Trivia for
Midnight Cowboy (1969)

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• According to producer Jerome Hellman on the two-disc DVD's commentary, the famous line, "I'm walkin' here!", contrary to all other accounts, was actually scripted. The cab driver was, in fact, an actor hired to almost drive into Dustin Hoffman. The production team made the take look as though it was an ad-lib.
  
  
• Dustin Hoffman's performance as "Ratso" Rizzo is ranked #7 on Premiere Magazine's 100 Greatest Performances of All Time.
  
  
• Dustin Hoffman kept pebbles in his shoe to ensure his limp would be consistent from shot to shot.
  
  

• Bob Dylan's song "Lay Lady Lay" was written for inclusion in the film but missed the deadline.
  
  
• Lee Majors was originally cast as Joe Buck, but had to pull out when his TV series, "The Big Valley" (1965), was renewed for another season.
  
  
• Michael Sarrazin was cast as Joe Buck but shortly before filming he pulled out over a wage dispute. Jon Voight was then brought in to replace him.
  
  
• Robert Blake was offered the part of Ratso, but declined.
  
  
• Before Dustin Hoffman auditioned for this film, he knew that his all-American image could easily cost him the job. To prove he could do it, he asked the auditioning film executive to meet him on a street corner in Manhattan, and in the meantime, dressed himself in filthy rags. The executive arrived at the appointed corner and waited, barely noticing the "beggar" less than ten feet away who was accosting people for spare change. At last, the beggar walked up to him and revealed his true identity.
  
  
• One studio executive sent director John Schlesinger a memo stating, "If we could clean this up and add a few songs, it could be a great vehicle for Elvis Presley."
  
  
• Dustin Hoffman was originally chosen for the role of Ratso on the basis of an off-Broadway one-man show called "Eh!" in which producer Jerome Hellman saw him in 1965.
  
  
• The only X-rated film ever to win a Best Picture Oscar.
  
  
• Bette Davis appears in this film via a clip from Dark Victory (1939) seen in a television montage sequence.
  
  
• The film was rated "X" (no one under 17 admitted) upon its original release in 1969, but the unrestricted use of that rating by pornographic filmmakers caused the rating to quickly become associated with hardcore sex films. Because of the stigma that developed around the "X" rating in the ratings system's early years, many theaters refused to run "X" films and many newspapers would not run ads for them. The film was given a new "R" (children under 16 must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian) rating in 1971, without having anything changed or removed.
  
  
• This was the first film to have been released with an X rating to be shown on prime time network television. The film's rating had been changed to R by the time of the film's television premiere.
  
  
• The only X rated movie shown to a US President while in office.
  
  
• Teenage girl fans of The Graduate (1967) would scream when they saw Dustin Hoffman filming in the streets of New York, even though he was in his filthy costume as Rizzo.
  
  
• John Schlesinger once said that the inspiration for this film came from a little-known Yugoslav movie, Kad budem mrtav i beo (1967)
  
  
• Dustin Hoffman put in so much effort portraying one of Ratso's coughing fits that one time he actually ended up vomiting.
  
  
• Charles Durning was going to act in this film but dropped out.
  
  
• Stuart Cooper was considered for the Jon Voight part.
  
  
• Jon Voight replaced Kiel Martin.
  
  
• This film contains the first recorded use of the word "scuzzy", as a description of Ratso Rizzo. At its root, "scuzzy" is apparently a combination of "scummy" and "fuzzy".
  
  
• Harry Nilsson wrote the song, "I Guess the Lord Must Be In New York City" specifically for this film, but John Schlesinger preferred a Fred Neil song, "Everybody's Talkin' at Me". He did have Nilsson sing it, though.
  
  
• Warren Beatty was very interested in playing Joe Buck but John Schlesinger thought he was too famous to be believable as a naive street hustler.
  
  
• John McGiver played the religious fanatic, Mr. O'Daniel, with Jon Voight as Joe Buck, who'd been led to believe that O'Daniel is a bigtime pimp. McGiver had also played "Sen. Thomas Jordan" in The Manchurian Candidate (1962). In the remake of that film 42 years later (The Manchurian Candidate (2004)), Voight played "Sen. Thomas Jordan".
  
  
• In one particular scene, Ratso and Joe get into an argument over cowboys. Ratso states that "Cowboys are fags!" Joe's response is "John Wayne is a cowboy! Are you calling John Wayne a fag?" Coincidentally, Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight were nominated for the Best Actor Oscar for their roles as Ratso and Joe, respectively. They lost out--to John Wayne for his role in True Grit (1969).
  
  
• Al Stetson, the Florida bus driver, was an electrician on the movie. He filled in at the last minute when the extra failed to show up.
  
  
• In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked this as the #43 Greatest Movie of All Time.
  
  
• Bob Balaban's film debut.
  
  

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