Glen Campbell Is Awful

From what I understand, Campbell wasn't real crazy about doing the movie either, and it soured him on doing others. Apparently he and the director did not get along well. At least, that's what they said on TCM.

Glen Campbell was quite obviously not a world-class, big screen actor when he was cast in True Grit, but I disagree completely that the performance he turned in was awful. In my opinion, just the oposite was the case.

There are a number of different ways to look at this, forty years-on, and a number of different, then curent circumstances to look at when we consider the casting of Mr. Campbell in the role of La Beouf. First, we must recall that there were actually very few talents in 1968-1969 America that were any hotter than was Mr. Campbell. Especially new, young talent that wasn't expressly youth oriented. Mr, Campbell had a very broad apeal at that moment and I imagine any number of Hollywood producers were propbably more than a little anxious to exploit Mr. Campbell's popularity when True Grit was being cast. The part of the young Texas ranger had to have had all the ingredients of the perfect vehicle to introduce Mr. Campbell as a big-screen player. Both the actor and the character had much in common. Young, good looking and, most of all, each of their individual qualifications to successfully acomplish the job at hand were fairly unknown at the outset of both the film and the story. Glen Campbell also had a very obvious connection to all things Western through his music by the film's opening... even having hailed from Arkanas, the home of the fictional Matty Ross and her family.

Another similiraty between Campbell and La Beouf was their swaggering arogance.
La Beouf's came through the novelist's pen and Campbell's.... well, who can say other than that it had to have taken considerable guts and self confidence for ANYONE to agree to share scene after scene after scene with the legondary John Wayne... especially for one with vertually zero acting experience as was the case with Mr. Campbell. True Grit? I'd say quite a bit on the part of both Mr Campbell AND Mr. Wayne... not to mention the studio to agree to attempt this particular on-screen pairing.

Overall, I think when you consider the fact that Mr. Campbell had never done any serious acting prior to True Grit, he turned in a pretty credible job and the film would not have had the charm that it turned out to have had he not co-starred in it. Mr. Campbell did more than OK in my humble opinion... he also added an element of risk and, perhaps even a slight hint of danger by his very casting in what has turned out to be widely regarded as one of Hollywood's last truly great classic westerns!

He's not that bad. I've seen worse. For instance, Rick Nelson in "Rio Bravo". Much worse than Glen.

Disagree. To me, Ricky Nelson had charisma and was comfortable in front of the camera. Glen just comes off as a stiff with no natural acting talent.

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I just saw a TV special with Campbell last weekend and he poked fun at
how bad he was in it. But his rendition of the gorgeous title song
cannot be argued. Lovely ballad, beautifully sung.

From what I've read, this was NOT a happy set. Wayne had health issues,
drank in real life, and had no time to suffer fools. He was too much
of a no-nonsense legend. But he had to contend not only with Campbell's
insecurity and ego (Campbell was already a music legend and knew he
was out of his element in an acting role), but with Darby, who was noted
by many to be extremely difficult and aloof with The Duke. She was
super talented and pretty much ruined her own career due to her mammoth
bitchery. She also made the mistake of teaming with Campbell again the
following year in the forgotten stinker "Norwood." Today she teaches
acting. What a waste. She's sensational in the film.

"A lot of people feel as you do. I thought he was ok for the part since the movie was mainly about Wayne and Darby. I feel Clint would have been too old because the Campbell character was only about 30 years old. Jon Voight and Jack Nicholson would have both been great for the part but Jon was making Midnight Cowboy and Jack was making Easy Rider and these movies were what made them into big time stars. Another actor that could have done a good job would have been Bruce Dern."



lol. I could picture Nicholson sticking his face through a crack in the door yelling "Heres La Boeuf!!!"