Why John Wayne was banned from working with his favourite co-star: “Someone didn’t know dick”
Like many of the biggest stars tend to do, once John Wayne had become established as one of Hollywood’s most marketable leading men and consistent box office draws, he began assembling an inner circle of friends and frequent collaborators with whom he made multiple movies.
John Ford is the most famous, but their association predates the birth of ‘The Duke’ as audiences came to know him. The two had been familiar with each other since a fresh-faced Marion Morrison first tried to break into the business as an extra and prop boy, and their bond became career-defining for both.
Other members of Wayne’s regular crew included director Henry Hathaway, screenwriter James Edward Grant, stuntman Yakima Canutt, and actors like Paul Fix, Ward Bond, Harry Carey Jr, James Stewart, and Ben Johnson. They were a tight-knit group, although only one woman was allowed entry.
‘The Duke’ and Maureen O’Hara hit it off from the moment they first met, and they instantly tried to find a movie they could make together. That didn’t happen until 1950 when they played the leading roles in Ford’s Rio Grande, and they soon made up for lost time by re-teaming for The Quiet Man, The Wings of Eagles, McLintock! and Big Jake.
Their relationship was strictly platonic, with Wayne describing O’Hara as “my only female friend” and “a great guy,” and she was comfortably his favourite human co-star. If that sounds odd, it’s worth remembering that ‘The Duke’ singled out a horse as being his greatest screen partner of all time.
Still, despite their effortless offscreen chemistry, convincing a studio to pair the duo in a feature was an entirely different and much trickier proposition. When Wayne signed on to play Johnny Munroe in 1947’s adventure film Tycoon, he only had one actor in mind to be his love interest, Maura Alexander.
However, his paymasters disagreed. After originally agreeing to cast O’Hara, the studio decided to renege on its gentleman’s agreement with ‘The Duke’ and exercise its contractual option to pull her from Tycoon and parachute her into Sinbad the Sailor opposite Douglas Fairbanks Jr instead, with Laraine Day replacing her. Needless to say, he was pissed.
“Some bright spark at RKO decided we were mismatched or something,” he told Michael Munn. “And so they decided to put another actress in the part. Obviously, someone at RKO didn’t know dick.” It would be another three years before Wayne and O’Hara got the chance to appear in the same film, and it was only natural that Ford would be at the helm.
The Quiet Man was supposed to come first, but once again, the studio got in the way. After declaring that it didn’t stand a chance of making any money, the trio were effectively blackmailed into shooting Rio Grande first so that they had a profitable picture under their belt before turning their attention to the passion project.
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