Hi, glad you found your way here! A quick intro about me and this page: I have a respectable job during the day and I obsess over LVC by night. Kidding. My job might not be that respectable and I obsess over him during the day too. I’m Italian, so I thought: hey, maybe I can share with the world stuff that isn’t easily found in English, plus other things I’ve collected so far. Or just stuff I like. Or, well, the occasional unhinged fan moment. Also, I felt the internet needed a digital archive to preserve all those cool eBay finds and whatnot before the listings vanish into the void and links expire. Thanks for stopping by!
This might be the earliest mention of LVC being a villain, at least in a non-English newspaper. In 1953, just one year after High Noon!
HE DOESN'T COMPLAIN ABOUT HIS "BAD MAN" REPUTATION
Recalling that Clark Gable, Humphrey Bogart, Alan Ladd, and other famous and beloved stars began their careers in "villain" roles, Lee Van Cleef does not complain about the reputation of being "the quintessential cinema bad guy" that he earned from his first eight performances.* Nevertheless, he is satisfied with his new film, in which he plays a likeable role, paradoxical as that may seem. This film is Arena, M.G.M.'s first 3D feature-length production. Lee will appear as a daring and brave Western cowboy. Starring alongside him will be Polly Bergen, Jean Hagen, and Gig Young.
I was surprised once to find an Italian article from the late 50s along the same lines, but this is even earlier. I wouldn't have expected Lee to be on the radar of the international press pre-Leone, but I suppose these kinds of articles were based on press kits sent from the film production companies to newspapers.
* Lee starred in seven and not eight films before Arena, and in one of them he played a good guy (The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms), assuming he was a bad guy in the lost White Lightning too.
Here's a short and sadly pretty boring interview with Lee done for the Italian debut of The Master from a TV magazine. But, hey, at least you get a photo of him wearing a gold chain! (translation below)
Still tall, a little less thin, with very little hair left, now all white, Lee Van Cleef, the "meanest" villain of many Western films, has lost some of that tough-guy look that made him an actor no producer would ever have dared offer, say, the role of the good father.
Like many of his colleagues from the big screen, Lee has moved to the other side of the barricade: television. And for TV he filmed the series The Master which, after achieving great success in America, has also arrived here (Canale 5 airs it on Fridays at 8:30 PM).
In The Master, for the first time, Lee Van Cleef is not a cruel gunslinger, but a man in search of his inner peace who, against his will, is hunted by a secret Japanese sect, the Ninjas, who want him dead.
Still an action role, then.
Yes, still an action role, but this time on the "right" side.
How did you find yourself in the role of "the good"?
You'd like me to say I felt uncomfortable, wouldn't you? But no. After all, after so many films in which I lived with a gun in my hand, shooting left and right at sheriffs and Indians, a positive role gave me a burst of energy. It was a bit like starting over.
Speaking of starting over: you've come back to work after quite a long absence...
Yes, that's true, for the past couple of years I've slacked off a bit. But then again, what can I say, I'm not a kid anymore, I'm 61, and I think I can afford it.
But what do you do when you're not working?
I invent new dishes. Yes, a few years ago I discovered a passion for cooking, and you have no idea how relaxing it is for me to get in there, among the pots and pans, and mess around.
And how are the results?
At least according to the friends who come to eat at my place, good. As for me, even though I try to be very objective, I don't think I really am.
Very little is known about your private life...
Go ahead and say that absolutely nothing is known.
OK, nothing is known. Would you like to tell me something?
No. Believe me, it's not rudeness on my part. The fact is that deep down I am not an actor, with all the obligations that this job entails. I'm a man like everyone else, with a private life that I want to remain "private". In so many years of career, I have never deviated from this principle. You don't expect me to start now!
To be honest, I would like to ask more, but I hold back because, suddenly, Lee Van Cleef’s face has once again dangerously begun to resemble that of a gunslinger...
- BY ROBERTA SPARANO
Above, a close-up of Lee Van Cleef, and, on the right, the actor as we see him in "The Master". Van Cleef is 61 years old.
Lee Vine Cleef: Lee Van Cleef character moments I think about a lot [1/3]
Films: The Hard Way (1980), Return of Sabata (1971), Nowhere to Hide (1977), Guns, Girls and Gangsters (1959), Death Rides a Horse (1967), Joe Dakota (1957)
TV shows: The Master: Fat Tuesday (S1E6, 1984), The Rifleman: Death Never Rides Alone (S5E5, 1962)
John Mitchum on his relationship with Lee Van Cleef on and off the set of Guns, Girls, and Gangsters (1959):
Cindy [John's daughter] wasn't very old when she met Lee Van Cleef, who was then a heavy in Hollywood Westerns and crime dramas. Although the steely-eyed actor would go on to greater stardom as an anti-hero in For a Few Dollars More and other hard-boiled spaghetti Westerns, he was still struggling to make a reputation for himself. He had made his debut in the great film High Noon as one of the gunman who stalks Gary Cooper down the main street of town. I had worked with Lee on a 1955 cops-and-robbers thriller called The Big Combo (directed by Joseph H. Lewis) and we had become close friends.*
Lee came to my house at lunch time to deliver our three-week-old baby girl her first complete toilette set: Brush, comb, mirror, powder and perfume.
The tenderness he displayed stays with me much more powerfully than his screen image of filling cantankerous people full of holes.
Lee, it could be said conservatively, had a drinking problem. On a sound stage in Hollywood, he took me into his dressing room and offered me a drink. I looked around and saw no bottle. Not to worry. From his flight bag, Lee took an elbow pad used to protect that vulnerable area in stunt falls. From its curved folds he extricated a beautiful silver flask molded to the same curvature of the pad. It was filled with vodka—but not for long.
Source: Them Ornery Mitchum Boys by John Mitchum (1989)
* Apparently John Mitchum couldn't recall that he worked with Lee on Guns, Girls and Gangsters and not The Big Combo (1955). Or won't admit it. I get it, though. The Big Combo is the better film by miles. Guns, Girls and Gangsters is basically an armored cars infomercial. (Jokes aside, I suppose he just had a bad ghost writer/copyeditor.)
As I wrote in another post, I had to rip the LVC interview in Italian from Rai's website because I wasn't satisfied with the versions floating around. I mean, who doesn't need Lee making those faces in better resolution?
The great @noavemberrain has translated the video before, so I won't add much on that front. However, as an Italian native speaker, I feel it is my civic duty to let you all know that hearing Lee ask for a limonata ("lemonade") and being met by a no makes me giggle every time. Fyi, limonata is also slang for French kiss lol.
I hope Tumblr doesn't butcher the video quality. That being said, if you want to watch it in the best quality available, you can find the full episode here, interview starts at 41:10 (you'll need an account and likely a VPN to watch it).
As we're facing breast cancer, my friend has found herself victim of an unfair and frustrating insurance situation. Administrative mistakes and paperwork complications beyond her control have create unexpected expenses and, as we're working into a quick solution, she's in that limbo in between "Having" and "Not Having" a functional insurance.
Right now, we're trying to raise $250 to help cover urgent insurance-related paperwork fees, essential billings, and other immediate expenses that have appeared during this predicament.
Give us a hand 🙏
As a small thank-you, everyone who contributes will be entered into a drawing contest organized by @birthdaysandwich and me, a personalized commission.
You can check her work clicking here 🤠
If you're unable to donate, sharing this post would mean the world to us.
Thank you for reading, for caring, and for helping us with the path of recovery. Your kindness will always illuminate our path.
So, I ripped the whole episode of the Italian quiz show with Lee's interview from the network's website because I needed it in higher quality. For research purposes, obviously. Well, I was watching it and it's actually kinda cute since it's all Western-themed, and… there's this. Italy in the 60s was a magical place, I swear.
Not in the clip, but they ask the two contestants which actor had the sheriff's badge. Contestant 1 proceeds to answer confidently: "Lee Van Cleef. Lee Van Cleef!". (Also the host reads all the actors' names and goes "Clean Eastwood" lol.)
Sharing this sketch of Lee on Medic as Frank Strauss just to say: based on what I've seen since joining the LVC discord server, I swear literally every single Lee fan draws lol. Is it because his face card is so insanely good that it just begs to be portrayed? Or is it because we all have superior aesthetic tastes, which is why we partake in creative hobbies? I know, rethorical questions. The answer is both.
