R. G. Armstrong

The face that shaped the western

R. G. Armstrong was born in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1917. He had a square jaw and a stare that seemed to judge everyone who crossed his path. Before stepping onto a Hollywood set, he honed his craft at the Actors Studio in New York alongside names who would go on to define American cinema.

There he shared classes with James Dean and Paul Newman. His religious upbringing left a lasting mark on how he understood acting. Armstrong did not play a religious fanatic; he simply drew on what he had seen in his childhood in the Deep South.

That intensity opened the doors of Broadway for him.

His film debut came late, after he turned forty, in Garden of Eden (1954). But his meeting with Sam Peckinpah was what changed the course of his career. The director saw in him the perfect embodiment of the old law and the relentless morality that no longer fit the modern world.

The blood alliance with Peckinpah

In Ride the High Country (1962) he played an ultra-religious father who treated his daughters as private property. It was the start of a collaboration that continued through titles like Major Dundee (1965) and The Wild Bunch (1969). Peckinpah wanted tough guys who weren't afraid to get their boots dirty, and Armstrong was always the first on set.

But it wasn't all deserts and horses.

During the 1970s he became a familiar face on television. He appeared in nearly every hit series, from Gunsmoke to The Fugitive. His presence guaranteed a reliability that few supporting actors could match at the time.

So directors called him when they needed a sheriff who wouldn't take bribes or a villain who didn't have to shout to be scary.

From Peckinpah's Desert to Schwarzenegger's Jungle

Many younger viewers first discovered him through The Predator (1987). In that film, he played General Phillips, the man who sends the rescue team into almost certain death. Despite his advanced age, he projected a physical authority that intimidated even the bodybuilders in the cast.

Shortly after, Warren Beatty recruited him for Dick Tracy (1990). In this comic book adaptation he was buried under layers of makeup to bring Pruneface to life. It was one of his last major roles in a big-budget production before action movies changed their look.

Armstrong worked almost nonstop for five decades.

He died of natural causes at his home in Studio City, California, on July 27, 2012. He was 95 years old and had worked in more than 180 film and television productions over the course of his life.