Road House is a movie that gets no respect, but it’s either a secret pleasure or a guilty pleasure for millions of people if home video sales are any indication. Face it: it’s a fun movie. And it helped introduce Sam Elliott to a whole new generation. His role of Wade Garrett is a sort of guru or mentor for the lead Patrick Swayze character.
Sam was originally slated to play the head bad guy Brad Wesley, but he really didn’t connect to that role. When he was offered the Garrett role, he snapped it up, and the rest is B-movie history.
The Evolution Of Sam’s Voice
It’s no wonder Sam Elliott gets so much voiceover and narration work. His deep resonant baritone voice is very powerful. His costar from The Ranch Ashton Kutcher even said that as far as he’s concerned, Elliott ought to narrate “everything”. But if you look at some of his early roles, you’ll see that even though he always had a deep voice, it wasn’t that deep. Not like it is now.
According to Sam, “It came with age. It just kept going down the older I got”. So if you’re hoping for a job narrating Coen Brothers movies, or whatever, you have hope. Just keep getting older!
Sam’s Secret To Longevity
If you want to live a long time, you need to be picky about what you eat. And if you want longevity in an acting career, especially in Hollywood, you need to be picky about the roles you take. That has certainly been Sam Elliott’s strategy to remain popular and relevant decade after decade. He has often warned other actors and actresses that if they are willing to take any role that’s offered them they risk personal burnout and audience disinterest.
Sam has been quoted as saying, “I wanted to be an actor since I was nine years old and I figured that was only one way to ever have any longevity, and that’s to be careful about what kind of work you do”.
The Big Lebowski
The narrator the classic movie The Big Lebowski was described in the script to be like this: “the voice-over sounds not unlike Sam Elliott”. And the on-screen role was described in the script this way: “like a drugstore cowboy, looking not unlike Sam Elliott”. This may seem odd, but you will never find bigger movie fans than writer-director pair the Coen brothers. So it may come as no surprise that the role in that ended up going to Sam was described in such a precise way.
If there’s one thing that Sam has proven over and over in his career, it’s that he can make even a minor supporting role memorable. That was certainly the case with his unforgettable performance in the Coen brothers’ memorable movie.
On To Another Big Role
The Big Lebowski was not only a significant role for Sam Elliott in its own right, but also directly led to yet another career high point. Writer/Director Rod Lurie had just completed the script for The Contender and had cast Jeff Bridges as the American president. Lurie had enjoyed the on-screen relationship between Bridges and Elliott in The Big Lebowski and wanted to recreate it in his movie by casting Sam as the president’s Chief of Staff.
The casting decision was a little controversial because of Sam’s association with westerns, whereas The Contender was a modern-day political drama. But that was exactly the reason Sam was eager to accept the role. It was a welcome chance to stretch his acting muscles. And after the fact, nobody had anything but praise for his performance.