Search the Western Clippings Site

An Interview With…
        - Archives

Will "Sugarfoot" Hutchins
    - July 2023
    - April 2023
    - January 2023
    - October 2021
    - January 2021
    - November 2020
    - June 2020
    - April 2020
    - December 2019
    - November 2019
    - September 2019
    - August 2019
    - July 2019
    - May 2019
    - March 2019
    - September 2018
    - August 2018
    - March 2018
    - February 2018
    - January 2018
    - September 2017
    - August 2017
    - July 2017
    - May 2017
    - April 2017
    - January 2017
    - December 2016
    - October 2016
    - September 2016
    - August 2016
    - July 2016
    - May 2016
    - March 2016
    - February 2016
    - January 2016
    - December 2015
    - November 2015
    - September 2015
    - August 2015
    - July 2015
    - May 2015
    - April 2015
    - March 2015
    - February 2015
    - January 2015
    - December 2014
    - November 2014
    - October 2014
    - September 2014
    - August 2014
    - July 2014
    - May 2014
    - April 2014
    - March 2014
    - February 2014
    - January 2014
    - December 2013
    - November 2013
    - October 2013
    - September 2013
    - August 2013
    - July 2013
    - June 2013
    - May 2013
    - April 2013
    - March 2013
    - February 2013
    - January 2013
    - December 2012
    - November 2012
    - October 2012
    - September 2012
    - August 2012
    - July 2012
    - June 2012
    - May 2012
    - April 2012
    - March 2012
    - February 2012
    - January 2012
    - December 2011
    - November 2011
    - October 2011
    - August 2011
    - July 2011
    - June 2011
    - May 2011
    - April 2011
    - March 2011
    - February 2011
    - January 2011
    - December 2010
    - November 2010
    - October 2010
    - September 2010
    - August 2010
    - July 2010
    - June 2010
    - May 2010
    - April 2010
    - March 2010
    - February 2010
    - January 2010
    - November 2009
    - October 2009
    - September 2009
    - August 2009
    - July 2009
    - June 2009
    - May 2009
    - April 2009
    - March 2009
    - February 2009
    - January 2009
    - December 2008
    - November 2008
    - September 2008
    - August 2008
    - June 2008
    - April 2008
    - March 2008
    - February 2008

Do You Remember?
    - Archives

Comic Book Cowboys
    - Archives

Westerns of...
    - Archives

Heavies and Characters
      - Archives

The Stuntmen - Neil Summers
    - Archives

Western Treasures
    - Archives

Circus Cowboys
    - Archives

Radio Range Riders
    - Archives

Rangeland Elegance
    - Archives

Western Artifacts
    - Archives

Film Festival Fotos
    - Archives

Silent Western Reviews
    - Archives

Serial Report
    - Archives

Subscribe to Western Clippings

COLLECTIBLES FOR SALE:

Western Clippings Back Issues

Daily Comic Strips
    - Page 1 (1910-1949)
    - Page 2 (1950-1979)

Sunday Comic Strips
    - 1907-1990

Books

Miscellaneous Collectibles

Autographs

Lobby Cards

Movie Posters

Home

OCTOBER 2016

Howdy! Awhile ago, Babs and I found ourselves at a long table in a New Jersey hotel signing 8x10s for all the pretty people. One of our favorite tablemates, Candy Clark, sat next to us. At a longer table, holding forth, sat Adam West, Burt Ward, and a bunch of Batman baddies. Murdoch’s Fox News sent a crew to cover this really big show. I don’t look for trouble; trouble looks for me. I espied a sly guy sidewinding his way to our table. He sported a frozen smile and ice cold eyes. He didn’t buy anything. He didn’t say anything. He waved his camcorder like a vacuum cleaner over my glossies of yore. Rutt Roww! He stopped and slowly tilted up to show Fox News viewers, graphically, the ravages of years in the saddle. I cackled feebly, “Heh, heh—I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille.” What I should have said: “I’ll be right back.” I should have pulled a Three Stooges gag: fake walking down stairs behind the table, waving good-bye.

Next day’s headline in Murdoch’s NEW YORK POST: “Hollywood Has-Beens Washed Up On Jersey Shore.” I Ay Chee Hoo-Ah Hoo-Ah! The sweet gal who played Tabitha on TV was devastated. Kindly Channel Four showed up. John Astin fairly leapt onstage with a huge poster advertising his one-man, cross-country show: “John Astin is Edgar Allen Poe!”

Drawing of Will Hutchins as Sugarfoot.The POST headline was right, you know. We were has-beens. We are all has-beens. We are all will-bes. Mostly, we are all are-nows. Be here now!  That’s all there is, folks. There isn’t anymore.

Uncle Miltie Berle was a prolific song lyricist (“I’d give a million tomorrows for just one yesterday”, “Sam, you made the pants too long”, etc.). He wrote this: “I’d rather be a Could-Be if I cannot be an Are; because a Could-be is a May-Be who is reaching for a star. I’d rather be a Has-Been than a Might-Have-Been, by far, for a Might-Have-Been has never been, but a Has was once an Are.

A pard o’ the pen writes and asks why I looked different from show-to-show. Well, I aged and gained weight. I wore different duds. My hair varied in length. Sometimes it was combed. Jean Burt Reilly bleached it. I felt scalped. The bleach smarted. Seasons passed. My hair was allowed to grow back to its original feelthy blond.

Ah! The great Warner Bros. cameramen! Each had his own way of shooting me. Ted McCord (“East of Eden”, “Treasure of the Sierra Madre”) accented my eyes with a magenta spot. He was a perfectionist. When the director called for a re-take, McCord would jump in and improve the lighting. His crew sure wasn’t motley.

We had a wide variety of scripts. They ran the gamut from horse opera to soap opera, from stalwart straight shooter to slapstick saphead. I showed my range on the range, foolin’ around with facial facets.

Gordon Bau headed the make-up department. He required his talented make-uppers to apply Bau’s own private brand of greasepaint. Conflict of interest? The stuff had a distinct aroma. I could smell a contract player from 20 paces. Col. Warner hated to see shiny ears in rushes. Each a-yawn, the make-uppers spelunked every orifice above the neck. They slathered us up pretty thick. Ted McCord and brethren worked hard to give our pusses a modicum of dimension.

Sweet old Bob Conrad was one-up on the Colonel. He’d sit on a fold-up chair, outside his sound stage, a huge aluminum collar ‘round his throat to catch some rays. Back then, we had an ozone layer.

A few weeks after the Colonel let me out to pasture, I sat in a barber chair on La Brea Avenue. The guy in the next chair was an animator from Warner’s cartoon department. I told him I loved The Road Runner. He told me how the show evolved. They wanted to make the show pure action. Wile E. Coyote of the Acme Mail Order Company was in constant pursuit of The Road Runner, who was the carrot on the stick, always just beyond Wile E.’s reach. Wile E. was a wild, complicated character, expensive to draw. They made The Road Runner simpler, a bullet train, a blur-no dialogue—moving lips took time to draw. What then? Tweet Tweet? Well, there was this funny janitor who mopped the hallways in the animation building. To let the crowd around the water cooler know he was coming, he’d go “Beep Beep! Beep Beep!” Eureka! The barber asked me if I were in a play. “No, why?” “You’ve got a pretty healthy glob of make-up in your left ear.” Yipes! Henceforth, in my 10 years as a klown, never once did I hear the roar of the greasepaint. I settled for the pitter patter of pancake makeup.

One time NEWSDAY (Long Island’s newspaper) asked me to list my five favorite Westerns, and why? (How about 50?) I tossed ‘em the first five to come to mind. “Shane”—Woody Allen’s favorite flick, period! And he doesn’t like Westerns. Alan Ladd’s last hurrah. Paramount should have pitched him for an Oscar. Palance shoots Cook Jr. in the mud. Pow! Right between the eyes! “Destry Rides Again”—sorta Sugarfootish. Gentle, funny Stewart at his best, before his post World War II hard-bitten, steely-eyed avenger. Terrific ensemble cast, beautiful barroom brawl. La Dietrich’s raucous physical comedy, with a dash of pathos, added salt to this zesty stew. Wanna hear my rendition of Marlene’s “See What the Boys in the Backroom Will Have”? “The Outlaw”—Every teen-aged lad’s guilty pleasure. No, it wasn’t shot at the Grand Tetons. It was shot by the master Gregg Toland (“Citizen Kane”, “The Long Voyage Home”; “Wuthering Heights”, etc. etc.). Howard Hughes should have found time to direct more flicks. “Tom Horn”—To me, the last of the great westerns. McQueen, most memorable movie star born in the ‘30s. Powerful parable of Big Biz’ discarding, long-time, loyal workers like squeezed lemons. “The Westerner”—Gregg Toland again. Wyler, Brennan, Cooper at the top of their games. Best of the ‘indoor’ westerns. Coop is mystical in the last of his great performances. Watch him roll a ceegaret…Ooops! No John Wayne!!!  Sorry, Duke—You the man!

       —Adios