Rio Lobo was the last theatrically released feature film made by producer-director Howard Hawks before his death in 1977. The project was announced in a 23 Apr 1969 Var brief, which stated that John Wayne would star and co-produce through his Batjac Productions. As noted in a 24 May 1970 LAT article, the film marked Howard Hawks’s fifth collaboration with John Wayne, after Red River (1948, see entry), Rio Bravo (1959, see entry), Hatari! (1962, see entry), and El Dorado (1967, see entry).
       The 14 Oct 1969 DV reported that filming would start in Feb 1970 at Churubusco Studios in Mexico City, Mexico. Production was slightly delayed, and the 17 Feb 1970 DV noted that principal photography was now set to begin in Cuernavaca, Mexico, on 16 Mar 1970. The budget was estimated to be between $4 and $5 million in items in the 26 Nov 1969 and 2 Jun 1970 DV.
       The picture was briefly re-titled San Timoteo by Cinema Center Films, as stated in the 6 Mar 1970 DV. Ten days later, the 16 Mar 1970 DV referred to the project as Rio Lobo when announcing the casting of Chris Mitchum, and confirming the start of production that day. In an interview in the 24 May 1970 LAT, Hawks claimed that Cinema Center had initially rejected Mitchum and had insisted on casting someone else. When he received the news, Hawks was on location preparing for the shoot. Disapproving of the actor Cinema Center had chosen, he threatened to shut down production unless they cast Mitchum. The 27 Mar 1970 DV stated that Hawks had originally wanted Robert Mitchum, who was Chris Mitchum’s father and Wayne’s former co-star in El Dorado, to play “Capt. Pierre Cordona,” but his salary demands proved to be too high.
       After only one day of filming, John Wayne’s mother, Mary A. Preen, died “following an operation and a long illness,” according to her 19 Mar 1970 DV obituary. Wayne took a short leave to attend her funeral in Long Beach, CA. He also left the set in early Apr 1970 to attend the 42nd Annual Academy Awards, where he won Best Actor for the role of “Rooster Cogburn” in True Grit (1969, see entry). Soon after, an item in the 23 Apr 1970 DV reported that Wayne would receive another honor, the Golden Saddleman Award of the Western Writers of America, at a ceremony in North Platte, NE, on 18 Jun 1970. The award was said to acknowledge Wayne as “the man who has contributed most to the history and legend of the west.”
       While shooting was underway in Cuernavaca, an accident took place on 26 Mar 1970, during the filming of a railroad scene which Hawks was directing from the back of a speeding train. The 27 Mar 1970 DV noted that an engineer had had to stop abruptly to avoid an automobile crossing the railroad tracks, at which point Hawks was thrown against the camera platform, suffering a deep gash in his leg that required stitches. The director was treated at nearby Social Security Hospital.
       Mexico filming infused the local economy with $1.3 million, as stated in the 27 Mar 1970 DV, and was completed by 31 Mar 1970, when cast and crew moved to Old Tucson Studios, “a complex of film sound stages and outdoor shooting sets 11 miles north of Tucson,” the 14 Apr 1970 DV noted. A news brief in the 30 Apr 1970 DV pointed out that Wayne owned stock in Old Tucson, as well as Rolly Harper Catering, which was used on set. Twenty-five days of filming in Tucson were set to be followed by six days of shooting in Nogales, AZ, and, finally, twenty-two days in Los Angeles, CA. Producer-director Michael Winner, who was filming his western, Lawman (1971, see entry), around the same time, claimed in a 28 Jun 1970 LAT interview that he had fought Hawks over the use of Western sets in Durango, Mexico, which resulted in Hawks using Old Tucson, instead. A 2 Jun 1970 DV item stated that filming would conclude on schedule, on 8 Jun 1970. Re-shoots involving Wayne and Jorge Rivero took place in Tucson on 28 and 29 Aug 1970, the 31 Aug 1970 DV reported.
       A preview screening was set to mark the opening of National General Pictures Corporation’s new South Coast Plaza Theatre in Costa Mesa, CA, on 10 Nov 1970, according to the 8 Nov 1970 LAT. The event was organized as a fundraiser for an “American heritage seminar” for U.S. teachers. A later notice in the 23 Nov 1970 LAT stated that the screening had been moved to 24 Nov 1970. On the same night, another benefit screening was scheduled to take place at the Loyola Theatre in Los Angeles, with proceeds going to the Westchester Mental Health Clinic. The film opened in Los Angeles the following month, on 30 Dec 1970. Critical reception was mixed. By 3 May 1972, the picture had grossed only $954,401, according to that day’s Var.
       Actor and journalist George Plimpton, who played the small role of “Whitey’s henchman,” was featured in a sixty-minute television special titled Plimpton! Shoot Out at Rio Lobo, which was part of a series in which Plimpton tried out various vocations. The program was set to be one of two produced by David L. Wolper Productions and sponsored by DuPont for the American Broadcasting Company (ABC). It aired on 9 Dec 1970, as noted in that day’s LAT, and the 23 Dec 1970 Var review described it as “basically ‘behind the scenes’ material” that incorporated clips of other Hawks films, footage from Wayne’s early pictures, and some “bloopers” involving actors and stuntmen Dean Smith, Mike Henry, and Danny Sands.
       According to the 11 May 1970 DV, theater actor Milton Rheubottom was supposed to make his feature film debut in Rio Lobo, under the stage name “Clinton Roberts.” The picture marked the theatrical motion picture debut of Peter Jason.