Chuck Roberson

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  • Sorry, I stand by my comment. I'm sure Chuck was knocked thru the door , then a cut to Duke laying there. The part when Anderson jumps on Duke's back (and his character has his back to the camera), I'm sure is Chuck. You can usually see the difference in hair between Duke and Chuck (Chuck's head is a bit flatter, and hair is a bit curlier in back, plus on Duke you can usually make out the line between his toupee overlay and real hair). Plus the old addage-if you can't see the star's face, it's probably not him. Great scenes tho-

  • I was really surprised the first time I realised that it was Duke carrying Quincy. I think it was Duke who did the drunk fall off the horse too.


    He did an awful lot of his own riding in the Ford films, its usually him doing the galloping on flat ground and climbing up and down cliff scenes and they only use doubles for falls and really dangerous riding, galloping down dangerous terrain. Even galloping on flat ground and in those charge scenes took a really good rider, which Wayne was. He also had beautiful soft hands on the reins. You never see Dollar or Banner or Steel chucking their heads or roll their eyes because their rider yanked the bit to hard.


    Its Duke riding in the Indian raid in The Searchers but Chuck Roberson doubled in the galloping away from the Indians after they met Debbie, with Chuck Hayward doubling for Jeff Hunter. Incidently that is a scene where Chuck Roberson shoots "himself" . He is the Indian who fires the arrow that hits Ethan and then Roberson and his horse Cocaine do a massive fall down a sand slope.


    Roberson did the ride down the cliffs in Hondo, breaking his ankle when Cocaine did the fall in the gully. The fall is done in one take, Roberson and Cocaine go down and Duke who was hiding in the gully stands up.


    In the winter scenes in the Searchers, it is Terry Wilson substituting for Duke and in the beautiful yellow sunset scene it is Chuck Hayward. In the party scene where the stunt guys were doing the dancing, there is a lovely Ford moment where Chuck Roberson playing a ranger asks Ethan to have a drink , and then for no reason two of the dancers Chuck Hayward and Terry Wilson move into the group. It means Duke is surrounded by the 3 men who doubled him in the film, a nice little moment that not to many big stars would do.


    You can see it is clearly Chuck Roberson in a couple of the falls in McLintock in the fight in the general store. It is clearly Duke doing the gallop up the hill to the Indian hanging. Chuck Roberson is riding beside him.


    If you want to get an idea of what a good rider Roberson was, in the egg race in McLintock he turns around and mounts a plunging red horse and holds its still. The playing up horse is Cocaine, clearly looking forward to a gallop.


    Duke actually rides Cocaine in the Searchers. It shows what a good rider he was that he was allowed to get on Cocaine who was a pretty high strung horse. They must have decided it was better continuity to let Duke ride the stunt horse than switch horses as well as riders.


    It is Chuck Roberson who does the ride down the hill to the cave after Debbie but Duke sticking out the horse when it bucks as Martin tries to pull him off it.


    It is also Duke who rides at a gallop across the river when the Indians chase them. If you want to know how dangerous that river was watch one of the stuntmen and horses nearly get swept away in the Indian scenes. In the scene used in the film Ward Bond;s horse comes down with him and Jeffrey Hunter stops to help him, one of Ford's famous acident moments, not a stunt. There is an outtake in the documentary on the Searchers there is another shot of that river crossing where Wayne is riding at the back of the group and his horse goes down in the water and comes up with Wayne hanging halfway across the saddle as it plunges to get to its feet. Soaking wet and hanging off the horse he stays in character still shooting at the Indians.


    According to Chuck Roberson in his wonderful book The Fall Guy the stunt thta nearly injured Wayne badly he was not even doing. He was standing behind the camera when someone miscued a horse fall and they slide right into him with Wayne ending up under the horse. Ford nearly had an apoplectic fit apparently.


    The bucking horse in Hondo is Cocaine, blaze dyed out, with Chuck Roberson on him, with Duke getting on to do the close ups.


    In Angel and the Badman, Yakima Canutt does the first scenes, the jump and the running horse that falls, using Wayne's horse Banner, the only time you see Banner do a stunt fall but it is Duke who does the galloping in the cattle chase scene and alot of the buckboeard driving.


    I think Gail Russell may have driven the horses up at a gallop in the scene where Quirt sees her for the forst time. The angle make sit pretty hard to hide a driver and extra set of reins under the seat.


    In Stagecoach, Yakima Canuut did all the famous jumps onto the team of six but Duke did get on the lead horse and gallop it (bareback no stirrups) for the close up and jump off as it was pulled up from a gallop. He also, only at a trot, in the Western street drives the six up team which is probably the hardest thing to do of all the horse stunts in movies. Andy Devine was beside him ready to grab the reins if something went wrong but I cannot think of another western where you clearly see the star driving six horses even at a walk. They always cut from closeup to very long shot.


    By the way the answer to why Duke always rode big red whitefaced horses was because it was easier to get a match for Cocaine than keep dying Cocaine. And as an aside whenever you see in a western movie or TV show the hero or villian on a whitefaced red horse you know a horse fall is coming up. The three best falling horses in Hollywood were Hank Williams Coco, CHuck Roberson's Cocaine and Chuck Hatward's Twinkle Toes and all were red horses with white faces.


    And another aside, Twinkle Toes who would have been about 20 at the time was the horse that Duke rode to jump the fence in True Grit, and Cocaine was well over 25 when Chuck Roberson jumped him through the glass window in Chisum.

  • I would like to make a correction of a mistake that I see is made quite often. Dukes horse was named Dollor not Dollar. It's a derivative of a Spanish word for sorrow.

    ''baby sister i was born game and intend to go out that way.''

  • I think there were two horses. The one he rode in True Grit and the Undefeated (and Kirk Douglas rode in the War Wagon) I think was Dollor which Harry Carey said was a mean horse that kicked everything that came up behind it. The one he used in the later movies was Dollar but it could be the other way around.

  • "The bucking horse in Hondo is Cocaine, blaze dyed out, with Chuck Roberson on him, with Duke getting on to do the close ups. "

    except you can clearly see Chuck Hayward as the rider, not Roberson.

  • [quote='tinker','http://dukewayne.com/bb/index.php?thread/&postID=99406#post99406']I was really surprised the first time I realised that it was Duke carrying Quincy. I think it was Duke who did the drunk fall off the horse too.

    ***I think that was Jim Burke who took the fall. There's a cut right before and again right after. Then Duke is show on the ground but not quite in the same position as the guy falling off. No real reason to risk Duke especially since it was a backward-type fall where he could have been hurt.


    Roberson did the ride down the cliffs in Hondo, breaking his ankle when Cocaine did the fall in the gully. The fall is done in one take, Roberson and Cocaine go down and Duke who was hiding in the gully stands up.

    ***I may be mis-remembering, but I thought Chuck said in his book that due to his broken ankle, veteran Cliff Lyons actually did that fall into the gully (where Duke was laying unseen). The Duke popped up-very smooth stuntwork regardless!


    You can see it is clearly Chuck Roberson in a couple of the falls in McLintock in the fight in the general store. It is clearly Duke doing the gallop up the hill to the Indian hanging. Chuck Roberson is riding beside him.

    ****I think Roberson doubled Duke in the general store spot due to Duke having hurt his tailbone in the earlier wagon-jump scene.

  • Quote


    ***I may be mis-remembering, but I thought Chuck said in his book that due to his broken ankle, veteran Cliff Lyons actually did that fall into the gully (where Duke was laying unseen). The Duke popped up-very smooth stuntwork regardless!


    Read the book a few months ago and Roberson said it was him, they got it in the shot he broke his ankle.


    Quote

    "The bucking horse in Hondo is Cocaine, blaze dyed out, with Chuck Roberson on him, with Duke getting on to do the close ups. "

    except you can clearly see Chuck Hayward as the rider, not Roberson.


    Pretty sure Roberson says its him and Cocaine in the book. He describes using a bucking strap on Cocaine to make him buck but maybe he got pictures mixed up. He mixes a few others up.


    Good excuse to read the book again :)

  • I remember on the set of 'Cahill' that I thought Chuck Roberson resembled Robert Preston. Chuck was actively involved in setting up all the stunts for 'Cahill'. I also remember that when Chuck doubled Duke in the long shots, that wardrobe put him in padding to approximate Duke's build.

  • Hiya Joe-never thought about it, but Chuck Roberson DOES remind me of Robert Preston a bit too. I always thought Chuck could have made it as an actor. He had a reassuring presence in most of his short acting roles, that would have worked well for him.