Plucked for a banjo part again

Billy Redden’s appearance in Tim Burton’s “Big Fish” will best be appreciated when the film lands on home video. Viewers can freeze-frame on his big scene, which lasts a matter of seconds.

That’s him sitting on a porch, picking a few notes from the bluegrass classic “Dueling Banjos” on a banjo as our wandering hero, portrayed by Ewan McGregor, enters the eerily idyllic backwoods Shangri-La known as Spectre.

That banjo and that song are the clues to this compellingly enigmatic figure’s status as a screen icon. It was a little more than 30 years ago that this “Banjo Man,” as he is listed in the film’s end credits, portrayed Lonny, the “Banjo Boy” in “Deliverance.”

Today, Redden, 47, is co-owner of the Cookie Jar Cafe on Highway 441 in Clayton, Ga., “where the spring spends the summer.”

As word of his return to the screen has spread, Redden has added to his duties of washing dishes, manning the grill and serving up the cafe’s signature “Hillbilly Philly” steak sandwich. He also leaves time to greet his public, who travel far and wide to get an autograph or have a picture taken with him.

Redden is something of a reluctant celebrity, according to Ron Baumes, 38, who co-owns the Cookie Jar along with his wife of nearly 10 years, and with whom the divorced Redden lives.

Baumes and Redden had worked together for seven years at another local “breakfast anytime” place called the Huddle House. But it was not until a local TV station arrived to interview Redden on the occasion of “Deliverance’s” 25th anniversary that Baumes discovered his co-worker’s indelible part in a film ranked among the 15 greatest “heart-pounding movies” of all time by the American Film Institute.

“He really doesn’t talk about stuff,” Baumes said in a phone interview from the cafe. “If you ask him, he’ll tell you. I was shocked. I rented the movie because I had never seen it. Knowing him, of course, made it more exciting, but it just blew me away how good he was.”

Redden’s lone scene is one of two for which “Deliverance” is most famous (squeal if you know the other). As in “Big Fish,” he has no dialogue in “Deliverance”; he lets his banjo do the talking. Slowly rocking on a backwoods gas station porch swing, the boy with narrow, sunken eyes and blank expression is noted by one of four Atlanta men embarking on a canoe trip through the Georgia mountains.

“Talk about genetic deficiencies; isn’t that pitiful?” the man, portrayed by Ned Beatty, mockingly remarks.

Appearing in “Deliverance” was mostly a good experience, said Redden, who was plucked from among his classmates by casting agents who visited his high school. Beatty, Ronny Cox and Jon Voight were nice; Burt Reynolds, not so much.

“Burt was all right, but he wouldn’t hardly talk to you,” Redden said in a phone interview from the Cookie Jar, where he could be heard scraping the grill. “He just kept things to himself. He wasn’t rude. I guess he had so much on his mind that he had to concentrate on what he was supposed to be doing. I didn’t let it bother me.”

Redden, who was 15 at the time, enjoyed his 15 minutes of fame. His scene from the R-rated film was shown for his school, and he received a standing ovation from classmates. After that, he said, “I had to catch up on my schoolwork.”

Redden’s casting in “Big Fish” was not simply an in-joke. It is more a grace note in a film brimming with magical moments and fantastic characters. Burton was inspired to try to find Redden while scouting for locations in the South.

“The Georgia Film Commission office told him that the boy who played the banjo in ‘Deliverance’ was from the area, and that lit Tim Burton up,” recalled extras casting coordinator Maryellen Aviano-Roberts in a phone interview from the set of “The Princess Diaries 2.” “He said, ‘Let’s find him.’ ”

A slew of phone calls to small town cafes and police stations paid off. “Everybody in town knows Billy,” Baumes said.

Why was Burton so intent on finding Redden?

The director was in London and unavailable for comment, but Aviano-Roberts offered, “[Burton] is a very visual director, and for him, visually, [having Redden in the film] meant something to him.”

That’s when Burton and company discovered Redden’s True Hollywood secret. “I don’t play banjo,” he said.

For “Deliverance,” a musician had been positioned behind the swing. His left arm, hidden up Redden’s sleeve, performed the fingering.

Burton, Redding said, was good-natured about it.

“He said, ‘Billy, I don’t care if you play or if you don’t. I’m glad to have you. You just do what you normally do.’ He was real friendly. He was a lot better than Burt Reynolds.”

“That’s all the talk was that day,” Aviano-Roberts said with a laugh. “Everyone was saying, ‘Did you know he doesn’t play banjo?’ [For another scene set in Spectre], I hired bluegrass musicians from Montgomery, Ala. The day of the shoot, I told them Billy would be in the scene, and who he was. I’ve never heard so many musicians gasp. They didn’t know he didn’t play banjo. But they were thrilled. It was really neat to see the musicians say, ‘It’s him.’ ”

That seems to be the general reaction nowadays around the Cookie Jar.

A picture of Redden with Burton hangs on the wall, as do front-page stories about Redden from the Clayton Tribune and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Redden has fielded phone calls from such far-flung locales as London, Australia and New Zealand. Paul Harvey did a story about him on his syndicated radio show. A Seattle radio station sent him a gold plaque commemorating “Dueling Banjos’ ” worldwide sales. The plaque sports an embossed album cover that depicts Redden’s scene in the film.

Baumes is heartened by the attention Redden is receiving. “He’s just such a hard worker. His dedication is phenomenal,” he said.

And Redden, though not entirely comfortable in the spotlight, tolerates it all. “Oh, yeah,” he said, “as long as it helps the restaurant out. That’s the main goal.”

Redden doesn’t drive, so he was picked up and delivered from Clayton to the set of “Big Fish” in Montgomery, a 4 1/2 -hour trip each way. One of the perks was hotel accommodations. Another was an invitation to the film’s New York premiere. His one regret is that he did not get a chance to meet Danny DeVito, who also appears in the film as a circus owner.

Redden gives “Big Fish” an A. “Deliverance,” he said, gets an F.

“I like my part pretty good, but the rest of it I didn’t really care nothing about. That ‘squeal like a pig’ scene shouldn’t have been in there.”

With “Big Fish” now in theaters, the most frequent question Redden fields is whether he would like to be in another film. “Yeah,” he replied. “Ain’t no sense in stopping now.”

And should he once again be typecast, perhaps he will be able to actually play the instrument with which he is so closely associated. As a parting gift, Burton presented Redden with the banjo he holds in the film. He also gave him an instructional video.

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This article originally appeared in the Chicago Tribune.