When was easy rider made

People would wonder and ask themselves what was that? They would have to come back again to figure it out. I made George a lawyer. He explains Wyatt and Billy to the audience in a sweet and wacky way. George was the innocent. In all great Greek tragedies, the innocents die first. George is only killed because he is with us, not because he has done something wrong. And then they called me up to read. I know other people read for it and I got it.

She joined Hopper, Fonda and Black in New Orleans during Mardi Gras of to shoot scenes of the festivities as well as the surreal set piece that takes place while all four are tripping on acid at a local cemetery. I could just tell by her body language what an actress she was. The New Orleans scenes were the first to be shot for the film.

Basil and Black returned at the end of production to shoot the traditionally scripted sequence in the brothel where Wyatt and Billy meet the prostitutes.

He was intense about things. His work ethic was very intense. We all came from the same place, so it was not far off the wall what he was asking for. I mean, it was part of his vision, you know? Henry Fonda is said to have come out of "Easy Rider" a confused and puzzled man. He had worked in movies for 35 years and made some great ones, and now his son Peter was going to be a millionaire because of a movie Henry couldn't even understand.

Where did those two guys come from, he wanted to know. What was their background? How did they set up that drug-smuggling deal? Where were they going?

And what, oh what, did the movie mean? I suspect many members of the Hollywood older generation believe, sincerely and deeply, that "Easy Rider" doesn't have a story, and doesn't mean anything, and that the kids are all crazy these days. But in fact, director Dennis Hopper has done an old and respectable thing. He has told his story in cinematic shorthand, instead of spelling it out in dreary detail. Fifty years ago, Hollywood figured out that if you put the good guys in white hats you could eliminate 10 minutes of explanation from every Western.

Hopper has applied this technique to the motorcycle movie. He also has made a great film, but more of that later. Everybody "knows" that "Easy Rider" is tremendously popular with high school and college-age kids. But these kids apparently sprang into existence full-blown, and did not grow up or go to any other movie before they found this one.

That's the way Hollywood sees it. He said that he and Dennis liked the film so much they wanted to be in on the screenplay credits. Well, one of them was the producer and other was the director so there was no way the Writers Guild was going to allow them to take a screenplay credit unless I insisted. I wonder what that's about? As the story goes, in , Rip Torn had dinner with Fonda and Hopper, who were considering casting him in the role of lawyer George Hanson.

Hopper went on The Tonight Show in and recounted how Torn pulled a knife on Hopper during the dinner, thus losing the gig. But Torn said it was the other way around: Hopper pulled the knife on him. It was supposedly a butter knife.

In an interview with Film Comment , the interviewer asked Nicholson if he knew the film would be a hit, and he said yes. I thought the moment for the biker film had come, especially if the genre was moved one step away from exploitation toward some kind of literary quality.

Schneider and Rafelson created The Monkees and used that money to fund the film. I can't understand what's gone wrong with it. Billy : Man, everybody got chicken, that's what happened. Hey, we can't even get into like, a second-rate hotel, I mean, a second-rate motel, you dig?

They think we're gonna cut their throat or somethin'. They're scared, man. George Hanson : They're not scared of you.

They're scared of what you represent to 'em. Billy : Hey, man. All we represent to them, man, is somebody who needs a haircut.

George Hanson : Oh, no. What you represent to them is freedom. Billy : What the hell is wrong with freedom? That's what it's all about. George Hanson : Oh, yeah, that's right. That's what's it's all about, all right. But talkin' about it and bein' it, that's two different thangs. I mean, it's real hard to be free when you are bought and sold in the marketplace. Of course, don't ever tell anybody that they're not free, 'cause then they're gonna get real busy killin' and maimin' to prove to you that they are.

Oh, yeah, they're gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em. Billy : Well, it don't make 'em runnin' scared. George Hanson : No, it makes 'em dangerous. Sign In. Play trailer Adventure Drama. Director Dennis Hopper.

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