John Wayne The Legend And The Man

The family photo abums, the classic film costumes, the telgrams and medals, from the internationally-beloved icon, The Duke! All collected here for the first time. An undisputed American icon, John Wayne is recognized the world over for his signature drawl and confident swagger; the ultimate personification of American courage and honor. This fall, John Wayne Enterprises has chosen powerHouse Books to produce the first-ever exclusively authorized photographic record of his life, both on-screen and off. John Wayne: The Legend and the Man celebrates Duke's life and legacy through film stills and backstage photos and snapshots ranging from his cinematic masterpieces-True Grit, Rio Grande, Sands of Iwo Jima, The Quiet Man, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Fort Apache, and The Alamo-to a surprising variety of early-career, leading-man films: The Big Trail, Stagecoach, Flying Tigers, They Were Expendable. Also included are a wide selection of fan mail art; family albums, photos from friends and loved ones, and the many treasures gathered over the years in his immense archive (famed film costumes, publicity photos exchanged with costars, telegrams and medals), many of the photos and these personal effects being published for the first time, and all from Duke's personal archive. Duke was more than just his on-screen persona-he was known by loved ones for his warmth, charm, charisma, passion, loyalty, and spirit. Through an in-depth expose of the memorabilia, the private moments, the inner thoughts, and familial memories, John Wayne: The Legend and the Man captures both the man and the myth and furthers the legacy of this giant of American cinema. "This wonderful collection of photographs gives us John Wayne the figurehead, John Wayne the actor, and John Wayne the human being. It's a rich experience to look through these pages and see where Wayne's three roles converged and diverged.... And in all the photos, you see another, earlier America with different ideas of glamor, beauty, fashion, and behavior, a world that now feels as distant as the renaissance. A movie-made hero...a superstar, one of the very first...an image of manhood...and a great American artist. This book affords us a generous look at John Wayne from every angle." -Martin Scorsese, from the Introduction "To the people of the world, John Wayne is the United States of America. He is what they believe it to be. He is what they hope it will be. And he is what they hope it will always be." -Maureen O'Hara "In my acting, I have to identify with something in the character. The big tough boy on the side of right-that's me. Simple themes. Save me from the nuances. All I do is sincerity, and I've been selling the hell out of that ever since I started." -John Wayne (Time, June 9, 1967)

This revelatory biography shows how both the facts and fictions about John Wayne illuminate his singular life.

A rare behind-the-scenes look at John Wayne: the legend, hero, and Hollywood icon of numerous epic Western films, including an Academy Award-winning performance in True Grit. No legend ever walked taller than “The Duke.” Now, author Michael Munn’s startling new biography of John Wayne sets the record straight on why Wayne didn’t serve in World War II, on director John Ford’s contribution to Wayne’s career, and the mega-star’s highs and lows: three failed marriages, and two desperate battles with cancer. Munn also discloses publicly, for the first time, Soviet dictator Josef Stalin’s plot to assassinate Wayne because of his outspoken, potentially influential anti-Communist views. Drawing on time spent with Wayne on the set of Brannigan—and almost 100 interviews with those who knew him—Munn’s rare, behind-the-scenes look proves this “absolute all-time movie star” was as much a hero in real life as he ever was on-screen.

Almost two decades after his death, John Wayne is still America’s favorite movie star. More than an actor, Wayne is a cultural icon whose stature seems to grow with the passage of time. In this illuminating biography, Ronald L. Davis focuses on Wayne’s human side, portraying a complex personality defined by frailty and insecurity as well as by courage and strength. Davis traces Wayne’s story from its beginnings in Winterset, Iowa, to his death in 1979. This is not a story of instant fame: only after a decade in budget westerns did Wayne receive serious consideration, for his performance in John Ford’s 1939 film Stagecoach. From that point on, his skills and popularity grew as he appeared in such classics as Fort Apache, Red River, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, The Quiet Man, The Searches, The Man who Shot Liberty Valance, and True Grit. A man’s ideal more than a woman’s, Wayne earned his popularity without becoming either a great actor or a sex symbol. In all his films, whatever the character, John Wayne portrayed John Wayne, a persona he created for himself: the tough, gritty loner whose mission was to uphold the frontier’s--and the nation’s--traditional values. To depict the different facets of Wayne’s life and career, Davis draws on a range of primary and secondary sources, most notably exclusive interviews with the people who knew Wayne well, including the actor’s costar Maureen O’Hara and his widow, Pilar Wayne. The result is a well-balanced, highly engaging portrait of a man whose private identity was eventually overshadowed by his screen persona--until he came to represent America itself.

John Wayne - A Western Celebration celebrates 2007 as Duke's Centennial year since his birth in 1907. It is a stunning, oversized coffee-table book showcasing the entire and rare, Western poster collection in full color, of every one of Duke's Westerns - 85 full page color posters with a 250 word synopsis about each movie. Additional pages include superb artwork and design highlighting various aspects of his career as America's most popular and beloved cowboy.

"John Wayne remains a constant in American popular culture. Middle America grew up with him in the late 1920s and 1930s, went to war with him in the 1940s, matured with him in the 1950s, and kept the faith with him in the 1960s and 1970s. . . . In his person and in the persona he so carefully constructed, middle America saw itself, its past, and its future. John Wayne was his country’s alter ego." Thus begins John Wayne: American, a biography bursting with vitality and revealing the changing scene in Hollywood and America from the Great Depression through the Vietnam War. During a long movie career, John Wayne defined the role of the cowboy and soldier, the gruff man of decency, the hero who prevailed when the chips were down. But who was he, really? Here is the first substantive, serious view of a contradictory private and public figure.

Follows the legendary John Ford through a career that spanned more than five decades, drawing on dozens of personal interviews, material from Ford's estate, and film criticism.

New York Times Bestseller Named one of the best books of the year by: Parade The Guardian Kirkus Library Journal The true story behind the classic Western The Searchers by Pulitzer Prize-wining writer Glenn Frankel that the New York Times calls "A vivid, revelatory account of John Ford's 1956 masterpiece." In 1836 in East Texas, nine-year-old Cynthia Ann Parker was kidnapped by Comanches. She was raised by the tribe and eventually became the wife of a warrior. Twenty-four years after her capture, she was reclaimed by the U.S. cavalry and Texas Rangers and restored to her white family, to die in misery and obscurity. Cynthia Ann's story has been told and re-told over generations to become a foundational American tale. The myth gave rise to operas and one-act plays, and in the 1950s to a novel by Alan LeMay, which would be adapted into one of Hollywood's most legendary films, The Searchers, "The Biggest, Roughest, Toughest... and Most Beautiful Picture Ever Made!" directed by John Ford and starring John Wayne. Glenn Frankel, beginning in Hollywood and then returning to the origins of the story, creates a rich and nuanced anatomy of a timeless film and a quintessentially American myth. The dominant story that has emerged departs dramatically from documented history: it is of the inevitable triumph of white civilization, underpinned by anxiety about the sullying of white women by "savages." What makes John Ford's film so powerful, and so important, Frankel argues, is that it both upholds that myth and undermines it, baring the ambiguities surrounding race, sexuality, and violence in the settling of the West and the making of America.