When Clint Eastwood became a real hero and saved a man’s life: “I saw that look in his eyes”
For the last 60 years audiences have grown accustomed to seeing Clint Eastwood play heroes of varying degrees, but on one occasion life was forced to imitate art when the actor and filmmaker sprang into action to save a man’s life.
The four-time Academy Award winner has played good guys, embodied antiheroes, and brought to life characters who operate on the greyer side of morality, but when the cameras aren’t rolling, he doesn’t think twice about dropping everything and swooping in like a guardian angel to prevent disaster.
Unforgiven‘s William Munny famously said it’s a hell of a thing to kill a man, and Eastwood simply couldn’t stand back and watch when it almost happened right in front of his eyes. Unlike many of the hard-nosed and gun-toting characters he’s played, it wasn’t a villain he had to deal with but a rogue piece of cheese.
That’s right; one of the most legendary figures in Hollywood history laughed in the face of danger when he utilised every ounce of his action-hero credentials to prevent death by dairy during a post-golf tournament dinner when the looming spectre of the Grim Reaper began hovering ominously into view.
It’s never nice to make light of such a dicey situation, but the way Eastwood described saving a man from choking on a nugget of cheddar made it sound almost comically foreboding. “I saw that look in his eyes,” he told the Carmel Pine Cone. “And saw that look of panic people have when they see their life passing before their eyes.”
That sounds like something Harry Callahan would say, but his solution to the problem most definitely was not. “I gave him three good jolts, and that got it out,” he said of expelling the cheese in a manner not dissimilar to Father Merrin’s attempts to rid Regan of a demon in The Exorcist. “And then I made him drink a big glass of water with a bunch of lemon squeezed in it.”
Eastwood confessed that he’d never performed the Heimlich manoeuvre before, but the first time turned out to be the charm when Steve John lived to fight another day, even if it would be sensible to remove cheese from his diet in the aftermath of a near-death experience to prevent the same thing from happening again.
“Clint came right up behind me, and he knew exactly what he wanted to do,” the subject of salvation remarked. “He did the Heimlich manoeuver, and he lifted me right off the ground. He’s strong. The cheese popped out, and I was fine.”
It’s maybe not the most heroic example of an A-lister and icon jumping into the fray to prevent certain death, but how many people can honestly say Clint Eastwood saved their life, whether it was cheese-related or not?
Never Miss A Tale
The Far Out Clint Eastwood Newsletter
All the latest stories about Clint Eastwood from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.