The Norseman
The Norseman is a 1978 American adventure film starring Lee Majors and directed, produced and written by Charles B. Pierce.
Plot
An 11th-century Viking prince sails to North America to find his father, who was captured by Native Americans during a previous voyage.Cast
- Lee Majors - Thorvald
- Cornel Wilde - Ragnar
- Mel Ferrer - King Eurich
- Jack Elam - Death Dreamer
- Susie Coelho - Winetta
- Christopher Connelly - Rolf
- Jimmy Clem - Olif
- Deacon Jones - Thrall
- Denny Miller - Rauric
- Kathleen Freeman - Old Indian Woman
- Jesse Pearson - Narrator
Production
The film was a co-production between Charles Pierce and Lee Majors, with AIP handling the distribution. It was Pierce's first film with a major Hollywood studio.Majors said it "took a lot of guts" to play a Viking but was persuaded by a fee of $500,000 and 10% of the profits. He later remarked, "I had a little time off, and they said, "It shoots in Florida, on the coast there, out of Tampa," and they had a bunch of Tampa Bay Buccaneers that were gonna play Vikings, so... I don't know, I thought it'd be fun, so I did it."
The film was shot in Tampa, Florida. Postproduction was done at Pierce's $2 million facility at Shreveport, Louisiana.
"There is no character to develop here and hardly any dialogue," said Majors, "this is a formula film."