Clint Eastwood Risked Big and Rejected This 1969 Western for a Low-Budget Film — and Was Proven Right

Long before Clint Eastwoodbecame one of Hollywood’s most prominent actors, he made a career-defining call by turning down a flashy Western that looked like a sure thing on paper.

In the late 1960s, Eastwood was searching for his first major American film after rising to fame in Sergio Leone’s Dollars trilogy. At the time, many critics still dismissed his Spaghetti Western success, making his next move especially important.

That’s when he was offered Mackenna’s Gold, a star-packed production featuring Gregory Peck and Omar Sharif. It came with a bigger budget, bigger names, the exact thing many believed Eastwood needed at the time. But there was just one problem—he hated the script.

“I talked to Carl Foreman on several occasions, but I didn’t care for the script,” Eastwood later said in the book Conversations With Clint, which contains lost interviews with the actor by Paul Neeson.

His representatives reportedly pushed hard for him to take the role, reminding him of the famous cast and the opportunity to raise his profile. But Eastwood didn’t budge. “They kept saying, ‘Wow, but you get to work with a lot of well-known actors,’” he recalled. “I said, ‘Yeah, but I just don’t like the script.’”

Instead, he chose the much smaller Hang ’Em High, a lower-budget Western that cost far less to make… but the gamble paid off. 

For the role, the American Film Institute notes that Eastwood reportedly earned a salary of $400,000 for Hang ‘Em High, plus 5 percent of the film’s total profits. The film did around $11 million at the box office worldwide—with a modest budget of $1.6 million—which means Eastwood made around  $550,000 in total. 

Mackenna’s Gold, however, only ended up doing a measly $3 million worldwide, with a staggering $14 million dollar budget.

READ MORE: Clint Eastwood Turns 96 Next Month and Is Reportedly Done With Hollywood for Good

Now, decades later, Eastwood appears content far from Hollywood decision-making. The actor and director, who turns 96 in May, has reportedly stepped back from filmmaking and is spending his time playing piano and creating art.A source recently said to Closer Weekly that “his filmmaking days are finally over,” adding that Eastwood has little interest in revisiting his legacy.