Uvalde, Texas, is a place where the very spirit of
westerns has been born incarnate:  Dale Evans, the
“Queen of the West,” was born there and even
though she lived out her life other places, she would
always tell people it was home.  Dana Andrews, who
lived in Uvalde as a child, went on to Hollywood to
become a 1950s screen heartthrob in such legendary
westerns as Kit Carson (1940) and The Ox-Bow
Incident (1943) and serve as the president of the
Screen Actor’s Guild in Los Angeles.  Years later, in
1969, Matthew McConaughey would be born in Uvalde
and later make the film The Newton Boys, a story
about outlaws also born and raised in Uvalde.  But it
seems none of these characters ever played
completely by anybody else’s rules.  And perhaps that
is why this dry and inhospitable, hard-scrabble kind of
place now lends itself to the making of a powerful and
poignant new western entitled Road to El Paso that
almost exclusively showcases local talent and sites.  

And certainly deserving mention are other scrappy,
die-hard individualists that were born and lived there:  
the colorful, former Vice-President of the United
States, John Nance Garner; the indomitable former
Texas Governor Dolph Briscoe; “700 Club” co-host
Ben Kenchlow; the outlaw-turned-lawman King
Fisher; and the two-time Grammy Award Winning
group Los Palominos.  While they all would leave
town for their adventures, they would also return time
and time again.  Once it was in their blood, it appears,
they would come back to Uvalde throughout their
lives, even though there is no readily apparent draw.  
Still today, there are no malls, bookstores, or Starbuck's.  The small claim to fame has been
the large live oak trees, true to the spirit of the place,
quietly growing in the middle of city streets.

To get a sense of the place, imagine the dry
lonesomeness of Larry McMurtry’s movie The Last
Picture Show (1971).  Take it forward to the
modernity of 2007, populate it with 14,929 people, but
leave it just as lonesome.  An unrelenting feeling of
alienation permeates the hard, menial jobs, back-to-
back traffic, and the lives of many struggling families
and businesses.  This rugged Texas town reflects
both Mexico and the United States as it lies in the
middle of vast stretches between San Antonio and
Mexico.  The old, fading downtown is a North
American crossroads, with roads meeting at the
middle of the center town that stretch to the four
borders of the U. S.  Highway 90 cuts through the
middle of the town, heading for the Pacific and the
Atlantic oceans.  Highway 83 cuts horizontally across
that path and makes its own way both to the Gulf
coast and up to Canada.  Underneath the town are the
remnants of an ancient ocean that still leak through
layers of limestone in the Edwards Aquifer, one of the
largest bodies of fresh water in Texas, but, like its
genius loci, it is there, but cannot be seen.

When he drove through town a couple of years ago,
Josh Lasserre, a representative of the Texas
Historical Commission, was deeply concerned about
the visible decline of the historic downtown buildings.  
He encouraged Uvalde Economic Development
Director Tom Austin to apply for a Visionary for
Preservation grant, which the city was awarded.  
While the committee explored ideas to breathe life
back into its dying architecture, the Uvalde Visitor’s
and Convention Bureau struggled with a challenge of
its own:  determining Uvalde’s elusive defining
qualities.  An Austin public relations and marketing
firm, Northstar Strategies, was hired to study the
community and interview the inhabitants to determine
the best definition and label for the town.  When the
results came back after the in-depth two-year study,
true to its nature, Uvalde still defied common
category.  Most believed the “Surround yourself with
adventure” given as a marketing label only began to
describe the color and history of the town, but to their
credit, they may have hit on its milieu.  They found that
the heart of Uvalde may not be indoors or even within
the confines of the city limits.  They were struck by
the outdoor life that remains unchanged from
decades past and the strong reaction that visitors
have to the always-present impression of harkening
back to a day when freedom meant an afternoon
alone in untamed nature.  The surrounding areas,
popular with bird watchers and hunters, are rough,
wide open spaces teaming with wildlife; vast skies
where the stars, sunrises, and sunsets are a daily
spectacle; and where an old-fashioned afternoon
outdoors, free from the constraints of civilization in
the many miles of rivers, speaks to the inner soul.  
Nearby Garner State Park and Frio Country Resorts in ConCan does feel like stepping
back to a time when family vacations consisted of
dancing on a pavilion in the evenings after a day of
hiking and floating down the river together.

All these considerations led Texas Ranch
Productions to not go outside this edge-of-the-world
area for “better,” more established or well-known
environs, but to build on the autonomy that lends itself
to the most dynamic storytelling.  Based on a ranch in
central eastern Uvalde County, the producers
embarked on Road to El Paso by enlisting the town
and its residents in its creation.  Why go outside of
themselves for better seeing, they reasoned.

Specifically, local architect John Graves, Jr.
generously loaned the production company an old,
empty downtown building temporarily converted into
an 1800s saloon.  The Janie Slaughter Briscoe Grand
Opera House staff and thrift shop Alley Cat Alley
came up with 1800s costumes.   A local gunfight
reenactment group, “The Texas Guns,” already
prepared for the era, took on roles and assisted in the
creation of the saloon, blocked off roads, and
supplied their own firearms.  A giant four-foot candle-
filled crystal chandelier, rigged for lowering,
authenticated the establishment and graced the
saloon with an historic glow.  Cowhands and show
horses from local ranches rode up to the different
sets each day.  While cigar smoke and the sound of
clinking coins over card games filled the air, over one
hundred extras danced and “drank” the nights away,
bringing “Graves’ Saloon” to life with “barmaids and
gambling cowboys,” some from the Rio Grande
College on the outskirts of town.  Marlowe Downing,
an antiques importer, furnished and delivered an
entire saloon full of 1800s furniture—from wooden
carved troughs to eight-foot high solid wood doors.  
Locals brought in old chairs and spittoons.  Debbie
French, an associate producer and lead actress,
worked with hair-and-makeup artist Lee Guzman to
create feather-filled long curls and dirt-caked
cowboys.  Prentiss Varnon, a finalist on the first
season of Nashville Star, returned home to Uvalde to
pick fights in the saloon, alongside his brother Cody
Varnon, and ultimately dies in one of the movie’s
pivotal scenes—a moment that ties together the two
stories and eras of the production.  

Almost the entire town of Uvalde turned itself into a
movie set to bring the project to life.  Local coffee
shops and restaurants, Katie’s Amber Sky, Neil’s
Café, Java Junction, and the House Pasture Cattle
Company, opened their doors for the cast and crew
during and after-hours.  Hotels, ranches, and homes
were offered by locals eager to help in the creation of
the western.  The County Attorney, John Dodson, took
a lead role, playing Marty, a cartographer in 1800s El
Paso, a character that mirrors the modern character
of Martin Auden, played by Rawlyn Richter, executive
producer of the project.  Uvalde Economic
Development Director Tom Austin played a Texas
Ranger, and his son “Boots” became a ranch hand in
the movie.  Local students worked in-between
classes to make costumes, decorate sets, and take
on roles.  Richard Nunley, the owner of Black Mesa
Ranch near Big Bend National Park provided many
more miles of wild, open, scenic spaces.

The production hit the deep heart’s core of Uvalde’s
old west, independent spirit and its never-ending
desire to live it.  Defying the façade of McDonald’s on
one end of town and Wal-Mart on the other, Uvalde
eagerly, fervently expressed itself in what it once and
always quietly was, a place where Texan movie stars
and real outlaws are born.  Far from being
disenchanted, its historic spirit was alive and well.

So, in true nature of the cowboy who always stops
and gives thanks, the producers of the picture and
creators of the Uvalde Film Society decided to
recognize Uvalde County’s Sesquicentennial
Anniversary by honoring those celebrities who most
aptly personify fortitude and character.  Working with
City Manager John Harrell, Assistant City Manager
Joe Cardenas, and another indomitable Uvalde spirit,
Nancy Feely, the group petitioned the city council to
approve the erection of four brass plaques in the
middle of the City Plaza (the former wagon yards
established in 1853) for Dale Evans, Dana Andrews,
Matthew McConaughey, and Los Palominos.  What
could have been merely a publicity event resembled a
down-home celebrity family reunion.  On October 8th, 2006,
members of the families came together for the day
and, like old friends around a Sunday dinner table,
spent the ceremony mostly recollecting memories of
Uvalde.  Matthew McConaughey’s kindergarten
teacher, Jama Brown, presented the plaque to
Matthew’s brother, Patrick, and recalled Matthew
being a pest to his older brothers.

Beyond Uvalde, the cast and crew of Road to El Paso
traveled to New Mexico on several occasions to film
wild horses in Albuquerque, Los Lunas, and Sonora.  
Working in conjunction with the New Mexican Horse
Project, the crew captured footage of horses in the
wild, shooting actual wild horse captures and
releases as the horses were taken to protected
lands—both in the movie and in reality.  A percentage
of the profits of the movie will go to help protect the
horses.

The story of Road to El Paso begins as Martin Auden’s
wife leaves him, his tractor breaks down, and his
horse is stolen.  An actual nine-month drought, worse
than had been experienced in over fifty years, set in.  
During the shooting of the picture, the 125 year-old
Ingenhuett store burned down in the Hill Country town
of Comfort, Texas.  The loss provided more of an
impetus for the heartbreak in the opening sequences
of the movie.  The burned remains echo the shell of a
man and the challenges he is up against.  In the story,
only a few items remained from the burned store
ruins, including a handwritten journal from El Paso,
1886.  When Martin meets his ex-wife Paula at a café
to ask her to come home, she refuses but
encourages him to go after the stolen horse—to not
let anything else get away.  Out of complete
frustration, Martin packs his bags to head to El Paso
to follow the one lead he has.  On one of his lonely
evenings, he begins reading the old journal.  His
journey West takes on similarities of the story written
in the journal—the story of John (John Dodson), a
young man who meets Emily (Emily Willis), a young
woman passionate about protecting the land from
corrupt fortune seekers.  In his quest, Martin meets
Skye Morrow (Debbie French), a single woman
desperate for the new life she thinks she may have
found on land she has inherited.  In her attempts at
her new life, Skye has purchased Martin’s stolen
horse and set it free on her property.  Skye gives
Martin permission to search her land, the only
condition being that she gets to go with him on foot
into the 40,000 acres of badlands.  On their
treacherous journey, Martin and Skye spend their
evenings reading the unfinished love story in the
journal, only to discover endings of their own.

The final product of Road to El Paso is a modern
western, in full color, that frames an 1800s western,
which was edited in sepia.  The music for the
soundtrack, original rock n’ roll by Will Richter, is an
independent project of its own entitled “Songs of
Women, Guns, and Booze.”  The town of Uvalde lent
its heart and inspiration to the creation of a new
western wherein mystery of place and character are
real and driving forces.  Using the coveted
conventions and deep existing mythology of
westerns, the producers hope the movie pays
homage to the spirit of the small Texas town while
redefining what it means to live nowadays in the West.

Shiloh Richter

March 2007

[Note:  October 2007.  The bronze plaques, while dedicated last October, have not yet been installed due to Uvalde's downtown area under massive road and park reconstruction. ]