Sally Field Had No Idea What Robert Mitchum Was Saying on Set

Michelle Stein June 16, 2026, 8:52 am

Robert Mitchum, Sally Field — Everett Collection

What To Know

Sally Field revealed she often couldn’t understand what Robert Mitchum was saying to her while filming the 1967 western The Way West.
She shared one clear comment from Mitchum, although she didn’t fully grasp its meaning at the time.
Years later, Mitchum reaffirmed his earlier statement to Field, saying, “I told you so,”

Sally Field recently confessed that she had no idea what her co-star, Robert Mitchum, was saying to her on the set of The Way West.

During an interview for the June 11 episode of the Talking Pictures podcast, Field, 79, opened up about what it was like working on the 1967 western film. The actress played Mercy McBee in the movie alongside Mitchum, Kirk Douglas, and Richard Widmark.

While on set, Field explained she would often sit in the dirt away from the more established actors.

“Mitchum would sit with me, and I never could understand a single word he said,” she admitted. “I didn’t know what he was saying. I don’t know if he was stoned or what, but I couldn’t string two words together. And I would go, ‘Yeah, yeah,’ and [laugh] and pretend I understood what he said.”

Field continued, “Sometimes, I would get the gist of it. But did know the feeling of it is that he was somehow accepting of me. And he was good to me.”

There was one time when Field said she understood what Mitchum told her. But it still left her confused.

“The only thing that I understood that he said to me — and then I thought, did I understand that right? — he said to me, he said, ‘You know, you’re one of us,’” she recalled. “And I went, ‘Well, OK.’”

Although she “didn’t really know what it meant” at the time, she explained that Mitchum wasn’t “overly sentimental or overly flattering” when he said it. “It just was a fact,” she pointed out. “He said, ‘You know what? You’re one of us.’ And I just said, ‘Thank you.’”

Sally Field Says This TV Show Made Her Unemployable

Years later, Field ran into Mitchum and got some clarity on the comment.

“In the early ‘80s, I had to join a table at the People’s Choice Award,” she explained. “And I went to sit down at this table, and Mitchum was across the table. He was still alive — older, obviously — and he stood up, and we looked at each other, and he said, ‘I told you so.’”

Mitchum died at 79 in 1997.

In addition to Mitchum, Field, Douglas, and Widmark, The Way West starred Harry Carey Jr. and Michael McGreevey, among others.

The Way West, streaming on Tubi, Pluto TV, MGM+, FRNDLY TV, and Philo