John Wayne’s rise to Hollywood’s most prominent cowboy is perhaps one of the most retold stories in the Western genre. Each narrative sheds light on a corner of his life we didn’t know. But before John Ford‘s Stagecoach launched him as the poster boy for rugged Western individualism, Wayne was just another regular extra trying to pay his bills. In one of his most overlooked early appearances, he found himself on the set of the 1928 film Noah’s Ark, a sprawling Warner Bros. religious epic that attempted to fuse the biblical flood with the carnage of World War I.
Then credited as Marion Morrison, Wayne was among the extras tossed into the torrent of floods in the film directed by Michael Curtiz, who would later cement his name in cinema with Casablanca. If the production of the prequel TV series to Casablanca was troubled, Noah’s Ark was downright tragic. According to Michael and Harry Medved‘s The Hollywood Hall of Shame: The Most Expensive Flops in Movie History, at Curtiz’s insistence on making things dangerously real, the film used tons of overflowing water and collapsing sets to mimic the effects of floods. But it did more than the intended job, resulting in the drowning deaths of three cast members, the maiming of at least one, and the injury of dozens. Though Wayne survived unharmed, the experience was an indelible early brush with the dangers of an industry that was only beginning to reckon with safety standards.
Michael Curtiz’s Ambition for ‘Noah’s Ark’ Turned Tragic
A golden donkey in Noah’s Ark.Image via Warner Bros.
The 1920s was the era of grand epics, when silent cinema sought to dazzle audiences with scale as much as story. So when Warner Bros. greenlit Noah’s Ark, the studio was chasing spectacle, and Curtiz’s vision was nothing if not ambitious. He saw the film unfolding as a transitional silent-to-sound picture, infusing dialogue in some parts and music over images in others. The end product is a narrative with a dual contrast between the biblical account of Noah’s flood and a modern storyline set during World War I. Visually, the film reveals Curtiz’s determination to overwhelm.
To achieve his vision, Curtiz demanded realism at every turn. Rather than rely on controlled effects, he ordered the construction of massive flood tanks and collapsing sets, all to be unleashed on scores of extras standing in as desperate humanity is swept away by the deluge. One of these extras was the young Marion Morrison, who had yet to become a star. As per The Hollywood Hall of Shame: The Most Expensive Flops in Movie History, 15,000 tons of water swept through the set, toppling wooden structures and pulling extras under, turning the staged chaos into real danger. For Wayne and thousands of others (the real figure is reported to be anywhere between 3,500 and 7,500), it was not acting so much as surviving. Unfortunately, three extras were killed and several others injured. Reflecting on the film in Michael and Harry Medved’s book, cameraman Hal Mohr recalls having reservations about Curtiz’s approach:
“When they started talking about how to do it, I objected… Not as a cameraman, but as a human being, for Christ’s sake, because it seemed to me they were going to kill a few people with these tons of water and huge sets falling on them.” —Hal Mohr
Even though Wayne has never openly talked about the incident, and he is not visually recognizable in the film, his presence inadvertently shows that simply showing up, even when circumstances aren’t ideal, is part of the journey to greatness. It is a quality that we see throughout his journey, from being a former USC football player who stumbled into film work after an injury derailed his career to coming into John Ford’s orbit and breaking out in Stagecoach, and then dominating the Western for decades.
Insofar as Wayne’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it screen moments go, he would appear in another religious epic, the 1965 film The Greatest Story Ever Told, this time as a movie star cast to boost viewership. In Noah’s Ark, he was just an ordinary guy without many choices, looking for work. We may not have many glossy things to write home about his performance in this particular film, as he is just a figure among thousands of extras, but Noah’s Ark is one of the films in which tragic events behind the scenes made Hollywood pay more attention to safety measures during production.
Release Date
November 1, 1928
Runtime
135 minutes
Director
Michael Curtiz
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Dolores Costello
Marie / Miriam
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George O’Brien
Travis / Japheth
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Noah Beery
Nickoloff / King Nephilim
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Louise Fazenda
Hilda / Tavern Maid
