"This Failed Blockbuster Killed Old Hollywood (and Maybe" Topic

… John Wayne, Too)

"John Wayne portraying Genghis Khan is truly an odd idea. The legendary western star approached the role of the Mongol leader as if he was playing a gunfighter—one with yellowface makeup, slanted eyes, Fu Manchu mustache, and eye-popping costumes to amplify the actor's physique. Yet, this head-scratching casting choice is merely a jumping-off point for the strange, monumentally disastrous, and even deadly story of The Conqueror, the 1956 epic movie made by RKO Studios and produced by billionaire mogul playboy Howard Hughes. The plethora of problems only began with the casting.

The movie fared well at the box office but struggled to earn enough to recoup its behemoth budget. Legend and rumors and politics would swirl like polluted sand in a windstorm for decades to come, but what The Conqueror did more than anything else was destroy Old Hollywood. The Golden Age came to a climactic close in the 1950s, and if one particular movie can be blamed for ending it all, it's this one. Killing John Wayne: The Making of The Conqueror, examines this unbelievable story like never before.

Fittingly, The Conqueror is associated with another great fear of the 1950s—nuclear fallout. The epic Asian-set blockbuster was filmed in Snow Canyon, Utah – some miles downwind of the Nevada Proving Grounds, where atomic tests had been actively underway just one year before the film shoot. Nuclear fallout from a bomb test in 1953 was swept toward the community of St. George and contaminated much of the surrounding area. John Wayne would die from cancer nearly two decades later, along with director Dick Powell, co-star Susan Hayward, actors Pedro Armendariz and Agnes Moorehead, along with countless extras and crew members…"

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Armand

Yet another legend that refuses to die. Most of the cancer deaths among the "cast and crew" of The Conqueror were among studio personnel who were never anywhere near the filming location. And Wayne's cancer was far more likely due to his three to ten pack a day cigarette habit than nuclear fallout.

And what destroyed the studio system was the US Government's anti-trust actions that led to the sell-off of the studio-owned theater chains (and the closing of two-thirds of the movie theaters in America). TV didn't help, either.

+1 rmaker.

I did some research on that cancer story a few years ago.
While I don't remember the details exactly, the percentage of people on the cast and crew who died of cancer was right about the national average at the time.

And yes John Wayne smoked a lot and had cancer twice, and beat it the first time.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek

Thanks.

Armand

The article states that The Flying Leathernecks is a "forgotten movie". I dare say that more people remember that movie over The Conqueror.