John Wayne, currently Hollywood's most popular leading man, achieved his success in large part due to his vigorous action roles. A football player with the University of Southern California, he, better known as "the Duke", started his movie career as a prop man and bit player during the off season. He was noticed on the studio lot by director
Raoul Walsh which led to being featured on-screen in primarily physical he-man roles.
Stagecoach (1939) would become a pivotal movie in his career as one where his natural "cowboy" talents were used. His roles over the subsequent two decades would have that noted physicality, largely in westerns or war movies or other such epics. Those movie successes would result in him being awarded the Henrietta as World Film Favorite Male by the Hollywood Foreign Press. Not content to rest on his laurels, he would move from being in front of the camera to behind the camera as a director.
—Huggo