Alan Ladd: The True Quiet Man | The Hollywood Collection

sure. But I felt like it wasn't the job he was looking forward to, but when he arrived he was absolutely the first one to take it, it was magical. - Of course you realize, Tallant, I never had the slightest intention of taking you back to London. - Now yes. And while they are going to hang me. -James and I did a lot of things alone together because we heard that Alan had a virus, he had the flu. I said, poor man, he's not very strong, he gets sick quite often. Well, apparently it wasn't that. Apparently he had a little problem with alcohol, which I didn't know about.

He never manifested himself on the screen, he never did it on the set. - Alan, you never heard him say anything bad about anyone in public. He was cheerful and polite in all situations. And there are times when you need to do something to achieve it, Sue was the one who did it. She was there looking at the camera, watching the montages. I'm sure I check the scripts every day if there were any rewrites. She was managing him and his career. I don't know if that always made things at home so happy, because Alan was a man and here was a lady guiding him and his career very successfully. - Sue was a lot of people for him.

Lover, mother, many things for him. It was a very unusual relationship, but it was there. - Sue was with Alan the whole time. At work, she had to come to the set and people were like, well, maybe she hangs around him too much. Well, that wasn't the truth. The truth was that he wanted her there, he needed her, he wanted her there. - Ladd himself did not fear anything except traveling by plane. He never, ever traveled by plane, anywhere. So when the children traveled, and they traveled a lot, they traveled by train across the country and then by boat across the Atlantic.

Since taxes in those days were between 90% and 92%, they made films abroad. And as long as you kept moving, you didn't have to pay US taxes. - The family became everything to him. I mean, there wasn't anywhere he went that we didn't all go, whether it was Europe or Arizona or wherever, we went as a family, we went en masse. - In 1954, Alan Ladd and Marilyn Monroe received the Photoplay Award for being the two most popular Hollywood stars in the world, and it came a year after the release of "Shane." - No matter who it is, you know, when it comes to your career, you have your ups and downs and then there's a period of time where every actor has been number one, like Alan was for 10 or 12 years, or whatever. to be. and the public changes.

And some of those movies he made didn't make money. And once that happens, our town is a very cruel town. They want someone else. It's this young man, or that young man. And that had an effect on Alan. In our business no actor works continuously. And that intermediate time could be three, six, eight, nine, 12 months. You can do a lot of athletics and stuff, and Alan was very physical at one point. The drink was having an effect on him, so he wasn't exercising as much as he should. And then he was embarrassed when Sue told him he didn't look good, and that bothered him. -In "Boy On A Dolphin" he had to play a doctor in archeology, which was not particularly suitable for Ladd.

But he agreed to do it, it was in Technicolor and they could go to Greece. And he sounded wonderful on paper. But they had that demoralizing task of having to stand on a box or have their protagonist in a hole, and that had to have a very bad effect on the ego. And it was certainly a traumatic experience for Ladd. - Here is the fabulous romance of the wild island girl and the American adventurers who search for an amazing treasure that remained buried for two thousand years at the bottom of the seas. - The statue disappeared, you are ready for the rest of your life. - I haven't stolen.

I have found, and what I have found in the sea is mine. -The director was promoting her new discovery, Sophia Loren. Who would be one of the great international stars during the 50s. And certainly, she was going to spend a lot of time in front of the screen. I think she realized that the role wasn't going to mean much. - I had a movie I had wanted to make for some time called "The Proud Rebel," which was about a father who had returned home from the Civil War and found his home gone, his wife dead, and he was told that his son I was in an orphanage.

And he went to the orphanage and found the son, and the son couldn't speak. The film required a big star, because it had all the characteristics of a western. The movie really belonged to the guy. I offered it to two or three stars and they all said, "Well, it's the photo of the boy." Then one day, I had a secretary at the time, who came to me and said, have you ever thought? Alan Ladd has a son, and I saw him in a small role in a movie called "The Proud Land", maybe they would be interested in doing it together. - "Proud Rebel" is a story of deep emotions.

A story full of love. The love of a father for his son, the love of a man for the only woman who understood his deep pride, the eternal love of a child for his dog. Starring Alan Ladd as the man whose stubborn pride could destroy even the ones he loves. -Whose dog is it, boy? -I told you, he was mine. - I want the boy to tell me. Whose is he? Speak up, boy. - It had a wonderful director, a man named Michael Curtiz. Olivia de Havilland joined the team, who also gave Alan a lot of confidence. - Stay away, Chandler. - Don't be stupid, guns won't stop them either. - They are not going to keep my land. - Wait, let's try it without weapons. - And introducing the new young star of the screen, David Ladd.

Only a

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father and son could capture such deep emotion. - Vance is gone, David. I sold it. I know, I know I lied to you. You can hate me. David! - Just think about this. You're a big star, and Alan was a big star then, and you had a kid that you adore and you don't want to mess it up. And I think I had real insecurities about it. - We filmed in Utah. It was one of the strongest memories of my life. It was a wonderful moment and a wonderful sharing between father and son. - This man has this pent-up frustration over the fact that this child can't speak.

And the frustration builds in the man, and when Alan saw the script, he said, "We can't do that scene." The director said, "Why not?" He said, "Because I can't do that scene." He said, "I react, I don't know, I don't do these things." Sue jumped into action and said, "Let's try to get the scene." She supported us. I think he was pretty wonderful in that. - What do you want? What is it? What happen? What is it? I do not know what you want. If only you told me! -Chandler! Sailboat! - Curtiz had quite the reputation of being a loudmouth and tough guy.

Well, nothing could have been further from the truth, but maybe part of that was because Dad was there and he was making sure this principal didn't abuse his son. - I've heard stories about how Alan drank in a movie. He never touched a drop in the photo we took. I never touched a drop. He was very proud of his relationship with his son and knew that anything that made that child nervous would upset him and he wasn't going to let that happen. - Johnny, be careful! - Say it. You said it, say it again. Say it!

You said it, say it again. You can do it. - Johnny, Johnny. - My film with Alan Ladd was "One Foot In Hell". The year was 1959 and it was a very, very sad time in Alan Ladd's life. He was fighting a battle and he wasn't winning. Alan Ladd himself as a young man was a fabulous athlete. And I think that kind of confidence that he had in his own physical abilities when he was young carried over into his career. I think he saw even more, the difference between what he could do before and what he couldn't do anymore.

So I think the experience was probably detrimental to him. -The only person Alan did anything to hurt was himself. We all loved him, we all tried to advise him as much as we could. -He was a beautiful man. He spoke well. He had talent. And he was a movie star. But he never thought within himself that he deserved all this. And I really think he felt like at any moment it would all go away and people would find out and find out he was a fraud. It's not an uncommon thought process for actors, even today. The difference is that in today's world, people can get help.

People can get psychiatric help. People can register at the Betty Ford clinic. People can go to a rehab center, go on talk shows and talk about it. - I took this photo, which I consider the first, it may not have been. And I took the last photo of him. When it came time to do “Carpetbaggers,” he was cast in the role and we gave him a chance. What I didn't realize was that he was physically coming to an end. It wasn't his movie and this was the first time Alan, in 15 or 20 years, had played a supporting role.

He was brilliant at that. However, in retrospect, should I have made the film? Probably not. - "The Carpetbaggers", which brings to life the characters of the best-selling novel. Characters like Jonas Cord Junior, Rina Marlowe, Jennie Denton, Nevada Smith. The man who keeps Jonas's secrets and Jonas's women. A

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man with enough guts to kill. - I observed your meanness and your cruelty. I have seen you make men vomit with fear and women cry with misery and shame, but until this moment I have never judged the full measure of your cruelty and madness. To put it bluntly, Jonah.

I think you're crazy! - It is unlikely that you will experience everything you will see in "The Carpetbaggers" in your life. -He worked very hard, I must say, because it was a difficult film to make, and I think he turned it into one of his best roles. - You got good reviews in this movie. Unfortunately, he did not live to see those criticisms. He was dead before the film's release. According to the forensic report, the cause of death was a mixture of sedatives and alcohol. - My mother was a very generous person. And I'm sure that after my father died, she probably questioned whether she had done everything she could to help him or whether she had done too much to help him.

And I don't think there was ultimately a different path. The demons my father had were his demons. They were not demons created by anyone else, they were things that were not resolved in his own being. One of the fondest memories I have of my father was the first time I took a trip alone. I went with a group of friends to Hawaii. And my dad and mom took me to the airport, and right before I got on the plane, my dad said, "Come here, David," and I ran up to him, and he put his arms around me and just hugged me for a little while. moment. the longest time.

And when I pulled back and looked at him, he had tears running down his eyes. And I got on that plane and I had never felt such love for my father. And I sat down and wrote a love letter, a love letter from a son to his father. - My wife and I were at the Ladds' house for dinner, it was just the four of us. And the doorbell rang in the middle of dinner, and it was a special delivery letter from David. And Alan loved this letter and he used to show it to his friends.

Alan was buried with that letter. - There are many reasons why I wish he was still here. And the basic one, that he could see how well his children had prospered. You know, we hear time and time again how difficult it is for children of stars to succeed. But take a look at that family. There's the oldest son, Alan Ladd Junior, who has been president of Fox, chairman of the board of MGM, had his own Ladd company and has Oscars. There is David, who has been head of production at MGM and now produces independently. Carol Lee is married to John Veitch.

John, who's had some wonderful productions and a great career as a production manager at Columbia, the man they've known since they were 22 when he was a war hero. They found him injured, of course, in a hospital. - Alana is like Sue in a way when it comes to Michael Jackson. She is with him in many meetings, supports him and helps him in every way possible. -And the strange thing is that I met her when she was working in a particular room in a particular building, the same room, the same building where Sue Ladd met Alan Ladd.

CBS Radio. - The interesting thing about my parents is that they were both only children. Together they created a great family. We are four. And they've all had kids, as have I, and suddenly all those kids are starting to have kids of their own. It's quite remarkable, I mean, we all live within about a three mile radius of each other. We have always lived here and we are always together. - Alan Ladd was one of the

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cinematic heroes of my childhood. There was something about that man that I found completely convincing. He was the real

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man.

There was a kind of kindness to the man, that even when he was a tough hero, came across on screen. -He was a great, great star of his time. And I remember that at Paramount we had many important stars. But he was undoubtedly one of the greatest of all. -The image I remember most of my father was the image in "Shane," when he looks at Brandon de Wilde and says, "Bye, Joey," and he just turns that corner and goes into the mountains. -Shane! Go back! - And that music comes out, and I tell you, to this day, when that music comes out, it makes me cry.