Trivia / The Horse Soldiers

• Dueling-Stars Movie: John Wayne and William Holden
• Troubled Production:
  • Star John Wayne was preoccupied with the preproduction for his own The Alamo (1960), which he would direct and star in the next year, and wasn't able to give his best performance. He did, however, have enough time to quarrel with costar William Holden, which may have helped as their characters are likewise at odds during the film. However, much of their off-camera repartée was about politics, with Holden as liberal as Wayne was conservative, and the experience left the former so bitter he never worked with Wayne again.
  • Althea Gibson (yes, as in the tennis great) flatly refused to do her dialogue in stereotypical way it was written. Ford, who normally didn't put up with that kind of pushback from an actor, broke down and agreed to change it.
  • Near the end of the shooting a stuntman died of a broken neck after falling off a horse. Ford took this very personally, and by all accounts seemed to lose interest in finishing the film. Hence he ended the film without the big, explosive climax the novel and the original screenplay had.
  • Before production the film had made the news since Holden and Wayne both agreed to a $750,000 salary, a record for a star at the time. Unfortunately for the producers there were a lot of other cost overruns; the involvement of multiple production companies did not help this in the slightest.