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Keith Carradine
Plays Wild Bill Hickok
HBO: The role of Wild Bill Hickok has been played by everyone from Gary Cooper to Jeff Bridges — what was it like playing such a historic character?
Keith Carradine: It's a challenging role in that the guy has taken on such a mythic proportion over the years. When Gary Cooper played the part, he didn't have long hair, he didn't have the mustache. It was more of a Hollywood take on who the guy was. Jeff Bridges was the first one to actually play Hickok with any degree of historical accuracy. I've been given an opportunity to carry on in that light.
Bill Hickok was a fascinating character from a point of view that he was a survivor, in a milieu where survival was a dicey proposition. The west was a wild place in his time.
HBO: How did you prepare for the role?
Keith Carradine: I learned as much as I could about his character, the way he lived. The man had this extraordinary sense of style, let's face it, it took some balls to dress the dandy, the way some of these guys did. And Hickok was known for it. Every picture that I've ever seen of him, he had this sense of style and confidence. There was something intimidating about a guy who was known to be a killer and at the same time, there was a bit of a showman about him.
I've grown this mustache which saves me from having to glue on one every day in the heat. When you get all this stuff on and you put on the guns and the hair, it has an effect on the actor. It tends to lend a certain something to the way you feel as you're just walking around looking that way.
HBO: What are some of the misconceptions people have about Bill Hickok?
Keith Carradine: There's a great argument about how many men he actually killed. People would tell stories and then as we all know as stories get told over and over again, they get embellished, facts get changed, elaborated upon, exaggerated.
He was definitely known as the foremost man killer in the West; however there's controversy about virtually every killing that he was known to have been involved in. There are people who said he killed over a hundred men. Historical fact doesn't corroborate one hundred men. There's a great deal of gray area because of the fact that he operated as a spy during the Civil War for the north. There were incidents that were attributed to him but they've never been substantiated factually. The nearest that I could glean from the books that I've read is that he probably killed between fifteen and twenty men in the course of his career as a lawman. But that's a lot of people.
HBO: What were some of your favorite stories about Wild Bill Hickok the gunfighter?
Keith Carradine: There was the famous Tut killing in Kansas. Where he actually lost his pocket watch in a poker game to this guy named Tut, and Tut was sort of lording it over him. Hickok told him, don't you be wearing that watch in the street, cause I'm gonna get it back from you, by hook or by crook. I'll either buy it back or I'll win it back in another game. But don't you be wearing it in the meantime. Well Tut was in his face about it and showed up the next day wearing the watch. And they drew down on one another and apparently they were about seventy-five yards apart, which is quite a ways. And Tut missed and Hickok didn't. He apparently put a bullet through Tut's heart at seventy-five paces. That was the beginning of his legend as a gunfighter.
HBO: What other character traits did you learn about Hickock while preparing for the role?
Keith Carradine: In a gunfight, the difference between him and an opponent was that Hickok wouldn't hesitate. One of the keys to his surviving was that he was very deliberate and also he wouldn't hesitate. If he thought that violence was going to break out, he'd pull out the gun and shoot. He wouldn't think about it.
I remember reading an expression that Hickok was a very quick draw, but he was real slow about it. Hickok would say that he never regretted anybody that he killed because they all deserved it because they were either trying to kill him or somebody else. And he didn't think about it afterwards. It didn't weigh on his conscience. He just went on with his life. While at the same time knowing that once he had gone down that road, once it was clear that his life was never a peaceful one from that moment on. He always knew that there was somebody that would like to kill him.
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Deadwood Nuggets
According to eye witnesses, Wild Bill Hickok could hit a dime tossed into the air nine out of ten times; he could knock an apple from a tree with one shot and then hit the apple again with another bullet before it hit the ground, all at 25 paces.
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Deadwood History
For more information and on the Real Deadwood, try the following source:
Adams Museum and House
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