Clint Eastwood is a rich man; that much goes without saying. However, throughout his career, it can also be argued that he has always been one of Hollywood’s most savvy and frugal A-listers, especially when it comes to the money he asks studios to part with for his directorial efforts. Ultimately, Eastwood is a realist, and nothing exemplifies this better than the time he actually told his agent that he would have been happy to make a certain picture for free, as long as it proved his worth to the studio.
By 1971, Eastwood had established himself as one of the most bankable names in Hollywood. After learning his trade on western TV shows like Rawhide, he broke out as a star with his classic ‘Man With No Name’ trilogy of spaghetti westerns in the mid-1960s. He followed these movies up with a succession of hits like Hang ‘Em High, Where Eagles Dare, Coogan’s Bluff, and Kelly’s Heroes. In December ’71, Dirty Harry was released, giving Eastwood arguably his most iconic character, and the star was on top of the world.
Two months before Dirty Harry hit cinemas, though, Eastwood starred in a movie that was a slight departure for him. A lurid thriller, it cast the granite-faced man of action as a radio disc jockey being stalked by an obsessive and murderous female fan. The film was called Play Misty For Me, and its critical and commercial success gave Eastwood a solid foundation for the rest of his career. You see, Eastwood didn’t just star in the movie. He also directed it – and was paid the Director’s Guild of America minimum for the privilege.
In 2012, Eastwood spoke to Arts Beat LA about how Play Misty For Me came about. He revealed that he sought out the project by asking for a meeting with Universal Pictures’ head honcho, Lew Wasserman. The studio mogul immediately agreed for Eastwood to star in the picture, but when the star went one further and said, “Oh yeah, and I’d like to direct it,” Wasserman was bemused. He agreed to Eastwood’s gambit, though, and the actor strode out of the meeting feeling incredible. He chuckled while remembering how he thought, “Boy, that was easy. I was thinking I was going to have to sell him on the idea.”
Suddenly, though, Eastwood’s agent came hurrying out of the meeting to catch up to his client. He told him, “Oh yeah, they want you to do it, but they don’t want to pay you.” To his shock, Eastwood told his agent he was fine with that arrangement. In fact, he didn’t think the studio should have to pay him either. “I would pay them to do it,” he admitted.
Naturally, Eastwood told his agent not to give this away to the studio, and legally, the studio had to pay him the DGA minimum. He was adamant, though, that the sentiment was correct because he felt he needed to prove himself as a director before any studio should be forced to pay him the big bucks to do it. “Why would they pay some guy who is directing for the first time out?” Eastwood reasoned. In the end, by getting minimum wage, he joked, “I’m way ahead of the game. I would have paid them.”
In American Rebel: The Life of Clint Eastwood, the star reflected on getting his start in directing with Play Misty For Me, a movie whose importance to his career can’t be understated. He felt his years of experience as an actor allowed him to avoid all the common mistakes and focus on the good things he learned about directing along the way.
“After 17 years of bouncing my head against the wall,” he said, “hanging around sets, maybe influencing certain camera set-ups with my own opinions, watching actors go through all kinds of hell without any help, and working with both good directors and bad ones, I’m at the point where I’m ready to make my own pictures.” How right he was.