MovieChat Forums > Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) Discussion > has there ever been a pairing like Redfo...

has there ever been a pairing like Redford and Newman?

posted 13 years ago by lostto
42 replies | jump to latest

I'm really surprised to find no posts here re: this inspired pairing. I have often read how much both men have hated their status as some of Hollywood's most gorgeous men. Both were such skilled actors, deliberate and conscientious re: the craft, and have hated the distraction their looks created....but one just can't help but think at times during this movie "this has got to be one of the most high-wattage handsome pairings of all time". Over the years I've noted how women always react when this movie is mentioned...and they're first comments are never about the movie (though pretty universally liked or loved), but about the effect of both these men together on the screen!

[–] LudwigVanGoldfish 13 years ago

When there's an excellent story and script matched to an incredible pair of actors then there is really something to see.

Here is another film you might really enjoy from 1975 - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073341/ - The Man Who Would Be King. You have Michael Caine paired with Sean Connery!

Also a great director who waited years before finding the right pair to fill the boots of two incredible story characters from the creative and inventive mind of Rudyard Kipling who wrote what might be the greatest adventure short story ever - The Man Who Would Be King.

Another interesting pair - Dustin Hoffman and Steve Mcqueen, 1973 (only four years after Butch Cassidy), in Papillion. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070511/ Pure adventure in every scene.

Look where no one else is looking and see what no one else sees.

[–] lostto 13 years ago

both those sound really interesting...gonna check them out for usre..thanks for tips!

[–] spotlightne 13 years ago

Dustin Hoffman and Warren Beatty in Istar (1987)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093278/

[–] Arthur_Nelson 13 years ago

Spot on sir, spot on...MWWBK came to my mind instantly too. ;)

[–] ecarle 12 years ago

Here is another film you might really enjoy from 1975 - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073341/ - The Man Who Would Be King. You have Michael Caine paired with Sean Connery!

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Director John Huston brought that script to Paul Newman(they had worked together on Judge Roy Bean and The Mackintosh Man) for another possible teaming with Redford, and Newman said..."They're British...its got to be Connery and Caine!" So Paul Newman evidently cast "The Man Who Would Be King."

Except:

John Huston had first intended the movie, in the fifties, for Clark Gable and Humphrey Bogart...

...and later for Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole.

[–] heyuactor 13 years ago

Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis made some fun movies together.

"Did you make coffee...? Make it!"--Cheyenne.

[–] DocCasualty 13 years ago

"this has got to be one of the most high-wattage handsome pairings of all time"

I think you've pegged your answer there and I don't think there is another pair that matches them in talent and looks. While some good movies and excellent actors have been mentioned, they're no Newman and Redford.

Ishtar is probably the worst movie of all time and there are a lot of stinkers out there to vie for that title.

"Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye." 2001: A Space Odyssey

[–] suzycreamcheese1 13 years ago

heath and jake

RIP Heath Ledger 1979-2008

[–] ecarle (14979) 3 years ago

Worth remembering:

When Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid came out in 1969, Paul Newman was an established, major star.

But Robert Redford was not. He'd been in a lot of movies (War Hunt, The Chase, This Property is Condemned) but never really "breaking through" as a star. In his one true hit -- Barefoot in the Park -- he played a buttoned-down, square young lawyer.

And Redford only ended up in Butch Cassidy with Newman after McQueen and Beatty turned it down. Brando had evidently been rejected.

Note: Robert Redford himself noted -- a little snarkily -- that when he made The Sting in 1973 and Paul Newman was brought in, "Newman was actually considered somewhat on the downhill slide." Which was true. Newman had made a string of movies (WUSA, Sometimes a Great Notion, Pocket Money, and The MacKintosh Man) which were not hits. The Sting kind of brought Newman back.

[–] 13 years ago

[deleted]

[–] KyleH87 13 years ago

I would place Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci in Raging Bull slightly higher. It's pretty hard to beat that pair. If you're referring more to how attractive the two men are to women than how well they look together on-screen, then yeah, Redford and Newman would probably gain the top spot.

[–] greenbanzanas 11 years ago

I consider Robert DeNiro to be the most overacted actor ever, and not only does Raging Bull suck but so do...dare I say it...all of Scorcese's films, even Good Fellas is barely watchable.

[–] floyd-52 10 years ago

Even "The Color Of Money"?

[–] modelbehavior24 13 years ago

Emilio Estevez and Richard Dreyfuss in Stakeout, and Another Stakeout. Those are also two great films with great chemistry between the two actors!

[–] benteigil 12 years ago

Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise in RainMan

[–] kodax2 12 years ago

Kurt Russel and Val Kilmer in Tombstone
Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Duvall in Lonesome Dove

[–] gonza-peralta 10 years ago

I like your choices! And if we're talking westerns, J. Robbards and Charlie Bronson in Once Upon a Time in The West

[–] Burning_Sosobra 8 years ago

Don't get me wrong, Stakeout is a fun movie, though I'll never see Another Stakeout because it's just the same plot as the first, just with the addition of Rosie O'Donnel, who is utterly disgusting. But Dreyfuss and Estevez is your idea of an "epic" pairing of actors? Dreyfuss is a decent actor, but Estevez would never have been famous, even as brief as his movie career was, if not for being Martin Sheen's son. Just seems like an odd choice. De Niro and Pacino, Eastwood and Hackman, De Niro and Pesci, are examples of amazing actors being paired together. Estevez and Dreyfuss doesn't even come close to the previously mentioned pairings. Now if you had said Dreyfuss and Bill Murray from What About Bob?, then you'd be more on the right track.

Just like the tide out at sea, we lower & rise again

[–] joopzijnmail 12 years ago

Danny & Rusty (Clooney & Pitt)
Vincent & Jules (Travolta & Jackson)