Gertrude Smith aka Treacherous Trudy from ‘The Harder They Fall’ is trending on the internet after the movie ‘The Harder They Fall’ hit the screens and Netflix recently. Is She Real?
‘The Harder They Fall’ revolves around the story of an outlaw who discovers his enemy is being released from prison, he reunites his gang to seek revenge.
The Harder They Fall is a 2021 American Revisionist Western film directed by Jeymes Samuel, who co-wrote the screenplay with Boaz Yakin. The film stars Jonathan Majors, Idris Elba, Zazie Beetz, Regina King, Delroy Lindo, Lakeith Stanfield, RJ Cyler, Danielle Deadwyler, Edi Gathegi, and Deon Cole. It is one of few Westerns whose principal cast members are all Black.
The movie primarily focuses on fictional events, however, most if not all of the characters are based on real cowboys, lawmen, and outlaws of the 19th-century American West.
The Harder They Fall had its world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival on October 6, 2021. It received a limited release on October 22, 2021, prior to streaming on Netflix on November 3. The film received generally positive reviews
The 2 hours and 19 minutes running movie has acquired 6.5 out of 10 on IMDB.
Samuel’s narrative is inspired but not based on the real events that happened to these Black cowboys and outlaws.
In this article, we will discover if the character Trudy Smith portrayed by Regina King in the movie is real or not and take a closer look at everything we know about the smith.
Who Is Gertrude Smith From The Harder They Fall?
Gertrude Smith from The Harder They Fall was a real person.
However, much about Smith was not documented and there is not much information available on the web as of now.
She was a pickpocket from the wild west and would partner up with a girl named Dolly Mickey and perform their daily work of picking pockets and stealing from people according to HITC.
King revealed to Variety, there may be only one image available of Smith on the internet and most of her personal information is not available as it was not documented well during her lifetime.
Yes, King’s character, Gertrude “Trudy” Smith was actually a pickpocket in real life.
Even though Trudy is based on the Old West outlaw, the western mostly glorifies her presence in this setting as there is not a lot known about her life.
IndieWire reported that Trudy would partner with a girl called, Dolly Mickey, and spend her days stealing before being arrested.
The Harder They Fall failed to include Trudy’s real-life MO as a thief, but instead, gave her a more traumatic backstory which fuelled her to become an outlaw.
She spent her life as a pickpocket and thief by partnering with another girl named Dolly Mickey but much about her personal life is not known on the web.
Although, Smith was a real person the lack of information about her personal life has led the writers and directors of The Harder They Fall to improvise her character for the movie.
Despite the story being based on the true story of Smith, there is a number of things that have been changed and added to give more life to her character for the movie.
Gertrude Smith isn’t as widely known as some of her counterparts that were in The Harder They Fall but this is the one pic of her that’s in existence. https://t.co/W0K2I2upnJ
According to Pop Sugar, most of the story behind Trudy Smith has been fictionalized as there is very little to know about her. Her name was kept original and the base of the story was real.
Actress King who has portrayed the role of Smith said, “it was never his idea to make everyone exactly what people may have read or researched . . . This is more of an extrapolation of people that are real, which I think makes it more stylized, more fun.”
HITC also emphasizes that Trudy was given more of a dramatic back story to fuel her change into an outlaw.
Other Cast Members From The Netflix Western Who Existed In Real Life revealed
Major’s character, Nat Love, existed as a real cowboy in the Old West, however, he was never an outlaw nor part of a gang. Instead, he took part in cattle drives between the 1870s-80s, and his conflicts were primarily based on the cowboy’s confrontations with Indigenous tribes.
The real-life Rufus Buck, played by Elba, had no connection to Love in real life, but he did lead the Rufus Buck gang between 1895-1896. Buck was only a teenager during his time as leader and met his end in 1896 when Buck and the rest of his gang members were hanged by a judge for robbing and killing several people.
Additionally, Zazie Beetz’s character, Stagecoach Mary, was actually the second woman to take on the role as star route carrier for USPS, taking her nickname from frequenting the stagecoach. LaKeith Stanfield’s character, Cherokee Bill, was in fact a real-life outlaw, but he was part of the Cook gang instead of Rufus’
Jeymes Samuel’s revisionist western “The Harder They Fall” assembles an all-star cast of both actors and legendary Black western figures from across time for a fictional story about two rival groups, the Nat Love and the Rufus Buck gangs.
In real life, the two men likely never crossed paths. And Samuel’s blind casting process led him to choose Idris Elba for the role of Buck, an infamous outlaw who was just 18 when he was executed.
“[Buck] was biracial, he had mixed heritage,” said Samuel. “And obviously, Idris is a wicked actor. He’s many things, but he’s not 18. It’s not a biopic, so I wasn’t looking at who looks like any of those characters, because none of them do. It’s just what they embody as actors.”
The film offers rare representation for Black cowboys, frontiersmen and lawmen who have largely been written out of Hollywood’s cinematic depictions of the Old West. In actuality, at least one in four cowboys was Black. “Black cowboys were some of the very first cowboys on the cattle trails because many of them used the skills they already had from handling cows as slaves,” said Gloria Austin, co-founder of the National Multicultural Western Heritage Museum in Fort Worth.
“Western history is like a bridge between slavery ending and the civil rights movement [beginning]. It’s empowering when people are able to see their rightful place in society and the many different avenues that were taken other than what is generally shown in movies, television and textbooks.”
Here’s a brief history of the real-life figures who inspired characters in “The Harder They Fall.”
Jonathan Majors as Nat Love in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Nat Love, played by Jonathan Majors
Nat Love (pronounced “Nate”) was born into slavery in June 1854 in Tennessee.
A skilled cowboy, Love would earn the nickname of Deadwood Dick after winning a shooting contest in Deadwood, S.D. He was also an expert at roping, herding and branding cattle and horses.
Love became a free man at the end of the Civil War and after winning a horse in a raffle, set off on his own at 15. He settled in Kansas and found work as a cowboy on the cattle trails and as a Pullman porter on the railroads. He published a memoir, “The Life and Adventures of Nat Love,” in 1907, perhaps the only full-length autobiography written by a Black cowboy. Love died in 1921 .
Idris Elba as Rufus Buck in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Rufus Buck, played by Idris Elba
Of Black and Creek Indian descent, outlaw Rufus Buck led the Rufus Buck Gang, which rose to prominence in summer 1895. That July, Buck (just 18) and his four associates went on a crime spree, preying on local white settlers, Creek Indians and Black people alike. Buck hoped to instigate an uprising to force white settlers off the land and return it to the Creeks and Cherokees. The gang killed several people, including a U.S. deputy marshal, and raped and pillaged across the Fort Smith, Ark., area before being hanged together in July 1896.
Zazie Beetz as Stagecoach Mary Fields in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Stagecoach Mary, played by Zazie Beetz
Mary Fields was born into slavery in or around 1832, likely in Tennessee. Newly freed after the Civil War ended, she headed north and landed at a convent in Toledo, Ohio, where she found work as a groundskeeper.
In 1885, she headed to Montana and began working at a new convent, but her gruff manner constantly landed her in trouble. The “hard-drinking, quick-shooting” Fields, who had a penchant for men’s clothing and stood at an imposing 6 feet, was fired after she nearly got into a gunfight with a janitor.
In 1895, Fields was contracted by the U.S. Post Office Department to become a mail carrier, the first Black woman and just the second woman to ever do so. She was nicknamed Stagecoach Mary in acknowledgment of her ability to protect the mail from thieves and bandits. She held the position for eight years before her death in December 1914.
Lakeith Stanfield as Cherokee Bill in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Cherokee Bill, played by Lakeith Stanfield
Born Crawford Goldsby in 1876, Cherokee Bill was an infamous outlaw who rode with the Cook Gang. With Black, Sioux, Mexican, Cherokee and white ancestry, he was light enough to pass for white.
Goldsby attended Native American schools in Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) from age 7 before falling in with a rough crowd and engaging in crimes ranging from stealing horses to train and bank robberies. He killed seven to 13 people before he was apprehended and convicted of murder.
Goldsby unsuccessfully attempted to escape from jail, killing a guard in the process and earning a second murder conviction. He was hanged in 1896 at age 20. When asked if he had any last words, Goldsby said: “I came here to die, not to make a speech.”
RJ Cyler as Jim Beckwourth in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Jim Beckwourth, played by RJ Cyler
James “Jim” Beckwourth was born into slavery in Virginia in April 1798. The son of a white man and an enslaved woman, Beckwourth was awarded his freedom by his father in 1810.
Known widely as a mountain man, Beckwourth embarked on a fur-trading expedition in 1823 and an expedition to the Rocky Mountains the following year. He took several Native American wives and lived among the Crow Indians for six years, impressing them with his athletic prowess.
Edi Gathegi as Bill Pickett in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Bill Pickett, played by Edi Gathegi
Known as the father of bull-riding, Bill Pickett invented competitive steer wrestling (or bulldogging) and performed in rodeos throughout North America and Europe.
Born William Pickett in 1870, he began work as a ranch hand in lieu of attending the sixth grade. When he was 18, he and his brothers established the Pickett Brothers Bronco Busters and Rough Riders Assn., a horse-breaking cowboy service in Texas.
Bulldogging, which involves subduing a steer by grabbing its horns and biting its nose or bottom lip, changed the face of rodeo and allowed Pickett to travel across the U.S. and to Canada, Mexico, South America and England as a performer. The world champion rodeo bulldogger died in April 1932 after being kicked in the head by a horse. His legacy continues with a traveling rodeo that bears his name, the Bill Pickett Invitational Rodeo.
Delroy Lindo as Bass Reeves in Jeymes Samuel’s “The Harder They Fall.”
(David Lee / Netflix)
Bass Reeves, played by Delroy Lindo
Lawman Bass Reeves is one of the best-known Black historical figures from the Old West. He was the first Black deputy U.S. marshal west of the Mississippi and despite being illiterate, managed to memorize the warrants for every suspect he sought to apprehend.
Reeves was born into slavery in Arkansas in 1838. He served a stint in the Civil War as a servant and fought in several battles before escaping into Indian Territory as a fugitive slave. While there, he served in the Union’s first Indian Home Guard regiment and in 1875 became U.S. deputy marshal in the territory.
Reeves’ history as a lawman is notoriously colorful: He would often sing softly before going into a gunfight and once walked 28 miles dressed as a beggar to fool a pair of criminals into letting him stay the night.
He was one of the most successful lawmen in American history, arresting more than 3,000 fugitives during his 32-year career. He was let go from the force when Oklahoma was granted statehood in 1907 but worked for the Muskogee police department for an additional two years before being diagnosed with Bright’s disease and dying in 1910.
