Mad Coyote Joe came by the True West World Headquarters this morning and kidnapped me. He drove us down into the Beast to 19th Avenue and Glendale to a little taco shop called Tacos Atoyac, highly recommended by Joe's daughter Katie. We met Joe's TV producer, Don McClure, from when Joe did The Sonoran Grill on Channel 15.
Inside, the place was slammed. Got a cup of menudo and a chicken taco and a side of pinto beans ($6, plus $1 tip). Here's Joe with the feast:
As for the quality, Joe remarked, "This is the best Mexican food I've had in a tire shop." The whole complex is a Llantera Shop.
Got back to the office at two and worked on a couple new True West Moments. Speaking of which. . .
Just got off the phone with Hugh O'Brian who wanted to tell me his old TV show "The Life & Legend of Wyatt Earp" is now playing daily on the Westerns Channel. I asked him what it was like seeing the show on TV again after so many years and he said, "It was nice to see the horses." Ha. Funny guy. He also told me about his two favorite horses, the first, he said, they used for about six or seven weeks until it got loose and ran off about 200 yards and fell in a hole, breaking its leg. They had to shoot it. The second horse, Candy, he remembers quite fondly. She was so gentle, he told me, he would dismount, put the reins over the rail and she would stay put, but would cross her front legs, rest her head on the rail and go to sleep!
Hugh also told me when they first started the show they did one episode a week shooting five days. But then the studio got greedy and started shooting two shows a week and expanding the work to six days. On Monday and Tuesday they would shoot the first episode on the lot, then on Wednesday they would go off the lot to shoot exteriors for both the first and second episodes, then come back and shoot Thursday, Friday and Saturday picking up the second episode and everything else. Hugh said his day started at 4:30 in the morning with a six o'clock pickup and he got home almost every night after nine at night. He also had to memorize 20 pages of script a day. Hard work. However, all that hard work did have some side benefits:
I sent, via email, this photo from the Broadmore Hotel in Colorado Springs, Colorado (the photo is on the wall and says "Hugh O'Brian and friend" and asked Hugh if he remembered this friend.
"Go big or go home."
—Friend in photo
