 Before filming began, director John Huston (I) (qv) and star  Burt Lancaster (qv) took actress Lillian Gish (qv) out to the  desert to teach her how to shoot, which she would have to do in the  film. However, Huston was astounded to discover that Gish could  shoot more accurately, and faster, than both he and Lancaster, who  thought themselves expert marksmen. It turned out that early in her  career Gish was taught how to shoot by notorious western outlaw and  gunfighter Al J. Jennings (qv), who had become an actor after his  release from a long prison sentence for train robbery and was in the  cast of one of her films. She found that she liked shooting and over  the years had developed into an expert shot.