The Cheyenne Social Club

In 1867, John O'Hanlan and Harley Sullivan are aging cowboys working on open cattle ranges in Texas. John gets a letter from an attorney in Cheyenne, Wyoming that his brother, D.J., left him The Cheyenne Social Club in his will. Once the pair arrives in Cheyenne, John visits D.J.'s lawyer and receives precisely $1110.05 in cash (equivalent to $21,521.76 in 2021), his share of the profits earned by The Cheyenne Social Club since it became his property. John soon learns that the club is a high-class brothel separated from the busy part of town by the railroad tracks. John falls into disfavor with both the Club's ladies and the men in Cheyenne when he decides to close the Club. John learns his brother's deed had a provision the property would revert to the railroad if the ladies moved. Jenny, the Club's madam, is assaulted by a man named Bannister. John kills Bannister and regains popularity. Bannister's relatives come to Cheyenne for revenge, but John, Harley and Jenny successfully fight them off. When advised that even more of the Bannisters' relatives will soon come to town, John transfers ownership of the property to Jenny and he and Harley return to Texas.

• James Stewart as John O'Hanlan
• Henry Fonda as Harley Sullivan
• Shirley Jones as Jenny
• Sue Ane Langdon as Opal Ann
• Elaine Devry as Pauline
• Jackie Russell as Carrie Virginia
• Jackie Joseph as Annie Jo
• Sharon DeBord as Sara Jean
• Robert Middleton as Barkeep
• Robert J. Wilke as Corey Bannister
• Dabbs Greer as Jedediah W. Willowby
• John Dehner as Clay Carroll (uncredited)

Set in a brothel with suggestive dialogue, this was one of the few off-color films that James Stewart did. He also specifically asked that his friend Fonda be cast; they had most recently worked together two years previously in Firecreek. Stewart and Fonda's first film together had been the musical comedy On Our Merry Way (1948), and they had also both appeared in How the West Was Won (1962) but had no scenes together despite playing best friends.

The exteriors were shot at two Western film lots near Santa Fe, New Mexico: the Eaves Movie Ranch, which was built for the film,[3] and Bonanza Creek Ranch. The interiors were shot at the Samuel Goldwyn Studios in Hollywood.

A novelisation of the screenplay was written by Phillip Rock.

The film had its world premiere in Salt Lake City on June 10, 1970. It also opened in Provo and Ogden, Utah and Boise, Idaho before expanding into Des Moines and Waterloo, Iowa and Omaha, Nebraska as well as Montana.[1][4]

The Cheyenne Social Club turned a small profit but was poorly received by critics. It didn't receive any notoriety until decades later with numerous cable television broadcasts. Barrett's script earned a 1970 Writers Guild of America nomination for "Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen", but lost to Neil Simon for The Out-of-Towners.

In its first five days in 15 theaters in Utah, Idaho, Iowa and Nebraska it grossed $108,622.[4]

• List of American films of 1970

• The Cheyenne Social Club at the American Film Institute Catalog
• The Cheyenne Social Club at IMDb
• The Cheyenne Social Club at AllMovie
• The Cheyenne Social Club at the TCM Movie Database