A Dollar For the Dead Article





Remember this classic scene from one of Sergio Leone's spaghetti Westerns?

A Man With No Name stands belly up to the bar in an old West saloon. There's a shotglass of whiskey in his hand. Another man steps up behind him and draws a gun. But with lightning quickness, our hero drops the shotglass, goes for his gun, spins and shoots his would-be assailant, reholsters his weapon and catches the whiskey glass before it hits the floor. Not a drop is spilled.

You say the scene seems familiar, but you can't place the Leone movie in which it took place? Was it Clint Eastwood in "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly"? Charles Bronson in "Once Upon a Time in the West"? Actually, you haven't seen it yet. It occurs in "Dollar for the Dead," a Leone-like film that stars Emilio Estevez as, well, let's call him another Man With No Name. Producer Stan Brooks had always wanted to make a western and finally he was able to make his dream a reality. "I met a gifted screenwriter named Gene Quintano, who had a number of great Western scripts on his shelf," Brooks recalls. "We made up our minds to get a Western made. I got one script to CBS, but I couldn't get anybody to order it. Then, about 10 months ago, TNT called. They said, 'We're looking for something for Emilio Estevez' " He remembered Quintano had worked with Estevez in "Loaded Weapon," a spoof of "Lethal Weapon."

"Gene had written and directed 'Loaded Weapon,' so I said, 'Do you think Emilio would do one of your Westerns?' And Gene thought he would. Emilio...had a history of doing Westerns and even knew how to ride. And Gene had a script that was a true homage to the spaghetti Western. "Emilio liked it and said yes. And then Turner ordered it the next day after they read it. So off we went." "Dollar for the Dead," will air in October on TNT.


Article typed and contributed by Marcie for PRESENTING...EMILIOJ!!!