Although the real-life outlaws Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were close, actor Paul Newman admitted that he harbored some grudges against the young Robert Redford throughout the period of filming.
A true testament to their acting prowess, Redford as Harry Longabaugh, aka “Sundance Kid,” and Newman as Robert LeRoy Parker, aka “Butch Cassidy,” were convincing in their portrayals of the Wild West friends, notorious criminals who were eluding the law after a string of bank and train robberies.
The 1969 film, which was based on the actual outlaws, won four Oscars and is still regarded as one of the best Westerns ever produced. Four years later, in The Sting (1973), another caper movie starring two similarly attractive heartthrobs, the stars reunited.
Legends in their own right, Newman and Redford worked their magic when they were together. However, have you ever wondered how Hollywood’s A-listers get along away from the camera?When he was 44 years old, Newman, who portrayed Butch, admitted that he had been interested in the 33-year-old Redford’s 33-year-old character.
In a BBC Talking Pictures interview, Newman noted, “We have a lot of fun together, and we bounce off each other really well.” I would have wanted to play Sundance, he continued. With that cooled-out quality, I feel a little more at ease. It must be the simpler part, I suppose.
Redford was a budding star who won the Golden Globe for New Star of the Year in 1965 for his work with Natalie Wood in the movie Inside Daisy Clover.
After appearing in movies like Cool Hand Luke (1967) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) with Elizabeth Taylor, Newman had already achieved superstardom.
Redford was cast opposite Newman, who was winning acting and directing accolades, in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid after Steve McQueen turned down a role in the film. McQueen also declined parts in Dirty Harry, The French Connection, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
The two celebrities weren’t truly friends at the time, according to Newman’s memoir, “The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man: A Memoir,” the BBC reports.
Newman said, “You can’t depend on Redford. You’re never sure he’s going to be there. That’s simply discourteous.”
Their differences in working styles, according to Newman’s youngest daughter Claire Newman Soderlund, whom he fathered with his second wife Joanne Woodward, may have contributed to their conflicts.
She said, “My father was very much a stickler for timeliness and Bob, that was never really his strength. It was hard work for dad. He worked very hard at it because he wanted to be good and he wanted to be successful and Bob was more of a free spirit.”
When Newman passed away from lung cancer in 2008, Redford, who is now 86, told ABC News that, “It was just that connection of playing those characters and the fun of it that really began the relationship,” he said, reflecting on Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. “And then once the film started, once we went forward, we then discovered other similarities that just multiplied over time, a common ground that we both had between us, interests and so forth, and differences.”
Newman and Redford looked into possibilities to collaborate on a third movie after portraying renowned outlaws and later thieves in The Sting, but it never materialized.
In Bill Bryson’s 1998 book of the same name, A Walk in the Woods, which was adapted into a 2015 movie, it almost happened. The plot of this buddy movie centers on two elderly guys who are out of shape and want to hike the challenging Appalachian Trail.
In 2005, Redford, who both appeared in and produced the movie, chose this script with his close friend Newman in mind.
In 2015, Redford said, “It started with Paul, because Paul and I had been looking for a third film to do together. A lot of time had gone by, and I just couldn’t find it. When I read this book… I thought of Paul right away.”
Redford, who was 79 at the time of the interview, claimed that he sent the book to Newman, who later cast Nick Nolte in the part because he wasn’t sure he could do it physically.
Since they initially worked together on Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the relationship between Newman and Redford, two highly regarded performers, has significantly deepened. The performers, who lived in Connecticut just a mile apart and started to act like brothers, are also close with their families.
Speaking after his buddy died, Redford said, “We both got to know each other’s flaws pretty well. Of course, I outweighed him on that front. But knowing each other’s flaws, we just played them to the hilt and we’d try to trick each other. We’d try to surprise each other, and it was so damn much fun that it became like–it became like a scenario unto itself.”
He added, “Paul really likes to have fun and he loves to laugh and he really especially loves to laugh at his own jokes, and some of them are just really awful. So the fact that he enjoyed them so much, you forget about the joke and you’d start to laugh with him because you’re so caught up in his enjoyment of them.”
Paul Newman and Robert Redford had such a great chemistry! Let us know what you think of their on-screen friendship and real-life romance!
Kids with kids: Where are Britain’s youngest parents now
When the story of then 13-year-old Alfie Patten went viral, then Prime Minister David Cameron stated, “I just thought how worrying that in Britain today children are having children.”
Even before reaching the legal age to buy party poppers, Alfie became the youngest ever father in Britain. It was later determined that another young man, slightly older than Alfie was the real father, and this incident ruined Alfie’s life completely. Even today, he’s facing plenty of issues, including alcohol abuse and problems with the law.
However, the story of Alfie and the girl who gave birth to his alleged daughter isn’t the only one of youngsters becoming parents in Britain.
Tressa Middleton, the youngest mother in Britain, who gave birth to her first daughter at the age of just twelve, recently announced she’s expecting her fourth child.
The now 29-year-old mom shared the news of her pregnancy on the social media by posting a photo of the ultrasound. She welcomed her latest child 17 years after she made headlines for being the youngest mother Britain has ever seen.
“So guys, it’s another girl!!” she captioned her post. “Four girls, I can’t believe it. Good luck, Darren.”
Tressa’s story is a heartbreaking one. Her parents were alcohol and drug abusers and her childhood was a tough one, to say the least.
She fell pregnant at the age of 11 and gave birth at 12, shortly after finishing elementary school.
Following the birth of her daughter, the young mom battled depression and started using drugs and alcohol, which resulted in losing the custody of her girl. The baby was put up for adoption.
The father’s identity was kept a secret until 2009, or three years after Tressa gave birth.
At one point, she broke down and confessed that her daughter was her brother’s who s******y assaulted her from the time she was seven years old.
The 34-year-old Jason was found guilty and sentenced to four years in prison in 2009.
Speaking to the Daily Mail in 2011, Tressa confessed that “sometimes he blackmailed or bribed me to do it.
“He’d say he was going to tell Mum. He’d give me things – joints, drink, cigarettes. Or he’d threaten me.”
Since then, Tressa has battled to put her life back on track and overcome her addictions, which cost her around £400 every day.
Up until 2011, Tressa was considered to be the youngest mother in Britain. But then, the news of an 11-year-old girl who gave birth filled the headlines.
The girl’s identity was kept a secret, but what is known, as per The Sun, that she was s******y assaulted and her family was unaware of that.
“It has come as a big shock,” a family friend said in 2021 to The Sun.
“She’s now being surrounded by expert help. The main thing is that she and the baby are OK.”
Prior to the case of Alfie, it was Sean Stewart who was thought to be the youngest father in Britain.
In 1998, Sean’s next door neighbor, Emma Webster, 15, got pregnant with his child. At the time, Sean was 11 years old.
A month after turning twelve, Sean’s son, Ben Louis, was born and Sean was granted a day off from school.
Sean and Emma were neighbors and according to her, he would climb to her rooftop to see her.
“He said he was 12, I’d never have gone out with him if I’d known he was 11,” she told The Sunday Telegraph at the time.
Shortly after giving birth, Emma married someone else and moved to a £200,000 house, while Sean continued attending his local school before leaving Bedfordshire in his early adolescence.
According to The Daily Mail, in the early 2000s, he was incarcerated for seven months for stealing.
Speaking of him, Emma said at the time, “I don’t know where Sean is or what he is doing. I don’t want to talk about it anymore because I don’t think it helps Ben.”
No matter how unbelievable these stories sound, the one that is the most shocking of all is that of Lina Medina from Peru who gave birth at the age of just five. Today, Medina is 89 years old.
When she gave birth in 1939, she became the youngest mother in the history. Allegedly, she suffered from “precocious puberty,” a disorder that causes puberty to start earlier than usual.
At the time, it was believed that Medina’s child was her father’s but he was eventually freed of all charges because of insufficient evidence.
Teenage couples of a comparable age who have consensual s*x in the UK and are under the legal consent age of 16 are unlikely to face legal action.
But all s****l activity with children under the age of 13 is illegal.
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