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This is Later with Lee Matthews,
The Lee Matthews Podcast. More of what

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You here weekday afternoons on the Drive. Dwayne Epstein is the author of many

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books New York Times bestsellers, Lee
Marvin point Blank, and other acclaimed biographies.

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His newest creation is Killing General is
the Making of the Dirty Dozen,

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the most iconic World War Two movie
of all time? Dwayne, It's one

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of my favorites. But to you, what makes it one of the most

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iconic? Well, oh, well, good morning, Lee. Um.

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I'll be honest with you. I
didn't come up with that subtitle. I

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was the publisher's idea. I personally
think it's yon. I personally think it's

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iconic because of remaking cast and the
ensemble aspect of it. One of the

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best casts in the movie history,
in my opinion. And at the time

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it came out in nineteen sixty seven, there was never really any kind of

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film even close to that kind of
cutting edge action and anti establishment um demeanor

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and theme and you never you had
never seen in a film before where there

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really wasn't any any good guy to
root for. Every everybody was a little

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anti hero or or you know,
excuse me, but the military establishment came

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off like an American corporation, and
that they weren't very likable and they weren't

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very smart. And the character that
Lee Marvin played, the lead character,

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John Reisman, was very much a
maverick and didn't go by the rules.

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And at the time the film came
out in nineteen sixty seven, that was

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a very popular idea that you can't
you know, you can't trust anybody over

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thirty and things of that nature.
All at all, it was just a

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wonderfully done package to make for a
powerful uh film. Dwayne Epstein and the

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book is Killing Generals the making of
the Dirty Dozen, and this movie it

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came out, had a lot of
competition that was a little less gritty.

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Yeah, there was a hell of
a year sixty seven. It was a

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pivotal year in American film history.
In the Heat of the Night came out

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Cool Hand, Loup, Bonnie and
Clyde. Oh my gosh, so many

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great movies the Graduate, But I
don't know, they weren't the same kinds

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of movie. They were. They
were important films yet, but The Dirty

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doesn't change the rules of filmmaking in
a different way. I won't go into

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the whole story about how it was
the end of the studio system and the

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production code was changing. But The
Dirty doesn't challenge all those rules like nor

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the film had before, and it
wounded up becoming the number one film in

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the country. Well, and another
thing you saw in that year was the

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change and how and how camera angles
were shot. You started seeing more close

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ups and more quick takes and quick
cuts. Right, yeah, absolutely absolutely,

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And as you said, a moment
ago different camera angles, like in

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the opening of The Dirty doesn't when
they you know, when Lee Marvin's character

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has to go and witness a hanging, the director Robert Aldres put the camera

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under the gallows so when the body
dropped, you saw it from the bottom

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up. And he did that by
digging a hole into the company, into

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the sound stage. I mean,
those kind of things hadn't been done before.

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Talking about killing generals. The making
of The Dirty Dozen of book by

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Dwain Epstein. If you are a
movie film you'll love this. And maybe

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this wasn't the Well, I guess
it was kind of the first to usher

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in that new age of war movie. The Kelly's Heroes followed it, where

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Eagles dare color grit no heroes anti
heroes and the military brass are are almost

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always the enemy instead of the Nazis. Right, absolutely, right, fact,

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Lee Marvin has a line in the
film where he tells Ralph Meeker,

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the guy who plays a psychiatrist,
you know these guys hate you. And

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Lee Marvin's character says that's because you
know they the Germans haven't met them yet,

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so you know, the characters the
military more than the Nazis. And

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this put Lee Marvin on the map. He's an actual War War two head,

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yes he is. He served in
the Pacific as a marine during World

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War Two and he uh he was
wounded, that got the purple heart and

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um uh. He brought a lot
of his own experience into the character.

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And you know, it's been said
over the years that Lee Marvin was not

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a fan of The Dirty Does.
Actually that's not true. He didn't think

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the premise was very believable, but
the film itself he liked a lot.

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He thought it was really really well
done. Oh I remember you can tell

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yeah, I'm sorry, no,
it's we have a delay here because of

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the digital thing. But and I
apologize too for jumping on you. But

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but when I saw it for the
first time. I remember thinking that,

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wow, this is kind of implausible, but it was one hell of a

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ride, right, yeah, exactly
the point. Yeah, Dwayne empstyould say

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this, go ahead. I'm sorry, just real quick. Um that that

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there was no dirty doesn't that's an
urban, urban legend that's gone on for

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it was based on some actual group
of from the one hundred first Airborne and

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all that never happened. However,
the US Army has never used convicts for

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military service. But right now,
even as we speak, the Russians are

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doing that in the Ukraine. They
are recruiting. Yeah, seriously, they

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are recruiting convicts to fight in the
Ukraine. I discovered that and I put

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it in the book, and I
think it's amazing. Leave it and the

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Nazi and the Nazis did it too
during World War Two. So you know,

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when it comes to doing stuff like
that, we might not be the

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best army in the world, but
at least we don't do that and never

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have. That is a sign that
they're scraping the bottom of the barrel because

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they're running out of people, exactly
right, that's the point. Dwayne Epstein

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is author of the book Killing Generals
The Making of The Dirty Dozen. Let's

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talk about that title. I don't
want to pick on it too much,

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but killing Generals, I mean,
we're not about the book isn't about killing

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generals? Oh, I don't know. No, I'm kidding yea, yeah,

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it's interesting. The editor and I
were discussing what the titles should be,

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and at the same time we both
came up with the exact same title.

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It's it's the last line in the
film spoiler alert that Charles Bronson has

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after he gets visited in the hospital
by the by the officers, including the

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general played by Ernest board Nine,
and when they lead, Bronson goes,

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boy, oh boy. Killing generals
can get to be a habit with me.

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And I thought, if there's gonna
be, you know, a title,

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a title to the book that resonates
with readers, it's going to be

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that we're with Dwayne Epstein, who's
the author of Killing Generals. The making

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of The Dirty Dozen? Was it
difficult for Robert Aldrich to get that many,

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that much star power together and to
direct them all um, Yes and

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no, it really wasn't that difficult
to get the cast together. That was

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done mostly by well in tandem,
Robert Aldridge and tandem with the producer Ken

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Hyman, who by the way,
is very much alive, and I interviewed

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him, and it wasn't so much
that it was I mean, there were

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some people they tried to get for
the film that passed for one reason or

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another. Jack Palance was originally going
to play the Telesavadas part and he turned

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it down, which is an interesting
story as to why he turned it down.

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There was also Sidney Portier was approached, actor Nick Adams, Burt Lancaster,

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a bunch of other actors, but
once they spettled on the cast,

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they all Ken Hyman said on the
first day of rehearsal, he said,

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and he was there every day.
He said, it was amazing to me

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how quickly they all jelled into the
characters they were to play, and how

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they got along as an ensemble.
And he pointed out as well, he

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goes, you would never ever ever
get a cast like this again, and

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coasts that they were so you know, their personas were different, their backgrounds

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were different. And I I interviewed
a couple of cast members who said it

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was fun watching Telly Savalis and John
Cassavetti's argue about where you can get the

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best grief food in New York.
You know, things like that. It's

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you know, I think I think
it's really cool. I mean, the

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chemistry was amazing and it's there on
the screen and in casting non actors um

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like Trinny Lopez and Jim Brown.
Was he trying to Robert Aldrich. Was

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he trying to appeal to younger audiences? Oh? Absolutely, because you know

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there was a thing in movies in
the fifties and sixties in order to help

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improve box office you put a young
teen idol or young singer in the movie.

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Yeah, Frankie avalon Faby and Bobby
Darren m And I guess it was

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just Trinny Lopez's turn. Yeah.
And as far as Jim as far as

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Jim Brown goes, excuse me,
he was still playing with the NFL.

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This was his second film. Oh
you had done a Western a couple of

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years before, and it was during
during the making of the movie that he

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decided to quit the NFL. He
was only twenty nine years old. And

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it's an interesting story that's almost a
full chapter in the book. That he

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held the press conference and during the
filming of the movie in England, the

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whole movie was shot in England,
and he said he's retiring from the NFL

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and he wouldn't be back for the
sixty seventh season. And you know you

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can't buy publicity like that. I
mean, no, really really helped put

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the movie in the headlines at the
time it was still in production. Come

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on out and see why Jim Brown
is quitting the NFL exactly worked its movie

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worth ending his career. Dwayne Epstein, thank you for joining us Killing Generals.

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It's the book and the making of
The Dirty Dozen, the most iconic

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World War Two movie of all time. I love this behind the scenes stuff

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and I thank you for bringing it
to us. No, thank you so

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much for having me. Thanks for
listening to Later with Lee Matthews, the

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Lee Matthews Podcast, and remember to
listen to The Drive Live weekday afternoons from

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five to seven. And I Heearts
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