5 Things You Never Knew About Gary Cooper

Lauren Novak June 11, 6:29 pm

SERGEANT YORK, Gary Cooper, 1941 — Everett Collection

With his tall frame and slow, deliberate way of speaking, Gary Cooper didn’t need to say much to command the screen. For more than three decades, he defined what it meant to be a movie star, from the silent era to the golden age of Hollywood. He starred in over 80 feature films, won two Oscars for Best Actor and helped shape the very idea of the American hero.

Whether he was playing Lou Gehrig in The Pride of the Yankees or the principled marshal in High Noon, Cooper brought a quiet dignity to every role. This June, Turner Classic Movies is honoring him as their Star of the Month, and it’s the perfect time to revisit the man behind the legend. Here are five things you might not know about the actor:

1 He paid with checks for a sneaky reason

Everett Collection

Cooper had a sneaky trick when it came to paying for things. Instead of handing over cash, he’d write a check, knowing full well that most people wouldn’t cash it because they would keep his signature as a souvenir. According to actor James Garner, it was something Cooper did often, and it worked like a charm. It’s even said that Pablo Picasso did the same thing. You can still purchase Cooper’s signed checks on sites such as eBay or Heritage Auctions.

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2 He got in a fight with a director

MOROCCO, from left: Gary Cooper, Marlene Dietrich, 1930

Everett Collection

During the filming of Morocco in 1930, Cooper had a showdown with the notoriously controlling director Josef von Sternberg. The two clashed often, but things really boiled over when the director started barking orders at Cooper in German.

Fed up, Cooper grabbed the much shorter von Sternberg by the collar and lifted him off the ground. “If you expect to work in this country,” he told him, according to the South Hampton History Museum, “you’d better get on to the language we use here.”

3 He walked with a limp his whole life

BALL OF FIRE, Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck, 1941

Everett Collection

You probably never noticed it, but Cooper walked with a slight limp throughout his life. It dated back to a car accident he had as a teenager, one serious enough to affect the way he moved forever. But he didn’t let it stop him from becoming a leading man in action-heavy films.

4 He had a large appetite despite his thin frame

THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES, Gary Cooper, 1942

Everett Collection

No matter how much he ate, he stayed remarkably trim, which only added to the legend. In his early days in Hollywood, when he was still picking up odd jobs and living with his parents, he once joked that his “starvation diet” consisted of a dozen eggs a day, two loaves of bread, a platter of bacon and enough pork chops between meals to tide him over until supper. His specialty dish? Wild duck covered in bacon, plus four eggs and a steak on the side. He was also known to polish off a whole cherry pie and wash it down with a quart of milk for lunch.

5 High Noon won him an Oscar … but a different Western icon accepted it

HIGH NOON, Katy Jurado, Grace Kelly, Gary Cooper, Lloyd Bridges, 1952.

Everett Collection

Cooper won his second Best Actor Oscar for the legendary Western High Noon, but he wasn’t able to attend the ceremony. Instead, John Wayne famously accepted the award on Cooper’s behalf. It’s a fun Hollywood moment considering the two stars had very different on-screen styles and public personas, yet this simple gesture showed a mutual respect between the icons.