Hello DQ Fans:

I've heard a lot of you have seen HIDALGO and commented that you saw me in it. I know a lot of you wished my role as "Texas Jack" had been larger. Well, I subscribe to the  old saying:" There are no small parts, only small actors." In other words, every role an actor plays in important. An epic film like HIDALGO is a mosaic and I'm just happy to be piece of  the picture !

In the case of HIDALGO, I was offered the role without an audition so I was pleased to know that someone out there was thinking of me. The added bonus of working on HIDALGO was that it was like a DQ reunion. My make-up artist was Michael Mills who had worked the first few seasons on DQ. I also ran into Lesa Neilson, from DQ make-up, "Lips," our beloved wrangler and a whole bunch of other DQ wranglers and background artists. In addition, my daughter Claire was thrilled to come on the set one day and meet Viggo Mortenson. At the time I had not seen any of the LORD OF THE RINGS films but Claire had and she was in awe when Viggo invited her to pose for a photo. Then he walked us over to his trailer and gave Claire an autographed LORD OF THE RINGS collector card.

It was also fun to play an actual historical figure; I love to do research for roles like this. Texas Jack Olmohundro was quite a colorful character. One bit of background information I thought you guys might find interesting: Remember the scene where I'm playing poker in the traveling rail car? We were rehearsing the scene and the director, Joe Johnston, suggested that I should improvise some line as I was raking in my winnings. I remember an old actor had once given me a piece of advice,"Always make sure someone says your name in the first scene you're in; that way the audience knows who you are." Since no one in the written script says my name, I came up with an idea of how I could introduce myself. Since we were playing poker, I suggested to Joe that I lay down four jacks and say, "And that, gentlemen, is why they call me Texas JACK!" He thought it was a great idea and shot an insert (a close-up shot) of me revealing the four jacks. I haven't seen the movie yet but I've been told that shot is in the film.

By the way, if you want to see a bit more of my mug, check out THE WHOLE TEN YARDS which opens April 9th. In that film which stars Matthew Perry and Bruce Willis, I play "Strabo Gogolak" who is about as different from old Horace as night and day.

best wishes,
Frank Collison