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Richard Harrison (Actor)Richard Harrison is an American B-movie actor who is better known for starring in various obscure Hong-Kong ninja movies by Godfrey Ho, and many Italian peplum and adventure movies. He was born on May 26, 1935 in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. Early Career In the 50's, Richard Harrison was a muscular young man who posed as a model for various fashion and sport magazines. Starting from 1957, he played little Hollywood roles such as Jeanne Eagles by George Sydney (with Kim Novak) or Too Much Too Soon by Art Napoleon (with Errol Flynn). Through his stepfather's influence, Richard Harrison entered a contract with the firm AIP, which produced a lot of action, adventure and science-fiction B-list series. As a result of this contract, he can be seen next to Charles Bronson and Vincent Price in the movie Master of the World, which is based on Jules Verne's works and directed by William Witney. After this movie, he gave up the opportunity to become a Hollywood minor actor, and preferred to go to Italy. In Italy, among other films, he starred in the main role of Alberto de Martino's movie The Invincible Gladiator (1961). Life in Italy During the next twenty years in Italy, Richard Harrison acted in more than a hundred movies. His movies have been among all the genres of the European B-movies. Peplum, western, spy flick, war, adventure, thriller, etc. (Except the fantasy genre). These movies, which were often screened in low-value special theaters, rarely attracted good reviews. Yet his involvement in a large variety of smaller, low-budget, low-publicity movies gave him a "cult" actor status over time. In sharp contrast to his colleague and friend Gordon Mitchell, another famous "American of the Cinecitt". Acting Career Peplum Movies In peplum movies, while Gordon Mitchell rose in starhood with The Giant of Metropolis (1961), Richard Harrison became popular as the "creator" of the character of Perseus (in Medusa against the Son of Hercules) before acting in more "sword and sandal" movies such as Gladiators 7, peplum version of The Seven Samurai. In adventure movies, Richard Harrison appears bearded in Domenico Paolella's Avenger of the Seven Seas (1961) (one of Michle Mercier's fifty movies) or in Three Sergeants of Bengal (1964), with a Malay crew led by Umberto Lenzi. If Richard Harrison's fame in peplum remained lower than Steve Reeves, Gordon Scott, Ed Fury or Mark Forest (from the usual "Maciste" from Cinecitt), his ability to adapt allowed him, unlike the others, to survive the fall of the genre in the middle of the 60's. The newer styles were mostly western and the Giallo genre (Italian horror thriller). Spaghetti Westerns In the 60's, Richard Harrison continued his acting career in the "Spaghetti Western" genre and in the "paella" genre (that is shot in the Spanish sierras). He usually played as one of the heroes El Rojo, Sabata or Sartana (all of whom seemed like rip-offs of Django, Allelouya and Trinita), and appeared in "classics" such as Ricardo Blasco's Gunfight at Red Sands or Antonio Margheriti's Vengeance (1963). Action Cinema Richard Harrison acted in various War movies and Spy Flicks, very fashionable genres in the 60's and the 70's. He usually assumed the following roles: Career in France During his co-productions, Richard Harrison visited France, where he appeared in Marc Simenon's The Hideout (adapted from Alphonse Boudard) (1971) with Mylne Demongeot, and also in a few Eurocin productions: Luigi Batzella's Achtung! The Desert Tigers (1976), and, from the same director, Black Gold Dossier (1979) with Gordon Mitchell again at Harrison's side. Career in Asia In the early 80's, the European movie business was greatly weakened by the inflation of production costs, emptying evening movie theaters. Jobs were increasingly rare even in America. Richard Harrison, like many, left to work in Asia. He primarily survived with less reputable movies and studios. His first asian appearances were in two movies from the Shaw Brothers (Hong Kong) studios: Boxer Rebellion (1979) and The Four Assassins (1975), where a certain Godfrey Ho worked as an assistant. He then worked in Philippines where he worked with the Silver Star firm. These productions were often advertised as having been "shot with American stars". The silver Star employed the notorious producer-director Cirio H. Santiago along with other American producers such as Roger Corman or the also notorious duo Golan/Globus (Who distributed many of these products to the Western market). Taped by Teddy Page or Jun Gallardo, taking advantage of the lone violent dispensers of justice (or Richard and the sub-Bronsons), or the patriotic heroes released in the jungle (or Richard and the sub-Chuck Norris), the results were mediocre yet amusing. In the middle of the 80's, Godfrey Ho convinced Richard Harrison to try acting in the Hong Kong kung-fu movie genre for IFD, led by Joseph Lai. The result was a series of terribly campy "Ninja" flicks, (Ninja Silent Assassin, Ninja Terminator, Ninja The Protector, Ninja Thunderbolt, Ninja Squad, etc). These were often made by patching together stolen scenes from old Asian movies and scenes from other movies shot with Richard Harrison (and other Westerner actors, such as Stuart Smith (a.k.a. Stuart Steen), Bruce Baron, Bruce Stallion and Pierre Tremblay). In an interview on the website ultimateninja.com , Richard Harrison said this about the filming of the movies he was in: "The storylines were very hard to understand. I was given scenes to shoot but I didn't know the full story. In the last movie I was made to do, I had different scenes that were inserted in nine different movies. When I tried to prevent this, I was denounced to the tax department and I had to pay thousands of dollars of taxes, even though I was supposed to have received my fees after taxes deduction. (...) I wasn't expecting those movies to be of exceptional quality but I have never thought that they could be so bad." Disgusted, Richard Harrison watched his name discredited by these products on screen, and then in the video market. Return to USA In 1990, Richard Harrison left to return to living in California, in Palm Springs. He would shoot a few more movies in Europe and in the United States (mostly for Fred Olen Ray) before finally ending his acting career, preferring, instead, a political and writing career. Other Work Along with an active acting career, Richard Harrison also directed or wrote several storylines. He produced a few movies anonymously. For example, he was behind the parodic western Jesse and Lester (1972), the movie Three Men on Fire (1986), and he wrote the original script of the Bruno Mattei movie, Scalps (movie). Recently, Richard Harrison and his son Sebastian started Gladiator Electronics, a business dealing with numerous electronic devices (cellular telephones, region-free DVD, VTR recorders, players and multisystem video converters etc.). The name is a tribute to the "Sword and Sandals" genre. Relation to Clint Eastwood As an American, Richard Harris felt that the attempts of recreating the appearance of the myths of the (non-existent) Wild West in Italy were hardly effective. He refused an offer by Sergio Leone who wanted to make him the hero of A Fistful of Dollars. Richard, instead, recommended a young American actor who had also just emerged from AIP productions: Clint Eastwood. Richard Harrison later said that this recommendation was his only good contribution in the whole cinema industry (and the only way he could get in cinema encyclopedias at the letter E!). Yet, it was due to him that Clint Eastwood rose as a star... "only because he knew how to ride a horse." External links * Gladiator ElectronicsRichard Harrison's new electronic device business website
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