Audie Murphy centenary: how the most decorated soldier in American history became a movie star
Already a military hero by the age of 20, where else could Audie Murphy go but into a Hollywood movie career? One hundred years after he was born, we remember an actor who – although plagued by PTSD throughout his career – became one of the western’s steadiest hands.
Audie Murphy had a rough childhood, to put it mildly.
He was one of 12 children of poor Texan sharecroppers, but his father left the family when Murphy was in his early teens, and his mother died soon after. Murphy had to hunt small game so his siblings would have enough food to eat. Thanks in part to his deprived upbringing, he cut such a slight figure that he was initially rejected by several branches of the military when he tried to join. Finally, he bulked up just enough that the Army allowed him into their ranks when he was 17 (he’d faked his birthdate to appear 18), and he went off to Italy and then France, to fight in World War II.
Against the odds, he went on to win every military combat award for valour in existence at the time, becoming the most decorated soldier in American history – all by the age of 20. His was a story made for the movies, and the movies were about to find him.
Back in the States, James Cagney was setting up his own production company. He saw a front page article about Murphy in Life Magazine and decided to bring him to Hollywood. Cagney let Murphy stay at his house, got him acting lessons, and helped get him his first few roles. Although their partnership wouldn’t last very long, Murphy was grateful for Cagney’s mentoring his whole life.
Murphy’s first star turn was in Bad Boy (1949). At 24, despite all he’d been through, he still looked boyish, and was credible as the titular juvenile delinquent. Still, studios were eager to capitalise on the heroics that had enraptured the country’s attention in the first place, so, predictably, he found himself in war films.
Two stand out. The tortured making of John Huston’s The Red Badge of Courage (1951) was famously recounted in the book Picture by Lillian Ross. The movie itself was mauled by the studio and an overbearing narration added, but enough remains that the simple power of Murphy’s leading performance as a frightened young soldier who grows in courage remains undimmed.
Even more notable was To Hell and Back (1955), which was based on Murphy’s own autobiography. Though he was not the first person to play themselves in a biopic (baseball legend Jackie Robinson had done so in The Jackie Robinson Story five years earlier), To Hell and Back is still a fascinating, uncanny valley-dwelling artefact. It’s hard to imagine what it must have been like for Murphy to relive his biggest battles, the loss of his mother and many of his friends, in front of the sanitised glare of the movie lights.
Despite war films being the obvious genre for him, it was within the western that he found his most enduring cinematic home. Of the 45 or so movies he made during his time in Hollywood, nearly three quarters were westerns. While some were unremarkable, a number were classics on the calibre of the celebrated Ranown cycle that Budd Boetticher was making with Randolph Scott around the same period: taut, complex and atmospheric.
When Cagney parted ways with Murphy, however much warmth the two personally shared, he had a bluntly harsh view of the younger man’s abilities: “We had no use for him really. He couldn’t act.” There was certainly a stiffness to his early performances, but he soon shook that off. Over time, he became one of the western’s steadiest hands.
He was never the most exciting or charismatic of stars. Nonetheless, he had a low-key earnestness that made him believable in his roles. In his best films he’d often be teamed up with a more dynamic actor, and his solidity would ground the pairing – this was the case when he shared the screen with Dan Duryea in Ride Clear of Diablo (1954) and John Saxon in Posse from Hell (1961). He’d rarely steal scenes, but he’d reliably sell the quieter emotional moments. The combination of his diminutive stature and famous real-life heroism made him plausible both in vulnerable and in action star mode, often giving dimension to characters that seemed flat on the page.
Yet he did not always act the hero. In No Name on the Bullet (1959) he’s a hitman who operates within the law by provoking his targets to draw on him – but he always gets to his gun faster. His arrival in town causes widespread terror, and though Murphy remained an unintimidating physical presence even a decade into his Hollywood career, he’d gained enough confidence in front of the camera that his ability to frighten with his mere aura was remarkably convincing.
More often, however, he played men who wore their heroism warily, wearily. In Showdown (1963) he stars as a cowboy whose friend’s drunken fight gets them both locked up alongside a killer and his gang. Throughout the movie, as the friend keeps getting them deeper into jeopardy, Murphy keeps saving them, although the feckless foolishness of his compadre is clearly weighing on his patience. In his most engaging turns, he made his heroism look effortful, adding realism to a genre that specialised in the mythic.
Unsurprisingly for a man who’d had his experiences in war, Murphy struggled with PTSD his whole life. He worked solidly on screen between 1948 and 1966; in the years after, his struggles with addiction and depression often overwhelmed him. He lost much of his fortune to gambling and bad investments. In 1971, at just 45 years old, he died in a small plane crash – a violent, dramatic bookend to a life that had been defined by violence and drama.
Audie Murphy arrived in Hollywood as little more than a novelty act. Nevertheless, across his years on camera he grew into a compelling actor on his own terms, his unique real-life story adding another layer of depth to his quietly rich, textured performances.