Regarding the difficulties the Ryan actors had with staging. I don’t know what that entails. Still, I wonder if their lack of military experience had anything to do with it. I assume Dale Dye or someone like him put them through a ground-pounder course before filming commenced. But perhaps Combat scenes came more naturally to its actors because they’d served. Morrow and Jack Peabody were ex-Navy; that might not have helped them. But Jack Hogan was USAF during Korea. And Rick Jason was Army Air Corps from 1943 to 45.

Consider Gene Evans. According to a story I read, Sam Fuller wondered if Evans might be right for a part in a film he was directing, The Steel Helmet. To get a first impression, he tossed an M-1 Garand to him. Evans had been an Army sergeant during WWII. So he easily caught the rifle and expertly inspected it. I know that’s trickier than it looks: I was trained to use an M-14 when I was at Naval Air Station Keflavik from January 1975 to June 1976. (If you’re wondering why a woman would receive rifle training at a time when we were prohibited from being in combat, that’s a tale for another day.)