Ian McCulloch on Marino Girolami

From: A Trilogy of Terror

An interview with Ian McCulloch

by Jason J. Slater & Marcelle Perks

Diabolik number 1 (1997)

The director of ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST was a veteran of Italian comedy television films. How was it to work with him in a horror movie? Did he find it difficult to work within such a genre?

This chap? (Ian points at the credits of a theatrical poster). Remind me what his name was.

Marino Girolami which is his real name instead of the pseudo Frank Martin.

Marino? He was just a really, really nice fellow. He was obviously quite old, you know. I take it he's dead now as well?

Yeah, he died in early '95.

He was much older than Fulci and he seemed to have a long career in making films. He was so straightforward, but he was also a bit of a bully, never to me but to the minions around who were supposed to be doing something they weren't doing right. You know, he was so much fun to talk to and it was great to have someone like that. We were driving through Rome one day and he said to me that (Ian points as to imitate Marino) "You see that statue over there? That's me." When Mussolini brought the Olympic Stadium in Rome, they had various statues of their athletes all over the place, and one of a boxer is Marino because he was at one time the European boxing champion (Note that the statue can also be seen in the weirdo documentary THE WILD WILD WORLD OF JAYNE MANSFIELD). But he was friendly, open and would talk to you. His English may have been not that good but it didn't matter to him. So against all odds, and although it was very silly, ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST turned out to be a far happier film than I expected.

[Marino Girolami was a much more experienced director than just a maker of Italian television comedies. 1962's L'IRA DI ACHILLE (aka THE FURY OF ACHILLES) was his 36th or 37th directing credit (depending on whose count you believe). When Richard Harrison introduced me to him, he said that Marino was the quickest film director of whom he knew; quick but good. In fact, he made films so quickly distributors asked him to credit other directors so as to not glut the market. He was responsible for a whole series of Westerns made in Spain credited to other guys: POCHI DOLLARI PER DJANGO (A FEW DOLLARS FOR DJANGO, credited to Leon Klimovsky and recently claimed by Marino's son Enzo G. Castellari who reused some footage for his first directoral credit SETTE WINCHESTER PER UN MASSACRO, aka PAYMENT IN BLOOD), ANCHE NEL WEST C'ERA UNA VOLTA DIO (aka BETWEEN GOD THE DEVIL AND A WINCHESTER, credited to Dario Silvestri by directed by Marino says star Richard Harrison) and REVERENDO COLT (aka REVEREND COLT, credited to Leon Klimovsky but directed by Marino says Harrison). Despite his diverse experience, his most popular successes in Italy were comedies such as PIERINO CONTRO TUTTI, which has recently been released in the U.S. on Mya DVD as DESIRABLE TEACHER. ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST was originally theatrically released in the U.S. as DOCTOR BUTCHER M.D. ]

Remember Aldo

I was probably 11 when I first became aware of Aldo Sambrell. Burt Reynolds in NAVAJO JOE gave a physically thrilling performance as a man seeking revenge on the gang of scalphunters that murdered his wife and village. The leader of the gang was evil personified and the actor who played the role filled it with chilling conviction. Who was that black-hatted actor? He was billed for that film as Aldo Sambrell. Later on I realized that he was in the three Sergio Leone directed Westerns starring Clint Eastwood - but he never again had quite the high-profile role that he had in NAVAJO JOE.

After NAVAJO JOE burned his face into my consciousness, Aldo popped up in scores of movies that I saw - including THE GOLDEN VOYAGE OF SINBAD, THE LAST RUN w/George C. Scott and FACCIA A FACCIA with Tomas Milian and Gian Maria Volonte. His billing seemed to change alot - Aldo Sanbrell and Alfredo Sanchez Brell were just two of the variations.

In 1984, I started my fanzine SPAGHETTI CINEMA (with Jerry Neeley and John Sullivan) and in issue #7 I decided to attempt to review every film featuring Aldo. I entitled the article "Spain's Best Villan" - only later realizing that I had left out an "i". (This article was partly inspired by the fact that Spanish language stations in L.A. were showing a pile of movies featuring Aldo about which I had been previously unaware: ATRACO EN LA JUNGLA, SOL SANGRIENTO, VUDU SANGRIENTO, LAS MUNECAS DEL KING KONG.) Thanks to the fanzine, I made contact with quite a few fans of these kinds of movies, one of whom was Michael Ferguson. Mike got up the money to visit Spain and later wrote me that he had found the offices of Asbrell Productions and met the man himself; Aldo Sanbrell. He mailed to me a photo which Aldo had kindly signed. (see above)

Years later, again thanks to the fanzine, I met Don Bruce, who had decided to visit every location used by Sergio Leone in the making of the Westerns. While in Spain, he met Aldo Sanbrell, and eventually decided to pay Aldo's way to visit Los Angeles to attend the 2002 Golden Boot Awards - an annual celebration of Western movies which was a fund raiser for the Motion Picture and Television Fund. Kindly, Don also invited Tom Betts and me to attend. Not only did we get to meet with Aldo at the Beverly Hilton event, but Don invited us to breakfast the next morning at his house where we would interview Aldo near Don's swimming pool. It was a great chat, but the highlight for me was when Aldo pulled out his portfolio and resume - which included a photocopy of my first article on him from S.C. #7. It turn out that Mike Ferguson had given him a copy of that issue, so he knew who I was before I met him.

Don paid Aldo's way to attend the 2004 Golden Boot Awards and I was able to visit with him again. It was a real pleasure.

So, the news that he had been hospitalized at the end of May due to a series of "mini-strokes" was upsetting. And while there were reports that he may be sent home from the hospital, there were also reports that he was having trouble speaking and remembering.

On July 10, 2010, he died in the hospital in Alicante, Spain. He left behind a wife, Candida, and more fans than he probably knew that he had.

An Official Look At the European Zorros

From: ZORRO UNMASKED

The Official History

by Sandra Curtis

During the 1960s, over thirty foreign Zorro movies were produced, chiefly in Mexico, Italy, and Spain. Inexpensively shot, they would be classified in the genre of "spaghetti westerns."

McCulley's masked fox confronted Cardinal Richelieu with the Musketeers in ZORRO E I TRE MOSCHIETTIERI (ZORRO AND THE THREE MOUSKETEERS, 1961, Italy). Zorro returned the grand duchy of Lusitania to its rightful heir in ZORRO ALLA CORTE DI SPAGNIA (ZORRO IN THE COURT OF SPAIN, 1962, Italy). He became King of Nogara in ZORRO CONTRO MACISTE (ZORRO AGAINST MACISTE, 1963, Italy). In ZORRO ALLA CORTE D'INGHILTERRA (ZORRO IN THE COURT OF ENGLAND, 1969, Italy) Zorro opposed a tyrant who ruled an English colony in Central America for Queen Victoria. ZORRO, MARCHESE DI NAVARRO (ZORRO, MARQUIS OF NAVARRO, 1969, Italy) found the masked hero opposing Napoleon's troops in Spain at the beginning of the 1800s. An extra named Sophia Ciccaloni who appeared in IL SOGNO DI ZORRO (ZORRO'S DREAM, 1962, Italy) went on to a renowned film career as Sophia Loren. Another 1962 Italian film, IL SEGNO DI ZORRO (THE SIGN OF ZORRO) launched the acting career of Sean Flynn, the son of romantic swashbuckler Errol Flynn. The fox didn't wear his characteristic black outfit and carve a Z on a wall only once. Directed by journeyman Mario Caiano, the remake was lackluster and forgettable.

The most notable of these foreign productions starred French actor Alain Delon. As with other productions, Delon's 1974 film takes great liberty in place and story, yet preserves the basic elements of McCulley's character.

[The wife of John Gertz, one of the owners of the Zorro copyright, Sandra Curtis obviously needed a better proof reader as Zorro did not fight the Mousketeers in an Italian film.]

Duccio Tessari on the end of the Italian Western

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: A typical element of American Westerns were Indians. Why was this element missing from Italian Westerns?

Duccio Tessari: Because we don't look like Indians! A tall blond stuntman can look like an American. A good Flamenco dancer - I can use him as a Mexican. But for Indians - we don't have the faces!

LDL: Why do you think the Italian Western came to an end?

DT: It was a too exploited genre. The audience was fed up, but I think that the end of the genre was also caused by Enzo Barboni. I mean parody films exault the subject - think of the Franci and Ingrassia movies. But when you take genre and subvert it; build up gags like Barboni did with TRINITY, you reach a point where there is nothing left to say.

Yul Brynner crashes car during production of INDIO BLACK.

From: YUL BRYNNER

THE INSCRUTABLE KING

by Jhan Robbins

Brynner's next role was a laconic soldier of fortune in a spaghetti Western called ADIOS SABATA (1971). The movie was short on plot but long on violence - a goldplated, sawed-off repeating rifle and a triple-barreled derringer got a great deal of practice. Yul made good use of both of them.

Alberto Grimaldi, the producer, had loaned him a sleek cherry-red convertible to ferry him to and from the set. Initially, Brynner made the trip in half an hour. Each day he managed to reduce his time. He had it down to twenty-one minutes when the car got out of control and crashed into a stone embankment. Fortunately, Yul wasn't hurt. However, the car was reduced to rubble. When he requested that it be replaced with another sports car, he was told that it would be best if he was driven by a chauffeur.

"Yul gave me his version of the accident," Jean Levin said. "According to him it was entirely the automobile's fault - defective breaks. In all the years I knew him, never once did he take the blame for anything. It was always somebody else's fault. Even the breakup of his marriage wasn't due to something he did. He and Doris were having lots of marital problems. I suppose the chief one was his continued interest in other women."

Duccio Tessari on influences

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: Who influenced you the most?

Duccio Tessari: I think that, even if we don't realize it, we are influenced all the time. One who reads - a learned man or anyone, possesses a little critical sense. It's difficult to not be influenced because these people keep on stocking-up a great deal of things.

We are never original - not when we write, neither when we speak and make a pun. However, when you read a lot, or see and assimilate a lot of films, its gets difficult to distinguish between what is your own and what is not. As a film director, my great loves have been Ford, Hawks, Hathaway - but they did not influence me in the way of shooting. Or, at least, not that I am aware. The two directors I really feel bound to are De Sica and Luchino Visconti.

Duccio Tessari on the difference between American and Italian Westerns

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: What are the differences between the Westerns of John Ford and Howard Hawks and the Westerns of Sergio Leone and Duccio Tessari?

Duccio Tessari: The fundamental difference is that they play at home. They have the right faces for the characters; from the heroes to the extras - the indians are as real as the musicans and the cowboys. Their scenery and environment are genuine. We were compelled to struggle with impossible things. It was typical in our films that the villains were Mexicans. Why? Because we were shooting in Spain where the scenery and the environment looked like the American West and the people were similar to Mexicans. The only Americans were the 2 or 3 main characters. We were compelled to recreate everything; Americans had everything on hand. That's the real difference between our Westerns and their's.

Duccio Tessari on the sound of the Italian Western

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: The Italian Westerns used the soundtrack differently; why this particular attention to the soundtrack?

Duccio Tessari: I don't think that is a fact concerning quality. I mean that Morricone, Ferrio, Travaioli, took the classic music themes in a new way. But in our Westerns, and here's the difference, the noise - the punches, the gunshots - was exaggerated, expressive, never real. During the sound mix, inorder to avoid the music getting covered by other noises, we tended to set the volume higher.

I remember Sergio Leone in the dubbing studio calling to the mixer, "Bartolome! Make the blows louder! Bartolome!"

LDL: American critics didn't approve of the Italian reinterpretation of the myth, but wasn't your Ringo a success in America?

DT: My films, Corbucci's films, and Leone's films were successful everywhere in the world - Japan, France, Germany, Hong Kong. Americans had to accept what was going on and showed our Westerns, too, and they were successful there, too.

Duccio Tessari on the intention to demythologize

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: As with American Westerns, Italian Westerns had good and bad characters, but for us it was only a convenient distinction as our heroes were all but honest and clean. Was the reinterpretation of the classic hero intentional or did it just happen?

Duccio Tessari: I don't think there was a clear, precise intention. I say so, because I remember well the scripts for PER UN PUGNO DI DOLLARI (aka A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS), made with Sergio Leone, and UNA PISTOLA PER RINGO (aka A PISTOL FOR RINGO). We must not forget that our cultural ground is not American, but European. For us the distinction between Good and Evil, Black and White, doesn't exist. Even the Good one commits wicked actions and even the Evil caresses children. I would say that the attitude of demythologization is typically Italian and not only concerning the Westerns. It was not intentional, it was natural for us to write Western stories that way.

Duccio Tessari on cultural plundering

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: The success of the Spaghetti Western raised alot of polemics: someone charged our cinema with appropriating a culture not its own. Then Sergio Leone said, "The West, considered as the myth of imagination, belongs to everybody." Do you agree? What were your Westerns based on?

Duccio Tessari: Sergio Corbucci was right when he said there was nothing wrong with us shooting a Western since the American filmmakers had, years before, come to Italy to shoot films about Ancient Rome. However, the West has been for us the dream of our childhood. Every one of the directors of my generation had grown up with formative movies, in a culture of cinema lovers. These films were all Westerns.

Besides, as I said before, the American people were an heterogeneous mix of races, and therefore the Western is not an exclusive American heritage. So, when we had this wonderful toy of our infancy in our hands, it was something fantastic.

Duccio Tessari on Italian Western heroes

[In 1986, Lorenzo De Luca conducted an interview with director Duccio Tessari which was published in both Lorenzo's fanzine FAR HORIZONS and his book C'ERA UNA VOLTA IL WESTERN ITALIANO.]

LDL: In the '60s, the American Western was in a crisis. Had the audience grown tired of the upright hero?

Duccio Tessari: I should say so! Upright heroes are typically American heroes; originated from a Protestant culture. They are round, complete characters; doubtless. Our horoes, however, are always somewhat defeated heroes. From the beginning, doubtful and perplexed.

At first, America was a country where people from different groups lived - Englishmen, Irishmen, Greek, Italian and so on. Then these groups melted together inorder to face the adversities of the new frontier and to defend themselves from the Indians.

And then America could be said to be one people, and from them arose the image of the heroic American, upright and invincible. It is highly probable that during the '60s, the American hero was not very popular, but it is clear that such a crisis does not exist now - consider RAMBO. Today the heroic myth rises again.

Our Cowboys were rogues, fearful, shot people in the back, and had little in common with the heroic Cowboys - starting with Corbucci's violent ones, to my free and easy ones, and ending with the studied and serious characters of Sergio Leone.

The Leone influence.

From: National Catholic Office For Motion Pictures Films '69/70

Film Education The Western: A Genre in Transition prepared by Frank Frost USC

The disillusionment we see in THE WILD BUNCH is not exactly new, nor is the public unprepared for its degree of violence. The unabashed violence of the Sergio Leone Westerns (A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, and so on) was no hindrance to their very popular success. To a public saturated with the saccharine goodness of men who shoot only when they have to, and then only to wound, in the defense of delicate women (whether they be devoted wives or pretty prostitutes), Leone's films offered a cynical and textured real world in which men are ugly, unshaven, sweaty, and irritated by horse flies. Likewise women are plain, earthy, and as hard, calculating, and self-seeking as anyone else. Peckinpah also creates such a texture, tempered, however, with characters who have some human feelings

Monte Hellman on CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37

From: Cable Column

"A Conversation with MONTE HELLMAN"

Z Channel Magazine - unknown date

Monte Hellman: TWO LANE BLACKTOP probably had the most success of any of my pictures because it was really widely distributed. It was booked into a lot of theatres in America even though it wasn't ever really promoted. But I think CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 actually made more money in a realistic sense for the people who were involved because it was made so cheaply and everybody that sold it, sold it at a profit. TWO LANE BLACKTOP, I'm sure made money for the distribution company but the production company claims that it's still in the red or something. I don't know. CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 made more money because everyone who's touched it has essentially doubled his money.

(Z: Was TWO LANE BLACKTOP the biggest budget?)

MH: No, actually CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 was the biggest budget. TWO LANE was $900,000 and CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 was $1,100,000, actually. Just to show the difference now, one film I'm preparing to be shot essentially the same way as the other pictures, in Jamaica, is budgeted at $2,700,000. And that's the cheapest we can make it. That's how much the cost of films has gone up in the last two or three years.

(Z: Why are all three of your Westerns so different?)

MH: When I made the first two Westerns, I was really trying to do something different because I thought everybody had already made all the traditional Westerns that needed to be made. So I decided to make a couple of anti-Westerns. And having done that, I got it out of my system. When it came to CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 I really wanted to make a pro-Western, a traditional Western. And I guess I did it to the best of my ability. I think it didn't quite come out that way, but I gave it my best shot. (laughs.)

[The film Hellman was preparing was IGUANA (1988).]

Robert Woods on Sicily and stuff

From: That's With An "S" IV

An interview with, and a look at the films of, Robert Woods

by William Connolly

with research by Michael Ferguson, Tom Betts and Gordon Harmer

Spaghetti Cinema #53, June 1993

Robert Woods: (On MY NAME IS PECOS...) Demofilo Fidani did the costumes. Demofilo and Mila Fidani. They did the costumes and that sort of stuff. And he became very big.

WC: Fidani?

RW: Yeah, as Miles Deem. The guy released films in South America and made fortunes. I did his first film. They begged me to do for nothing. It was called PEONYS and it was a piece of garbage. I hated that film. And I die in the end, and in Naples they tore out the seats of the cinema and threw them at the screen, because you don't kill the hero. You just don't. Not in a Latin country. You just do not kill the hero.

That's Naples, though. The Southern Italians, man, they just, "Arrgh! This isn't what I want to see. I want him to win."
Rome and the South are kind of weird people; kind of strange people. Arab almost. I mean there's sort of this Arab influence.

WC: I understand that Italy and Sicily are almost like two different countries.

RW: Oh, yeah. Indeed.

I did a film in Yugoslavia, I can't remember the name of it, with Gianni Grimaldi.

[STARBLACK.]

And he was Siclian and I went down to visit then. I love Sicily. What a beautiful place. We went fishing all night, Elga Andersen and I. The lights on the water, and fish flying - the flying fish - and the moon. Ah, man it was great! It was great! It was one of those unforgettable experiences where even the smells around you; everything was sensual. Great time. Great time.

WC: And, of course, we have Sicily to thank for Claudia Cardinale.

RW: I've got a Claudia Cardinale story. I was sitting on the set with Hank Fonda one day when we were doing BATTLE OF THE BULGE and she was down doing something... She was down getting ready to do something, and somebody brought her in and introduced her to Fonda. And he introduced her to me. I hadn't met her either. And he talked; he was very congenial - Fonda's a great guy. And as she walked away, he said, "Beautiful girl."

And I said, "Yeah."

He said, "Fat ass."

She's got this huge butt, you know?

And that was shocking from Fonda, because he wouldn't usually do that.

Robert Woods on MY NAME IS PECOS

From: That's With An "S" IV

An interview with, and a look at the films of, Robert Woods

by William Connolly

with research by Michael Ferguson, Tom Betts and Gordon Harmer

Spaghetti Cinema #53, June 1993

Robert Woods: I think I might have dubbed MY NAME IS PECOS, because I did some of them, but I was so busy that I have very little time... You'll find that most of the actors were so busy that they could not dub themselves. You'd have it in your contract; 'cause I always wanted to dub myself - I mean I do voice-overs and things like that, and I thought it was right to do things like that.

I dubbed alot of Brad Harris films, as a matter of fact.

WC: When I saw you in the makeup for Pecos, I wondered if you had had an accident. It looked rather odd.

RW: I liked the look; I liked the idea. You see, the whole thing about becoming an actor is... I like any kind of thing where you can... Okay, maybe I was playing myself with the Pecos makeup, but it was a way out of myself, you know? Acting for me is an escape. I'm not basically a shy person anyway, but I like to do something different. I played Ned in THE THREEPENNY OPERA and I liked it. I liked to be deformed, you know what I mean? I prefer that to being clean and...

WC: Was it a conscious idea in MY NAME IS PECOS to have the Mexican hero be sort-of a representative of the "Third World" getting back at the Ugly Americans?

RW: Of course. The whole thing about the Europeans is that they don't look at Americans as individuals; they look at us as a suppressive country, because we're the country in power. I mean I'm not kidding; we're very hated almost every where. If you learn the language, they respect you and like you more; you can get along with them, and everything works. I have alot of friends because of that. If you don't bother to learn the language, you're a hated individual or a collective society in Europe.

Many times I've sat in an outdoor cafe and heard Ugly Americans come in and say, "What the hell do you mean 30 thousand lira? We won the war."

And you just want to go: "Whoa...", you know? Or "back to Mom" or something. The worst feeling in the world is to watch Americans behave badly in a place that isn't their's, but Americans have this attitude that, "Hey, we won the war; it's our's, and you should bow-down to me. I'm American."

WC: I figured that that was probably why PECOS was so popular in places like Africa.

RW: Sure, that's why it was. Basically, it had a social message. There were a lot of these films that you might laugh and say they're campy and they're this and that, but they said a few things in those films. Not all of them... PECOS happened to one of them.

Giulio Questi on DJANGO KILL!

From: I Made One, And To Tell the Truth I Only Like One

An interview with director Giulio Questi by Stephane Derderian

translated from the French by Alain Petit

Spaghetti Cinema # 67, July 1997

I am Giulio Questi. I was born on March 18, 1924, - Yes, I am very young! - at Bergamo, a town in the north, near Milan; very near the mountains. I was in the war of liberation [from the Fascists] for two years; I was eighteen then.

What do you think of Italian Westerns?

I never liked Italian Westerns. I made one, and to tell the truth, I only like one; the one I did.

Why did you make one?

I can't answer. They asked me to make others, but I didn't do it, because the Western genre didn't interest me. When I say I didn't like Italian Westerns, it isn't presumtion; it is personally true. When I say I only like mine, it is because I always considered it different from other Italian Westerns. For me, the Italian Western was only a way to tell stories that I had more than in the head - in the heart. I tell you again, in SE SEI VIVO SPARA, I didn't use the movie Western formula, only the look; but I wanted to recount all of the things, the cruelty, the comradary with friends, the death, all the experiences I had of war, in combat, in the mountains. SE SEI VIVO SPARA is for me an unique experiment that I can't repeat mechanically. The Italian Western didn't interest me.

Gordon Mitchell on cheating for the camera

From: His Name Is Chuck 4

Interview by William Connolly and Tom Betts on April 1, 1990

Spaghetti Cinema #59, December 1994

Gordon Mitchell: When you watch MACISTE NELLA TERRA DEI CICLOPI (U.S. title: ATLAS IN THE LAND OF THE CYCLOPS), Paul Wynter - all the time through the whole film, there's not one dagger on him. And then, the scene at the end of the film, all of a sudden, I turn my back and he pulls a dagger out of his thing. I mentioned it to the director, and he said, "Forget it. They'll never notice."

But, I'll tell you. On some of these films things like that happen. You jump off a horse, and the next day they can't get that horse, so you get another horse. Alot of times for director Demofilo Fidani, to help him... Like I escape on my horse, and he needed some more people to make the band following me a little bit bigger, so I'd put a Mexican hat on and I'd ride after myself.

I mean if you talk to people they have no idea of the crazy things... especially when you did low-budget films, because you really had to really help as much as you can. Alot of times you even help the cameraman, or help set the lights up on some films for some buddies of mine. Help set the lights, help with the camera, set up the fight scenes and do it, and then change two or three times your clothes.

Dean Reed in the late 1960s.

From: COMRADE ROCKSTAR

The Search For Dean Reed

by Reggie Nadelson

In Moscow, after the peace conference at Helsinki, Dean arranged to interview Valentina Tereshkova for Argentine television. The first Soviet woman in space, she would not kiss Dean and was embarrassed. Back in Buenos Aires, where he was then living, Dean was questioned by the police and, when the military took over the country - the sequence of South America coups is always hard to keep up with - he was expelled. In 1966, still married to Patty, he went to live in Madrid, made a couple of pictures, and moved on to Rome.

For the next half dozen years, Dean commuted between South America and Europe and the Soviet Union. Deported from Argentina, threatened by the Right, he tried to get in again by travelling to Uruguay. He was arrested. The the world who knew him, he had the glamour of a political cowboy, moving faster and faster, and he wrote it down in his autobiography that was printed on the crappy paper. So did the FBI and the State Department. It took two years for Dean's file to arrive on my desk, courtesy of the Freedom of Information Act. But when it did, the account of his exploits in South America, was, so far as I could tell, absolutly accurate.

After an illegal entry, a policeman in Uruguay, who had previously arranged his deportation, recognized him. 'Hello, Dean, I always suspected we would meet again,' said the policeman.

By 1967, Dean was living in Rome where he made Spaghetti Westerns (This wasn't a life, it was a mini-series!). He made eight altogether: in 1967, there was BUCKAROO; in 1968, 20 STEPS TO DEATH, THE THREE FLOWERS and ADIOS, SABATA. In 1969 came DEATH KNOCKS TWICE, PIRATES OF GREEN ISLAND and my favourite, MACHING GUN BABY FACE.

Sometimes, late at night, you could still catch ADIOS, SABATA on television. In it, Dean worked with Yul Brynner. Dean was taller than Yul, but Yul was the star. Dean played their scenes standing in a hole on the beach that had actually been specially dug for him. Dean told the story for the laughs, but it clearly got up his nose that he was less important than Yul.

When Dean went to Santa Domingo to get the divorce from Patty, he laughingly told the press about how he was taller than Yul. Next thing he knew, he saw a story in the paper that Yul had arrived in Santa Domingo.

And in 1970, when Dean applied for a new passport - his old one had expired - his height was listed not as six foot one, as it was on his original document, but as six foot four, but then, by 1970, perhaps Dean felt he had grown taller.

Enzo Barboni on why no more Westerns.

Enzo Barboni: It has always seemed to me that there's no need to keep going for the gold. It's also risky. So I only did the first two comic Westerns, and then I did something different. I believe in moving on from a genre at the proper moment, even it other then follow and do excellent business. But when Zingarelli and I did the Trinity series, they weren't even making Westerns anymore. Times change, other things come along. Who can believe in a gunslinger on horseback anymore, when a purse-snatcher on his Vespa motor scooter does things Jesse James wouldn't have dared? Your average thief on his motorbike does acrobatics that would make a poor horse's head spin. When I did the second Trinity - there was a gag that a friend wryly responded to: "Well, if a fanatic on horseback can do that, what would I do with 218 horsepower in my engine?"

The motorcycle has definitely replaced the horse.

[Of course, Barboni did make a third Western. After negotiations with Terence Hill and Bud Spencer to make a third Trinity film in 1995 fell through, Barboni made TRINITA & BAMBINO... E ADESSO TOCCA A NOI, aka SONS OF TRINITY. Hill and Spencer made BOTTE DI NATALE, aka THE FIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS, aka THE TROUBLEMAKERS, as Travis and Moses.]

Gordon Mitchell on Clint Eastwood

From: His Name Is Chuck 4

Interview by William Connolly and Tom Betts on April 1, 1990

Spaghetti Cinema #59, December 1994

Gordon Mitchell: I remember when Clint Eastwood made his first Western with Sergio Leone. People have no idea; he worked for nothing on that film. He was probably getting 3 or 4 thousand dollars a week. But after that, he just went up and up.

You saw FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE, didn't you? Did you look at it real well at the beginning of it? They shot that twice after they got a bit more money. You see where he comes in at the very beginning of the film, they have it raining. He's sopping wet. Then you see him walk in dry as a bone into the saloon. And then when he rides away, that street's a dusty as can be. They got a little extra money to do that first scene.

I mean that's just one of the things.

People never really pay any attention to it.