolver with silver inlaid snake grips, that Rowdy gets from a villian named Mastic.

I'll post more later.

[cigar joe]

Rest of Season one was typical of the series, no later breakout stars in the rest of the first season.

Started on Season 2 a few days ago. First episode was notable for being almost exclusively upon the character of Rowdy Yates and his adventure during the "Day Of The Dead" on a Hacienda in Texas. episode 2 & 3 again typical of the series. will report as I see more.

[titoli]

I know this is hard to define, but can you remember what your attitude was when you watched the Eastwood character as a boy and how you see him now? Same?

[cigar joe]

The difference was that he wasn't the major character in charge on Rawhide, he wasn't the equal to Eric Fleming, he was sort of in the role of the sidekick, not the traditional role of comedic sidekick but more like the understudy to the headliner. If you've seen Unforgiven he's back playing the role of Rowdy Yates at the beginning of it. There is a sequence where he reapeats what is told to him by the Schofield Kid, something like "he cut a whore" Eastwood "he cut a whore!", that was pure Rowdy Yates from Rawhide.

So in Rawhide he was playing a cross between a young hot head and an aspireant to leader, my attitude was ambivilant, I think I favored Eric Fleming as the more assured man in charge.

how you see him now? Same

I think I mentioned before that when I first saw "For A Few Dollars More" I didn't even recognize Eastwood as being the same actor from Rawhide (that portrayal was that different), so it wasn't as if I was following his career at that time.

For a number of years after I though of him as a screen giant  the ultimate cool badass anti-hero, nowadays its like he decompressed back to where he was as a character during Rawhide but with the badass factor still there under the surface.

[titoli]

I asked you this because I read somewhere that Rowdy was perceived at the time as "wimpy". Now, I've seen an episode and, though he's not first banana, he does look quite a factual character, though not yet the baddest badass. He's not playing, I mean, (but, of course, I've seen just that episode) the little boy you have in other series like Bonanza or The High Chaparral naive and goofish. What I'm trying to establish is if the passage to a new character was really a dramatic unexpected jump or it was just a step ahead of Rowdy. (Though, of course, FOD was a fist in the stomachs of western buffs). 

P.S. when did you first make the connection Rowdy Yates - MWNN? And how do you explain that  just a three day beard could make that difference for you (assuming you were a Rawhide fan)? Was the poncho who led you astray or the action or what? 

[cigar joe]

Yea it was the pancho, the beard, the new demeanor.

If you've only seen one episode of Rawhide you may have not seen one of the more common story side bars of the series where if any episode had a skirt in it Rowdy was usually chasing it and occasionally like a love sick puppy, he also smiled a lot which he doesn't do as TMWNN.

[cigar joe]

Season 2 so far only notable guest supporting actor who whould later become more well know has been Strouther Martin, but he's not in his well known weasel mode in this bit he plays a surveyor in episode 8 but its sofar the weakest of the serires I've seen (The Haunted Hills). It deals with an Indian valley that has a sacred burial ground with geysers (like Yellowstone) but they look quite fake and the story didn't quite hit on all cylinders.

[cigar joe]

Continuing on my re-viewing Rawhide:

On The Second Season so far Skip Hormier from various film Westerns makes an appeance in "The Incident of the Blue Fire", again this TV western was chock full of great scenic shots for a majority of the episodes,  a few were set in town, possibly 10%, but of the outdoor cattle drive sequences they are like moving Fredric Remington or Charlie Russel paintings.

[cigar joe]

Season 2 volume one disc 4 last episode "The Incident of The Wanted Painter" a story about the attempt to break out a Southern guerrilla fighter turned outlaw from his jail cell has a future Leone & Spaghetti Western alumnus show up in a small but very good cameo in the part of a character called "Holzman" who infiltrates the drovers to get at a painting of the town of Lampton that will serve as a town plan for the breakout. Holzman is none other that Frank Wolff.

[cigar joe]

Of note Season 2 Volume 2 disc 2 "Incident Of The dancing Death" Warren Oats makes a brief cameo as a Gypsy.

[cigar joe]

"Incident of the 100 Amulets" RG Armstrong as a saloon keeper Vaughn Taylor (The mob guy in the wheelchair that Eli Wallach shove off the balcony) as a general storekeeper.

[cigar joe]

Season 3  Disc 2 "Incident of the Slave Master" (1960) a rotund Peter Lorre makes an appearence as Col. Lorrier who has kept Union Officers prisoner of war working a cotton plantation in a hidden valley in Texas. The prison set is reminicent of  the plague camp in Keoma.

[dave jenkins]

Season 3  Disc 2 "Incident of the Slave Master" (1960) a rotund Peter Lorre makes an appearence

Even by 1954's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea he was pretty heavy.

[cigar joe]

Season 3 Disc 2 episode 2 "incident on the road to yesterday" had one of these in a town stage office, a Jost kerosene fan, pretty cool to see it check out this youtube of one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bbxdui66DBY