Starting as an actor in the radical theater groups of the 1930s, Martin Ritt had a promising television directing career cut short in the early 1950s by the anti-communist blacklist of the time. He survived this to emerge later in the decade as a notable film director with his debut, the low-budget, hard-hitting racial drama Edge of the City (1957). His films, many of which deal with injustice and courageous individuals taking on a corrupt system, include Norma Rae (1979) and The Front (1976), one of the first movies to deal with the blacklist. He has the distinction of having directed 13 different actors to Oscar®-nominated performances. Ritt died in 1990 at the age of 76.

Paul Newman and Martin Ritt, who were business partners for a short time, worked together on five other movies: The Long, Hot Summer (1958), Paris Blues (1961), Hemingway's Adventures of a Young Man (1962), The Outrage (1964), and Hombre (1967).

Neal was astounded that she won Best Actress at the Academy Awards. "No part as small as mine had ever been nominated for best lead performance," she said. She immediately sent a cable to Martin Ritt, referencing his concern when he sent her the script: "It was not too small."

Neal arranged for a special showing of Hud in Aylesbury, England, where she and her family lived. The proceeds from the phenomenally successful screening went to an organization Neal and her husband founded, International Help for Children.

Patricia Neal made two more films after winning her Academy Award for Hud - Psyche '59 (1964) and In Harm's Way (1965) - before suffering a massive stroke that left her paralyzed and unable to talk for years. With the help of her husband, Roald Dahl (creator of the Willie Wonka character), she recovered and, although she turned down the role as Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate (1967), returned to the screen for The Subject Was Roses (1968), earning a second nomination. The story of her illness and near miraculous recovery was filmed for television in 1981 with Glenda Jackson as Neal and Dirk Bogarde as her husband.

Larry McMurtry's Texas-set novels have been turned into several other successful movies, including The Last Picture Show (1971), for which he also adapted the screenplay, and Terms of Endearment (1983). His stories of the old West have been filmed for television: Lonesome Dove (1989) and Buffalo Girls (1995). He also co-wrote (with Diana Ossana) the Oscar®-winning adapted screenplay for Brokeback Mountain (2005).

Although the only major cast member not nominated, Brandon de Wilde went on stage on Academy Awards night to accept the Best Supporting Actor award on behalf of the absent Melvyn Douglas.

Married couple Harriett Frank, Jr. and Irving Ravetch worked on 17 screenplays together (sometimes jointly or under the single name James P. Bonner). They contributed scripts for Martin Ritt eight times, including two others with Paul Newman, The Long, Hot Summer and Hombre. Their screenplay for Ritt's Norma Rae was their only other Academy Award nomination besides Hud.

The film's costume designer, Edith Head, eschewed her usual glamour in favor of authentically gritty and dowdy clothing for the characters. Head was the favorite costumer of many stars and the most lauded and successful designer in Hollywood, Oscar®-nominated for her work on 35 pictures between 1948 and 1977. She won eight times.

1963 was a particularly fruitful year for acclaimed composer Elmer Bernstein; he wrote music for a total of eight films and two TV shows that year alone, including one of his most famous scores for The Great Escape. Bernstein worked on close to 300 films and television shows in a career that spanned more than 50 years. Nominated 14 times for Academy Awards, surprisingly he won only once, but he holds the distinction of being the only person nominated in every decade from the 1950s to the current one. Among his memorable film scores are those for Sweet Smell of Success (1957), The Magnificent Seven (1960), Animal House (1978) and Far from Heaven (2002).

Process photography for Hud is credited to the ubiquitous special effects master Farciot Edouart, a nine-time Oscar® winner and leader in his field. Even those who may not know his name are certainly familiar with his work in such films as Sullivan's Travels (1941), Samson and Delilah (1949), Elephant Walk (1954), and many Elvis Presley and Jerry Lewis movies of the 1950s and 60s.

Not everyone was completely enamored of Hud. Reportedly, McMurtry felt Ritt had not made it clear enough that the animals slaughtered were irreplaceable breeding cattle or that Homer died because his life's work had been destroyed.

Memorable Quotes from Hud

LONNIE (Brandon De Wilde): Looks like you had quite a brawl in here last night.
BAR OWNER (Carl Saxe): I had Hud in here last night is what I had

HUD (Paul Newman): I always say the law was meant to be interpreted in a lenient manner. That's what I try to do. Sometimes I lean to one side, sometimes I lean to the other.

HUD: This whole country's run on epidemics, where you been? Epidemics of big business, price fixing, crooked TV shows, income tax finagling, souped-up expense accounts. How many honest men you know? You take the sinners away from the saints, you lucky to end up with Abraham Lincoln. I say, let's us put our bread in some of that gravy while it is still hot.

HUD: Happens to everybody-horses, dogs, men. Nobody gets outa life alive.

ALMA (Patricia Neal): Don't you ever ask?
HUD: Only question I ever ask any woman is what time is your husband coming home?

ALMA: I've done my time with one cold-blooded bastard. I ain't looking for another.
HUD: Too late, honey, you already found him.

HUD: All right, I'll bite. What turned you sour on me, not that I give a damn.
HOMER (Melvyn Douglas): Just that, Hud. You don't give a damn.

HOMER: Little by little the look of the country changes because of the men we admire.

Compiled by Rob Nixon