Entertainment icon Pat Boone has a solution for Hollywood – embrace faith and positivity.
“People waste millions making sordid, corrupt films that fail. Once in a while they get big, to the sorrow of all of us. But if you want to make a successful, profitable film, make it family friendly, make it faith friendly, make it a good story, and do it well, and you’ve got a great shot,” Boone told Fox News Digital on the red carpet for the MovieGuide Awards.
The icon was also happy to celebrate the films being honored at the ceremony because it showcases, “family films, faith-based films and prove[s] that they can make money, can be prosperous.”
Boone has been in the entertainment business since the 1950s, selling millions of records and rivaling Elvis Presley in popularity at one point, as well as working as a prolific songwriter.
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He continues to work and share music on streaming services and even released a song last year, titled “Where Did America Go?”
As described on his website, Boone is “desperately worried for our country,” and wrote the song as a “calling for America to come back together. This relevant and poignant wake-up call warns that one generation can erase a great nation.”
On top of his music career, Boone has also appeared in dozens of films, including last year’s Ronald Reagan biopic starring Dennis Quaid.
“We used to be the best commercial for America in the world, we made good films and we always made America look great. We became the envy of the rest of the world,” the 90-year-old told Fox News Digital of the current state of Hollywood.
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“But then, with films or television like ‘Dallas’ and other films that made heroes out of people who were doing dastardly things, then we started creating more and more films [going] around the world showing America and the underbelly and the worst that we can be, and now we can deserve in some nations [to be] called ‘The Great Satan.’”
Instead, Boone insists, “We gotta stop that. We gotta start and continue to produce really good positive things that make people glad to be alive and not afraid to be or sorry to be alive.”
The multi-talented star has been a devout Christian his entire life, and feels success is better achieved through embracing one’s faith.
“I make movies and I sing and I do all the things I’ve done as a career because I like doing it. But, of course, you like it a lot better if it’s successful. But faith-based films, and even for that matter, music, television all does better with families in mind, if children are in mind, and if something in your heart communicates that you want the best and not the worst,” he said.
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“You won’t always make money doing whatever it takes, no, if you want to prosper, you want to prosper doing good,” he added, saying he believes, “it pays to find the goodness in our God-ness. It would be better if we’re godly.”
Boone has always stood by his principles and faith, which sometimes caused friction in his career.
In 2022, he told Fox News Digital that he risked suspension of his contract with 20th Century Fox for refusing to do a movie with Marilyn Monroe.
The movie would have starred Boone as a younger man who becomes involved with a cabaret performer played by Monroe, but he felt the story was “immoral.”
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He recalled meetings with Buddy Adler, the head of the studio, who threatened him with suspension from his seven-year contract, which could have also impacted his music and television work.
“We had a couple of tense meetings in his office. I finally said, ‘Mr. Adler, you do what you have to do. But I’ve got to follow my own conscience. I’ve got millions of teenage fans. I’d love to make a movie with Marilyn Monroe, but I can’t make this immoral story. Teenage fans will undoubtedly get the wrong message and think it’s OK to have an illicit affair.… I just can’t do it.”
The film moved forward with production after the 1962 death of Monroe, eventually becoming “The Stripper,” starring Joanne Woodward and Richard Beymer.
According to Boone, the film was “a terrible flop,” and the studio lost money.
As the industry and country at large have evolved over the years, Boone has seen a shift in people more openly embracing their faith as he does.
“Even now, politically, even now our president currently believes that God spared him when the bullet nearly took his ear off. Reagan, when he got shot in the chest, [said] I believe God spared me and I’m going to spend the rest of my life and presidency doing whatever he wants me to do. Now we have another president that is saying the same thing,” Boone told Fox News Digital at the MovieGuide Awards. “And he’s a novice at it, I must say, because this is new in his life, but he’s got good around him who are helping him see the God-ness in our goodness.”
The MovieGuide Awards airs March 6 on Great American Family.
