''Little Fauss and Big Halsy'' is a 1970 American

comedy-drama film Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...

directed by

Sidney J. Furie Sidney Joseph Furie (born February 28, 1933) is a Canadian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for his extensive work in both British and American cinema between the 1960s and early 1980s. Like his contemporaries Norman Jewison ...

, starring

Robert Redford Charles Robert Redford Jr. (born August 18, 1936) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the List of awards and nominations received by Robert Redford, recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Awards, Academy Award from four nomi ...

and

Michael J. Pollard Michael J. Pollard (born Michael John Pollack Jr.; May 30, 1939 – November 20, 2019) was an American actor. He is best known for his role as C.W. Moss in the film ''Bonnie and Clyde'' (1967), which earned him critical acclaim along with nomi ...

, also featuring

Lauren Hutton Lauren Hutton (born Mary Laurence Hutton; November 17, 1943) is an American model and actress. Born and raised in the southern United States, Hutton relocated to New York City in her early adulthood to begin a modeling career. Though she was ini ...

, Noah Beery, Jr. and

Lucille Benson Lucille Benson (July 17, 1914 – February 17, 1984) was an American character actress. Biography Personal life Born in Scottsboro, Alabama, on July 17, 1914, Benson was adopted by her aunt, Mrs. John Benson, after her mother died of tuber ...

. The film concerns the exploits of two

motorcycle A motorcycle (motorbike, bike, or trike (if three-wheeled)) is a two or three-wheeled motor vehicle steered by a handlebar. Motorcycle design varies greatly to suit a range of different purposes: long-distance travel, commuting, cruising ...

riders and is one of Redford's relatively unsuccessful films and is therefore lesser-known than his other works.

Johnny Cash John R. Cash (born J. R. Cash; February 26, 1932 – September 12, 2003) was an American country singer-songwriter. Much of Cash's music contained themes of sorrow, moral tribulation, and redemption, especially in the later stages of his ca ...

contributed the title song and other parts of the soundtrack, which also features both

Carl Perkins Carl Lee Perkins (April 9, 1932 – January 19, 1998)#nytimesobit, Pareles. was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter. A rockabilly great and pioneer of rock and roll, he began his recording career at the Sun Studio, in Memphis, Tennes ...

and

Bob Dylan Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career sp ...

. The title song, "The Ballad of Little Fauss and Big Halsy", written by Perkins, was nominated for a

Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song The Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song is a Golden Globe Award that was awarded for the first time in 1962 and has been awarded annually since 1965 by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. The award is presented to the songwriters of a ...

. The main characters are the inept, unsuspecting Little Fauss (Pollard), and the opportunistic, womanizing Halsy Knox (Redford). Hutton played the supporting role of Rita Nebraska, a role originally offered to

Grace Slick Grace Slick (born Grace Barnett Wing; October 30, 1939) is an American singer-songwriter, artist, and painter. Slick was a key figure in San Francisco's early psychedelic music scene in the mid-1960s. With a music career spanning four decades, s ...

Plot

Halsy Knox, a professional

dirt bike The six main types of motorcycles are generally recognized as ''standard'', ''cruiser'', ''touring'', ''sports'', ''off-road'', and ''dual-purpose''. ''Sport touring'' is sometimes recognized as a seventh category or integrated with the ''touring' ...

racer, runs into Little Fauss, an amateur racer, after a race held near

Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ; nv, Hoozdo; es, Fénix or , yuf-x-wal, Banyà:nyuwá) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities and towns in Arizona#List of cities and towns, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona, with 1 ...

. They strike up a friendship as Fauss is attracted to Halsy's carefree lifestyle. However, Fauss's father regards Halsy as a bad influence on his son and refuses to help Halsy when his truck breaks down. When Halsy arrives later at the motorcycle repair shop where Fauss is employed, he tricks the admiring Fauss into repairing his motorcycle for free. When Fauss breaks his leg in a desert race, Halsy, who has been barred from racing due to drinking at the track, proposes that they form a partnership in which Halsy would race under Fauss's name with Fauss serving as the mechanic. Fauss joins Halsy on the motorcycle racing circuit despite his parents' disapproval. Fauss is constantly confronted with his inferiority to Halsy, both on and off the racetrack. Their partnership is finally broken when Rita Nebraska, a drop-out from a wealthy background, arrives at the racetrack and immediately attaches herself to Halsy, despite the attention Fauss pays her. Fauss returns home to his parents to find his father has died. Several months later, Halsy visits him and attempts to ditch Rita, who is now pregnant. Fauss, however, refuses to take her. He informs Halsy that he plans to reenter the racing circuit. The two men race against each other a short time later at the

Sears Point International Raceway Sonoma Raceway (originally known as Sears Point Raceway from 1967 to 1980 and 1982 to 2002, Golden State International Raceway in 1981 and Infineon Technologies, Infineon Raceway from 2002 to 2012) is a road course and dragstrip located at Sears ...

, where Fauss tells Halsy that he has been drafted. Halsy's motorcycle breaks down. As he leaves the track, he hears the announcement that Fauss has taken the lead.

Cast

- Halsy Knox *

- Little Fauss *

- Rita Nebraska * Noah Beery, Jr. - Seally Fauss (billed as Noah Beery) *

- Mom Fauss * Ray Ballard - Photographer *

Linda Gaye Scott Linda Gaye Scott (born February 1, 1943 in Los Angeles, California) is an American actress. Music career In 1963, Linda Gaye Scott appeared on the cover of Jan and Dean's second album "Jan and Dean Take Linda Surfin'." Another photo from the s ...

- Moneth *Erin O'Reilly - Sylvene McFall *Ben Archibek - Rick Nifty (billed as Benjamin Archibek)

Soundtrack album

soundtrack album A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television show. The first such album to be commercially released was Walt Disney's ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' ...

was released in 1971 on

Columbia Records Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on Janua ...

, produced by

Bob Johnston Donald William 'Bob' Johnston (May 14, 1932 – August 14, 2015) was an American record producer, best known for his work with Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Leonard Cohen, and Simon & Garfunkel. Early days Johnston was born into a professional mus ...

and featuring the songs by

and

featured in the film.

Production

After

dropped out of ''

Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between violet and cyan on the spectrum of visible light. The eye perceives blue when obs ...

'' (1968), Paramount sued him for violating his three-picture deal; the lawsuit was dropped in his agreement to play Halsy in May 1969.

was cast as Fauss the following month and was paid $175,000 for the role.

Barbara Hershey Barbara Lynn Herzstein, better known as Barbara Hershey (born February 5, 1948), is an American actress. In a career spanning more than 50 years, she has played a variety of roles on television and in cinema in several genres, including weste ...

and James Victor were also considered for roles in the film.

Principal photography Principal photography is the phase of producing a film or television show in which the bulk of shooting takes place, as distinct from the phases of pre-production and post-production. Personnel Besides the main film personnel, such as actor ...

began on June 16, 1969, in

. Filming moved to

Antelope Valley The Antelope Valley is located in northern Los Angeles County, California, and the southeast portion of Kern County, California, and constitutes the western tip of the Mojave Desert. It is situated between the Tehachapi, Sierra Pelona, and the ...

and

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish language, Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree kno ...

in August, with Redford commuting between the set and the studio's soundstages in Hollywood to finish filming scenes for ''

Downhill Racer ''Downhill Racer'' is a 1969 American sports drama film starring Robert Redford, Gene Hackman and Camilla Sparv, and was the directorial debut of Michael Ritchie. Written by James Salter, based on the 1963 novel ''The Downhill Racers'' by Oakley ...

'' (1969). Filming completed in mid-September.

Release

''Little Faust and Big Halsey'' premiered at in New York City on October 21, 1970 and began an exclusive engagement one week later at the National Theatre in Westwood, California. The review aggregation website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

reports an approval rating of 33% based on six reviews, with an average rating of 4.8/10.

References

External links

* * {{Sidney J. Furie 1970 films 1970s buddy comedy-drama films 1970s road comedy-drama films 1970s sports comedy-drama films American auto racing films American buddy comedy-drama films American road comedy-drama films American sports comedy-drama films 1970s English-language films Films directed by Sidney J. Furie Films set in Maricopa County, Arizona Films set in California Motorcycle racing films Paramount Pictures films 1970s American films