Shooting HorsemanshipShooting Horsemanship
Rex Peterson has made a career training horses for the big screen. He attributes his success, however to his mentor, legendary movie wrangler Glenn Randall Sr.
There’s a comical, yet true, old saying that you can “shoot off of any horse—once.” Twice can be a whole different matter.
But to a hand like Rex Peterson, teaching a horse to accept the pop of a single action is elementary compared to teaching them to run over cars, fall into pits, fight lions, Roman ride, bow, nod, hitch up—or to accept being buried alive.
Peterson puts it best. There’s horse trainers, and then there’s horse trainers. The latter are the “master horsemen.”
Learning from the master Rex Peterson was born and raised in Ogallala, Nebraska. His godparents were none other than Walt and Hazel Haythorn of the famous Haythorn Ranch. Peterson learned to cowboy early, and trick and Roman rode for PRCA rodeos by the time he was seven. This trail led to a Wild West show in New Jersey in 1974, produced by legendary movie wrangler Glenn Randall Sr., the man who trained the Triggers for Roy Rogers, the horses for Ben-Hur, the last Rex for Gene Autry—and that’s the short list.
“I became enamored with him,” Peterson shares. “I had a team of gray Hancocks and one of them would flip over backwards. Glenn fixed that for me permanently in one morning. Then, I’d turn them out in the arena to run, and the only way I could catch them was to rope them. He said, ‘What the hell are you doing? This has to stop!’ Peterson laughs. “In one hour, he had them whip broke and they were following him around. I couldn’t believe it. I thought, ‘I’ve worked with them five years and he did that in an hour??!!’”
That was a life-changing experience; he loaded up and followed Randall to California and stayed 15 years. He was one of very few to last under the ultimate taskmaster. They worked together on The Black Stallion, Electric Horseman and other movies.
Becoming a master Peterson’s training philosophy, which came from Glenn Randall Sr., is simple.
“Break it into pieces. Do every piece separately. Then put the pieces back together.” Saying it is one thing; doing it is another.
Just before Randall passed away in 1992, a studio called and wanted a horse buried alive for a music video. This time, Randall suggested they call Rex Peterson.
“I told Glenn that I had no clue how to do such a thing,” Peterson says. “Glenn said, ‘You’ll figure it out’. We started filming Saturday at 9 a.m. and by 11 a.m. I had buried my black stud Justin nine times in a row. Not one hair of his hide ever showed through the dirt. Everybody wants to know how I did it. Let’s just say it was a major undertaking.” Pun intended.
Peterson admits he hasn’t had time for much mounted shooting. But training a horse to be shot off of is a movie horse prerequisite.
“I start with the Australian bull whip, until the horse accepts the crack on the ground and on his back. Then I use the cap gun for a sharper crack. Next, I use Black Cat fireworks with 10 or 15 tied together. Some horses stand a single action, but lose their minds with rapid fire. Finally, I shoot the single action and balloons.”
Peterson’s resume includes over 40 films and counting (many including shooting off horseback), including Black Beauty, The Horse Whisperer, Flicka, Dreamer, Appaloosa, All the Pretty Horses, The Ring, The Patriot, Runaway Bride, The Black Stallion and many more.
Still, with all the experience and background, each film presents its own challenges.
The plot surrounded an 1890 long-distance horse race in Arabia. American cowboy/Wild West show star Frank Hopkins (played by Viggo Mortensen) was invited to compete, riding his Mustang Hidalgo against some of the top equines in the world. Rex Peterson was the obvious choice to oversee the wrangling. But the problems were big. There were multiple locations in Montana, California and Morocco. Peterson had to select the horses, ship them back and forth to the shooting sites, supervise vet care and medical papers, arrange truck transportation in Europe, and much more.
The Morocco shoot was particularly tough. Peterson knew about the country already; much of 1982’s The Return of the Black Stallion was filmed there. The language barrier was one issue. Native customs were another. And all of the competitors in the race were blooded stallions that could cause some trouble, especially in scenes of the starting line.
In some ways, it required human training as much as horse training. At the start of the production in Morocco, Peterson told the various riders and actors (often through translators) that they had to keep their mounts under control, or else.
“Two studs started fighting, and I ran the Paint I was riding between them and separated them. And I just turned around and said, ‘Those two are fired.’ And I threatened to fire the contact man, too.” His bosses backed him up, and there was little trouble after that.
But there were challenges in the U.S., too. One scene called for a huge herd of Mustangs to be released from a corral, to run free across the grassy hills of Montana. Peterson selected the horses from the local Blackfeet Indian Reservation. Then he had to prepare them and his chosen wranglers for the spectacular shot. “When we opened those gates, we turned 570 of ‘em loose and let ‘em run—without a cowboy in sight,” Peterson remembers. “We chased ‘em with two camera cars and a helicopter.”
The challenge, of course, was to round the horses up, bring them back to the corral and do additional takes. They had just a couple of weeks of rehearsal available. “Every day in rehearsals we’d walk them out and them stop ‘em. Walk and stop, walk and stop. And you’ve got control of these horses.”
One person wasn’t a problem: star Viggo Mortensen, who would later work with Rex again in the 2008 Western Appaloosa. He didn’t know anything about the actor at the time. “I put Viggo in a round pen on a horse. And I asked him if he could ride, and he said “a little.’ And I watched him in that round pen. And when he was done, I said to him, ‘Partner, you lied to me. You ride pretty damn good.’” Mortensen got even better at it, listening to Peterson’s riding instructions.
By the way, the star took home one of the five Paints that portrayed Hidalgo. Screenwriter John Fusco got another. Rex kept a third called RJ.
A switch in focus There aren’t many Westerns being shot nowadays. Movies don’t need men of Rex Peterson’s skill: “When I started there was 180 wranglers. Now there’s 15.”
So these days, he and his sons are taking on a few “problem child” horses, but the focus is on clinics and DVDs, plus an RFD-TV show is being planned. And Peterson remains ready for the next Hollywood opportunity, the place where he can really show his stuff—to the delight and fascination of millions of movie-goers across the globe.  Related posts:
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