THE ACTOR IN THE LAUNDROMAT

Mary Strachan Scriver
5 min readMay 16, 2021

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Alex McArthur, the Desperado

At a time that never really was and yet always is, it is the real/unreal nature of towns built to be movie sets, so full of dreams and myths and yet as real as human habitation can be in the sense of an archetype, these false front main streets are a habitus template for millions of people. For instance, Valier cannot get “Mayberry” out of its head. It’s not always an advantage.

The decades right after the Civil War — just as the industrial revolution swept the continent — seem something like now in terms of change so profound it could hardly be felt, except for shooting incidents erupting without warning, economic disaster and a drive to reach back to the early principles of democracy. All of it is in the Westerns alongside the environmental disasters, a cyclorama of nature with her droughts, earthquakes, locusts, cyclones and tsunamis.

While I was in Saskatoon, ’87-’88, a new Western series was proposed and filmed in the US, but in the face of money and moguls, the plan crashed. The footage was finally edited into four self-contained movies, each based on the idea of a “Desperado” — that was the title. I got all this off the internet. The protagonist was a young man with soulful eyes and a wide wry mouth. In batwing chaps, a duster, and a genuine working hat, he was armed with a Winchester ’66, the “Golden Boy,” legendary among gun aficionados. The actor’s name is Alex McArthur.

He’s older now. I met him and his dog at the laundromat a couple of weeks ago, which is what kicked off this current blog thread. He’s still a person of presence. During this pandemic I haven’t gone to the laundromat, but now I was fully vaccinated. Normally I wear a mask and bite people’s heads off if they try to talk to me, but not this time. There were two cowboy actors I’ve admired more than others, the two that were once stunt men: Richard Farnsworth and Ben Johnson, both gone now. They have a quality that parlor cowboys never achieve, something about being sadder but wiser. Alex has it. When he rode, he was solid in the saddle. He and his horse were bonded but neither made a big fuss — just stayed close to each other. No kissing.

Westerns were not McArthur’s only genre. Who would a desperado fall in love with but a Madonna? This link is to “Papa Don’t Preach” a video in which Alex McArthur is the boy Madonna loves. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G333Is7VPOg “Papa

It’s worth noting that in the two “Desperado” movies I watched, each script had a brief love-making scene. These tender and sweet montages are quite different from what is conventional now. The first one has a corny overlay of “flames” at the end, but the one in “Return” includes lyrical superimposed images. The young McArthur has a gentleness that makes the music vid with Madonna believable. He seems trustworthy.

But then Antonio Banderas stole the whole desperado shtick. Alex McArthur, the original desperado, went to contemporary crime and horror stories and so did all the rest of the world. But when I asked him at the laundromat McArthur said “Desperado” was the role he loved most, the one that was the most fun. This link below is to the second film on YouTube: “The Return of Desperado.” It’s old and fuzzy but probably better than the first film, which is okay but not as well-edited, more disrupted. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xUOL5kf1f4

The first film was originally written by Elmore Leonard and includes Pernell Roberts (!) and Yaphet Koto (shockingly young). Both of those actors also have that elusive “presence” or charisma. When Roberts appears as a bounty hunter in pursuit of the hero, he packs a real punch, but also still has that Bonanza vibe of honor. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoV1wU-tCKc&list=PLLKDZOsKJWng1-03SRZ8Ak7Rl0nAB8_7o

The version I watched was in a foreign language, but it didn’t matter because I was after the “material culture” as anthros say. The cows were more assorted (even some longhorns) and the “town” was smokier. The girls were kinda modern. Roles for black actors. A creek-side bathtub with warm water.(?) An elusive horse — oh no! Shot! But hints of culture: books, painting, chess, lace curtains. I reckon those are leftovers from Elmore Leonard.

I watch films in multiple layers: the actor’s quality as a person, previous roles, previous films in the genre, time of the filming, people involved. I can’t watch with anyone else because I’m always cutting away to IMDB or Wikipedia. This is because of basic theatre at NU (’57-’61) but also because of old friends from those years and brief visits to Hollywood. Finally I was repelled by the lives they lead. Even when those friends came here, I became upset. They lived in fantasies all about money and it made them arrogant. They insulted people I care about.

I’m very much out of the scene, but it begins to be apparent that the scene itself is totally changed, and even those deeply into the movie biz are as confused as anyone else. The good thing is that the era of the big stupid mogul/dictator who ran everything is now over. But big money is still rolling around through lives and the hope of a major blockbuster still controls a lot of people. It was a strange truth I learned that people have always made money by writing scripts that were never produced at all. I don’t know whether that is still true.

The encounter in the laundromat was unexpected and Alex is nothing like my friends, who like me are twenty years older. In conversation images and themes came up, plus the interplay of acting and reality, got me started (actually continuing) to think in a layered complex that is as cultural as personal. The acting depends on the set. The movie Western town exists as a small temporary construct on a planetary canvas of wind and dust. Not unlike our small flashing gem of a planet traveling against an ebony cosmic sky.

When Alex was ready to leave with his clean clothes and his good dog, he told me his name and shook my hand. I was surprised that his was big and calloused, a hand that had been used for building. Suppose we invented a new movie town script, about a man contracted to build one of these Western towns. Since we need a female lead, let’s make her a building inspector for the county or maybe from OSHA, so now she keeps trying to apply the usual laws but he has to defend himself by reminding her this is NOT a real town and these are NOT real houses.

Maybe there are episodes of sabotage. Or we could invent a small runaway boy who is hiding amid the construction and stealing from lunch buckets until the builder brings his dog to see what’s happening. The dog finds the boy and the hostile female inspector knows from other places who he is and why he’s hiding. Now the builder and inspector cooperate for the boy.

So there you go, a new concept for a script not even written. It doesn’t have to obey any rules.

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Mary Strachan Scriver
Mary Strachan Scriver

Written by Mary Strachan Scriver

Born in Portland when all was calm just before WWII. Educated formally at NU and U of Chicago Div School. Clergy for ten years. Always happy on high prairie.

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