While Hollywood does its best to impress us with great visual effects, it’s ultimately the charisma of a compelling movie star that generates enthusiasm from audiences when they watch a movie. Even when working within established franchises or well-known archetypes, films must create characters who have a strong emotional connection with their audiences.
The “New Hollywood” era of the industry saw the rise of many young performers whose skills seemed idiosyncratic compared to the generation that preceded them. By challenging preconceived notions of what a “star” could be, these actors helped the medium as a whole move in a more ambitious direction. However, this significant shift in the industry’s power dynamics led to some early headaches when it came to casting. Despite their future successes, Clint Eastwood and Burt Reynolds were both fired by Universal Studios the same year in the 1950s.
Clint Eastwood Didn’t Look like a Typical Movie Star
Although he would eventually create a persona that was synonymous with the revitalization of the Western genre, Eastwood began his career working on low-budget horror films for Universal. Following his first film acting role in the aquatic-themed monster movie Revenge of the Creature, Eastwood frequently appeared in similar “B-movies,” including Never Say Goodbye and Tarantula! While these roles were essential in establishing Eastwood’s name and introducing him to the rigors of a film production, they weren’t exactly a great showcase for his abilities as an actor. Even a performer with as much nuance as Eastwood was unable to elevate these unoriginal projects that put little emphasis on their characters.
Although he made peculiar acting choices that inadvertently made these early films more interesting, Universal was not a fan of Eastwood’s demeanor. While the previous generation of Old Hollywood movie stars had called for clean, warm, and sensitive actors like Gene Kelly and Tony Curtis, Eastwood presented a screen persona that was dark, brooding, and disheveled. Convinced that he did not have the talent to ever break into leading roles, Universal fired Eastwood for failing to conform to their ideas of what a “movie star” should look like. According to Reynolds, Eastwood “was fired because his Adam’s apple stuck out too far,” “he talked too slow,” “and he had a chipped tooth and he wouldn’t get it fixed.”
Although these brutish qualities may have been to blame for the initial breakdown in Eastwood’s relationship with Universal, it was his unusual mannerisms that helped turn him into a global superstar. After being dropped by Universal, Eastwood left the United States to work with the Italian filmmaker Sergio Leone on the 1964 Western A Fistful of Dollars, which became a massive hit and essentially kickstarted the “Spaghetti Western” subgenre. Eastwood proved to be perfect at playing moody, quiet loners who weren’t as openly expressive as characters in Hollywood films. It was evidently a niche that worked for him, as A Fistful of Dollars was followed by two even more popular sequels, For A Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. They were so successful that when Eastwood eventually made his American comeback, he was met with open arms.
Burt Reynolds Was Told He Was a Bad Actor
While Universal certainly shot themselves in the foot by not recognizing why Eastwood’s unique talents would appeal to a significant population of their audience, the studio was even more belligerent in their dismissal of Reynolds. Like Eastwood, Reynolds’ career was not an overnight success, as he had spent years appearing in television shows like Riverboat and the anthology mystery series Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Although his screen persona was defined by his roguish, defiant personality, Reynolds was fired by Universal because he was told he couldn’t act. He would later joke that while he “could learn to act,” Eastwood was stuck with his physical characteristics.
Universal’s objections to Reynolds’ trajectory suggests that they did not understand why his persona was so appealing. By often succeeding at playing rogue characters with checkered backstories, Reynolds challenged the traditional notions of heroism. His black sense-of-humor and immense physicality seemed like an odd match, but Reynolds proved himself capable of leading both dramatic and comedic projects. Like Eastwood, he owned much of his success to the Western genre. Audiences got a taste of Reynolds’ abilities thanks to his recurring role in the classic Western adventure series Gunsmoke.
While the notion of television actors transitioning to film roles was relatively unheard of during this era of Hollywood history, Reynolds managed to capitalize on the success of Gunsmoke when he took on his first movie parts. Although his career was met with a few early failures, including the doomed Western Navajo Joe and botched fantasy epic Skullduggery, Reynolds eventually got the chance to prove his dramatic acting chops in the 1972 survival thriller Deliverance. Hailed as an uncompromising and emotionally sincere genre thriller, Deliverance succeeded in helping Reynolds earn some of his most iconic roles in the subsequent decade.
Clint Eastwood & Burt Reynolds Made an Underrated Crime Movie
Despite their shared negative experiences with Universal, Eastwood and Reynolds’ careers diverged quite dramatically. Though he started in the action genre, Reynolds began transitioning towards comedy roles thanks to his recurring roles in the Smokey and the Bandit and The Cannonball Run franchises. Eastwood was only content with being told what to do by studios for so long. After his 1971 directorial debut Play Misty For Me, he began a successful career working behind the camera that continues to this day.
Despite occupying different spaces within the cinematic ecosystem, Eastwood and Reynolds teamed up for the 1984 buddy cop crime movie City Heat. Directed by Richard Benjamin, the film starred the two iconic actors as law enforcement officers on the trail of a ruthless criminal. While not remembered as one of the best buddy cop movies of all-time, City Heat’s moderate success just proves how much of a mistake it was when Universal fired two of the most successful stars back then.