Picture Perfect
Almost thirty years ago, tiny Archer City was invaded by Hollywood: Peter Bogdanovich and company came to town to film Larry McMurtry’s The Last Picture Show. Here, Bogdanovich, Cybill Shepherd, Jeff Bridges, and others in the cast and crew look back at the moviemaking experience that changed them—and us—forever.
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Bridges: When we were in Archer City there, shooting, somebody would nudge me and say, “Look, there’s the real Duane.” A lot of these characters were still walking around. All of us, the young guys especially, were fortunate to link up with a young fellow named Loyd Catlett. He was a young kid living in Wichita Falls at the time, and he was hired to play a part and to also coach us in dialect and just for us to observe and see what growing up in Texas was like. He was a wonderful help and a great friend to us all.
Platt: The hardest thing about making the movie was the climate, because we needed to shoot summer sequences and we got there in September. We started shooting in October, and we were desperate to get finished before Christmas. And we had to do the summer sequences in the coldest, freezingest—and only people in Texas know what I’m talking about, that wind coming down, right across the plains, flat, flat, flat. So the climate was hostile, and we had to have the kids in the movie—I was just a kid myself—but we had to have the kids in this little scanty clothing.
Neachmal: When we were shooting in the main part of town, there was [a restaurant], I think it was called the Golden Rooster; we would always go in there, and while we’d be waiting, Ellen [Burstyn] and me, a woman we met at the restaurant would sit with us. And one day she was just beside herself. She finally burst into tears and said that she was married and everything, and we knew she was married anyway, and she was crying so uncontrollably. And we were consoling her and feeling very sorry, and she said, “No, not my husband; my lover.” I mean, we were in the middle of Last Picture Show without even realizing it.
THE CAST
Chason: [Peter] pretty much had Cybill in mind going in. He didn’t really want to see anybody in Texas for the role of Jacy. However, I got him to agree to look at one actress in the state of Texas for that role, a girl from Dallas by the name of Patsy Calmes. I know the name Patsy Calmes doesn’t ring any bells because Patsy moved to New York City and changed her name and got a job in soaps and is still working to this day. Now she lives in L.A., and the name that she changed her name to is “Morgan Fairchild.”
Bogdanovich: Cybill was the only person I ever considered for the part. I saw her on the cover of Glamour magazine. I had never bought Glamour or even noticed it, but for some reason her expression on this one particular cover caught my attention in the supermarket, and I bought the thing and asked my assistant to find out who the girl was. And I went to New York and I thought she’d be perfect. She had a kind of offhand, destructive quality. I remember she came in to see me with her agent or her manager—I was at the Essex House, on Central Park South—and she came in wearing a Levi’s jacket and Levi’s jeans, a big girl. I had just had breakfast, and I was sitting on the couch with the coffee table in front of me and the remains of my breakfast—you know, sometimes they put a flower in a little vase, a little rose? So she sat on the floor on the other side of the coffee table, and we’re talking, and she kind of offhandedly was fiddling with that little flower. And the way she did it, I thought, “Well, that’s kind of the way she plays with guys, just kind of offhandedly.” And that little gesture made me feel that she could do this part.
Platt: When I saw [Cybill’s] picture—Peter leaves me out of this story—but I saw it and said to Peter, “Doesn’t she look like Jacy?” We were shopping in the supermarket; he would never be in a supermarket without me. Well, it was interesting, because I had very high standards, and she was perfect. She had this sexual chip on her shoulder, certified, and I’ve never seen anybody who was more—she was gifted, a very gifted girl.
Bogdanovich: Polly had nothing at all to do with the casting of the movie. And of course I was in the supermarket alone. At that time in my life I chewed toothpicks, and I remember going to the supermarket on the way to the office to pick some up. Polly was already at the office, so she couldn’t have been with me.
Shepherd: About the magazine cover and everything? I don’t know who found it. What I always knew to be the case was Peter saw it in the grocery store and said, “Find this girl. That’s Jacy.” But now I’ve also heard that Polly says she found it. But, you know, who cares? It’s like who designed Chartres.
S. Bottoms: I’ve always thought of Texas as my home away from home because I was, of course, discovered there, as an actor, and I’ve done some other work there. I never had a chicken-fried steak till I went to Texas. I never had a pecan pie till I went to Texas. I ate my first peanut pattie in Texas. A lot of firsts for me in Texas.
Bogdanovich: First day of shooting, as we were driving through town I saw this kid sitting on the steps; he was just sitting there, with his knees up, just sitting and watching. And I said, “Wait, stop the car, lemme get out a minute.” And I went over and I said, “Who are you?” He said, “Well, I’m Sam Bottoms. I’m Tim’s brother.” I said, “Can you act?” He said, “Well, I don’t know.” I said, “You wanna be in the picture?” And he said, “Sure.” He had braces all over his teeth, and I said, “Can you take your braces off?” And he said, “I don’t know. I’ll have to call my mom.” And I said, “Well, go ahead, and if they let you do it, you can be in the picture.” And that’s how he got in the picture. He just looked right.
S. Bottoms: I didn’t read the script. I didn’t read the book. I didn’t know what the story was about. I’d just come to work when they’d tell me to and I’d just stand where they’d tell me to.…Larry was real nice. He came out to the set. He paid me a nice compliment. He said, “I always kind of imagined Billy looked something like you.”
Bogdanovich: Not only was John Ritter in the running [for the part of Sonny], he was the runner-up. His father came in to see me, with John—that’s how I met Tex Ritter. I had met John, I liked him, and he read, I think, three or four times for the picture. Tex wanted to play Sam the Lion; he was sort of the runner-up for that. And he would have been good. I thought Ben was wonderful, though. Ben turned the picture down four times. I finally got John Ford to call him. Ford told him, “What are you gonna do, be Duke’s sidekick the rest of your life?” Of course, Ben called me after that, and he said, “You put the old man on me.” I said, “Ben, I really want you to do this.” “Oh, Pete, I don’t know,” he said. “There’s too many words in this picture. There’s too many words.” I told that to Ford, and he said, “Yeah, he always says there’s too many words. He said there was too many words in She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. He just likes to ride.” Finally, in the last meeting with him, I said, “Ben, you don’t understand. If you do this picture, you’re gonna get an Academy award; you’re gonna get a nomination at least.” When I said it to him, he got angry. He said, “Why do you say that?” And I said, “Because I think so.” “Goddammit,” he said. “All right. I’ll do the goddam thing.”
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