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AUDITION 4/13/2013 5:58:01 AM
In the 1950s, I went to Hollywood to audition for Sugarfoot, an early ABC-TV offering at Warner Bros. I went because Jock Mahoney (Sally Field’s dad) said I was a natural for the part and would probably get it (I did not; it went to Will Hutchins, a local actor who was a year older than I, but the audition was great fun and vacationing in LA was a hoot; my novel Tycoon! is based loosely on that experience.)
On the way to LA, I changed planes in Chicago, and while in the 1st class lounge at O’Hare, I ran into Johnny Carson, Susanne Pleshette and their spouses.
How do you know Jock Mahoney? Carson asked, seemingly genuinely interested.
He was a guest on my TV show in Rochester, I explained. Carson, whom I had never met previously, seemed surprised that I actually had a TV show of my own. Mahoney was in town with the circus, I said, so I nabbed him for an interview. He said I should try out for Sugarfoot and to call him and have dinner while I’m there out there.
Hmmmm, mused Johnny, no longer, I was sure, surprised; just bored.
I never did have dinner with Mahoney (he had given me his home phone number in the San Fernando Valley, but he was out of town while I was in LA. I did, however, visit with Steve Ellis, a Kraft Television Theater leading man, who lived in Brentwood with his wife.
He too encouraged me to audition for the ABC-TV series. He even picked me up at my hotel and took me out to his home for dinner. Then he loaned me his car and gave me directions how to get to the studio. What a guy!
(Background: His brother Gene had been a friend of my Rochester colleague, Ken Powell, when they worked together at CBS in New York).
The pilot of Sugarfoot (called Brannigan’s Boots) was to include co-stars such as Dennis Hooper, Slim Pickens and Kurt Russell, and was scheduled to be produced by Warner Bros and directed by Irv Moore; the exec producer was William Orr. Will Hutchins was a tentative star but auditions were still open.
The first thing the casting director asked me was, Can you fence? Not certain how much fencing was required for a Western role, I answered, Sure. Who cannot? Her second question was Can you ride? Lying further, I said, of course. I was practically born in the saddle!
The audition scene was simple enough. I was to mount a horse tethered just outside a saloon front, after I had fallen through the swinging doors, then get on the horse and ride at a full gallop to the end of the phony street, spin the horse about and return to the spot where I had begun, dismount, drop to my knees and draw my 6-shooter, emptying it at the three bad guys pre-arranged to come out of the saloon.
The first snafu occurred when I was unable to slip the knot that held the reins where the steed was tied to a hitching rail. Instinctively, I took out my Swiss Army knife to slice the animal free. Then, not so instinctively, I tried to mount the horse from the right-hand side.
Had I succeeded, I would have been ass-backward in the saddle!
The steed, however, being a true Hollywood veteran, saved me and circled around so I could put my left foot in the left stirrup, grab the saddle’s pommel, and pull myself up in a professional manner. It was not easy, but once aboard, the horse took off at a full gallop — as I held on for dear life!
At the end of the street the animal screeched to a halt and reared up on his hind legs; I should have rolled off backwards, but instead I stayed firmly anchored in the saddle and raised my prop department Stetson in a wave of dramatic derring-do (Johnny Mack Brown, eat your heart out!)
When the horse raced back to the faux-saloon, I tumbled to the ground just as the three bad guys exploded through the swinging doors. Desperately, I whipped the 6-shooter from my holster and fired it blindly at the desperados. Click, click, click, click! — even the blanks were against me!
The bad guys kept coming. In a moment of sheer panic, I got to my feet and bravely faced them. In one last moment of inspired bravado, I flipped the gun about, grabbed the muzzle and flung the malfunctioning piece at them with all my might! Luckily, it did no greater damage than dent the swinging doors.
Cut! Cut! the director shouted. Cut, for cripesake, before he kills somebody!
Needless to say, Will Hutchins signed his contract the next day. Sugarfoot, they tell me, ran for four seasons. I never missed watching an episode, and I was certain the dent in the swinging doors was never repaired.
Hutchins appeared in several less-than-monumental Hollywood epics after Sugarfoot ran its course, but to my knowledge does not have his hand or foot prints enshrined in cement near Grauman’s Chinese Theater. He is now in his eighties and lives with his second wife in NYC.
A fellow announcer back in Rochester, Bob Trebor, said after I returned, I am surprised they did not hire you, anyway. Hollywood is always looking for weak-chinned, gross-looking leading men with bad posture and big noses. I figured you were a natural.
