In like Clint: Davenport native plays homage to Eastwood

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By David Burke | Sunday, January 14, 2007 1:06 AM CST | () comments

Clint Glenn is playing an Clint Eastwood-esque character in “The Quick and the Undead,” which was released on DVD last month. (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO)

Perhaps it was prophetic 32 years ago when William and Diana Hummel named their baby boy Clint.

“My dad was a big fan” of Clint Eastwood, the Davenport native said of his late father. “We’d sit and watch his movies together. I think I was definitely named after him.”

And now, this Clint is playing an Eastwood-esque character in “The Quick and the Undead,” a combination spaghetti Western-and-horror movie that was released on DVD last month.

With the stage name Clint Glenn — the surname is his father’s middle name — he plays Ryn Baskin, a bounty hunter in a futuristic world where three-fourths of the population are “the undead.”

Glenn, who’s also a producer of the film, has been working with director Jerry Nott for several years, looking for the right movie.

“He’s always wanted to put me in a part where I could be a Clint Eastwood-type character. People tell me I resemble him, and my name’s Clint, so why not,” he said. “We both wanted to do a take on a spaghetti Western film.”

Glenn moved to Los Angeles 10 years ago and had struggling-actor jobs, such as watercolor-artwork salesman, bartender, janitor and carpenter during the day while acting at night, including four years with a company that did Shakespeare in repertory.

He’s had bit parts, among them a role as a cop in the final episode of the TV sitcom “Frasier,” but said it was hard work to be the lead of a movie as he is with “The Quick and the Undead.”

“It really focuses you, when all the weight’s on your shoulders and everyone looks to you to lead them and be an example,” he said. “It was very similar to my experience being captain of the football team.”

Clint Hummel was an all-conference offensive tackle and defensive lineman for Davenport Assumption High School and went to St. Ambrose University in Davenport on a football scholarship.

He hadn’t even thought of acting until he saw an audition notice for the drama “A Few Good Men” — one of his favorite movies — in the Ambrose theater department during his freshman year and decided on a lark to audition. He was cast as Lance Cpl. Dawson in the military drama, and said, “I just kind of got hooked.”

He transferred to Iowa State University as a theater major and stayed there for two years.

“I didn’t go back my senior year,” he said. “I drove out to California to be an overnight success, and that was 10 years ago.”

The movie is distributed by Anchor Bay Entertainment, which also released the “Halloween” and “Evil Dead” movies on DVD, he said. It’s been picked up for distribution by all of the major national video store chains.

Glenn knows he won’t be renting a tux for Oscar night. He said the online reviews for the movie have run the gamut from praise to outright disgust.

“He played the homage to those anti-heroes that on the outside look to only care about themselves, but at times shows signs of remorse,” a critic at BumsCorner.com wrote.

“Unfortunately, the lead actor exudes the charisma of most socks,” a posting at Amazon.com reads.

Glenn laughs at the reviews.

“It’s basically a 50-50 split. Either people think it’s the worst movie ever made — worse than ‘Congo’ — or they love it and get it,” he said. “Our theory is you have to be a fan of Westerns to like the film. If you don’t like the slow-paced, close shots of those Westerns, you aren’t going to get it.”

He refers to the style as an “homage that borders on parody.”

“We took it very seriously, but it’s definitely an homage to films like ‘A Fistful of Dollars’ and ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly,’ ” he added.

The movie was shot in northern California and near Waco, Texas, and Glenn said he didn’t feel like he got the star treatment. He had his own trailer on the set, but it was a 1972 mobile home dubbed the Millennium Falcon, a beat-up white-and-blue vehicle so rickety that he was the only person on the set who wasn’t afraid to drive it.

“The hope for this movie is that it’s a start,” he said. “It’s not a big-budget movie. A career is all I want. I have no aspirations to be a big movie star, I just want a career and a steady job doing what I love. I think it’s realistic, very possible.”

Glenn said he’s been embraced by some horror movie fans, including an invitation to speak at a convention sponsored by Fangoria magazine, and signing his autograph on posters and pictures for three or four hours at a time.

“It’s pretty surreal,” he said.

Glenn has two other movies in the works — the horror film “The Flesh Keeper,” in which he plays one of three Texas brothers who keep their cannibalistic brother locked away in the basement, and “The Big Kill,” a Western in which he has two scenes opposite Burt Reynolds.

Clint is the fifth of nine children of the William, who worked as an insurance agent, and Diana, who was a stay-at-home mother and now works at the Von Maur store in NorthPark Mall.

Even though he had to give up his last name for the business, he said it’s still worth it to see his moniker on a marquee — or even a DVD case.

“I’ve got a slight, tiny, tiny, inkling of fame,” he said. “To get these movies made and get cast in these movies, it’s all about your name.”

David Burke can be contacted at (563) 383-2400 or dburke@qctimes.com.