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I don't have fun acting. I don't enjoy acting. I think acting is very painful. There may be those joy boys and joy girls who claim that acting is the stuff of life, but I think most artists find that their art is very painful and very laborsome and very difficult under the best of circumstances, almost a killing kind of process. You can have fun during a picture but there's also a great deal of creative pain involved in something like this for me. There's not much happiness in the creative process.
Clu Gulager
Clu Gulager grew up an only child on his alcoholic uncle's farm near Tahlequah, Oklahoma. Clu (the nickname means "Red Bird") is part Cherokee and is Will Rogers' cousin.
Clu Gulager
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William Martin Gulager
16 November 1928, Holdenville, Oklahoma
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Clu Gulager (born November 16, 1928) is an American television and film actor. He is particularly noted for his co-starring role as William H. Bonney (Billy The Kid) in the 1960-62 NBC TV series The Tall Man and for his role in the later NBC series The Virginian. He also appeared in the racing film Winning (1969) with Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, was the as the protagonist Burt in the horror movie The Return of the Living Dead (1985).
Gulager was born William Martin Gulager in Holdenville, Oklahoma, the son of John Gulager, a cowboy entertainer. His first cousin was Will Rogers (through his paternal grandmother). Gulager served in the United States Marine Corps from 1946 to 1948. He has Cherokee Native American ancestry.[citation needed] His nickname was given to him by his father for the clu-clu birds that were nesting at the Gulager home at the time Clu was born.
In the spring of 1959, Gulager appeared as Tommy Pavlock in the episode "The Immigrant" of NBC's The Lawless Years, a 1920s crime drama. In the fall of 1959, he appeared in the episode "The Temple of the Swinging Doll" of NBC's short-lived espionage drama, Five Fingers, starring David Hedison.
He then played Billy the Kid in the 1960-1962 NBC series The Tall Man opposite Barry Sullivan as Pat Garrett, and succeeded in portraying Billy as a sympathetic character without resorting to the 'misunderstood young man' portrayal so often used in such films as The Outlaw and The Left-Handed Gun. In 1961, he guest starred on the NBC western Whispering Smith, Audie Murphy's only attempt at series television. Gulager portrayed "Emmett Ryker" from 1964 to 1968 on another NBC series The Virginian starring with James Drury, Doug McClure, Lee J. Cobb, Roberta Shore, Randy Boone, and Gary Clarke. He appeared more than sixty times in other roles in film and television, including the film "Winning".
He starred with Lee Marvin, Ronald Reagan and Angie Dickinson in the 1964 version of The Killers.
Gulager is the father of film director John Gulager (contest winner in third season of Project Greenlight), and is the widower of the actress Miriam Byrd-Nethery who died in 2003.
He appeared notably in The Last Picture Show along with Cybil Shepherd and Ellen Burstyn. In 1977, long after his role on The Virginian, he appeared in Rod Taylor's unsuccessful NBC western series, The Oregon Trail, in the episode "The Army Deserter".
He appeared in his son John Gulager's Feast series of films as a shotgun-toting bartender.
He was also a featured player in director John Landis' darkly comedic 1985 film noir satire, Into The Night, a film rife with insider Hollywood cameos, as an FBI agent, courier of a cache of clandestine funds, which he grudgingly delivers to secure the safety of the film's two romantic leads, Michelle Pfeiffer and Jeff Goldblum. In an example of the film's dry humor, the glamorous leading lady and her tall, dark and nearly handsome hero find they are not in a position to object as the agent/courier (Gulager) angrily pilfers as many packets of bills from the treasure trove as he can resentfully stuff into his pockets in plain sight of them, before leaving the bewildered pair in a huff.
He appeared as Burt in the Dan O'Bannon directed 1985 cult classic, The Return of the Living Dead.
Father, John Gulager, was a Broadway actor-vaudevillian who worked with George M. Cohan.
Got nickname from his father for the clu-clu birds who were nesting at the Gulager home at the time Clu was born.
Clu and his wife, Miriam Byrd-Nethery, had two sons - John Gulager, born in 1958 and Tom Gulager, born in 1965.
Signed with Universal in the 1960s as a contract player.
Revitalized his career in the 1980s in scores of horror flicks that took advantage of his ever-growing, wild-eyed eccentricities.
Started out in experimental theatre in Paris under the guidance of actor Jean-Louis Barrault.
He was in the Marines, stationed at Camp Pendleton from 1946 to 1948.
Mentor and longtime friend of Patrick Thomas.
Attended Northeastern State College, Tahlequah, Oklahoma (now Northeastern State University) in the late 1940s.
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