After this initial success, his follow-up projects were less critically and commercially well received, including Ward's first directorial effort, Cannery Row (1982), and a sequel The Sting II (1983).

[2] Ward's efforts to sell a script based on the frontier days of California were undone by an industry-wide "ban" on Westerns after the spectacular failure of Michael Cimino's Heaven's Gate (1980).

In a lawsuit by a judgment creditor, Ward was forced to turn over his prized possession, a baseball bat signed by the cast of Major League.

[7] In 2006, Ward was credited on another film, Flyboys, a World War I drama starring James Franco directed by Tony Bill (who was a producer on The Sting).

Ward has produced the Canadian-American thriller film Bloodwork, and co-wrote another period drama, I'll Find You (previously known as Music, War and Love).