Where was paint your wagon filmed

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The site is located in Baker County, Oregon in the Eagle Cap Mountains along East Eagle and Jack Creek.

www.oregonicons.com/paintyourwagon.htm

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Coordinates:   45°1'17"N   117°20'7"W

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This small interpretive site commemorates one of the areas used during the 1968 filming of the movie "Paint Your Wagon" . The photogenic area was chosen for the mixture of open pine forests and meadows that give way to the rugged Wallowa Mountains in the Eagle Cap Wilderness in the background. Scenes of the movie were shot here along East Eagle Creek as part of the "No Name City' scenes, in Forshey Meadows in the southern Wallowa Mountains, and up at Anthony Lakes (site of the Starbottle Saloon).

In 2018 Baker City and other local communities celebrated the 50th anniversary of the film.

At a Glance

General Information

Directions:

The interpretive site is located about 31 miles north of Richland, Oregon. From Richland head north for 3 miles on the New Bridge Road to Newbridge; Turn left on the Sparta Road (dirt surface) and travel 13 miles to the East Eagle Creek Road; (turns into Forest Road 70); On the East Eagle/Forest Road 70 travel north about 6 miles to Forest Road 7020;  Continue on Forest Road 7020 to Forest Road 77 for 4.6 miles and cross Eagle Creek; On Forest Road 77 travel for a short 0.1 miles and take the East Eagle Creek Road (Forest Road 7745) for 3.7 miles to the site. Be advised that there are many sections of private land along East Eagle Creek between the Forest Road 77 and the interpretive site.

Parking:

 Limited parking in the meadow

Activities

Dispersed Camping

 Large meadow offers dispersed camping

Interpretive Areas

Lee Marvin drank real alcohol throughout the production, even though director Joshua Logan fought him about it. In most movies, the actors and actresses drink tea for whiskey and water for vodka. Marvin would only work if he got real liquor.

Lee Marvin was apparently drunk nearly every day of filming.

Following The Sound of Music (1965)'s lead, director Joshua Logan decided to shoot on-location. He commissioned a huge mining town in the middle of Oregon's Blue Mountains, which was painstakingly constructed over seven months. This caused this movie to run wildly overbudget before filming even began. The location caused logistical nightmares: cast and crew slept in tents on-location, constantly running low on filming supplies, food, and other amenities. The stars were taken to and from the location by helicopter.

Filming climaxed with director Joshua Logan dynamiting the set, a fitting end to a long arduous shoot.

Jean Seberg (Elizabeth) described Lee Marvin's (Ben Rumson's) singing as "like rain gurgling down a rusty pipe".

In his memoir, Alan Jay Lerner relates that Anita Gordon, his first choice to dub Jean Seberg's singing, had faded from view by 1969, as the studio system had dissolved and movie musicals were rarely produced. But he was convinced that Gordon was the best match for Seberg's speaking timbre. When all of his attempts to locate the elusive Gordon failed, he contacted the Screen Actors Guild in one final attempt to track her down. When Lerner told the phone operator at SAG that he was seeking a singer named Anita Gordon, he received a shock when the operator responded that she herself was Anita Gordon. And, with that, Miss Gordon played her final hand in Hollywood as Seberg's voice double.

Lee Marvin (Ben Rumson) was set to star in The Wild Bunch (1969), a project that he helped put together with stuntman Roy N. Sickner, when Paramount Pictures offered him $1 million, plus a percentage of the box-office take, to star in this movie.

Clint Eastwood and Jean Seberg had an affair during filming in Baker County, Oregon. Jerry Pam, a publicist for both actors at the time, told Seberg biographer David Richards in 1981: "Once they got back to Paramount, it was as if Clint didn't know who she was. Jean couldn't believe that he could be that indifferent to her, after everything that had gone on in Baker. She was a very vulnerable woman, and it was a terrible trauma for her." At the same time, Eastwood was having yet another affair with one of the extras. Speaking on condition of anonymity, she told Seberg biographer Garry McGee in 2008: "We had an affair for two years. Since I was involved with Clint at the time, he pulled a few strings and got me work on the film." When asked if Seberg knew about Eastwood's other involvement, the woman said, "No. She had no idea." Online gossip has since identified the unnamed extra as Danielle Cotet, but this is unconfirmed.

Lee Marvin and director Joshua Logan became fast friends, and he developed a genuine fondness for Logan's two teenaged children. Logan was amazed at the contrasts in Marvin's character. Raised as a Southern gentleman, he always tipped his hat for ladies and referred to older men as "sir". But he also started drinking beer the moment he arrived on the set. If his drinking ruined a shot one day, he more than made up for it the next with a letter perfect performance. A few weeks after this movie came out, a New York City gossip columnist printed a story about Logan and Marvin having an on-set fight which climaxed with Marvin using Logan's boots "like a dog uses a fire hydrant." When Logan's children pointed out the article, he set the story straight with a letter stating, "Lee Marvin is a very close friend of mine and we will stay friends for many years to come. It is true that we have had a few mild discussions, never any violent ones. Lee Marvin is a great Southern gentleman. Therefore, when he is sober, it is absolutely impossible for him to have done such a thing, and when he is drunk, which he is once in a while I must admit, he is really drunk. He staggers and careens in such a way that he wouldn't have the aim."

This movie ultimately cost twice its original budget.

Released at a time when musicals were rapidly going out of fashion, this movie was notoriously over budget and behind schedule, opening to mostly negative reviews. It was not the huge box-office success that the producers had hoped it would be. Clint Eastwood's experiences on this movie inspired him to form his own production company, Malpaso, saying that working on this movie had shown him how not to make a movie.

The shoot attracted local vagrants and hippies, who stole food and supplies from the set. Logan cast them as extras, though they refused his instructions to cut their hair or wear period clothing. Eventually the extras organized a makeshift union, demanding twenty-five dollar a day payments and commissary bags full of food for fellow hippies. Director Joshua Logan, aggravated by an overlong shoot and lacking replacements, gave in to their demands.

Mariah Carey was named after the song "They Called the Wind Maria".

The song "Hand Me Down That Can of Beans" was performed by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, who were also extras in the movie. The band is most famous for singing "Mr. Bojangles".

Joshua Logan wasn't impressed with Oregon's natural flora, importing pine trees from Hollywood to augment the local forest.

Clint Eastwood claimed to have seen three different versions of this movie: the director's cut, the producers' cut, and the studio's cut. He said that the version prepared by director Joshua Logan, whom he greatly admired, was easily the best, "but that wasn't the one that was released".

This movie version bears little resemblance to the Broadway musical on which it was based. After the success of several musical movies in the 1960s, most notably The Sound of Music (1965), producers went looking for other projects to make, and "Paint Your Wagon" made the list. The original plot, about an inter-ethnic love story, was discarded as being too dated. The only elements retained from the original included the title, the gold rush setting, and about half of the songs. In the play, Elizabeth has a minor role, Pardner (Sylvester Newel) does not even appear, and Ben Rumson dies at the end.

Alan Jay Lerner micromanaged the production, overseeing filming and constantly countermanding director Joshua Logan's decisions. This drove Logan, who suffered from bipolar disorder, to despair. He confided in movie critic Rex Reed, "I don't know what the hell I'm doing here."

Only one number is sung by a trained singer - "They Call the Wind Maria" by Harve Presnell. (The word "Maria", spelled Maria without the H, is sung/pronounced as "Mariah".)

Jean Seberg filed for divorce from Romain Gary in the middle of production (Sept. 17, 1968) seriously thinking she would marry Clint Eastwood. Eastwood ghosted her just after filming ended, which deeply affected her already-fragile mental health.

In his book "No Minor Chords," André Previn (music director on this movie) offers a different take on how Anita Gordon came to dub the singing of Jean Seberg. He recalled watching an old movie on television and being impressed with the voice used to dub Jeanne Crain. The next morning, the music department at Twentieth Century-Fox told him it had been Anita Gordon, but they had no phone number, just an old address. He then called Western Union to send a telegram to her at that address and the person to whom he was speaking said she was Anita Gordon. He invited her to Paramount Pictures the next day and engaged her to dub Seberg. Like many anecdotes in his memoir, Previn was off base. Gordon never dubbed Jeanne Crain in any of the latter's pictures. Previn was likely recalling Anita Ellis, who did indeed sing for Crain in Gentleman Marry Brunettes (1955) (though this was not a Fox picture). What makes Previn's memory even less likely is the fact that he himself selected Anita Ellis to dub Vera-Ellen in MGM's Three Little Words (1950) and would therefore have been familiar with her instrument. In any case, it is Gordon, not Ellis, who dubbed Seberg in Paint Your Wagon (1969).

Diana Rigg was set to star as Elizabeth, but was forced to withdraw due to illness.

The location required was a majestic looking untouched valley and after much searching a suitable valley was found some 47 miles North East of Baker in Oregon. This meant everything needed had to be made or purchased in Hollywood and transported in 8 40 foot vans plus a fleet of trucks to create the buildings - stores, saloons, hotels, etc plus horses, mules, oxen along with 100's of bales of hay to feed them. Once filming had been completed everything was removed leaving the valley in it's original state.

The original Broadway production of "Paint Your Wagon" opened at the Shubert Theater in New York City on November 12, 1951 and ran for two hundred eighty-nine performances.

Lee Marvin essentially reprised his Oscar-winning Kid Shelleen character from Cat Ballou (1965) for his portrayal of Ben Rumson. Ironically, where critics had lauded the scenery chewing of his earlier performance, they crucified his work on the same grounds in this movie.

The play was produced on Broadway in 1951, and was one of the two properties Louis B. Mayer took with him after being ousted from MGM. Advancing age, and the fact that Mayer had been removed from actual movie production for thirty-plus years, rendered him unable to get it underway as a movie.

In 1964, Eddie Fisher bought the rights from Louis B. Mayer. He planned for it to be a Cinerama production to commence that November.

In a scene toward the end of the movie, Pardner (Clint Eastwood) mentions his name is Sylvester Newel, "with one 'L'."

California didn't have a "No Name City" during the Gold Rush, but Colorado does. According to wiki ... "No Name is a census-designated place in Garfield County, Colorado, United States. The population as of the 2010 census was 123. It is located east of Glenwood Springs, off Exit 119 of Interstate 70 in Glenwood Canyon. It is named for No Name Creek and No Name Canyon. The No Name Tunnel of I-70 is nearby."

Alan Jay Lerner had his doctor on-set through most of the shoot so he could be well supplied with amphetamines. His constant interference demoralized director Joshua Logan, who was suffering from manic-depression, though it wouldn't be diagnosed for years. On the first day of shooting, he was nowhere to be seen. He was finally found asleep on a table in the saloon setting.

In the DVD version, the four minute and twenty second intermission was kept in this movie.

John Truscott hired specialists to weave lace handkerchiefs for extras who would barely be seen.

The real name of the character "Pardner" is unknown to everyone until he is asked about it at the end of this movie. This hints at Clint Eastwood's prior recurring role as "The Man With No Name" in Sergio Leone's "Dollars" trilogy (A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965), and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)).

Bing Crosby was the first choice for the role of Ben Rumson.

At one point, it was strongly rumored that Richard Brooks was going to replace Joshua Logan as director. Logan ultimately completed the picture, but It was his last.

George Maharis was a close contender for the role of Pardner (Sylvester Newel).

The VHS packaging erroneously cites 1970 as the copyright year.

In the original Broadway production, Pardner was Hispanic.

The character Horace Tabor is perhaps named for the well-known nineteenth century prospector Horace (Haw) Tabor (1830-1899), although the real-life Tabor was known primarily for silver prospecting.

A team of horses required for one scene that should have required only a week's work were kept on-call for several months.

The Broadway production opened November 12, 1951 and earned no Tony Award nominations.

This movie was released in Mexico under a different name (in Spanish) as "La leyenda de la ciudad sin nombre", which translates to "The legend of the city with no name."

Lee Marvin's single recording of "Wand'rin' Star" from this film hit the top spot on the record charts in Great Britain, with a peak sale in excess of 34,000 copies a day.

When the girls arrive at No Name City and are helped down, it is obvious that they were wearing goggles when the dirt was applied to their faces.

Production designer John Truscott had previously won two Academy Awards for the Joshua Logan musical Camelot (1967). However, "Paint Your Wagon" gained such a reputation as an expensive, runaway production that, rather unfairly, he never worked in Hollywood again.

There is a entire chapter devoted to this movie in the book "Fiasco: A History of Hollywood's Iconic Flops" by James Robert Parish.

The theme song borrowed motifs from an Act I duet in Puccini's Tosca.

Cameo 

Where is No Name City from Paint Your Wagon?

Did Clint Eastwood do the singing in Paint Your Wagon?

Where is No Name City?

Was the movie Paint Your Wagon a flop?