“Two Glorious Scoundrels” is an absolute western milestone that contains several moments for eternity. One of them is pure improvisation!
“For a Fistful of Dollars” belonged entirely to its star Clint Eastwood; in “For a Few Dollars More” he fought his way through the Wild West together with Lee Van Cleef. In “Two Glorious Scoundrels”, the conclusion and by far the longest film in Sergio Leone’s so-called Dollar Trilogy, “Dirty Harry” finally had to share the stage with two other acting greats:
True to the international title “The Good, The Bad And The Ugly”, Eastwood embodied the blonde or good guy, while Van Cleef played the evil Sentenza and Eli Wallach slipped into his most famous role as Tuco aka “The Ugly”.
As the face of all three films, Eastwood may be the first actor that comes to mind when you think of Two Glorious Scoundrels. But Wallach, as a Mexican bandit who literally throws out iconic sayings, contributed at least as much to making the film the classic that it is – even more: through his spontaneity and improvisation, he even provided some of the most iconic moments of Italian film. Western milestones!
“Two Glorious Scoundrels” at Amazon*
But from the beginning: Leone had discovered the actor in American Wild West films – his performances in “The Magnificent Seven” and “That Was the Wild West” in particular had left an impression on the later “Play Me a Song of Death” maker.
In a conversation with film historian Christopher Frayling, Wallach remembered Leone’s first contact as follows (via AlloCiné): “My agent called me in Los Angeles and said, ‘There’s an Italian director who has seen your westerns and bandit films and would like to meet you.’ I asked, ‘What movie?’ – ‘A spaghetti western.’ I had never heard of a spaghetti western. How about Hawaiian pizza?”
In any case, I then met Sergio, who didn’t speak a word of English. He said to me in Italian: ‘I want you to be in my film. I’ll show you.'” Leone showed the “Misfits” star a part of “For a Few Dollars More,” and the playful opening credits completely convinced Wallach – so he soon signed his contract.
Eli Wallach improvised one of the best “Two Glorious Scoundrels” scenes
That turned out to be a win-win for everyone involved: Leone gave Wallach a free pass to do whatever he wanted with his character. So, with the help of American director Henry Hathaway, the actor chose his own outfit (including the famous straw hat!) and improvised several scenes that would make Western history…
…including the passage in which Tuco makes the sign of the cross several times at breakneck speed (“I thought it would be fun to do it two or three times in a row!”), and also one of his most famous quotes:
When Tuco is surprised by an old enemy while lying in the bathtub, he shoots him – and comments on the situation with the following saying: “If you want to shoot, you should shoot and not talk!” In fact, it wasn’t even planned for Wallach to have a line of dialogue in this scene – but both Leone and the rest of the team were so enthusiastic and amused that the line stayed in the film.
By the way: While Wallach and Leone seemed to get along brilliantly, things weren’t always harmonious between the director and his regular actor Eastwood. You can find out more about this in the following article:
This is how the director of some of the best westerns of all time said about his star Clint Eastwood: “He’s a block of marble”
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