Happy Christmas and Yearly review 2022

Happy Christmas and yearly review 2022-

Considering that 2022 has been something of a quiet year, we have still managed to somehow conjure up almost 80 new posts which I hope you have all enjoyed. Of course, like any other year, a great deal of material continues to be added to the dedicated film or subject pages and are there for you to discover whilst generally browsing. 

I would also like to thank everyone who continues to send material to me in order to either use on the archive or just to add to the collection - so often it’s sent as a simple ‘thank you’ gesture and in return for the dedication and time I put into the Archive - You are all extremely thoughtful and I thank you, sincerely. 

So, a brief recollection of 2022:

We began in January with some rather nice rare bits of material such as FYC ads for Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, we had a nice photo opp which also featured Cimino and Clint, we also featured some rare Hang ‘em high material which was donated by our friends Lee Pfeiffer and Dave Worrall of Cinema Retro magazine. We also looked at the struggle to obtain Richard Jewel on Blu-ray within the UK - which was really the first sign of something much darker to come. 

In February I posted When in Rome… April 1964, which included some of my personal collection of rarely seen photos while Clint was in town for the filming of A Fistful of Dollars. I followed this up with When in Rome… The return visit. Spaghetti & Skateboarding, a collection of more familiar shots taken in Rome during 1965 and Clint’s return to film For a Few Dollars More. We also reported that Dirty Harry was scheduled to hit the big screen again at the BFI, and also posted On Location: Rare Candids from The Beguiled including some previously unseen photos. In February we also posted a lengthy feature on Clint’s Crew: Cinematographer Tom Stern which included a rare interview and the complete feature from International Cinematographers Guide Magazine. I concluded February with a fascinating look at the rarely seen Dollar Trilogy in German Paperback form. 

In April we reported about the shabby treatment afforded to Cry Macho in the UK, in Time gentlemen please? Have Warner Bros pulled the plug on Clint? We moved straight to a more positive vibe with Clint & Sondra Behind the cover: The Photo shoot for People Weekly Magazine, Feb 1978 which featured a superb assortment of rarely seen photographs. In mid April we also posted the A Fistful of Dollars Rare UK Double Crown poster and the Carmel Magazine cover shot of Winter 2020 which featured a wonderful shot of Clint in his youth. Also in April I featured a piece on The WMS Gaming Fistful of Dollars Slot Machine, including a rare piece of advertising from my collection. We also took a first glimpse look at Giuseppe Tornatore’s heartfelt tribute to film composer Morricone and featured the new trailer. And we rounded off April with a lovely full page advertisement for Clint’s Burning Bridges single kindly sent to me by Dave Worrall.

May 1st, I posted a piece I had written called Clint & Wayne in The Hostiles - the John Wayne / Clint Eastwood project that never happened. In May I also scanned and posted some rare magazine features such as OUI Magazine: Clint Eastwood Interview, June 1978, Clint Eastwood: Numero Uno! Cosmopolitan Magazine, Article from October 1975 and Rona Barrett's Gossip Magazine Article Circa 1974 Clint Eastwood: Champion of the Year. I also posted a very rare piece on The Man with No Name arrives in the UK. May also featured A Fistful of Dollars: Rare UK Teaser campaign in use, a set of super pages donated to me again by Dave Worrall showing the great Fistful of Dollars teaser campaign in use within the trade press. And keeping with the Dollar theme, we concluded May with a look at the MGM Dollar Trilogy Home Entertainment Campaign of 2000.

We kicked off June with a fabulous set of colour photos from the Magnum Force: Shipyard sequence, and featured a super Photo op with Clint and Don on location for Dirty Harry. We also featured The Enforcer Rare Set of 16 Mexican Lobby Cards. Half way through the year, there was a real sense that A Fistful of Dollars was shining through as the dominant focus of 2022 and that continued when I featured the Rare 1965 German A Fistful of Dollars 7” Single - First Pressing. Also in June we featured some great In the Line of Fire Rare Original 1993 Storyboards, and the ultra rare Dirty Harry UK Double Crown poster. We also posted another original Mediascene Magazine Article November - December 1973, and an original letter from Clint in reference to a print of Paint Your Wagon. 

In July we posted some funky Italian Photobustas from Dirty Harry, and also an original pamphlet advertising the Holiday Inn with a certain rooftop pool… also in July I posted an early Eastwood signed letter to a fan from March 1962, and reproduced an article on Clint’s memories of being a lifeguard at Fort Ord pool complete with some great photos on his return. To round off July we posted a seldom seen Joe Kidd poster from Greece.

We opened August with a major feature reproduction of Screenwriter David Peoples talks about the lost ending Clint Eastwood cut from Unforgiven and featured a Clint mini season Fox promo from 2004. I also embarked on constructing a picture feature for The Man who loved Cat Dancing Premiere. I also managed to locate a Paramount / Wink Paint Your Wagon colouring competition! Also in August I completed a restoration on NATO’s Male Star of the Year 1971 Rare Warner Bros One Day Advertisement, and a feature on The Fate of the Dirty Harry Trestle.

In September we reported on Clint’s involvement in the Why On Earth Documentary and a small feature on the The Clint Eastwood Youth Program of 1985-86. We also found proof that Paul Newman was to originally star in The Eiger Sanction!

October brought news of a major new French publication, DVDvision le mook Clint Eastwood & Dirty Harry (hopefully due out very soon), and I touched again upon the ongoing whispers around Clint at Warner Bros and the lack of a Blu-ray release of Cry Macho in the U.K. all in the post ‘A farewell to Silver Screen Legends?’ I’m not liking this continuing story at all - but feel obliged to keep touching upon it. 

In November I put together an original piece - Peter Tevis Pastures of plenty: The evolution of a theme which looked at the coming together of the Fistful of Dollars theme (A Fistful of Dollars rising to the surface again in 2022…), I also posted some great examples of the  Ennio, il maestro French Grande Posters. 

We opened December with a close look at a Rare Japanese The Good, The Bad and The Ugly LP which was new to most of us. It  was also great to feature our dear friend Sally Stevens again and her book, I Sang That. I also featured some very unusual Magnum Force 'endangered species' ads - which just had to be posted! We came full circle once again with the A Fistful of Dollars 6 sheet poster, one that hardly ever shows its face and sold in auction on Dec 21st. 

In Memoriam:

Sadly, 2022 also saw the passing of some working colleges and co-stars from the Eastwood circle of friends. We said farewell to Mitchell Ryan, Fred Ward, L.Q. Jones, Wolfgang Peterson and Irene Cara – all of whom made the Eastwood light shine so brightly and will be missed dearly.

Finally, Thank you to everyone for your continued support - and especially to my team of correspondents and helpers who do a fabulous job. 

Have a great Christmas and a very Happy New Year.

Darren, The Clint Eastwood Archive

The Rare A Fistful of Dollars 6 sheet poster!

A Fistful of Dollars 6 sheet poster sells in Auction

I’d been keeping a close eye on this incredibly rare poster for the last couple of weeks, and it finally sold last night with a final price of just over $4,000. The A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS 6 sheet poster (size 81" x 81") dates from the first 1967 U.S. release. This poster combined all of the teaser designs and their taglines - "This short cigar belongs to the man with no name. This long gun belongs to the man with no name. This poncho belongs to the man with no name." and the final design and the introduction to Clint’s iconic character - “This man with no name is played by Clint Eastwood - A Fistful of Dollars is the first motion picture of its kind, it won’t be the last”

It’s a real stunner which combined all of the main elements from the United Artists publicity campaign. Below is an image of the original poster and below that a digitally restored version of the poster which I worked on - just for fun and to present it close to how it would have looked, fresh off the print back in 1967. I have removed the fold lines, the joins in the sheets, the watermark and magnets and some slight creasing to the bottom left of the first panel and finally balanced some of the colour and shading. An absolute beauty of a poster. 

Clint Eastwood Photo Opportunity #33

Clint Eastwood Photo Opportunity #33

Here’s a rather cool shot I discovered recently which features Clint with film producer and once head of Paramount Picture, Robert Evans. They are pictured here at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on January 15th, 1967 where they were attending Super Bowl 1. The Green Bay Packers won the game beating Kansas City Chiefs 35 -10. Clint began shooting his first American film Hang 'Em High on June 27th, 1967. A great shot!

Rare Magnum Force 'endangered species' ads

Rare Magnum Force 'endangered species' ads

Here’s a couple of unusual newspaper ads for one of our favourites, Magnum Force (1973). Nothing that unusual about the actual images - however it’s the taglines used that I have never seen before. These ‘held over’ ads (5th Smash Week and 7th Smash Week) obviously meant that Magnum Force was doing great box office business, so perhaps those advertising boys decided to spruce up the tagline. Inspector Harry Callahan was now…

#1 on the list of the Nation’s endangered species! 

It's just a shame they couldn't spell Callahan correctly! You’ve just gotta love vintage advertising! 

Sally Stevens: I Sang That, Book (2022)

Sally Stevens: I Sang That, Book (2022)

I SANG THAT… From The Sound of Music to The Simpsons, to South Park and Beyond… 

A Memoir From Hollywood, by Sally Stevens

It’s great to finally see this book available. Sally remains a much cherished friend of the Archive. Her contribution to films such as Dirty Harry, Magnum Force and so many other Eastwood Classics remains pivotal and essential. But of course, there is so much more.

“Sally Stevens’ memoir is just like Sally…elegant, honest and full of music and history. The only thing that could make this book better is if Sally sang it!” 

~Marc Shaiman, Tony and Grammy Awards Winning Film & Theater Composer

“You may not know her name, but you’ve heard her voice a thousand times – in movies, on TV, in commercials and on records. And now Sally Stevens is telling her own story of success in the music business. It’s a colourful, candid and delightful memoir.”

   ~ Jon Burlingame, Music Journalist & author of The Music of James Bond

This book is a personal journey — an inside view into the world of music-makers who create the film scores, television music, sound recordings, commercials and concert evenings the public has enjoyed over the last sixty years.

It’s about a long career that began with concert tours – Ray Conniff, Nat King Cole, and later, solo work in concert with Burt Bacharach. From Variety TV in the sixties — Danny Kaye, Red Skelton, Carol Burnett – to sessions with Sinatra, Dean Martin, Elvis Presley and others in the early days, Sally Stevens’ work eventually expanded into singing and contracting choirs for over a thousand film and television scores for composers John Williams, James Horner, James Newton Howard, Alan Silvestri, Marc Shaiman and many others. It’s about thirty years of singing the humorous vocals and celebrity “sound-alikes” along with the main titles for The Simpsons and Family Guy. It’s a visit behind-the-scenes through twenty-two years as Choral Director for the Oscars, with on- and off-camera work on Grammys and Emmys broadcasts.

It’s also the more personal story, a humble background of growing up in a “his, hers and theirs” family in the forties and fifties, and how a shy little girl became a second-generation singer in the ever-evolving music business of Hollywood.

I can’t think of a better stocking filler for Christmas 

Details can be found HERE

Nice Job Sally! 

Rare Japanese The Good, The Bad and The Ugly LP

Rare Japanese The Good, The Bad and The Ugly LP

I’m constantly surprised by the number of variants that still surface when it comes to vinyl album sleeve designs. 

I recently (purely by accident) stumbled across this lovely album. 

Ennio Morricone and his Orchestra – 続 夕陽のガンマン  The Good,The Bad And The Ugly, is a Japanese first edition from 1967 which came in a gatefold sleeve. It was released on United Artists Records – with the Cat No YS-965-UA, it was also a Stereo recording. It was manufactured and distributed by – Nippon Columbia Co., Ltd.

Obviously this is a release that doesn’t surface very often, especially in any great condition - I did however find a sales history on it and discovered its average selling price is around £85, with the most expensive selling for £106. 

Clint Eastwood Photo Opportunity #32

Clint Eastwood Photo Opportunity #32

This month’s Photo Opportunity is something of an oddity. It features Clint with director Brian G. Hutton on location during the shooting of Kelly’s Heroes (1970). Clint is pictured hugging the actress Celia Kaye. Kaye had starred in Hutton’s first movie, the rarely seen Wild Seed which was made for Marlon Brando’s Pennebaker Productions and released through Universal some 5 years earlier in 1965. Kaye didn’t appear in too many other movies, but did marry director John Milius (co writer of Dirty Harry and Magnum Force) on February 26th, 1978. They had one child together and remained friends despite being divorced by 1987. As to why Kaye ended up on the shoot for Kelly’s Heroes, I’m afraid, is something of a mystery.