Clint Eastwood Talks About His Acting Career

Clint Eastwood On The Roles He’s Most Proud Of… and the Ones He Wishes He’d Never Done

With his acting career nearly spanning 70 years, Clint Eastwood has been pretty open about his favorite and not-so-favorite roles over the years.

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Of all his film projects, Eastwood seems to be the proudest of the 1992 movie, Unforgiven. While speaking to the Los Angeles Times, the actor spoke about that role and what it meant to him. “I would never make a Western, just to make a Western,” he explained. “It has to be the story.”

Clint Eastwood also said when he reads a script, it’s tangible. He either likes what he’s reading or he doesn’t. “And I also believe in things being the way they are. I’ve had a distinct persona based on certain successes in certain areas, but I don’t know quite why that is or what it is. I also don’t know how to counteract that. If it’s something I’m perfectly happy with and it’s going to change with maturity, then I’ll let it go its natural course. Maybe it would have wrecked my career if I had been more analytical.”

Eastwood also praised his 1980 western Bronco Billy as well. “I always loved it,” he said about the role.

Clint Eastwood Admits His Musical Picture Experience Didn’t Go As Planned

However, there is one role that he wasn’t a fan of. According to Far Out Magazine, Eastwood discussed his role in the 1969 musical Paint Your Wagon. The film was bad on the Broadway show.

“I was crazy enough to try anything,” Clint Eastwood said about the role. “I’ve always been interested in music, my father was a singer, and I had some knowledge of it. Although what I was doing in that picture was not singing.”

Clint Eastwood notably signed on for the role due to having some high expectations going into it. The musical was originally described as gritty but due to a series of rewrites, it ended up being a “middle-of-the-road” family musical. After noticing the changes, Eastwood thought about bailing on the project. However, he was later convinced to come back.

After deciding to stay in the production, Eastwood stated the script was “much lighter” and it didn’t have the dynamics that the original script had. This led to another long shoot. After six months, the actor admitted he was very much done. “That was not as pleasant an experience as I was used to,” he recalled.

However, despite his failed musical experience, Clint Eastwood said there was one other project that made him reconsider his acting career. He once said that his 1958 film Ambush at Cimarron Pass was “probably” the worst film ever made. Eastwood admitted that after seeing the film twice, he thought he was through with Hollywood. “I’ve got to go back to school,” he thought at the time. Eastwood also thought he had to do something else. “I’ve got to get a job of other sorts.”

Thankfully, he pushed through the experience and went on to make amazing films, including The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.