Paul Newman wasn't supposed to be a hero in this. That’s the thing people always miss. When you look back at the hud the movie cast, you see these massive icons of the silver screen, but the 1963 classic was actually designed to make you feel a bit sick to your stomach. Martin Ritt, the director, wanted to show the rot of the American West. Instead, he accidentally created one of the most charismatic villains in cinema history because Newman was just too damn charming.
It’s 1963. The world is changing. The old Western tropes of white hats and "yes ma'am" were dying out, and in walked Hud Bannon. He was arrogant. He was cruel. He was also breathtakingly handsome. It created this weird friction for audiences back then—and honestly, for people watching it today on Turner Classic Movies or Criterion—where you want to be him even though he’s a total wreck of a human being.
The Core Four: Breaking Down the Hud the Movie Cast
You basically have four pillars in this film. If one of them had been weak, the whole thing would've collapsed into a boring melodrama.
First, obviously, is Paul Newman. He played Hud. At the time, Newman was already a star, but this role solidified him as the guy who could play "heel" without losing the audience. He’s the son of a cattle rancher, Homer Bannon. Hud spends his nights drinking, sleeping with married women, and driving his Cadillac like a maniac through the Texas dirt. He doesn't care about the family legacy. He cares about Hud.
Then you’ve got Melvyn Douglas. He plays the father, Homer. Douglas actually won an Oscar for this, and you can see why. He represents the "Old West"—integrity, hard work, and a sense of moral duty that Hud finds pathetic. Their chemistry on screen is cold. It’s brittle. You can feel the decades of disappointment radiating off Douglas whenever he looks at Newman. It’s not just "I don’t like my son." It’s "I’m afraid of what you represent for the future."
Then there’s the heart of the movie: Patricia Neal as Alma, the housekeeper.
Honestly, she’s the best part of the movie. She’s world-weary. She’s seen it all. She isn't some wide-eyed girl falling for Hud’s smirk. She knows exactly who he is, and she calls him on his crap. Neal also won the Academy Award for Best Actress for this role, and what’s crazy is that she’s only in the movie for about 22 minutes. That’s it. In less than half an hour of screen time, she defined the entire emotional stakes of the film.
Finally, the kid. Brandon deWilde played Lonnie. If you recognize the name, it’s because he was the little boy in Shane who yelled "Shane, come back!" a decade earlier. In Hud, he’s a teenager caught between two worlds. Does he follow his grandfather’s rigid morality, or does he follow his uncle Hud’s flashy, nihilistic lifestyle? Lonnie is us. He’s the audience trying to decide who to look up to.
✨ Don't miss: Why October London Make Me Wanna Is the Soul Revival We Actually Needed
Why the Casting of Patricia Neal Almost Didn’t Happen
It’s hard to imagine anyone else in the role of Alma, but the production almost went a different way. The character in Larry McMurtry’s original novel, Horseman, Pass By, was actually a Black woman named Halmea. Because of the era and the studio’s cowardice regarding a potential interracial subplot or just general 1960s Hollywood racism, they changed the character to a white woman and renamed her Alma.
It’s a stain on the film’s history, frankly.
However, Patricia Neal took that rewritten role and gave it a grit that saved it from being a cliché. She played it with a gravelly voice and a "don't mess with me" attitude that felt real. She had recently suffered a massive personal tragedy—the death of her daughter—and she later said that she poured that emptiness and resilience into Alma. You can see it in her eyes. There’s no "Hollywood glow" here. Just a woman trying to survive a house full of difficult men.
Paul Newman and the "Anti-Hero" Problem
Newman was frustrated.
He didn't want people to like Hud. He told interviewers later that he was shocked when young people started treating Hud Bannon as a rebel hero. To Newman, Hud was a sociopath. He was a guy who would sell diseased cattle to his neighbors just to make a buck. He was a guy who tried to force himself on the housekeeper.
But the hud the movie cast was so magnetic that the message got blurred.
- Newman’s blue eyes were too bright.
- His swagger was too cool.
- The way he leaned against that Cadillac became a poster for every rebellious kid in 1963.
This is a recurring theme in film history. Think about Wall Street with Gordon Gekko or The Wolf of Wall Street with Jordan Belfort. The actors are so good at being bad that we forget we're supposed to hate them. Newman’s performance in Hud was the blueprint for this. He played the role with a total lack of sentimentality. He didn't ask for your pity. He didn't have a "secret heart of gold." He was just a jerk. And people loved it.
🔗 Read more: How to Watch The Wolf and the Lion Without Getting Lost in the Wild
The Supporting Players You Forgot
While the "Big Four" get all the glory, the atmosphere of the film depends on the smaller roles.
- Whit Bissell as Mr. Burris. You’ve seen this guy in a thousand things, usually playing a doctor or a scientist (like in Creature from the Black Lagoon). Here, he’s the government vet who has to deliver the bad news about the foot-and-mouth disease. He brings a cold, bureaucratic reality to the ranch.
- Crahan Denton as Jesse. He’s one of the locals, and his interactions with Hud show how the town views the Bannons.
- Val Avery as Jose. Another veteran character actor who adds to the "lived-in" feel of the Texas landscape.
The cinematography by James Wong Howe—who also won an Oscar for this—makes these actors look like they are part of the dust. He used high-contrast black and white to make the Texas sun feel oppressive. It wasn't the pretty, wide-open spaces of a John Ford movie. It was harsh. It was bleak.
The Tragic Fate of Brandon deWilde
There is a sadness that hangs over the hud the movie cast in retrospect, specifically regarding Brandon deWilde. He was the "golden boy" of the 50s and early 60s. He had this incredible sensitivity. After Hud, he struggled to find roles that matched his talent as he grew older.
He died in a car accident in 1972 at the age of only 30.
When you watch Hud now, Lonnie’s disillusionment feels even more poignant. He’s the only character who truly changes. Homer stays rigid. Hud stays rotten. Alma stays survivor-focused. But Lonnie grows up. By the end of the film, when he walks away from the ranch, you feel like he’s leaving his childhood behind in the dirt. Knowing deWilde’s life was cut short adds a layer of "what could have been" to his performance.
Behind the Scenes: A Cast that Didn't Always Get Along
Actually, that’s a bit of a lie. For the most part, the set was professional, but the tension was real. Melvyn Douglas was a very serious actor who had been a leading man in the 30s. He didn't care for the "Method" acting styles that were becoming popular with the younger generation.
Newman was a product of The Actors Studio. He wanted to talk about motivation. He wanted to dig into the psychology. Douglas just wanted to hit his marks and say the lines with gravitas. This generational divide actually helped the movie. The distance you see between the father and son on screen wasn't entirely fake. They were two different types of actors from two different eras of Hollywood.
💡 You might also like: Is Lincoln Lawyer Coming Back? Mickey Haller's Next Move Explained
And Patricia Neal? She was dealing with the fallout of her affair with Gary Cooper years earlier and trying to rebuild her life. She was an outsider in many ways, which mirrored Alma's position in the Bannon household.
Why We Still Talk About This Cast Today
Most movies from 1963 feel like museum pieces. They’re slow. They’re "theatrical."
Hud is different.
The performances feel modern. If you put Paul Newman in a modern-day drama about a failing family business in the Midwest, his performance would still work. He doesn't do the "transatlantic accent" or the over-the-top gesticulating of his peers. He’s quiet. He’s internal.
The movie also dealt with things that were taboo. Foot-and-mouth disease sounds like a boring plot point, but in the film, it’s a death sentence for a way of life. The scene where the cattle are slaughtered is one of the most devastating things ever filmed. The cast had to stand there and watch (simulated) heaps of dead animals being buried. It changed the energy on set. It made the stakes feel visceral.
What You Should Do Next
If you’ve only seen clips of Newman’s "cool" moments, you owe it to yourself to watch the whole thing. It’s a masterclass in ensemble acting.
- Watch for the silence. Notice how much Melvyn Douglas says without speaking a word.
- Focus on Patricia Neal’s hands. She uses them to show Alma’s exhaustion—the way she wipes a counter or holds a glass of water.
- Pay attention to the ending. It is one of the most uncompromising endings in Hollywood history. Most studios would have demanded a "redemption arc" for Hud. Martin Ritt and the cast refused.
To really appreciate the depth here, compare this film to Newman’s other big hits like Cool Hand Luke. In Luke, he’s a rebel we love. In Hud, he’s a rebel who is fundamentally broken. Seeing the contrast is how you truly understand why he was one of the greatest actors to ever live.
Go find a high-definition copy—the Criterion Collection version is usually the best—and watch it on a night when you’re ready for a movie that doesn't give you easy answers. Look at the way these four actors dance around each other in that farmhouse. It’s as good as cinema gets. No special effects, no massive explosions—just four people and the slow, inevitable rot of a family legacy. That is the real power of the hud the movie cast. They didn't just play characters; they built a world that still feels dangerously real sixty years later.