I decided, "Well, I'll be a forest ranger!" Because I thought, "I'll get to go out in the woods, I'll be in the forest, and I can sit in a tower and watch for forest fires and play my guitar. That's what I want to do!" Well, I was an idiot, of course.

Part of my claim to fame is that my first film was also Johnny Cash's first film.

I mean, it was a rough place ["Wild Bill Hickok"], and you had to wear this kind of cloak that you were a badass, and the most efficient way to do that was with your language. Swearing was just a part of how you got by during the day, and it was quite historically accurate, that depiction.

I decided, "Well, I'll be a forest ranger!" Because I thought, "I'll get to go out in the woods, I'll be in the forest, and I can sit in a tower and watch for forest fires and play my guitar. That's what I want to do!" Well, I was an idiot, of course.

[David Milch] had say, "You have to understand that our history of western movies, what we've been doing in westerns since the movies began to talk, you had audiences that would be offended by certain things, and there was a cleaning-up of the way people spoke."

I was accepted to Colorado State University in Fort Collins, which is a terrific Aggie school, and they had a great forestry program. But when I saw the syllabus and realized what I was going to actually have to be studying, there was a lot of science! If you want a degree in forestry, it's basically a science degree. And I just thought, "No, no, no, wait a second. Never mind!"

[Mel Gibson] had just directed The Passion [Of The Christ], and it had just been released as we started production on Complete Savages. But I have to say, nobody ever talked about it, and he never brought any of that to work. He was just delightful, and I had a great time.