“He was a very colourful, profane, outspoken character”: the director who made a huge impression on Gregory Peck
Based solely on his stoic demeanour and penchant for playing straight arrows, Gregory Peck gave off the impression that he was a very hard man to impress.
During one of the most legendary careers in ‘Golden Age’ Hollywood, the actor was every bit as principled offscreen as he was when the cameras were rolling, with Peck one of the rare A-listers who was openly critical of the House Un-American Activities Committee during cinema’s communist witchhunt.
Speaking out in opposition was detrimental to many careers, but Peck was simply too popular and talented to be torpedoed. From his debut in 1944’s war drama Days of Glory to his final big screen role in Martin Scorsese’s remake of his own classic Cape Fear, he was a man who exuded gravitas and authority.
Peck was never a troublemaker, a party animal, or a headline magnet like many of his peers and contemporaries, and he maintained that innate dignity when he evolved into an elder statesman. That being said, he appreciated a good rabble-rouser, leaving him blown away by the fire, which was still being shown by an actor and filmmaker almost 30 years his senior.
Raoul Walsh was a trailblazer, a pioneer, and a legend, with his contributions to cinema including a starring role in the influential The Birth of a Nation, giving John Wayne the first leading role of his career in The Big Trail, helming the timeless White Heat with James Cagney, and becoming a major touchstone for a number of future greats, one of whom was Clint Eastwood.
In a conversation with Film Talk, Peck recalled accompanying Walsh to a seminar he was fronting at the American Film Institute, where he was astounded by how he continued to carry himself. “He was about 91 at the time,” he recalled. “He was a great character, wearing his eye patch. He still rolled his own cigarettes.”
Under most circumstances, a 91-year-old man with one working eye doesn’t sound like someone who’d take the younger generations to task, but Walsh was different. “He was a very colourful, profane, outspoken character from an earlier time,” Peck said. “He was tougher, more independent, and had more self-confidence about his way of life and his code of behaviour, without compromise.”
During the seminar, one of the students who clearly wasn’t familiar with his work asked if it was true that he used to be an actor, with Peck remembering how Walsh silenced the entire room; “He said, ‘Sonny boy, I played John Wilkes Booth, the man who shot Lincoln, in The Birth of a Nation. And there he was, sitting before them. There was a moment of silence, and then they stood and applauded. It was like seeing a ghost, but there he was.”
That would turn out to be one of his final public appearances, with Walsh passing away at the age of 93 in December 1980, but Peck would never forget how little more than a quick reminder of who he was could silence an entire auditorium.
