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Barbara Stanwyck knew that Lee Majors was destined to be a star when he was a young actor in The Big Valley
"There are times in my life I've worked with an unknown young actor that I knew had the quality to make it big," said Stanwyck.
To receive a compliment from Barbara Stanwyck is a ringing endorsement, but it's not something that anyone can just happen upon; It must be earned.
While Stanwyck may have been considered the star of The Big Valley by some fans, she certainly didn't share the opinion.
During an interview with NEA Features, Stanwyck maintained that The Big Valley was an ensemble cast of excellent actors playing resilient people.
"The Barkley family is full of strong, independent characters," said Stanwyck. "They're as tough as I am. I'd say we're a very normal family. That is, we fight. But nobody else better try to push any one of us around."
While plenty of talented young actors made up the cast of the Barkley family, there was one man who seemed to stand out to Stanwyck above all the rest: Lee Majors.
Majors is known for his work on shows like The Six Million Dollar Man and The Fall Guy. To consider him anything short of a television superstar is an insult. But all those years ago, when Majors was cast as Heath Barkley in The Big Valley, he was relatively unknown as an actor. Despite this, Stanwyck saw promise in the young performer and didn't hesitate to make it known.
"There are times in my life I've worked with an unknown young actor that I knew had the quality to make it big," said Stanwyck. "The first was a young kid in Golden Boy - Bill Holden. Then there was a young man just out of the Navy in '46 - Kirk Douglas. Now there's Lee Majors."
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