{"id":2108,"date":"2010-04-13T22:11:57","date_gmt":"2010-04-14T02:11:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ringsidereport.com\/?p=2108"},"modified":"2010-04-13T22:11:57","modified_gmt":"2010-04-14T02:11:57","slug":"from-the-boxing-ring-to-hollywood-superman-star-jack-o%e2%80%99halloran-speaks-to-rsr-about-his-remarkable-life-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/?p=2108","title":{"rendered":"From the Boxing Ring to Hollywood: Superman Star Jack O\u2019Halloran Speaks to RSR About His Remarkable Life, Part II"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Exclusive Interview by Geno McGahee (Reposted for Archive purposes)<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIf Richard Donner had been able to finish Superman II his way, it would have been an incredible film.\u201d\u2014Jack O\u2019Halloran<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1974, the boxing career of Jack O\u2019Halloran, and the movie career began.\u00a0 In 1975, he played a lead role in the movie \u201cFarewell My Lovely\u201d alongside the established actor, Robert Mitchum.\u00a0 O\u2019Halloran had re-invented himself and found a new and promising career as an actor.\u00a0 His next memorable film was the 1976 blockbuster, \u201cKing Kong,\u201d and two years later, he would land the role that most people associate him with.\u00a0 The comic book superhero \u201cSuperman\u201d hit the big screen, and the world was introduced to three super villains.\u00a0 \u201cNon\u201d was the strong and silent of the three, never uttering a word, but still is considered by most Superman fans as one of the best villains in the franchise.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 1980, in Superman II, the evil trio would steal the show and Jack O\u2019Halloran would discover what became his signature role.\u00a0 Only now in 2006, does it come out that there were two versions of this film, and that the original director, Richard Donner had never finished his vision of what the movie could be.\u00a0 Director, Richard Lester ran with the project, and apparently, this made absolutely nobody happy.\u00a0 O\u2019Halloran, despite his dislike for the change went on to make the role memorable and was etching out and very decent second career as an actor.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The action-packed \u201cThe Hero and the Terror,\u201d came out in 1988, starring Chuck Norris as the good cop (The Hero), and O\u2019Halloran as \u201cSimon Moon,\u201d a deranged serial killer that has escaped a mental asylum (The Terror).\u00a0 This is arguably the best movie that Norris has ever starred in and it was another role for Jack where he didn\u2019t say a word.\u00a0 The fight scenes were exciting and this was really one of the last great action films of that era.\u00a0 Although not a blockbuster at the cinemas, it made more than its mark with video rentals.\u00a0 This movie and the Superman entries were great movies that most people that were children at that time remember vividly.\u00a0 With the release of the Donner cut of Superman II, the clock is turned back, the movie is fresh, and people my age can relive the magic of the film, while others are introduced to a new perspective of the movie and the characters that made it so special.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There were other movies for Jack, but it seemed that his days in the movies had passed.\u00a0 Just as he had shown in his boxing career, he could never be counted out as he re-invented himself once again as a movie producer.\u00a0 The movie that he produced: \u201cThe List\u201d features Wayne Brady and Sydney Tamiia Poitier, the daughter of the legendary actor, Sydney Poitier in a comedy\/romantic film.\u00a0 This was the first, but will not be the last movie produced by O\u2019Halloran, and as mentioned in part one, he has authored a book concerning his father and the criminal activity that became such a part of his life, titled: \u201cDark Legacy.\u201d\u00a0 I was allowed to read it and it is a fantastic book, and I highly recommend it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In Part II of this interview, we speak more of the upcoming hopeful best seller, his movie career, and his thoughts on Richard Lester, Richard Donner, and the Superman Franchise.<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 When you sat back and witnessed the comeback of George Foreman, was there every an urge to comeback or was it medically impossible for you to return?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, I thought about it a couple of times, but you know, I was doing films.\u00a0 We had just done the Superman movies, and I had a serious back surgery in 1980, but I still got back into good shape again and I went down to San Diego and saw my trainer and was going to give it another shot\u2026but I had a pretty good film career, and even that I didn\u2019t do correctly, but now I\u2019m back doing it big time.\u00a0 I also have an amazing book coming out.\u00a0 The only reason that I am telling you about my father is because it is going to be read about in this book and the book is going to be huge!\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 I look forward to reading it.\u00a0 What is the name of the book?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s called \u201cDark Legacy\u201d and it presents quite an interesting story.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: When will it be released to the public?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The publishing deal will be done probably in the next ten days, and then it will come out for a summertime read, I believe.\u00a0 The book gives a lot of insight to who I am and what I am, and why I played this game of hide and seek in the boxing world.\u00a0 The book is brilliant.\u00a0 The book is going to be bigger than the Godfather.\u00a0 It\u2019s a great story and the book turned out very, very, well.\u00a0 That is why I\u2019m here in California.\u00a0 We have a film that we are putting together and we are just waiting for certain things to finish up, and once the publishing deal is done, everything else will fly like a domino effect.\u00a0 You\u2019re doing this story at the right time because the publicity is going to be astronomical.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: Now, your movie career is quite impressive.\u00a0 I remember as a kid going to see the Superman movies and then when I was a little older, seeing The Hero and the Terror with you facing off against Chuck Norris.\u00a0 You have made quite the impression, especially on people from my generation.\u00a0 Can you talk about your movie career<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

My first movie was \u201cFarewell My Lovely\u201d with Robert Mitchum.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: Were you intimidated by Robert Mitchum, considering the fact that he was an established and respected actor, and you were a boxer coming into a new field?<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Oh no.\u00a0 Mitchum and I became best of friends.\u00a0 He was like a father to me.\u00a0 He knew a lot about me because he knew people on the east coast.\u00a0 If I had been in the film business and had played the game like they do out here, I would have won an Oscar for supporting actor for that picture.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: To be honest, I have not seen that film, but I will have to check it out.<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n

You have to see the movie.\u00a0 It\u2019s a very good movie.\u00a0 You know, it is a very good film, and I play a lead character.\u00a0 It was my first movie and there I was doing a lead role beside Robert Mitchum.\u00a0 It was kind of cool.\u00a0 That\u2019s the reason that I did it.\u00a0 When they came to me to get into the film business back in the 1960s, I was friends with Steve McQueen when he did the Thomas Crown Affair in Boston, and he said: \u201cAh man, you gotta come down and we\u2019ll put you in the movie.\u00a0 Come on back to Hollywood with me,\u201d and I said, yeah\u2026yeah, and he kept calling me and he did a picture called \u201cThe Towering Inferno,\u201d and his name was Captain O\u2019Hallorhan.\u00a0 He said: \u201cHow do you like your name up in lights?\u201d\u00a0 We went round and round and it was good.\u00a0 We had a good time.\u00a0 There were good people, and he became a good friend, but I just kept on saying no.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When I knocked out Manuel Ramos in 68, they offered me the movie, \u201cThe Great White Hope,\u201d to play Jess Willard and I turned them down.\u00a0 The guy couldn\u2019t believe that I turned it down.\u00a0 The guy was a joke.\u00a0 I went to FOX and they said we are going to pay you so much per week and you will go to Spain for six months and I said, you want me to leave the country and leave boxing, and I just knocked out the number one or number two ranked guy in the world and you want me to leave boxing to go to Spain and do a movie?\u00a0 You are going to pay me what?\u00a0 I give that away in tips a week. What are you crazy?\u00a0 And I also had a lot of street business.\u00a0 I said, you want me to walk away from my life to go to Spain?\u00a0 It was a deal that was put together by some friends of mine that were trying to get me off of the streets, and I just wouldn\u2019t listen.\u00a0 I was hard-headed.\u00a0 I should have done it, actually.\u00a0 It was kind of foolish of me.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: In Superman, I had heard that it was your idea to make your character \u201cNon\u201d a mute.\u00a0 Is that true, and why did you want to have a non-speaking role if it is?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, they were talking about how to do the character.\u00a0 He was a mute in the first writing of it, I believe, and then they were talking, and when I was talking to Richard Donner, they didn\u2019t think that I would do a mute.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There was a film that I had really loved called \u201cGigot\u201d with Jackie Gleason, and he won an Oscar for it.\u00a0 He played a mute, and I thought that it was a brilliant way for an actor to express himself, and to do everything through facial expressions.\u00a0 So I said that I want to play Non as a mute.\u00a0 I liked it.\u00a0 It was a great challenge for me.\u00a0 I think that it was a brilliant idea.\u00a0 They said: \u201cSeriously, you\u2019ll do that?\u201d\u00a0 I said positively.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: The Richard Donner cut was recently released.\u00a0 It seems like a much sharper, smarter, and more adult oriented version of Superman II.\u00a0 Why wasn\u2019t the Donner cut completed from your perspective?<\/strong><\/p>\n

You know, it was a really lousy thing that they did.\u00a0 Richard Donner is a great director, and the people running the show were notorious\u2026they were notorious for things that they did as far as ripping people off.\u00a0 They had a deal with Richard Lester.\u00a0 Lester had done a film with the Beatles, and they owed him a movie.\u00a0 So, they knew that they were going to do what they did, because they didn\u2019t bring Donner back.\u00a0\u00a0 Not only did they not bring Donner back, but they didn\u2019t bring Marlon Brando back.\u00a0 How do you not pay Brando to do Superman II?\u00a0<\/p>\n

You see, people don\u2019t look at that.\u00a0 They think that they fired Donner over some wrong doing, but that\u2019s all bullshit.\u00a0 Donner knew that, before we were finished, that there was a problem because Lester showed up on the set.\u00a0 I had heard the scuttle bug, and I said this is really bullshit that they are doing this to him because Donner is a great director and he gave a lot to the film.\u00a0 If Richard Donner had been able to finish Superman II his way, it would have been an incredible film.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When they came out with the Donner cut, they had to paste things together.\u00a0 When we were doing the films, we had shot one and two together, and they had to stop.\u00a0 We were so much into doing Superman II, we had to go back and finish the first one, because they had a delivery date.\u00a0 They had to deliver the film.\u00a0 That\u2019s why so much of the second one was shot.\u00a0 But they did that purposely.\u00a0 They wanted the footage.\u00a0 Richard Lester is no Donner\u2026please believe me, and Lester\u2019s version of Superman II with all that comedy and crap he put into it was so ludicrous, especially opposed to what Donner was going to do, and people say: \u201cWell, it\u2019s not fair because Lester didn\u2019t shoot the whole film,\u201d but look what he did with Superman III!\u00a0 It was a joke!\u00a0<\/p>\n

They had made a deal with Lester.\u00a0 If they weren\u2019t such clippers, they could have done the deal with Donner, and let him finish, and then gave Lester Superman III.\u00a0 They had no intentions of bringing Brando back either.\u00a0 They use one excuse to cover up another.\u00a0 It was a lousy thing to do.\u00a0 Like I said, Donner really gave his heart and soul, and we all thought that we were going to do like seven Superman movies, like Star Wars have done.\u00a0 Everyone was under that impression, and Donner would have done like four of them.\u00a0 Donner, had he done three, it would have been such a better film.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 I can\u2019t see it getting much worse.\u00a0 Superman III and Superman IV were just horrible.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, the fourth one was just diabolical.\u00a0 What they did with four was to sell the rights to one film to Canon films.\u00a0 Canon was a sleazy outfit and the reason they allowed it was that they had allowed Christopher Reeve to write the script, and it was a horrible idea.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: I don\u2019t think that there could be a worse Super Villain than Solar Man, or whatever it is they called him in the fourth entry.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Why would you take a great subject matter like that and piss on it like that?\u00a0 First, they are not Americans and they didn\u2019t care.\u00a0 Superman is an American deal, and that is why Donner got into it so much.\u00a0 And they made a lot of money off of Superman, the first one, so they certainly had the money to hire Donner or anybody, and to bring Brando back.\u00a0 One of the things that is great about the Donner cut is it\u2019s got all of that Brando footage in it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 In the Donner cut, I really enjoyed how Superman was questioning his father, which you never saw in the Lester cut or anywhere else.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a father-son deal.\u00a0 It was never supposed to be a mother-son deal.\u00a0 It was a father-son deal for God\u2019s sake.\u00a0 So the entire premise of what they did was that they screwed up the entire deal and it\u2019s really, really, really sad.\u00a0 It really made a lot of people angry, and I went back and finished two because that is what you do as a professional.\u00a0 You do what you are paid to do, and you do your job, and you do it the best that you can.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t get along with Lester.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t like Lester.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t think that he was a good director.\u00a0 Nobody did.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 I think that it is obvious now when you compare the Donner cut versus the Lester cut.\u00a0 There is no comparison.<\/strong>\u00a0<\/p>\n

They way to do it is to look at Superman II, Lester\u2019s cut, and then look at the Donner cut right after it, and then you will really see the difference.\u00a0 I can imagine that if Donner had the chance, to do the shots that he wanted to shoot, and to really do that movie the way that he wanted to, it would have been awesome.\u00a0 It would have been awesome, and it would have left the door open for three, but it is such stupid shit that they do.\u00a0 It is really sad.\u00a0 It is so, so, sad.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM: What do you think of the new Superman movie: Superman Returns, that came out in 2006?<\/strong><\/p>\n

You know, I thought that the kid (Brandon Routh) got away with it, but I think that Bryan Singer is too much of a CGI guy.\u00a0 I think that they ruined and wasted a lot of very good talent.\u00a0 It is very difficult to replace Gene Hackman, but the kid ended up doing a good job as Superman.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GM:\u00a0 I have actually always thought that Gene Hackman, being such a great dramatic actor, was wasted, especially in the fourth entry because they made him so absurd and silly, when he could have nailed the role as a serious villain.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not only that\u2026but he didn\u2019t finish two.\u00a0 He got mad and he never came back.\u00a0 They had contract problems with him, and they wouldn\u2019t pay him what he wanted.\u00a0 He just didn\u2019t come back.\u00a0 They had to shoot a lot of his stuff with a double from behind.\u00a0 That didn\u2019t help.\u00a0 So, a lot of things that Lester created were really piss poor, but now they do this new film, and they change the costume, which I thought was a bad idea.\u00a0 There was too much CGI.\u00a0 You had great actors in Kevin Spacey and Frank Langella, who didn\u2019t have enough screen time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There wasn\u2019t enough screen time for Clark Kent as Clark Kent.\u00a0 The kid should have been Kent a lot more, and the storyline sucked.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In \u201cFrom the Boxing Ring to Hollywood: Superman Star Jack O\u2019Halloran Speaks to RSR About His Remarkable Life, Part III,\u201d we will discuss his experiences in working with Chuck Norris, his career as a boxing manager and trainer, and the product that Hollywood is currently putting out there.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Advertise Now On RSR<\/a><\/p>\n

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Watch The Trailer For Family Secret<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Exclusive Interview by Geno McGahee (Reposted for Archive purposes) \u201cIf Richard Donner had been able to finish Superman II his way, it would have been an incredible film.\u201d\u2014Jack O\u2019Halloran In 1974, the boxing career of Jack O\u2019Halloran, and the movie career began.\u00a0 In 1975, he played a lead role in the movie \u201cFarewell My Lovely\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[164,291,484,529,608,683,684,738],"class_list":["post-2108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boxing-news","tag-christopher-reeve","tag-gene-hackman","tag-marlon-brando","tag-ned-beatty-valarie-perrine","tag-richard-donner","tag-superman","tag-superman-returns","tag-unedited-donner-cut"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2108"}],"version-history":[{"count":-4,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2108\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}