The new Phil Stern’s exhibition (John Wayne between scenes) just opened his gallery in Los Angeles. Peter Stern, his son, share with us his memories.
“The Odd Couple: Phil Stern and John Wayne”
Phil Stern first worked with John Wayne in the 1950s, at the height of the McCarthy era-the “Red Scare” in America. “We were like the odd couple,” Phil says. I was a lefty and he was a right-wing. Whenever we got loaded we’d have terrible political arguments.” Wayne was a rabid anticommunist (he later joined the ultraconservative John Birch Society.) Some of Phil’s friends had lost their jobs in the movie industry because of the affiliations-or alleged affiliations. Phil used to tell Wayne he thought the loyalty oath was a crock, and the infamous blacklist an affront to the Constitution. Wayne would retort that Phil was a “bomb-throwing Bolshevik,” and Phil would counter with: “You’re a Neanderthal fucking fascist!”
None of this affected Phil’s fascination with Wayne as a subject. Sometimes when the two were drinking together, he would study Wayne’s ravaged, disaffected face and think: “I am sitting here with the biggest American icon of them all-the template of authentic Americanism. This is the guy who created his character in The Green Berets to justify the Vietnam War.” Wayne seemed indestructible: the cowboy personified, the last frontiersman, the Western hero. Then, without thinking, Phil might start creating the pictures in his mind that he wanted to shoot of Wayne. Phil imagined photographing just his enormous hands. Or his thick wrist, which was always adorned with a gold bracelet.
Phil never took those imagined photos [maybe as close as he got was “Flying Fists” taken in 1955 which is displayed in a 6’x4′ print in this exhibition] but did go on many of Wayne’s family trips, attended many of their family functions such as weddings and birthdays. Many of the photos he took during this time are in this show, and depict Wayne in a much kinder, gentler, manner. Wayne’s devotion to family is engraved in each image.
Phil took a definitive picture of Wayne [again displayed in large format at show] on location in Texas, where he was directing, producing and starring in The Alamo. Wayne is conferring with his mentor John Ford, who’d dropped by the set. Both men are in semidarkness: Wayne is in silhouette, so you can’t see his face-but “The Duke’s” profile is unmistakable.
Ultimately, Phil’s photographs of Wayne illuminate the actor’s innate elegance and grace. Consider the image of Wayne in plaid shorts and a cowboy hat, with a leather bag slung over his shoulder, another key image in exhibition. There is a serenity about Wayne in that picture that belies his tough cowboy mystique. Again, Phil showed his remarkable ability to discover what lies beneath the public image of a well-known figure.
Here are two of Phil’s favorite stories that may give some insight to a complex man: John Wayne.
I was in the USSR on my first visit in 1959 doing general coverage for my agency. While there I went to the main post office in Moscow and found the most graphic stamps with the largest images of Stalin and Lenin that I could find. I put them on postcards and addressed them to Wayne at his Newport Beach home. About a year later in a meeting he said to me, “I did get those postcards from Russia, you son of a bitch!” That was his catchphrase, he used it all the time. Like the time I pointed out his son Jonathan Ethan Wayne’s monogrammed initials on his luggage (“You son of a bitch!”)
We were once in Durango, Mexico – the middle of nowhere (I digress – but he shot there a lot because of the lack of telephone and telegraph poles, as his pictures were set in the 1800s. Mexico gave him the wide vistas he needed.) He had a turbo jet airplane that he used like most people used like station wagons to transport his family to locations. They’d never come out to the actual location – it was too remote. It was Pilar and Ethan (I think it was the trip with the luggage, actually.) Anyway, Wayne was getting made up and Ethan said to him, “Daddy, why do you make these movies in the ‘middle of nowhere’ as Mommy says?” and Wayne said, “To keep Mommy supplied in tennis balls!”
Peter Stern, Director
Phil work is represented by Creative Photographers Inc at the end of the article.
John Wayne, Between scenes, photography by Phil Stern
Until december 10, 2011
The Phil Stern Gallery
601 S. Los Angeles Street
Los Angeles
California 90014
TEL: 213.488.0138
