Why didn't he serve?
For a man who built his career around playing guys with bravado and patriotism to spare I'm surprised he didn't leap at the chance to sign up.
shareHe did serve for a while in WWII.
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MovieChat Forums > John Wayne Discussion > Why didn't he serve?
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shareAssuming he wasn't drafted or signed up during peace time (I can't answer that question). If you're asking why he didn't sign up during combat, it was probably same reason my grandfather didn't, Age. He was born just before WWI, so he was too young. By WWII, he would have been mid thirties so he was getting too old.
shareJimmy Stewart was the same age as John Wayne (well, a year older) and he served.
shareSome people thought they served better making movies. By the end of the War, they were calling up men in their forties. They didn't know if they'd need them to storm the Japanese mainland or not. The estimation I heard was that it would have taken 1 million men.
John Wayne was by no means the only rough, tough Hollywood actor who didn't serve. Cagney didn't, for instance.
The story told about Stewart was that he was too tall for his weight, so they were going to give him a 4F, but he asked that they just fudge the numbers a little. I don't know if that's accurate, but it makes for a good bit of Hollywood PR. It's my understanding he also flew in Vietnam. I could be wrong about that. Henry Fonda served at the height of his Hollywood popularity. Bing Crosby and Bob Hope served in the USO.
David Niven and Laurence Olivier left Hollywood and joined the British army, as soon as war was declared.
It didn't take long before Olivier was politely asked to stop crashing airplanes and please make some films that would help British morale, but Niven had been an army officer before he became an actor, resumed his commission, and was at the D-Day invasion of Normandy. His friend and former roommate Errol Flynn never served and was later rumored to be a Nazi sympathizer, and Niven never held it against him.
James Stewart rose to the rank of Brigadier General in the Air Force Reserve.
He was exempt due to the amount of kids he had. He felt he could serve the country better by making war films. He ended up regretting that decision.
shareWas the exemption optional, or absolute? Would one of the armed forces have taken him if he'd insisted?
And did he have the nerve to criticize draft-dodgers during the Vietnam War?
Lots of actors played guys with bravado and patriotism to spare, yet didn't actually fight in any wars. It's called acting. Wayne was never a cowboy, either. Cagney and Robinson were never criminals. Lugosi wasn't a vampire. So what?
John Wayne was conflicted about military service. He wanted to join, but the US got into the war just as his career, which he'd been working to get going for over a decade, was starting to take off. He was also the sole support of his family. He put off enlisting, waiting for a more opportune time, then put it off again. Eventually it was too late. He didn't feel good about it at the time, and he regretted it afterward. Fortunately, today Wayne's lack of military participation is only an issue to his bashers, who are irrelevant because he continues to be a huge star more than four decades after his death.
Sounds right.
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