MovieChat Forums > The Tall Target Discussion > Will Geer and some food for thought........

Will Geer and some food for thought...........


We all know [well not all of us I suppose] that the leading character in this excellent movie is intriguingly named John Kennedy. It's interesting to note that the actor Will Geer also appeared 22 years later in the very good movie "Executive Action" which was all about a conspiracy to kill President John Kennedy. In addition to this there was, back in the 1990's, a JFK conspiracy theory alleging that JFK's driver fired the fatal head shot. The Driver's name ? Not quite Will Geer but pretty close......William Greer.

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Fantastic piece of trivia. Darn close in name. You know that John Kennedy worked for Lincoln and Kennedy's personal secretary's last name was Lincoln.

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I was surprised that Will Geer got the part, since he was blacklisted in the 1950's for his leftist views. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about that:

Geer was blacklisted in the early 1950s for refusing to testify before the House Committee on Un-American Activities. As a result, Geer appeared in very few films over the following decade.

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Will Geer had worked the previous year with director Anthony Mann on Winchester '73. It may well be that Mann and Dore Schary despised McCarthyism and liked Will Geer.

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This was probably Geer's last film before being blackballed.

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Geer had a handful of roles in 1951 before being blacklisted. His next film role (apart from the suppressed Salt of the Earth) was in Advise and Consent in 1962.

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despised McCarthyism


Joe McCarthy had nothing to do with the blacklist. He was a senator, never in the House. HUAC was a House committee. My dad never liked the Waltons because Geer and Ralph Waite were leftists, LOL.

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close but no cigar

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