I have been a long time fan of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series. I plowed through the books as Sai King wrote them. When we reached the clearing at the end of the path, I turned aside to other stories but few captured my imagination like this one. For me personally, the series reached it’s apex with the books Wizard and Glass and Wolves of the Calla. I loved the back story of Roland Deschain and the idea of peacekeeping gunslingers roaming the world like King Arthur’s Knights of the Round Table.
At some point, I learned that there was a movie adaption of the story being made. I was surprised but excited. Surprised because this is a long, complex story and I had no idea how that would actually work as movie. I was excited because I wanted to see what the gunslinger would actually look like.
I finally got to go see the movie and while it wasn’t bad it didn’t really follow the books in any meaningful way that I could understand. That was not unexpected – it’s a hard story and King takes his time sharing it.
Idris Elba was cast as the gunslinger and he did a good job in the movie. That said, he looks nothing like the character described in the books. For that reason alone, I decided that I would create my own version of the fabled Gunslinger.
The Gunslinger is probably most closely realized in Clint Eastwood’s character in the movie The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. I was looking for someone with blue and the face of killer. I also needed someone kind of thin because by the time we draped them in two gun belts, a vest, a duster the camera was going to make them look bigger than they were.
I looked for weeks for the right person to play the role in my photo. I finally find him in a photo on Facebook – but he was not tagged so I didn’t have a name. After a fair amount of online stalking I finally found the name of my gunslinger – Stephen Keith.
It turned out that Stephen is a professional actor and has run the OK Corral shows in Tombstone, Arizona for several years. He was perfect for the role and, as a bonus benefit, he had all of the clothing the the guns needed to make this work.
Stephen graciously agreed to be a part of my little project and went out of his way to make it possible. His acting ability made the shoot far easier than I thought it would be and I enjoyed getting the chance to work with him. I was very happy with how the image turned out.
For other fans of the series, I say “Hile – I see you very well and I hope that we are well met. May this photo do ya’ fine.
Team Credits:
Model/Talent: Stephen Keith
MUAH: Kristopher Osuna of Perfection Artistry
Assisting: Daniel Ford
