It made over 46 million dollars at the box office. It was one of the best movies of 1972. It was selected as one of The Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made by the New York Times. And the soundtrack "Dueling Banjos" won the Grammy Award for Best Country Instrumental Performance in 1974. I'm talking about the "Deliverance" movie - it's 40th anniversary on June 26th is just around the corner.Here's an interview with Ronnie Cox (by Brent Lang/The Republic) who played Drew Ballinger in the film:
Q: You are a musician - did you actually play the guitar in the "Dueling Banjos" scene?
A: "I did not, sort of by my own choice, although I'm not nearly a good enough guitarist. Billy Redden, who played the banjo boy, could not play. He had another kid behind him working the strings."
"Since he was not able to play and we were going to just match the playback, I didn't want to miss a day of canoe practice to go off and record it. I had no idea that it was going to become this number one hit record. Because it's not me on the soundtrack, it probably cost me a gazillion dollars."
Q: When your character Drew's body is discovered, his arm is horribly mangled. That effect was not achieved with makeup.
A: "It was my real arm. That scene turns a lot of people's stomachs, but I had this light case of Polio as a child and I can do this thing where my shoulder comes out of place and just completely dislocates."
"I was in Georgia getting fitted for false eyeballs, because Drew was originally going to be discovered face up in the water, and I told Boorman that I could do this weird thing with my shoulder. Well, he almost fell down. He just thought it was the greatest thing and we later got credit for all this symbolism, but it was just a happy accident." Click here to read the entire interview about the Deliverance movie.
And now - before you go canoeing - enjoy a short 5 minutes of the movie Deliverance and it's title song "Dueling Banjos".
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