Harrison Ford Finally Opens Up

Most people know a good deal about Harrison Ford. His path to becoming an actor was methodical and uneventful: going out for parts, landing small roles. He figured he could be a character actor. "Anyone but the leading man" is how he describes it. A working actor. Getting paid and going home at night. Then there's the famous thing that happened, a story of which there are many versions, but this is the right one: Ford had got a small part in the second feature film by a young director named George Lucas, 1973's American Graffiti. But he had a young family and wasn't making enough to live on, so he worked as a carpenter. "I said I would do it but only at night, when no one was around, because I didn't want to be that guy—I wanted them to think of me as an actor, which I was," Ford says. "First thing in the morning in walked George Lucas to begin the process of meeting people for Star Wars. I was there with my tool belt on, sweeping up, said hello, chatted, and that was it. Later, I was asked by the producer to help them read lines with candidates for all the parts. Don't know whether I read with people who were reading for Han Solo—can't remember. I read with quite a few princesses. But there was no indication or forewarning that I might be considered for this part. It was just a favor. And then of course they offered me the part."

View in Browser  SHOP EXCLUSIVE SUBSCRIBE Harrison Ford Has Stories to Tell Most people know a good deal about Harrison Ford. His path to becoming an actor was methodical and uneventful: going out for parts, landing small roles. He figured he could be a character actor. "Anyone but the leading man" is how he describes it. A working actor. Getting paid and going home at night. Then there's the famous thing that happened, a story of which there are many versions, but this is the right one: Ford had got a small part in the second feature film by a young director named George Lucas, 1973's American Graffiti. But he had a young family and wasn't making enough to live on, so he worked as a carpenter. "I said I would do it but only at night, when no one was around, because I didn't want to be that guy—I wanted them to think of me as an actor, which I was," Ford says. "First thing in the morning in walked George Lucas to begin the process of meeting people for Star Wars. I was there with my tool belt on, sweeping up, said hello, chatted, and that was it. Later, I was asked by the producer to help them read lines with candidates for all the parts. Don't know whether I read with people who were reading for Han Solo—can't remember. I read with quite a few princesses. But there was no indication or forewarning that I might be considered for this part. It was just a favor. And then of course they offered me the part." Read More The Ted Lasso Season Finale Is—Improbably, Miraculously—Perfect In the season (and possibly series) finale, Jason Sudeikis and co. recaptured the magic that made us fall in love with AFC Richmond in the first place. Read More 9 Great Smokeless Fire Pits for More Relaxing Bonfires Your lungs, throat, and eyes will thank you. Read More How to Be a Man—According to Pop Culture Writer Manuel Betancourt is a historicizing critic. He thinks about the context in which something—whether a telenovela or sexy Adidas ad—is created, examining the positionality between the text and himself as a consumer. For him, media isn't a mirror, but something more fluid. He thinks of it as ripples in a pond, or light reflecting off a disco ball. At turns funny and sexy, thirsty for intellectual engagement (and men too), his new book, The Male Gazed: On Hunks, Heartthrobs, and What Pop Culture Taught Me About (Desiring) Men, untangles the simultaneous threads of desire to be a beautiful man, or to be with beautiful men, then unravels the implications of all of it to understand how those threads form the self. Read More Harrison Ford Knows Who Would Win a Fight Between Han Solo and Indiana Jones "Me, asshole." Read More The Dark and Stormy Has the Best—and Most Controversial—Name in Cocktails Technically, there's only one legal way to make one. Chris Moore, Head of Bars at the Ned, shows you how. Read More The Shoe That Officially Made Me a Sneaker Person It takes a lot to sell me on a sneaker. I'm a city person, so a sneaker needs to be sidewalk-friendly; I'm also a fashion person, so a sneaker needs to be…not hideous. It should be versatile enough to go with everything in my wardrobe, from rainy afternoon coffee runs to sunny morning commutes, and it should, above all else, be comfortable. Enter stage left: the Cariuma OCA Lows. I had high hopes for this sneaker (they are, after all, Ashton Kutcher's shoe of choice), and all of them were met (if not exceeded). I wasn't a sneaker person before, but I sure am one now—as long as these are the sneakers in question. Read More Follow Us Unsubscribe | Privacy Notice/Notice at Collection esquire.com ©2023 Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Hearst Magazines, 300 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019

Congress Is Terrifyingly Ignorant About the Debt Ceiling

Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat from Virginia, seems like a decent enough skin, although his selection as the 2016 Democratic vice-presidential candidate was the first ominous indication that Hillary Rodham Clinton was running a no-risk, milk-the-clock strategy against an obviously charismatic wildman. Now, though, he's got his dander up in a good cause. As part of the proposed debt-ceiling extortion, a provision was inserted that would green-light the approval process to finish the Mountain Valley Pipeline, a natural-gas delivery system beloved by Senator Joe Manchin (also a natural gas delivery system) and despised by people living along its proposed route, many of whom are Kaine's constituents.

View in Browser  SHOP EXCLUSIVE SUBSCRIBE Does Anyone In the Crazy Caucus Actually Know What the Debt Ceiling Is? Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat from Virginia, seems like a decent enough skin, although his selection as the 2016 Democratic vice-presidential candidate was the first ominous indication that Hillary Rodham Clinton was running a no-risk, milk-the-clock strategy against an obviously charismatic wildman. Now, though, he's got his dander up in a good cause. As part of the proposed debt-ceiling extortion, a provision was inserted that would green-light the approval process to finish the Mountain Valley Pipeline, a natural-gas delivery system beloved by Senator Joe Manchin (also a natural gas delivery system) and despised by people living along its proposed route, many of whom are Kaine's constituents. Read More Stop Trying to Sell Me the Best T-Shirt Ever—Hanes Already Makes It It's only $10 and infinitely better than anything else out there. Read More Balmuda's New Coffee Machine Gives You the Perfect Drip Burnt coffee will never be an option again. Read More Is My Writing a Hobby Or a Career? "So it's like a hobby?" Someone recently asked about my writing. No, I wanted to say. But yes, kind of. I've stumbled my way through this conversation many times before. Yes, I have a full-time job that isn't related to my writing; yes, I still think of myself as a writer. Is it a hobby, a side hustle, a passion project? It's all of those things and somehow none of them. Yet when someone refers to writing as my hobby, I flinch, despite knowing the value of hobbies, or perhaps because it feels so unlike my actual hobbies, like baking. I know how often creative work or work by disabled people, people who are parenting or caregiving, or people with other responsibilities gets relegated to this "hobby" categorization, regardless of how people classify it themselves. Maybe it is a hobby. Or maybe it's work someone cares about that doesn't fit a forty-hours-a-week model. Read More The Craziest 'Succession' Finale Theory Actually Came True As Succession rounded home this past weekend, Tom Wambsgans (Matthew Macfadyen) falling into the lap of wealth and power likely shocked audiences at home. But for one Succession theorist on TikTok, the popular HBO drama played out just as she predicted. Now, you may be thinking, Well, a lot of people thought Tom could end up as the CEO in the end! If so, you'd be mostly right. But not everyone figured it out using obscure, Ken Burns-level baseball history. Read More Ronny Chieng Is 'Asian-Mom Famous' You know Ronny Chieng. He's the guy who waltzes in with an ego the size of Texas—even though he's from Malaysia—cracking wise in a way that makes your jaw drop before the joke sinks in, then you laugh. The 37-year-old is famous for his hilarious (yet absolutely scathing) political commentaries as a correspondent on The Daily Show, his brilliant Netflix comedy specials, and his scene-stealing turns in blockbusters like Crazy Rich Asians and M3GAN. In between all of Chieng's comedic duties, we managed to catch him on a Zoom call to muse about his penchant for playing immoral characters, his future as an action star, and if just maybe, fortune willing, he could be the next permanent host of The Daily Show. Read More Allow Me to Introduce You to the Bruschetta Method You sit down at the Italian joint, order your negroni, and grab the menu off the red-and-white gingham tablecloth in front of you. The antipasti are there at the top left, and before long, you're ready to suggest a starter. But you're not quite sure how to say it—or play it. BruSHetta? BrusKetta? BruSKEHtta?! Based on an extensive peer-reviewed study titled, Listening to Random Americans I Both Know and Don't Know Saying It, I feel comfortable declaring that most would suggest to their table that they share a plate of "bruSHETTA." There's a 'C' in the word—bruschetta—but the 'S' usually dominates an 'SC' in English (muscle). In Italian, the 'CH' creates a hard 'C'. The "SH" is highly common, though, and also wrong, and wrong in such a way that it does betray what you do not know. Read More Follow Us Unsubscribe | Privacy Notice/Notice at Collection esquire.com ©2023 Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Hearst Magazines, 300 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019