Collin County Living Well Magazine July/August 2016 | Page 27

H

By Nadine Bubeck

is career spans nearly 50 years. Often seen sporting a
cowboy hat, Sam Elliott is a veteran actor with pop and
pizazz. In addition to his vast resume, the Hollywood
A-lister continues to indulge in new projects, including
co-starring with Ashton Kutcher in The Ranch, and a recurring role in the series Grace and Frankie.
So how has he maintained such success and longevity in the notoriously youth-obsessed entertainment business? Well, simply put––
his mustache stands out.

Elliott was born Aug. 9, 1944. He landed his debut role
in 1969, appearing in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance
Kid. Through the 70s, he found steady work on TV shows
like Gunsmoke, and then earned serious fans with 1989’s
Road House. You’ll likely remember his role in the 1998
film The Big Lebowski. Throughout his career, he has
played cowboys on TV and in films, including The Quick
and the Dead, Tombstone, and The Golden Compass.
The native Californian
grew up in Oregon,
often playing outdoors
or watching movies.
According to the
website, biography.com,
he decided on an acting
career at 9 years old.
Surely, that came
with skepticism.

But Elliott’s burning desire for Hollywood was overwhelming.
After moving to Los Angeles, he scored a role in Butch
Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, co-starting Robert
Redford and Paul Newman. As luck would have it,
that’s where Elliott met Katharine Ross, who was cast as
Redford’s lover. Nearly a decade later, Elliott and Ross
crossed paths again, fell in love and started a family.
Through the 1970s,
Elliott did a lot of TV
work, acting in shows
such as Mission:
Impossible, Gunsmoke,
and Hawaii Five-O. He
also played Evel Knievel
in a TV biopic about the
legendary motorcyclejumping daredevil. While
Elliott’s good looks could
have placed him in the
heartthrob category,
he didn’t quite form a
conventional Hollywood
career. In fact, he often
refused leading roles,
instead maintaining
what would become his
signature long hair and
handlebar mustache.

Elliott’s father, a worker
for the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, was
concerned about his
son’s chosen profession.
Actors Jeff Bridges, left, and Sam Elliott in the 1998 cult classic
The two were unable to
The Big Lebowski.
resolve those differences
before his dad died
of a heart attack when Elliott was 18 years old.
“I don’t want to be known as a sex symbol,” he told
“He died thinking, ‘Man, this kid is going to go down
Playgirl magazine in 1976. “There’s a great stigma
the wrong path,’” Elliott said in a later interview. “And I
that goes with that tag. I want to be a Sam Elliott.”
think on some levels that was either hard on me or made
me more focused in my resolve to have a career.”
And that he was.

Continued, next page

COLLIN COUNTY Living Well Magazine | JULY/AUGUST 2016

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