‘Get him back in the spotlight’: How George Strait got to star in his only Hollywood movie

Screenwriter Rex McGee admits that he barely knew who George Strait was before getting the job to write a movie starring the country legend.

“The producer said, ‘You’re from Texas, right?’ And I said, ‘Yeah’,” McGee told the Star-Telegram. “[He said], ‘You want to write a movie for George Strait?’ I said, ‘Who’s that?’”

McGee would get plenty of face time with Strait as the pair made 1992’s “Pure Country.” The project was the first and only time Strait acted in a film in his over 40 year entertainment career.

“Pure Country” starred Strait as Dusty Wyatt Chandler, a successful country singer who grows weary of how over-the-top his shows have become and longs to go back to his grounded home grown roots.

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McGee is a North Texas native, who grew up in Cleburne and graduated high school in Burleson. He would then go on to enroll and graduate from the University of Southern California’s film program.

As this year marks 32 years of “Pure Country,” McGee will be in attendance at a screening and Q&A event for the movie this weekend at downtown Fort Worth’s Rooftop Cinema Club. Tickets are available here.

McGee spoke with the Star-Telegram ahead of Saturday’s event about his North Texas ties, how he came to work under legendary director Billy Wilder and writing “Pure Country.”

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Star-Telegram: I believe your dad was a projectionist in Fort Worth. Is that correct? I was curious where your love for movies came from growing up?

Rex McGee: I basically grew up in Fort Worth, that’s where we came on the weekend. We go to Seminary South Shopping Center and go downtown, I get a burger at Chuck Wagon. These places don’t exist anymore and it was the place to go. I was living in Burleson and we would always have to catch the bus before we could drive to downtown Fort Worth and see a movie. Downtown Fort Worth had three or four really great movie theaters. The old time Palaces, the Worth Theater. That was like a gold palace, its gorgeous. And the Hollywood Theater and Palace Theater. They were all lined up on Seventh Street and my dad worked at all of them and ran movies. I would go to work with him and stay in the theater with him all day. And watch movie’s over and over and over again. That’s how it happened.

ST: I was looking over some research before we talked today and I couldn’t believe it. When you were at USC in the 1970s, you wrote a letter and became a protege for director Billy Wilder who’s known for movies like “The Apartment” and “Sunset Boulevard.” I was just curious how that came to be?

RM: I was the luckiest guy on Earth. I was a sophomore at USC and he made a film that I really loved, and it wasn’t doing well [1972’s “Avanti!”]. I sat down and I wrote basically a fan letter to him. I snuck around and got his private home address. So I sent the letter there and a couple of days later, I got a call from him in my dorm room at USC. He says, “Why don’t you come on over? Let’s talk.” That was shocking enough to hear his voice. But I went into that office at Goldwyn studios where he had written “Some Like It Hot” and “The Apartment.” When he opened the door, the first thing I saw was his six Academy Awards.

He needed to talk to somebody and I guess it was me. I sat down in a chair and he paced back and forth in front of me, waving his walking stick. He said, “What do you think I should do, Rex? You think I should stop making movies? Should I write plays? Should I play the horses at Hollywood Park?”. And I am sinking in my chair, because I’m 21-years-old and Billy Wilder’s asking me what I think he should do? Just astounding, it was an amazing moment.

A year later [Wilder] remade a film called “The Front Page” with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau that was a remake of “His Girl Friday”. I got to watch the whole process of making that film. When I settled into his office, he gave me copies of all his screenplays and ran all his movies for me. So I could read the script, watch the movie and then talk to the man that made it. It was like graduate school from heaven. I mean, there’s nothing like it.

I was with Billy for 29 years. I was with him basically to the day he died [in 2002], and he was 95. But what an experience.

ST: Shifting back into “Pure Country.” This year marks 32 years of the movie. Can you believe it’s been 32 years?

RM: I believe it though. Every three months I get a check from the Writer’s Guild [of America]. So thank you writer’s guild, the residuals are still coming in. [Laughs]. That’s amazing to me. We had no idea it would turn out to be a perennial film. That’s the only film George really ever made. I was on his coattails there. The producer said, “You’re from Texas, right?” And I said, “Yeah.” [He said], “You want to write a movie for George Strait?” I said, “Who’s that?” [Laughs]

ST: I was curious about how the project came to be, because I read that it started from Colonel Tom Parker wanting to do the same thing for George Strait that he did for Elvis Presley. You do the music and then you get in the movies. How did you come to be on the project?

RM: Well, they tried to get George to make the movie for like a year and a half, and he just did not want to do it. He never acted before and was very unsure of himself. He’s not extravagant onstage, I mean he just stands there and sings. No dance moves, nothing fancy. He was very nervous about acting. The film’s producer was Jerry Weintraub, who did a lot of movies. [Weintraub] was the personal manager for Elvis in the ‘70s. He had managed Frank Sinatra and The Carpenters and John Denver. Weintraub’s mentor was Colonel Tom Parker.

This was the early ‘90s and there were a lot of new country stars coming in at that point. Alan Jackson and Garth Brooks, lots of new guys coming in and they were kind of taking the spotlight off George. Colonel Parker said, “Put him in a movie like Elvis and that will get him back in the spotlight.” And that’s what he did. That’s why Weintraub just kept going until he convinced George. He needed a Texas writer, because George wouldn’t have used somebody from Brooklyn, probably. But anyway, that’s how I got the job. I had worked for the executives, I had written scripts for them before too. They didn’t get made but they knew my background and my work.

Then I met George and he was just so unassuming and quiet. He’s a regular guy with jeans, a t-shirt and a ball cap, you know? He didn’t see pretension that way. But I went to some of his concerts backstage. I hug out in Fort Worth, because I knew it had to have a rodeo in it. George was a team roper. I think my instructions from the movie’s producer was that the script is going to have 10 songs in it and George has got to rope something. Seriously, that’s how he put it. I said, “Okay, that’s interesting instructions on how to write a story.”

ST: I’m sure you’ve been asked this for the last 30 years or so. I feel like everybody has that one celebrity story. So if someone’s asking, “What’s your one George Strait story?” Do you have one in mind?

RM: We would go for lunch at this north Hollywood diner. We got this one waitress, who kept waiting on us and staring at [George]. She finally said, “You know, you look an awful lot like George Strait?” He said, “Yeah, I get a lot of that.” [Laughs] But he looked very plain, he just had a cowboy hat on like a regular guy. That’s the one that comes to mind right now.

ST: “Pure Country” just screams Texas and I know it was filmed in Maypearl and Cresson, even some in Fort Worth. Having such a Texas influence in the locations and overall vibe of the movie, is that something that you’re putting in the script? Or does that come from conversations with the director later? How do you effectively get a Texas-sized version of the story?

RM: How did it come to be shot in Texas? I had nothing to do with that. They wanted a real Texas landscape, I think that’s the reason. In the little town of Cresson, they shot a scene in the cemetery there. The character George plays, goes to see the tombstone of his parents. Who both died together, somehow. It was a phony headstone and I got a shot of George sitting on top of the headstone. The phony headstone had the names of my mother and father on it. They were both deceased when the movie came out. When I saw that I just cried like a baby, because it was sort of like my thank you to them. Because they would never see that, but there they were on a tombstone. Just wiped me out. That’s my favorite shot in the movie.

ST: Yeah, that’s a great shot there. When you think back on the legacy of this movie, I mean the movie’s soundtrack album sold over 6 million copies. When you think back about the legacy of the movie, what comes to your mind about the experience of it?

RM: Oh, boy. People love that movie. I hear from people all over the world that love that movie. It just stuns me, because I’m not sure the studio was sure of it when they finished it. They never made a film like that before. Maybe “Honeysuckle Rose.” But what it means to me? My God, it’s the reason I can afford an apartment. [Laughs] No, it’s more than that. I’ve just been very, very lucky with the way things turned out in my career. I’m very proud of that.

I came away owning the stage musical rights. I got the original songwriters to join me in making it a musical for the stage. They wrote 18 new songs for it. We had our first production at Lyric Stage in Dallas in 2017. It really went over well. We were all set to have an opening in Houston at their Theatre Under The Stars in March of 2020. We got hit by a tornado called COVID-19. They canceled the show and the whole season and were dark for a year and a half. We’re trying to find a new home for it now.

ST: Yeah, I was doing research and saw that you had been working on a musical. Then I saw it was supposed to come out in spring 2020 and then yeah, I’m sure that was heartbreaking.

RM: We’ve been working on that thing for so long. We don’t know where to go now. I was thinking the other night, I wonder if its time for a remake of the film. If we could get Taylor Swift to play George’s daughter in the movie. [Laughs] Flip the roles. I’m up for anything at this point.

ST: Speaking of that. There were two “Pure Country” sequels made. One in 2010 titled ”Pure Country 2: The Gift” and another in 2017 called ”Pure Country: Pure Heart.” As far as I can tell, the sequels do not feature the “Dusty” character but George Strait does makes an appearance in “The Gift” as himself. It doesn’t seem like you were involved in the two sequels, but were you approached at all on those projects?

RM: Those scripts existed for a long time. When Warner Brothers picked them up, they just slapped the “Pure Country” title on. I had nothing to do with them. Believe me, I was watching to see if this was a sequel and if George had played his character in “The Gift” then I would have gotten a big paycheck. I mean, they could remake “The Exorcist” and call it “Pure Country: The Exorcist” if they wanted to. [Laughs] They own the title. The title was Weintraub’s idea, my original title was “Unwound.” That was named after George’s first hit record. Weintraub said he wanted people to know just looking at the title what the movie was about.

ST: Rex, I think that’s all the questions I had. I wanted to wrap things up by asking what fans can expect from the “Pure Country” screening and Q&A on Saturday?

RM: I hope it doesn’t rain. That’s the big deal, they’re calling for rain on Saturday. But I’m gonna be there to meet my fans and friends and see what people think. I think its an interesting idea [the rooftop cinema]. Reminds me of the old drive-in days. My dad worked at those too, The Fort Worth Twin and the Boulevard. He taught me how to be a projectionist too. What killed drive-ins was the time change. Went to daylight saving time and they couldn’t start the movie until 9 p.m. To show two movies, you would be there till three in the morning. So I used to be a projectionist. I’m a Fort Worth boy. [Laughs]

Rex McGee is appearing at downtown Fort Worth’s Rooftop Cinema Club at 6:15 p.m. on Saturday at 235 Throckmorton St.