Westerns

We'll listen back to a 1989 interview with actor Harry Carey Jr., who died Dec. 27. Carey co-starred with John Wayne in the classic Westerns She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, The Searchers and 3 Godfathers. He talked to Fresh Air about filming epic cavalry-versus-Indian scenes — and his most challenging stunts.

Hollywood stuntman Hal Needham — one of the most famous practitioners of his dangerous craft — died of cancer on Oct. 25 at age 82. We'll listen back to a conversation with Needham from Feb. 7, 2011, when he had just published a memoir, called Stuntman!: My Car-Crashing, Plane-Jumping, Bone-Breaking, Death-Defying Hollywood Life.

Author Petrine Day Mitchum tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies that show business horses have been known to develop an actor's affection for the camera, often coming to life when the director says "action."

Enter Me

Critic David Edelstein says that despite its irresistible plot, Antoine Fuqua's remake of the 1960 classic Western is ultimately "just another formula revenge picture."

Scott Frank's Netflix series is full of western cliches but with a twist. The town in his series Godless is run by women because the men died in a mining disaster. And there's a lesbian couple and an interracial romance.

The Coen brothers pay homage to old Westerns with their new film, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs. The movie is a collection of six stories that often subvert the expectations of the genre.

Paul Greengrass' new film, a Western set five years after the end of the Civil War, stars Tom Hanks as a former Confederate captain who travels from town to town, reading aloud from newspapers.

Author Glenn Frankel says the 1952 film High Noon was inspired by the toxic political climate of the time. Originally broadcast Feb. 21, 2017.

Tim McGraw has been one of the biggest stars in country music for years, but lately it's an acting role that's getting a lot of attention. He's currently starring with his wife, singer Faith Hill, in the Paramount+ Western TV series 1883.