VLVL2 film & anti-communism

[pynchonoid]

Joe vs. The Duke
New Book Claims Stalin Plotted to Kill John Wayne

L O N D O N, July 31— Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin
was so outraged at the anti-communism of film star
John Wayne that he plotted to have him murdered,
according to a new biography of the American icon. 

John Wayne — The Man Behind the Myth by British writer
and actor Michael Munn says there were several
attempts in the late 1940s and early 1950s to kill the
man known to audiences around the world as "Duke."

In the first attempt, two Russian assassins posing as
FBI agents tried to kill Wayne — born Marion Morrison
on May 26, 1907 — in his office at Warner Brothers
studios in Hollywood.

But the plot was uncovered and the would-be killers
captured, the book says, citing several sources
including director Orson Welles.

The book says the Soviet plots were canceled after
Stalin's death in 1953, by his successor Nikita
Krushchev, who was a fan of the larger-than-life star
of more than 100 films.

"That was a decision of Stalin during his last five
mad years. When Stalin died I rescinded that order,"
the book quotes Krushchev as telling Wayne during a
private meeting in 1958.

But it says American communist groups took up the
cudgels against Wayne, who was a supporter of the
anti-communist witch-hunt led by Sen. Joseph McCarthy,
citing an attempt in Mexico on the set of the film
Hondo.

Wayne survived these attempts and another by a sniper
during a trip to visit American troops in Vietnam in
1966. He eventually died of cancer in 1979

<http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/US/stalin030731.html>

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