George Takei And John Wayne: Star Trek Actor’s Opinion About The Duke May Surprise You

George Takei has fond memories of working with Hollywood legend John Wayne even though they were ideological opposites.

Takei, a.k.a. Mr. Sulu from the original Star Trek TV series, is an outspoken social and gay rights activist who presumably is considered a liberal/progressive. John “Duke” Wayne was on the conservative Republican side of the political spectrum.

Wayne, who passed away in 1979, is still in the top 10 of America’s favorite actors, according to the Harris poll, the only actor to appear in the survey since 1944.

Irrespective of politics, Wayne wanted Takei to join the cast of his 1968 pro-military, Vietnam War film The Green Berets, a non-favorite of movie critics which nonetheless often shows up on the cable TV movie channels. Takei was against the U.S. involvement in that war at the time of the production.

In an interview, Takei told NPR’s Terry Gross about his conversation with John Wayne about the film:

I told him that ‘I’m one of your opponents in the political arena. I’m opposed to the war, and I’ve been active in the peace movement.’ And John Wayne gave me that famous squint of his that I remember seeing in all the big closeups that he got — whether it’s Fort Apache or the Wake of the Red Witch. And he said, ‘George, I want the best actor I can get. You know, we’re American citizens, and we have our right to our opinions. I have mine, and you have yours. And I respect that. But I want the best actor I can find.’ And so, he cast me in that. And I thought that was very revealing of the kind of man John Wayne is. He’s a very decent guy.

Wayne’s approach was far different than the norm in contemporary Hollywood. As has been well documented, it can be a career-killer in the entertainment industry now to hold to a view that differs from the Democrat/liberal agenda.

In an audio clip uploaded to YouTube in which John Wayne talks about this political views, he explains that he always thought of himself as a liberal and was taken by surprise about being branded as a right-wing, conservative extremist. Unlike what he called the “new liberal group,” Wayne noted that he always kept an open mind about issues: “I have listened to everybody’s point of view that I ever met, and then decide how I should feel.” Wayne added that the portrayal of Native Americans in his westerns was always dignified.

The Huffington Post offered an explanation of what it called John Wayne’s “uncanny endurance” and popularity: “But around the world, whenever John Wayne played a cowboy or a soldier, he was America. Wayne’s persona — its bigness, roughness, but also its decency — literally came to define our heritage. And to a surprising degree, it still does.”

An NPR essay about the iconic actor’s career declared that “I’m moved by his film’s portrait of an America whose confidence had yet to be shaken and by Wayne’s uncynical ability to embody virtues that are well worth preserving: the contempt for pettiness and love of hard work; the courage to be lonely in pursuing your goals; the respect for individuals in all their cussedness; and above all, the willingness to fight and die for a cause bigger than yourself. All of that is John Wayne, and it’s neither male nor female, conservative nor liberal. What it is, and always was, is American.”

[image via s_bukley / Shutterstock.com]

Are you surprised at all about the praise that George Takei has for John Wayne?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPe2hXSTTPU