The Making of Lonesome Dove (TV series)

[Music] an epic adventure the big sky and wide-open spaces of the West a legendary cattle drive cowboy heroes larger-than-life brave adventurous women a boy and a nation coming-of-age Lonesome Dove the highest-rated miniseries in history captivated audiences and compelled critics to call it a television masterpiece based on Larry McMurtry's Pulitzer Prize winning novel Lonesome Dove tells the story of two lifelong friends former Texas Rangers just McCray and Woodrow F call who take off on the adventure of a lifetime paradise 2 here J Kelly sounds like a damn wilderness if you ask me they round up a herd and head north to Montana 2,500 miles away along the trail they are battered by storms [Music] cross snake infested rivers [Music] I track for miles without water [Music] they find new romance and old loves they take on horse thieves outlaws ripoff him dead what'd you come into this world naked I reckon you can go out the same way and Indians [Music] and meet an astonishing array of characters who made the West wild and dangerous place it was [Music] Lonesome Dove takes us along on a rollicking journey into the legendary world of the classic western join stars Robert Duvall Danny Glover Tommy Lee Jones Angelica Houston Diane Lane Rick Schroder and the movie makers as they take you behind the scenes for a rare inside look at the making of an epic Larry McMurtry's vision is rather unique and it comes from as close to the source as a writer can get a writer that's living today is a great American epic which happens to be said in the West well Larry wrote it with Peter Bogdanovich originally as a theatrical vehicle for Henry Fonda John Wayne and James Stewart but they never could make that work so Larry stuck it on the shelf for another six or seven years and then when he took it off the shelf he rewrote it and expanded it hugely you know into the novel in some death it's really a saga of the West it really tells the story and indifferently in a different light than any Western I've ever seen and plus it was a fabulous book it's simply one of those books that you couldn't put down I think I read it for three solid days and and you know and towards the end no couldn't couldn't bear to finish it so I'd put it down and run off and do something and then come back to it but it's it's it's it's like a wonderful meal that you can't bear to be over Academy award-winning actor Robert Duvall makes a rare television appearance as Gus McCrae at first they approached me for the other part and I said no I've done that let me let me try this other parts kind of part of doing on stage before but never was making film that kind of outgoing guy and I said that's the only part I want to do so I said give it to me I mean I'm ready you know I got in good shape and that was it maybe gustafson grades my favorite character I've ever played because I could bring you know many sides to the guy this guy was out he was like a libertine he was happy-go-lucky he lived a moment in his own personal way to the fullest each moment of each day even if it was boredom I felt was a privilege to play that part great part maybe Gustus my grades my favorite character ever played at least as good as Hamlet had a bore you got a good game going there got mutton years of what tyre will it be old-timer well I will do providing to get your quit during Cowboys ought to broom yourselves off where you walk in here you know I'm saying we need without customers bringing it in that'll be a dollar Augustus McCrae walk into a Shakespearean played only zone as a interesting personality I'm katma Gus's McCrae this is Captain Woodrow F call now if you care to turn around you can see how we look when we was younger the people around here wanted to make a senator now the thing we didn't put up with then was daunting service I never interesting guys really like off duty some of them were lawyers poets writers they put on plays sharp guys a lot of them but they like they had that vigil anything about it and they had to be had to be killers and yet they were you know interesting that's what McMurtry got in the book and in this and they and bill would have gotten the script as well as that that sensitive he's got it wasn't all one side so there was a no emotional side to them like you sometimes don't see in movies when was you the happiest and then he has it seem later in Clara's orchard where it's a little emotional for him reminiscing about the one woman he could never get and that's what their very reason he's on the cattle drive is to go see Claire up they know Galal of Nebraska I expected let's take him alive let me slip away like I did well you've always got you [ __ ] I would like to find those those moments when I'm working especially a guy like it where I tried to do with Augustus McCrae and you know go along with the character who knows something happens to what happens there was one scene in particular where Jake is hung there was okay in the directors and let's try it again so we did it again and something happened fantastic for me what he'll sport hope you won't hold it against me no harm [Music] something happened that it was so emotional and I didn't connect it just some took over me like it was a very real thing it was one of the best moments I've ever had in my career yes sir died fine didn't Emmy award-winner Tommy Lee Jones stars as Captain Woodrow F call he's then a law enforcement officer most of his life that's and you know and to a certain extent always will be he's a leader a leader of men uncomfortable in towns uncomfortable in the company of ladies believes in the great struggle between good and evil and he's on the side and good once wants the world to be good has an idea of what what a fine place the world could be if people would just act right not everybody does and those are the ones that he wants to talk to there are variations as goodness and evil and we learn that through the as we follow each character through this long journey from the Rio Grande River to Montana we learned that evil - sometimes with us when we don't know it and we find like the same things goodness participated in many situations where their lives depended on upon one another they have a lot in common they pretty much dedicated their lives to civilizing Texas thousands of men seized the corners in the gutter somewhere and wiped us out like the suit gets done Custer why they remember a shoe hey lady write songs about it 400 years the point will grow what they're all they're opposites in many ways Gus is an extrovert call as an introvert call loves to work just hates it a Gus loves to joke call doesn't go very much apart and now that you're back I think I'll ride into town see if I can't scare me up a little bit up I'm just trying to keep everything in balance Woodrow you do more work than you got to so it's my obligation to do laughs popular film star Danny Glover plays expert tracker Joshua Dietz I read the script which is roughly 400 pages and it held my interest it moved me and it had me thinking I mean I like that about something that I do that that the thought process goes further than just just the character the question of how good the character is or whatever but the process of men we all were all going through the same struggle we all come on this earth we all become part of nature in becoming part of nature that struggle that that calm and gusts go through and able to verbalize in the film no doubt it's the same struggle that Dietz goes through as well oenomaus kept well we ain't turning back I spend a lot of time riding when I first arrived it just listening just hearing and getting from becoming familiar with with the terrain becoming for me with the the elements and very natural things about the environment just sitting in the saddle Spurs the imagination in the way and crossing rivers and and listening just listening and watching and taking it everything around I make a basic assumption that that that even 100 years ago people 150 years ago 100 20 years ago 10 years ago people make felt the same things they starving captain you're done cut up one horse oh really my god you mean they stole our horse for me they real pol how they just having a picnic we had one ourselves the other day without nobody shooting at us ain't gonna shoot them just gonna scare him off so we can get her horses back believe him to you Nick Meyers down in there they'll pull the boys fly and came see melted dese don't don't eat [Music] when you're dealing with a situation where the person you want next to you is the person you want to count on in any kind of situation it arises and you want to be able to count on him in trust his reaction then you hire people based upon their skills and a lot of people were black celebrated Australian feature film director Simon winter I'm not very conditioned by Hollywood westerns and stuff like that so I think I've bought a fresh look to them the whole sort of western genre if you like and after all this is sermon hopefully a revival of the Western and we've really gone back to there the history books and not gone for the kind of Hollywood costumes and the way they wear their guns and in the Hollywood westerns and stuff but really how it was and you know that's been forgotten over the years I think and Americans have never been very good at looking at their past I think accurately and hopefully and then summed up we're doing that certainly the biggest thing that I've ever done and I guess for any film director it's probably as big as they come it's being made on a television schedule which is 16 weeks and basically not 16 weeks from making four films and every scene is large and has some you know animals and there are 89 speaking parts in the film and a normal day for us with the herd would be upwards of 300 cattle or 17 actors mounted a couple of pigs and a few wagons threatening as well what we've tried to do we have nine different towns you know each town has a different look people have jobs people aren't just walking about the streets they're doing things I don't think a lot of people have spent the money or just taken the trouble to do before that kind of detail we've got a terrific production design team who are really very supportive and and want to get it absolutely right - Simon's a fluster rated horse trainer his self I believe he's got a knack about photographing animals at night when we'd get done on Lonesome Dove when we had all the cattle and everything and he'd already I mean he'd probably worked harder than any of us on the show but he'd get on a horse at night and help us drive the cattle back to the holding pens I mean it he loves it he loves the West he loves animals and it shows up on the pictures that he does - Simon did such a wonderful job getting the landscape and you get a feel of just how hard it was to survive acclaimed film actress Diane Lane plays Larina wood I wanted to play lorina because she's such a dichotomy of emotions he or she is doing what she does she gets paid for her services a sporting gal I kind of like it don't you [Music] don't go up there with him please don't I have to your name I'm with Jake now Gus he knew that she's so frail emotionally but you don't realize that until you bring her out of Lonesome Dove into a world she's never experienced before she's always previous to when you see her in the screenplay in the book her history is she's been taken care of by men and that was it and mistreated or not she's always been sheltered pretty little thing you see life in San Francisco still just life you want only one thing too much it's likely to turn out at disappoint now the only healthy way to live it I see it is to learn to lack all the little everyday thing yeah like what like a sip of good whiskey of an evening or soft bed or a glass of buttermilk or say feisty gentleman like myself [Music] I wanted to work with Duvall you closed your pretty little eyes God that was a really wonderful experience for me to work with him he was very generous we had a great when she leaves on the trail she gets blasted with these experiences she could be broken and damaged and finished a broken spirit want to die that kind of if Gus Duvall's character wasn't her literally her knight in shining armor they shouldn't I know honey what they did you got a long time to live and you don't want to say dragging you back I see so you just cried I'm not old guys [Music] Academy Award winner Angelica Houston plays Clara Alan McMurtry's son done a tremendous amount for for the woman and you know in westerns by mere fact that that he's given all of us very defined characters and entered into our entered into these characters as fully as he's entered into the men's seeking mama doing everything Kim for somebody's coming Clara Alan its Gus's longtime love she lives near Oglala on the way to to Montana she's a rancher's wife her husband is sick he's been kicked in the head by a horse she's got two daughters she's his sort of ideal and had been that they being childhood sweethearts so who comes back [Music] we were both pretty honest she's called them half honest but I think you know there's a there's a basic understanding there's a deep and old friendship there's there's the affection that you have for someone that you loved a long time ago that never really goes away [Laughter] much about women but you don't you're way over in that regard I always thought she was a bit of a rebel and in her time and she's doing her husband's work in her own - so there's a certain sort of freedom about how she moves and how she looks and it's not it's not straight-laced pioneer woman I think it's really used to [Music] sometimes it seems like grave Diggins ah we do around here donut Joe what do you think happens when we die not too much you are just dead maybe it's not as big a change as we think maybe you just go back to we lived or your family wherever you was happiest she's seen a lot of trouble in her time she's lost three boys she's a very original character wonderful character extremely passionate she give that boy your name before you left Montana oh not to mention she's very honest very straightforward very judgmental I liked her a lot Golden Globe winner and television star Rick Schroeder plays mute well newts I guess the youngest cowboy on the cattle drive he's captain calls son and the thing I like about Newt so much why I really wanted to play him is cuz he has the most growth through this through this through this film it takes place over 17 to 20 yeah how far is it up north well up north in a place that it's a direction where we're going about 2500 miles thataway 2500 miles so um he starts out as a young boy and along the cattle drive he grows up to be a man so it really fits me perfectly because I mean I'm changing from a boy to a man camp next time and go over Mexico can I go believe I'm getting old enough now go quick you keep setting around all night talking that's going bit you see experiences love howdy ma'am skin in pants all the experiences death ain't nothing much we can do neut bit too many times no it's a newt and I are really one person but you know I use my emotions I use my feelings and that's what comes out and new so I mean the things he's feeling right now in the script is what I'm feeling in my own life it's also a Western which is a lot of fun I mean you get to wear a gun you can see I mean I love twirling my gun and riding horses and getting in fights I mean that's what this is all about you know when you have actors like Robert Duvall and Danny Glover and Tommy Lee Jones you can't go wrong I mean they come bail I guess they like me and they talk about acting we're talking about techniques and we talk about all this fabulous stuff I would basically get paid nothing to work with them but you know luckily I'm getting paid wrangler rudy Ugland as far as casting of the animals in the show you know we probably had 25 or 30 principles on that show and some of them I mean even though they look like cowboys on film some of those people had never been on a horse before in their life it was murder it was murder for someone who's ever ridden before for I guess nine days I was learning out a horse that grad but now I love it they were good students and they they learned to ride worked real well we've spent a lot of time with him and picked out the right horse for him and made him look like a cowboy and when they finished that show they were Cowboys a big long horn down I actually grabbed it around the horns and grabbed it by the neck and twist its neck and so this 300-pound bull down Bobby we've all worked on the ranch he'd probably be the best cowboy on the ranch when you look for a horse for him you're actually looking for a horse that a cowboy would ride you're not looking for trigger or nothing fancy like that you're looking for a cowboy horse that one shot with Bobby where he was riding across the plains in search of the Indians here Bobby come right in on this horse and they fired off a couple scripts in front of him before I want to tell you what this horse went to whooping it up I didn't like the head stuntman was very very nervous because if I get hurt that's it and if it had been any other actor except Bobby Duval it could have might have been a bad record they left it in the picture and I I think that's what made that pitcher so great is because everything was real in it Tommy's horse was a horse that was an outlaw a bronc captain called he wanted the horse that was feisty it had a lot of go to it basically the horse that he rode in that in that show was that type of horse this horse might buck you off at any time I mean in real life and he got along fine with him he didn't he done a really a good job with it we had a herd of anywhere from three to six hundred head of cattle and we caught probably kept about 8590 horses on the show the town stuff that we did we probably brought in another you know 5060 head of horses and wagons and you know usually start on a picture a couple months in advance just to find these animals that can handle the terrain where you're gonna go we spent weeks teaching him to drive teaching him to swim teaching him to be around a movie company that with lights and cameras we never heard a horse or a cow or a pig on that whole show and it's a good feeling when you know you've done a job where you never hurt animals you know and then there's the feeding of them the care of them and the Cowboys and the Wranglers that don't ever get in front of that camera that's better up at four o'clock in the morning to prepare these things to get to work by 7:00 and then after work is finished at 6:00 at night you know finishing up and finally unsaddle on their horses at 9:30 10 o'clock at night we had some awful short nights on that show and some awful long days we had four sets of pigs and they went from a month old to six months old to a year old to two years old to two and a half years old because they went all through the whole picture from Texas all the way to Montana and so they undertake this epic journey to and not only do they do what the cattle do they get caught and blizzards and dust storms and then swim across rivers and so forth they become lovable characters like many other characters in the piece they're terrific most of the actors didn't like working with the pigs because they know that when the pigs are on the screen they haven't got a chance I'd say that Jake and me of course but they're wonderful I think the audience are really loving because they're involved in many humorous situations [Music] custody of designer van Broughton Ramsay basically what I'm sister do is to read the script talk to the director and then interpret what he wants by sketches a lot of this was based on photographs this was Robert Duvall the amount of research that that Robert Duvall had done was staggering I'll take Davos hat we had narrowed down to basically three different styles and he tried them on to see which one he liked he took the hats he went this one no this one no this one yes it was a perfect hat you know when you put it on you know it you just know anything like everything else for the walls around it and then the boots were made by some guys in the other there was all one piece of leather and that day and age they wore the boots on the outside and they weren't quite the the advent of the western boot as we know it today the cowboy would hadn't come to be tried to give everybody in a a unique look [Music] this was like one of the dresses for Diane Lane and one of the things we came up with Britain anjelica huston the women characters were pretty much based on diaries from women and choices of clothes that they might have worn and then some from photographs until I'm dressed and that and I'm on set it's it's hard for me to to really get a bearing on on what the character is or a lot of it and in this case I I kept finding myself running back and forth to wardrobe and saying do you have a hat see that little sorrel over there with the star in his forehead I want you to have thank you very much ma'am newt was interesting because he was basically the youngest of all of them and we were trying to show a progression of him from being a young young boy and not having very much responsibility being taken along on this cattle drive to becoming the head the kind of overseer of this ranch once they got there we did that mainly through his hat because he was like wearing a discarded hat a hat that really didn't fit him that was oversized and it was obvious that someone had given this to him and then when he finally got to Montana he he had his own hat and developed you know sense of style about himself we kind of had to imagine what what are these clothes really going to go through I mean are these the only clothes that these guys own and if they've been on a horse for a year well then you really beat it up and you try to simulate what kinds of things that this person exposing is close to and what kind of dirt does he ride through sometimes there would be scenes when they actually had to ride through the dust storms and they bring up these enormous Ritter fans and huge sacks of dust and just dump the dump the dust in front of the fans and let it go over everyone again so I mean they were just they were just covered and so was the crew I mean you had everyone using their bandanas I mean you you just couldn't tell people a screenwriter an executive producer bill witless humor plays a real big bonus in this film but it is it is a humor that comes through character I mean the humor when it comes through character comes through that specific character rather than being humor that's late on just to get a smile or a lay I mean it's an integral part of the story it's an integral part of the character well we don't cuz the man that does like to rent pigs is it's hard to stop if there ain't bad enough to get all them Greek words on there - I told you would go a long time ago it ain't Greek it lat well it's a motto it just says itself you'll bottom you'll bottom feet double roll you know it invites people to Robert well first man comes along that can read Latin is welcome to Rob as far as I'm concerned I'd like the chance to shoot at an educated man once in my life it's humor that's very very authentic to the time you know when it was a rough kind of humor I mean where the only way you could get through some of those situations where people were dying and getting crushed under horses and so on was to find a way to smile at it and go on no no Mary just waiting [Music] production designer Carrie White there was a tremendous effort made toward being just as authentic as we possibly could be with the story and we it would have been easier to shoot it perhaps on some other place but we did shoot it built the town of Lonesome Dove right on the banks of the Rio Grande you'd look over there and there was Mexico it's described in the book as a dried up a little part of a town on the banks of the Rio Grande this is the bird's-eye view of the town of Lonesome Dove it that I did originally just from reading McMurtry's description we wanted to keep it just real simple real stark just as bleak and barren as possible here's some illustration of the Hat Creek headquarters little adobe building I wanted it to have be all shored up where the pigs have been digging onto the front porch here's a just a sketch that I did of Gus and Jake spoon if the springhouse we did as much research as we possibly could our primary source was really the the photographs that we could find you'd do some adapting and basically come up with the design it's like casting for parts in the show [Music] such a complex story that working with an Australian director he wasn't that familiar with the geography of the US so Simon asked me to draw a map what we did was try to find different terrain that would match where we were supposed to be because we did not make this trip from here to here we went from we went from Austin to down to Del Rio up to northern New Mexico and we had to make it look like it was occurring the entire country so like for example when we shot Clara's ranch outside of Ogallala Nebraska it should have been real flat we actually shot it outside of Santa Fe we were very careful in picking the angles to avoid then the mountains as much as possible then we doped barns and out structures to mask out other mountains the cabin that the ant creek outfit bills up in milk river we got this character named Neil Bowie who's a log cabin constructor Bill Z's hand handmade log cabins and if it looks real that's because old Neil was there instructing these guys how to build it Neil Bowie he dug the dugout log canoe forest it was seen indents for and looked just terrific it's a drawing of the whiskey boat which was actually a barge that they use in Austin Texas that we sort of remodeled into a 18-hundreds whiskey boat this is a drawing of the courthouse in Santa Rosa New Mexico where Blue Duck takes his dive [Music] this is a drawing of the Alamo and our hero's ride by the Alamo when they are make their little side trip to San Antonio to pick up a cook it's really exciting to to see it come to life because you start off with just words on a page and then it takes on a visual form and then it becomes a concrete form and you know then you got people in it and it's cameras rolling until you see don't film it's a wonderful thing to behold stunt coordinator Bill Burton everybody wanted to do Lonesome Dove every stunt man every Wrangler every cowboy in the United States wanted to do Lonesome Dove my favorite scene in the whole movie was the fight between Col and the Scout we blocked the whole scene two or three days in advance with Tony and myself and Tommy Lee Jones step by step Tommy obviously once do all of his own stunts and in that particular scene he did he actually rode the grey what they call the hell [ __ ] down the street and ran it into a black falling horse which Tony upper was riding and and it was like throwing a punch at camera he never made contact with the black horse and the remarkable thing that you couldn't do if you had a double doubling Tommy was he stepped right off the hill [ __ ] went around and kicked Tony in the face so if we'd have had to double Tommy Lee in that sequence he would have we had to make a cut of course so that was a nice plus having someone as handy as Tommy Lee yes and then we did the whole fight we blocked it all out days in advance and and rehearsed it every move was blocked executed every swing with branding there every punch every kick the only thing wasn't rehearsed was when the Bobby Duval has to write it and wrote Tommy me and pull him off Tony action to save his life the scene in the beginning of the movie that we did where they still go into Mexico and steal horses and it was done to get actual location all these horses and all these cattle they all have a mind of their own it's not like a car chase or a motorcycle scene where you turn the key off or turn the gas off these horses you know and they were wild horses they pretty much do what they want to do and it takes you a couple of nights of chase and I'm just even get them honed in and tired enough to where they're responding to you and and get them trained which direction to run in the film so you've got it stampede horses right by your lens and right by Musco lights and stuff all they want to do is go the other way and you talk about you know a couple hundred loose horses want all wanting to go 200 different directions and you've got ten people trying to control them tough job I had a horse fall down and go right out from underneath me in fact it's still in the film it wasn't featured in it if you look in that and it stampede at night you see this little horse off to there I believe it's the left hand side your frame fall and go down rolled over me and and I was sore for a long time after that really hurt me and you know of course the horse fall down rolls overtop mean he gets up runs off I mean you've got a couple of horses right by it's you gotta run for cover and then we bring the horses literally across the Rio Grande the end of the United States and right up the main street of Lonesome Dove to me it was was the Old West was America [Music] there's a huge variety of characters in this thing both good and bad both male and female both white and Indian and Mexican and so on I mean it gets an absolute panorama the West it's a grand adventure and great entertainment that's why people are watch it it's I think it's fabulous there's a book it was great and it's television I don't think you'll find anything much more entertaining than this rather well made and very beautiful it's exciting and adventurous and and funny and heartbreaking those are all excellent ingredients for improving an audience's time bankers lawyers all my cowboy friends they watch it every day I know guys that come home from bunching cows at night and they turn on they only might watching half hour but they'll watch it builder ranch this little Valley right I've seen it two or three times now already and every time I see it I I get a chill down my spine because it's it's not a movie it's real it's epic it's about love it's about life it's about violence it's about men and women it's about overcoming fear it's about bravery it's about adventure it's it's um it's classic Western real classic Western [Music] [Music]

Channel: David Masson Concept Artist

Views: 52,534

Rating: 4.8704453 out of 5

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Id: XpqKUMlBYYk

Length: 49min 30sec (2970 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 05 2020