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The two 1956 movies that inspired classic rock and roll songs

Mon 8 June 2026 18:00, UK

If rock and roll was the prevailing method of outraging America’s stuffy older generation back in 1956, then John Wayne and the Hollywood old guard were among its prime targets.

Despite fostering a reputation as a cultural icon of America, the famously scathing actor was openly disapproving of the younger generation’s penchant for rebellion.

Let us not forget, after all, that Wayne was born in 1907, and his moral code was inevitably at odds with the wild rebellion of the rock and roll age. You only need to take a look at Wayne’s later propaganda flicks like The Green Berets to get an idea of what he believed America’s young people should be doing, rather than forming rock and roll bands. In a cruel twist of fate, though, Wayne was actually responsible for inspiring a major rock and roll classic.

By the time that rock and roll first commandeered the airwaves during the 1950s, Wayne had already been a fixture of the silver screen for multiple decades, and for the young songwriters carving out the scene, he was a pretty unavoidable cultural touchstone. Buddy Holly, for instance, spent many a day taking in Wayne’s westerns at the local picture house in Lubbock, Texas, so it was only a matter of time before the cowboy hero cropped up in his musical output.

Taking inspiration from the catchphrase of Wayne’s character in The Searchers, Holly recorded ‘That’ll Be The Day’ in 1957, having been to see that legendary western film the year prior. Although the rest of its lyrics had little to do with the film, it was Wayne’s catchphrase that gave the track its throughline and helped it to become one of the most iconic hits of the 1950s.

Not only did it make a star out of Holly, but it changed the rock airwaves forevermore given the sheer amount of artists who cite the track as a major influence.

It isn’t clear whether Wayne knew about his impact on rock and roll at the time, and, if he had a view on Buddy Holly at all, the actor kept it quiet throughout his life – an unusual feat for him. Ultimately, though, ‘That’ll Be The Day’ wasn’t even the only rock and roll track that had the cinematic offerings of 1956 at its core.

Outside the realm of the western, another major picture released the same year as The Searchers was the crime film Slightly Scarlet, starring the similarly-named but entirely different leading actor, John Payne. A classic film revolving around a crime boss, crooked cops, and a healthy amount of soft-focus love interests, the film might not have had quite the same cinematic impact as The Searchers, but it had a similar part to play in inspiring The Four Seasons’ legendary track ‘Big Girls Don’t Cry’.

That line was uttered in the film by John Payne’s character, and Bob Gaudio quickly used it as a spark of songwriting inspiration, writing The Four Seasons’ track after having woken up after a screening of the presumably not terribly engrossing film. Released in 1962, the single wasn’t quite as fast off the mark as Holly and ‘That’ll Be The Day’, but it nevertheless became one of the band’s defining singles.

Music and cinema have always enjoyed a close relationship, but 1956 seemed to be an unexpected golden age for leading actors named John, inspiring rock and roll masterpieces. It might have pained Wayne (and perhaps Payne) to admit it, but the actors were responsible for two of the era’s best-loved rock anthems.