The American Imports: Hollywood Stars in the Italian West
How washed-up character actors became international superstars.
A Second Chance at Stardom
In the early 1960s, many American character actors found their careers stalling. As the studio system collapsed and the traditional Hollywood Western fell out of favor, tough guys who usually played henchmen or sidekicks were struggling to find work. Then, Italian directors came calling.
Sergio Leone set the template by hiring a relatively unknown TV actor named Clint Eastwood for A Fistful of Dollars. The massive success of the film proved that American faces lent an air of authenticity to these European productions, and a flood of Hollywood talent soon followed.
The Legend of Lee Van Cleef
No actor benefited more from the Spaghetti Western than Lee Van Cleef. After years of playing minor villains in films like High Noon, his career had stalled to the point where he was working as a freelance painter. Leone cast him as Colonel Mortimer in For a Few Dollars More, transforming him overnight into a massive international star.
Van Cleef became the archetypal Spaghetti Western anti-hero: stoic, impeccably dressed, and effortlessly lethal. He went on to star in dozens of Italian films, including Sabata and Day of Anger, enjoying a level of leading-man status he never would have achieved in America.
Bronson, Palance, and Fonda
The Italian West allowed American actors to completely reinvent themselves. Charles Bronson, often relegated to ensemble casts in the US, became the ultimate enigmatic leading man in Once Upon a Time in the West. Jack Palance brought a terrifying, Shakespearean theatricality to his roles in The Mercenary and Compañeros.
Perhaps the most shocking transformation was Henry Fonda. Famously known as the moral center of American cinema (playing Wyatt Earp and Tom Joad), Leone cast him as a sadistic child-killer in Once Upon a Time in the West. It was a casting coup that perfectly symbolized how the Italian genre was subverting American mythology.
About the Author: Enzo Di Lucca
Enzo Di Lucca is a cinema historian and archivist specializing in European genre films.