Clint Eastwood is about as towering a cinematic figure as they come, but back in the 1950s, he was just a struggling young actor looking for a break. In a 1971 interview with Rex Reed as recorded in “Clint Eastwood: Interviews” by Robert E. Kapsis and Kathie Coblentz, Eastwood recalled his early career when he was stuck playing a lot of “motorcycle hoods and lab assistants” on screen. A string of these bit parts had him on the verge of quitting altogether. That was, until “Rawhide.”
“I was visiting a friend at CBS, and an executive saw me drinking coffee in the cafeteria and came over and asked me to test,” he recalled. “It was a fluke.” That one moment of luck turned into eight seasons of solid work on the popular Western program, with Eastwood playing Rowdy Yates, the young right-hand man to Eric Fleming’s Gil Favor. Eastwood’s first main role on a TV series ended up propelling him to stardom.
“Rawhide” — which had one of the best theme songs of all time — ran on CBS from 1959 to 1965. By the time it was over, Eastwood was well on his way to becoming a movie star thanks to his work in 1964’s “A Fistful of Dollars” and its two sequels — even if it did take some time for critics to warm to Sergio Leone’s celebrated trilogy. Without “Rawhide,” however, none of that may have happened.
Rawhide was the fluke that launched a legendary career
“Rawhide” — which is part of the newly launched WEST: Western Entertainment Series Television network’s slate of shows — was the perfect showcase for Clint Eastwood’s talents, establishing him as a Western star and providing the actor with solid work following several years of smaller roles. It also served as a springboard for the young star’s significant movie career.
As Eastwood recalled, he left “Rawhide” in the sixth year to make the first of Sergio Leone’s Dollars Trilogy: “A Fistful of Dollars.” At the time, the actor believed it was the perfect opportunity to branch out. “I had nothing to lose,” he said. “I had a job waiting in TV and I knew if [‘A Fistful of Dollars’] was a flop nobody would ever see it anyway.” It would take some time for audiences and critics to come around to Eastwood’s “Man With No Name” character, but the Italian-made Westerns certainly weren’t a flop, establishing both Eastwood and Leone as big names in the industry.
Beyond launching his career, “Rawhide” — easily one of the best Western TV shows of all time — provided Eastwood with the security he needed to take the kind of risks that would turn him from a household name in the United States to a global movie star. Without “Rawhide,” one could argue that none of this would have happened, making it all one heck of a “fluke.”