R.I.P.: L.Q. Jones

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If you didn't know the name L.Q. Jones, you knew his amazing work in almost every western TV series ever made, and in over 60 movies he made over the course of his career. His first movie role was in the 1955 movie Battle Cry, whose character's name he played he took as his stage name. He was born Justace Ellis McQueen Jr, no relation to Steve McQueen, in Beaumont, Texas and was a college classmate of actor Fess Parker, who motivated Jones to become an actor after brief careers at playing professional baseball and football, as a stand up comedian and a rancher in Nicaraugua.In college, Jones studied business, law and journalism.

But, it was acting which would be his calling. He was a member of Sam Peckinpah's stock company and appeared in five of Peckinpah's movies, including Ride the High Country, Major Dundee, The Wild Bunch, The Ballad of Cable Hogue and Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. He considered Peckinpah both a genius and an idiot, saying if Peckinpah could mess something up, he would do it, all the while still praising him as a genius. Jones also had praise for Martin Scorsese, who directed Scorses in Casino, in which Scorsese wrote his own dialogue for the movie, because Scorsese didn't know how to write Texan.

Jones appeared in three of Elvis's movies, an uncredited role as Pardee Fleming in Love Me Tender; he received screen scredit for his role as Tom Howard in Flaming Star and co-star billing in his last Elvis movie, as Bronc Hoverty in Stay Away, Joe. Jones was the only male actor to appear in three of Elvis's movies.

In 1975, Jones took Harlan Ellison's story A Boy and His Dog and turned it into a movie. He wrote the script, and produced (with actor-producer Alvy Moore, of "Kimall, Hank Kimball" from Green Acres fame) and directed the movie. It became a cult classic. Jones had also co-produced and written The Brotherhood of Satan In typical Hollywood style, A Boy and His Dog has been remade and is currently in pre-production. The remake uses Jones's story for the movie.

Jones's last movie role was also a movie in which he debuted as a singer, A Prairie Home Companion: The Movie. He played singer Chuck Akers, who is not in the best of health and who will be paid a visit by an angel, played by Virginia Madsen. In the movie, and on the soundtrack, he sings A.P. Carter's You've Been A Friend to Me. He was 76 years old at the time.

www.msn.com/en-us/movies/news/lq-jones-actor-in-sam-peckinpah-classics-and-director-of-a-boy-and-his-dog-dies-at-94/ar-AAZoFDG

www.thespectrum.com/story/entertainment/2017/08/15/turning-90-l-q-jones-reflects-hollywood-journey/568330001/

[erik]

There goes another great character actor, especially for Westerns, especially those of Sam Peckinpah. Jones was such a staple of that director's films (witness how he and Strother Martin get it on in THE WILD BUNCH and THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE as a sort of demonic Laurel and Hardy pair); and of course he always ended up dead either at or well before the end of those films--depending on how Peckinpah was feeling on any given day of shooting, of course. As Peckinpah once said: "L.Q. Jones died well".

This means that all of Peckinpah's stock company are now riding that great Western prairie up in the sky. Besides Jones and Martin, that cast of what I call The Usual Suspects included Warren Oates, Ben Johnson, R.G. Armstrong, John Davis Chandler, Slim Pickens, Emilio Fernandez, and Dub Taylor.

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Jul 12, 2022 13:00:26 GMT -5 erik said:

There goes another great character actor, especially for Westerns, especially those of Sam Peckinpah. Jones was such a staple of that director's films (witness how he and Strother Martin get it on in THE WILD BUNCH and THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE as a sort of demonic Laurel and Hardy pair); and of course he always ended up dead either at or well before the end of those films--depending on how Peckinpah was feeling on any given day of shooting, of course. As Peckinpah once said: "L.Q. Jones died well".

This means that all of Peckinpah's stock company are now riding that great Western prairie up in the sky. Besides Jones and Martin, that cast of what I call The Usual Suspects included Warren Oates, Ben Johnson, R.G. Armstrong, John Davis Chandler, Slim Pickens, Emilio Fernandez, and Dub Taylor.

And I rather imagine Peckinpah's stock company of actors are all having one whale of a party with L.Q. gone to join his friends. Of Strother Martin, L.Q. had a few funny tales to relate about his friend when he turned 90, including the last time he saw Strother just before he died. Three days before he died, in fact. The cast of actors in Sam Peckinpah's stock company were a distinguished company of gentlemen. L.Q. rarely played the good guys in the westerns. He was the bad guy almost always. I always thought it was something he preferred, though he was the opposite in real life. Took an exceptional actor to make you believe what he (or she) was not. I don't know if anyone eve asked him but I always wanted to ask him that he was just about in every western TV series made except one, that being Bonanza. He had multiple appearances on Gunsmoke, The Big Valley and The Virginian but not Bonanza. I could not imagine that and one reason he kept gettng hired was he was an easy to get along with person. So, why he never appeared on Bonanza was a mystery and still is. But, he's in enough other TV shows and movies, one will always see him and either recognize him immediately or they'll see him but not know his name, but know his work. He lived a good long life and I imagine he's getting used to his new surroundings now.

[erik]

On his friend Sam Peckinpah, L.Q. Jones had this to say to Peckinpah biographer Garner Simmons in the 1970's:

"There are three or four or five directors who are sheer genius in what they do, and Sam is certainly one of those. But he also relies a great deal on the people around him. And as much as I think Sam's a genius, I also think he's a f***ing idiot. But then. it takes a genius to f**k up in the idiotic ways he does. Everybody hates Sam; everybody loves Sam. Sam intentionally makes everybody on the set uncertain in order to get what he wants. He'll figure out which way you're headed and then keep at you until he's got you thinking 180 degrees from where you were. Then, just when you think you've got it licked, he'll start in on you and force you another 180 degrees so you're back where you started, only you can't recognize it. He wants you off balance, because that's the way he sees the world. Nothing is certain"

And at the memorial for Peckinpah in early January 1985, just a week or so after the director's untimely death at 59, Jones made the classic remark that went something to the effect of, well it's a Sam Peckinpah film, we're starting late, and nobody here knows what the f**k is going on.

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Jul 13, 2022 22:14:12 GMT -5 erik said:

On his friend Sam Peckinpah, L.Q. Jones had this to say to Peckinpah biographer Garner Simmons in the 1970's:

"There are three or four or five directors who are sheer genius in what they do, and Sam is certainly one of those. But he also relies a great deal on the people around him. And as much as I think Sam's a genius, I also think he's a f***ing idiot. But then. it takes a genius to f**k up in the idiotic ways he does. Everybody hates Sam; everybody loves Sam. Sam intentionally makes everybody on the set uncertain in order to get what he wants. He'll figure out which way you're headed and then keep at you until he's got you thinking 180 degrees from where you were. Then, just when you think you've got it licked, he'll start in on you and force you another 180 degrees so you're back where you started, only you can't recognize it. He wants you off babalcem because that's the way he sees the world. Nothing is certain"

And at the memorial for Peckinpah in early January 1985, just a week or so after the director's untimely death at 59, Jones made the classic remark that went something to the effect of, well it's a Sam Peckinpah film, we're starting late, and nobody here knows what the f**k is going on.

You think about the history and stories that man lived through and that are now lost. I thought he had written his biography some time before, but I haven't been able to find it on Amazon. The only book I found of his was the paperback novel for his movie The Brotherhood of Satan. We only know a handful of the other celebrity lives he crossed paths with; who knows how many others whose lives he crossed path with? Most of us will pass into the beyond with obscurity and no memory of us having ever been here. Others managed to leave behind memories of their existence but some choose to leave with as much obscurity as possible. Not that it's going make any difference to us when we or they are gone. If you're famous, you have an estate you leave behind and the estate controls what is seen and said about you. Sometimes, the obscurity is a blessing but not to the deceased, but to the survivors.