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The Harrison Ford Story

By Robert Deason

Key Takeaways

  • Why he first appeared in credits with a middle initial
  • Ford only took a drama class to overcome shyness
  • The friendship that led to an amazing casting opportunity

You know the iconic film actor as Harrison Ford, but in his first credited movie role, Harrison Ford went by … Harrison J. Ford. That’s how you’ll see him billed in A Time for a Killing, starring Glenn Ford. One thing, though—the ‘J’ is made up. Harrison Ford has no middle name.

He appeared in two films before A Time for a Killing, as an unbilled performer. Now that his name would appear in the credits for the first time, what should he call himself? According to the Screen Actors Guild rules, each member actor must have a unique, distinctive name to avoid confusion. Imagine the chaos if they had three Bob Smiths, for instance. The name Harrison Ford was already taken by a prolific actor from the silent movie era. The dashing young upstart discovered this when he found “his” star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. However, since the silent Harrison Ford died in 1957, Harrison 2.0 dropped the ‘J’ after this one film with permission to act under the name his parents gave him.

The Early Years

Harrison Ford was born July 13, 1942, in Chicago into a show business family. His mother, Dorothy, was a former radio actress, and his father, John William “Christopher” Ford, was an advertising executive. However, it wasn’t until his final quarter of college at Ripon College in Wisconsin that Harrison caught the acting bug. He discovered his new passion when he took a drama class to help him overcome his shyness.

In 1964, Ford spent a season doing summer stock in Wisconsin and then headed for Los Angeles in hopes of a big break. Columbia Pictures signed him. This led to the aforementioned minor, uncredited roles. A Time for a Killing was a step in the right direction for his career, but he quickly fell back into doing small, undistinguished parts, and, after making several more films, the movie parts dried up altogether. He then turned to television. Ford appeared in many episodes across the dial. If you watch INSP closely, you’ll see some of his early appearances in Gunsmoke and The Virginian, among others.

From Rooftop to Top of the World

By 1969, Ford wasn’t happy with his career progress. One studio executive told Harrison he had no future in the film industry. He took the disappointing news in stride. Ford reinvented himself as a self-taught carpenter to support his then-wife and two young sons. Among his carpentry clients were Malibu residents and well-known writers, Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne.

He became friends with them, and after several years, the relationship led to a casting opportunity. Ford landed an audition with George Lucas for the role of Bob Falfa in American Graffiti. Always one to take his own path, Ford agreed to accept the role on one condition: that he keep his long hair. Even though American Graffiti was set in the 1950s and the character was supposed to sport a flat top, Lucas bypassed the stalemate by agreeing to have the character wear a Stetson hat to cover the hair.

This small part in the 1973 film opened doors with Lucas that would send Ford’s career into orbit. Lucas hired Ford to read lines for actors auditioning for his next little-known project called Star Wars. Ford’s performance in these “dry runs” won over the director. Lucas cast Ford as Han Solo.

From Space Cowboy to Real Cowboy

Ford, and nearly everyone associated with the space-opera Star Wars, gained worldwide fame. During the rest of the 1970s and the 1980s Ford’s profile rose. He reprised his role as Han Solo in two more Star Wars sequels and added other iconic action-adventure heroes to his resume: Indiana Jones, Jack Ryan, and the title character in Blade Runner, The Fugitive, and Air Force One, among many.

Over two decades, Ford made hit after hit. Twelve of his 15 films reached the top 10 in the yearly box office rankings. Six were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, including the one in which he received his only nomination for Best Actor, The Witness, in 1985. Although he does have a stunt double, Ford prefers to do his own stunts for authenticity. In Raiders of the Lost Ark, for instance, he insisted on being dragged behind a truck. He injured himself, and the time it took to heal set back the filming schedule.

Ford is still working in films and television today at age 83, but when the camera turns off, he and his third wife, Calista Flockhart, live on an 800-acre ranch in Jackson, Wyoming, half of which he has donated as a nature reserve. He replaced General Chuck Yeager as chairman of the Experimental Aircraft Association Young Eagles program, pilots his own plane (and survived a 2015 crash on a golf course), and is an activist for various conservation causes.

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