The Harder They Fall, the Black Western in theaters now and on Netflix on Nov. 3, owes a tip of the Stetson to Woody Strode, one of the NFL’s first Black players (he signed briefly with the Los Angeles Rams in 1946), who later found a niche playing strong, silent types in Westerns.
Part African American and part Native American, Strode’s first big break was in 1960’s Spartacus, as the Ethiopian gladiator whose death sparks a rebellion. It was on the set of 1959’s Pork Chop Hill, a Korean War film, that Strode met John Ford (though Ford was not the director; Lewis Milestone and star Gregory Peck shared the credit). Ford was so impressed with Strode, he gave him the starring role in 1960’s Sergeant Rutledge, a Technicolor Western about a U.S. Cavalry sergeant falsely accused of raping a white woman and killing her father. Warner Bros. wanted Sidney Poitier, but Ford pushed back, saying he wasn’t “tough enough” to play Rutledge.
Released two years before To Kill a Mockingbird, Rutledge is one of the first mainstream Hollywood films to address racism frankly. Strode appeared in several subsequent Ford films, though never in a starring capacity. He served as a caregiver to Ford in his final years and was at Ford’s deathbed in 1973. Strode worked in B-movies through the ’70s and ’80s and acted as the narrator for Mario Van Peebles’ Black Western Posse in 1993. He died the following year at age 80.
This story first appeared in the Nov. 3 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.
