\u201cStalin decided that he would have him killed,\u201d said Mr Munn, who says he was told of the plot by Orson Welles at a dinner in 1983. Welles had said that the KGB was given the task of assassinating Wayne.<\/p>\n
\u201cMr Welles was a great storyteller,\u201d said Mr Munn, \u201cbut he had no particular admiration for John Wayne.\u201d He said that Welles had offered the story without prompting, and that his sources were excellent.<\/p>\n
A prominent Russian filmmaker, Alexei Kapler (who was imprisoned for an affair with Stalin\u2019s 16-year-old daughter, Svetlana), had told another Russian filmmaker, Sergei Bondachuk, about the order. Bondachuk was sceptical at first, but after Gerasimov confirmed the story, Bondachuk told Welles.<\/p>\n
Mr Munn said Wayne had also told him that his friend, the stuntman Yakima Canutt, had \u201csaved his life once\u201d. Mr Munn later asked Mr Canutt what he had meant by this comment. The incident is thought to have taken place in the early 50s.<\/p>\n
\u201cYakima told me that the FBI had discovered there were agents sent to Hollywood to kill John Wayne,\u201d said Mr Munn. \u201cHe said the FBI had come to tell John about the plot. John told the FBI to let the men show up and he would deal with them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wayne then apparently hatched a plot with his scriptwriter at the time, Jimmy Grant, to abduct the assassins, drive to a beach and stage a mock execution to frighten them. Mr Munn said he did not know what transpired, but heard the two men stayed in the US to work for the FBI.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfterwards though, John shunned FBI protection and did not want his family to know. He moved into a house with a big wall around it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Wayne then relied upon a group of loyal stuntmen who infiltrated communist cells in America and learned of plots to kill him.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe then gathered all the stuntmen, went to the communist meetings, and had a huge fight,\u201d Mr Munn said. This was when Wayne believes Mr Canutt saved his life.<\/p>\n
A further attempt to kill Wayne was made in Mexico on the set of the film Hondo <\/em>(which was released in 1953), led by a communist cell, according to Mr Munn.<\/p>\nThe book claims that Stalin\u2019s order was cancelled by his successor Nikita Krushchev after the dictator\u2019s death in 1953.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
That right there makes me want to watch every John Wayne movie, just to thumb my nose at the old butcher\u2019s ghost. \u00a0I love the idea of John Wayne wading into Commie cell groups with his buddies and delivering good old John Wayne left hooks:<\/p>\n