John Wayne's most frequent costars
Excellent performers and the very best friends of the Duke, John Wayne, were his frequent costars
List activity
8.6K views
• 13 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
57 people
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Gruff, burly American character actor. Born in 1903 in Benkelman, Nebraska (confirmed by Social Security records; sources stating 1905 or Denver, Colorado are in error.) Bond grew up in Denver, the son of a lumberyard worker. He attended the University of Southern California, where he got work as an extra through a football teammate who would become both his best friend and one of cinema's biggest stars: John Wayne. Director John Ford promoted Bond from extra to supporting player in the film Salute (1929), and became another fast friend. An arrogant man of little tact, yet fun-loving in the extreme, Bond was either loved or hated by all who knew him. His face and personality fit perfectly into almost any type of film, and he appeared in hundreds of pictures in his more than 30-year career, in both bit parts and major supporting roles. In the films of Wayne and Ford, particularly, he was nearly always present. Among his most memorable roles are John L. Sullivan in Gentleman Jim (1942), Det. Tom Polhaus in The Maltese Falcon (1941) and the Rev. Capt. Samuel Johnson Clayton The Searchers (1956). An ardent but anti-intellectual patriot, he was perhaps the most vehement proponent, among the Hollywood community, of blacklisting in the witch hunts of the 1950s, and he served as a most unforgiving president of the ultra-right-wing Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals. In the mid-'50s he gained his greatest fame as the star of TV's Wagon Train (1957). During its production, Bond traveled to Dallas, Texas, to attend a football game and died there in his hotel room of a massive heart attack.- Actor
- Writer
Paul Fix, the well-known movie and TV character actor who played "Marshal Micah Torrance" on the TV series The Rifleman (1958), was born Peter Paul Fix on March 13, 1901 in Dobbs Ferry, New York to brew-master Wilhelm Fix and his wife, the former Louise C. Walz. His mother and father were German immigrants who had left their Black Forest home and arrived in New York City in the 1870s. (The name "Fix" is of Latin/Germanic origin, and is derived from St. Vitus and means "animated" or "vital").
Besides Peter Paul, the Fix family consisted of two girls and three boys, the youngest of whom was six years older than the future actor. Peter Paul's childhood was a happy one. He and his family lived on the 200-acre property on which the Manilla Anchor Brewery, where his father was brew-master, was situated. Such was the importance of the senior Fix to the brewery that when he died at the age of 62 on the eve of America's entry into the First World War (two years after his 54-year old wife had died), the brewery closed.
The orphaned Peter Paul, who kept to himself a lot and had a vivid imagination, was sent to live with his married sisters, first one who lived nearby in Yonkers, and then to another in Zanesville, Ohio. The just-turned-17-year-old Peter Paul Fix joined the U.S. Navy on March 12, 1918, and spent his state-side service time during World War I in Newport, Rhode Island and Charleston, South Carolina. He first tread the boards as an actor while a sailor stationed in Newport, when the baby-faced salt (who looked much younger than his age) was one of six gobs chosen to play female roles in the Navy Relief Show "HMS Pinafore". The Navy staging of the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta was a big hit and chalked up a run of several weeks in Providence and Boston.
Fix was assigned as an able-bodied seaman to the troopship U.S.S. Mount Vernon, which was torpedoed by a German U-boat off the coast of France but did not sink as it was run aground. The rest of Fix's naval career was less exciting, and he was demobilized on September 5, 1919. After his discharge, Fix went back to his girlfriend Frances (Taddy) Harvey, whom he had left behind in Zanesville. He and Taddy were married in 1922 and they moved to California as Fix had always wanted to live in a warm climate.
Fix and his bride settled in Hollywood, not so much because he had set ideas about becoming an actor but because he didn't know what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. He liked writing and acting in local plays, and soon became friends with the fellow tyro actor Clark Gable, who was his own age. Fix and Gable were discovered by the stage actress Pauline Frederick, who hired them to be members of her touring troupe that traveled by train the length of the West Coast putting on plays. In all, Fix - who had informally renamed himself Paul Peter - appeared in 20 plays with Gable.
Paul Fix had one of his earliest acting roles on celluloid in the mid-1920s, appearing in a silent Western starring William S. Hart. The Western genre eventually would become the one he was most identified with. He played uncredited bit parts and small roles in silents before getting his first credited role in an early talkie (which was part-silent and part-talking), The First Kiss (1928), which starred future Hollywood superstar Gary Cooper and the dame that drove King Kong ape, Fay Wray. In all, Fix appeared in 300-400 films. The Western programmers of the silent and early talkie days could be shot in less than a week.
In 1925, Taddy gave birth to their daughter Marilyn Carey, who eventually would marry Harry Carey Jr., the son of one of the first great Western superstars. They would have three more children and become part of the extended family gathered around the director John Ford. In his career, Paul Fix would appear with another Western legend, John Wayne, in 26 films, starting in 1931 with Three Girls Lost (1931). Urged on by Loretta Young, Fix became an acting coach for the young actor, and Wayne later paid him back when he became a star by having Fix appear in his movies. (The Duke also was a part of the close-knit group that collected around John Ford). With the Duke's patronage, the kinds of roles that Fix played changed. He had been typed as villains in the 1930s but, in the 40s, he began assaying a better class of character.
Paul Fix was also a screenwriter, and is credited as the writer on three films: Tall in the Saddle (1944), Ring of Fear (1954) and The Notorious Mr. Monks (1958). His favorites parts included playing the stricken passenger in the John Wayne picture The High and the Mighty (1954), Elizabeth Taylor's father in George Stevens' classic Giant (1956), the grandfather of the eponymous The Bad Seed (1956) and the judge in To Kill a Mockingbird (1962). His last screen appearance was in the Brooke Shields movie Wanda Nevada (1979), but he is most famous for appearing in the recurring role of "Marshal Micah Torrance" in the popular Western TV series The Rifleman (1958). As of 1981, the 80-year old Fix was still getting mail from all over the world from "Rifleman" fans.
Paul Fix died October 14, 1983 of kidney failure. He was survived by his daughter Marilyn Carey and son-in-law Harry "Dobe" Carey, three grandchildren and several great-grandchildren.- Actor
- Writer
- Producer
Born in New York City to a Judge of Special Sessions who was also president of a sewing machine company. Grew up on City Island, New York. Attended Hamilton Military Academy and turned down an appointment to West Point to attend New York Law School, where his law school classmates included future New York City mayor James J. Walker. After a boating accident which led to pneumonia, Carey wrote a play while recuperating and toured the country in it for three years, earning a great deal of money, all of which evaporated after his next play was a failure. In 1911, his friend Henry B. Walthall introduced him to director D.W. Griffith, for whom Carey was to make many films. Carey married twice, the second time to actress Olive Fuller Golden (aka Olive Carey, who introduced him to future director John Ford. Carey influenced Universal Studios head Carl Laemmle to use Ford as a director, and a partnership was born that lasted until a rift in the friendship in 1921. During this time, Carey grew into one of the most popular Western stars of the early motion picture, occasionally writing and directing films as well. In the '30s he moved slowly into character roles and was nominated for an Oscar for one of them, the President of the Senate in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939). He worked once more with Ford, in The Prisoner of Shark Island (1936), and appeared once with his son, Harry Carey Jr., in Howard Hawks's Red River (1948). He died after a protracted bout with emphysema and cancer. Ford dedicated his remake of 3 Godfathers (1948) "To Harry Carey--Bright Star Of The Early Western Sky."- Actor
- Producer
- Additional Crew
George was the son of the San Francisco Chief of Police who became a college athlete. He was the Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the Pacific Fleet during World War I. In the early 1920s, George wound up in Hollywood where he worked as a stuntman and part time actor. In 1924, Director John Ford picked virtually unknown George to star in his first picture, The Iron Horse (1924). Over the next two years, he would appear in four more Ford films and would co-star with Janet Gaynor in The Blue Eagle (1926) and Sunrise (1927). "Sunrise," a winner of two Academy Awards, was the story of a simple farmer who lets another woman talk him into murdering his wife. George remained popular until sound came along. By that time, his popularity was sliding, but he did make the transition to sound. With his rugged looks and physical size, he was soon a Western Cowboy Star. He was in some of the best stories ever written, Riders of the Purple Sage (1931), and in some of the worst. But he was consistently in the Top Ten money-making Western Stars. He would appear in a few films outside the horse set, such as Ever Since Eve (1934), but those roles would be few. By the end of the 1930s, George was still a popular 'B' movie Cowboy Star, but he would not take the parts as seriously as he did a decade before. During World War II, he hung up his spurs, and he re-enlisted in the Navy where he fought in the Pacific and was decorated many times. After the war, when he would not find work in acting, John Ford, his old Director, would give him work with the cavalry in three of his films.- Stunts
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Starting out as a rodeo cowboy and then becoming a stuntman in silent westerns, Yakima Canutt later doubled for such stars as Clark Gable and John Wayne, among others, in such dangerous activities as jumping off the top of a cliff on horseback, leaping from a stagecoach onto its runaway team, being "shot" off a horse at full gallop and other such potentially life-threatening activities. He became expert at staging massive events involving livestock, such as cattle stampedes and covered-wagon races, as well as Indians-vs.-cavalry battles on a grand scale. Canutt's most noteworthy achievement as a second-unit director came in his staging and direction of the chariot-race sequence in William Wyler 's Ben-Hur (1959)--which, from initial planning to final execution, took two years.- Actor
- Producer
- Soundtrack
American character actor, mainly in Westerns in comic or rustic roles. Born Norton Earl Worden in Rolfe, Iowa, during his parents' visit to a relative's home there, he was raised on a cattle ranch near Glendive, Montana. Educated at Stanford and the University of Nevada as an engineer, he trained as an Army pilot, but washed out of flight school. Worden toured the country in rodeos as a saddle bronc rider and broke his neck in a horse fall in his 20s, but didn't know it until his 40s. Chosen along with Tex Ritter from a rodeo at Madison Square Garden in New York to appear in the Broadway play "Green Grow the Lilacs", the play from which the musical "Oklahoma" was later derived, he afterward drove a cab in New York, then worked on dude ranches as a wrangler and as a guide on the Bright Angel trail of the Grand Canyon. Recommended by Billie Burke to several movie producers, Worden became friends with John Wayne, Howard Hawks, and later John Ford, all of whom provided him with much work. He was married to Louise Eaton, who predeceased him. Following his wife's death, he shared his house with Jim Beaver for several years, thus generously helping the young actor gain a foothold in Hollywood. He died in his sleep at 91, survived by his adopted daughter Dawn Henry.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Hollywood stalwart Bruce Cabot's main claim to fame, other than rescuing Fay Wray from King Kong (1933), is that he tested for the lead role of The Ringo Kid in John Ford's Western masterpiece Stagecoach (1939). John Wayne got the role and became the most durable star in Hollywood history, while Cabot (eventually) found himself a new drinking partner when the two co-starred in Angel and the Badman (1947). In the latter stages of his career, Cabot could rely on Wayne for a supporting part in one of the Duke's movies.
It wasn't always so. In the 1930s Cabot's star shone bright. He was born with the unlikely name Etienne Pelissier Jacques de Bujac in Carlsbad, New Mexico, the son of French Col. Etienne de Bujac and Julia Armandine Graves, who died shortly after giving birth to the future Bruce Cabot. After leaving the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, the future thespian hit the road, working a wide variety of jobs including sailor and insurance salesman, and doing a stint in a knacker's yard. In 1931 he wound up in Hollywood and appeared in several films in bit parts.
The young Monsieur de Bujac met David O. Selznick, then RKO's central producer (a job akin to Irving Thalberg's at MGM), at a Hollywood party, which led to an uncredited bit part as a dancer in Lady with a Past (1932) and a supporting role in The Roadhouse Murder (1932). On a parallel career track at the time, Marion Morrison (John Wayne) had failed to follow up on his audacious debut in Raoul Walsh's The Big Trail (1930) (the Duke had appeared in 18 movies previously but had only been billed in one, as "Duke Morrison" in the unlikely John Wayne vehicle Words and Music (1929)). Cabot and Wayne eventually appeared in 11 films together.
Although Cabot was prominently featured in the blockbuster "King Kong" in 1933, he never did make the step to stardom, though he enjoyed a thriving career as a supporting player. He was a heavy in the 1930s, playing a gangster boss in Let 'em Have It (1935) and the revenge-minded Native American brave Magua after Randolph Scott's scalp in The Last of the Mohicans (1936); over at MGM, he ably supported Spencer Tracy as the instigator of a lynch mob in Fritz Lang's indictment of domestic fascism, Fury (1936). A freelancer, he appeared in movies at many studios before leaving Hollywood for military service. Cabot worked for Army intelligence overseas during World War II; after the war, he continued to work steadily, with and without his friend and frequent co-star, the Duke.
Bruce Cabot died in 1972 of lung and throat cancer. He was 68 years old.- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Jack Pennick was an American film actor, a familiar face, primarily in the movies of John Ford. He was born in Portland, Oregon, the son of gold miner Albert R. and Bessie (Murray) Pennick. After himself working as a gold miner, Pennick joined the U.S. Marine Corps and served, with the Pekin Legation Guard, in China in 1912 and in World War I. He and his first wife, Grechin, had two children by the time he was 20. He had a third child with his second wife, Nona Lorraine. After the First World War, Pennick worked as a horse wrangler and got work as such in various film productions. His rather unforgettably unattractive face caught the attention of filmmakers, particularly Ford, and Pennick began to get work as an actor, as well as occasionally a military technical adviser. Pennick re-enlisted in the navy in 1942, at the age of 46. He served as Chief Petty Officer under Commander John Ford in the Field Photographic Unit and, according to Ford, was decorated with the Silver Star medal for action in which he was wounded at Majaz al Bab, Tunisia during World War II. He continued to appear in films after the war, his career waning simultaneously with Ford's. He died in Manhattan Beach, California, at the age of 68.- Actor
- Stunts
- Additional Crew
Born in Oklahoma, Ben Johnson was a ranch hand and rodeo performer when, in 1940, Howard Hughes hired him to take a load of horses to California. He decided to stick around (the pay was good), and for some years was a stunt man, horse wrangler, and double for such stars as John Wayne, Gary Cooper and James Stewart. His break came when John Ford noticed him and gave him a part in an upcoming film, and eventually a star part in Wagon Master (1950). He left Hollywood in 1953 to return to rodeo, where he won a world roping championship, but at the end of the year he had barely cleared expenses. The movies paid better, and were less risky, so he returned to the west coast and a career that saw him in over 300 movies.- Actor
- Writer
- Producer
Harry Carey, Jr., had been reliable character actor for decades, mostly in Westerns, before he retired. He is the son of the actor Harry Carey and the actress Olive Carey. He was born on his parents' 1000-acre ranch near Saugus, in the northwestern part of Los Angeles County, which is now next door to Santa Clarita, a large town that certainly did not exist in 1947 or for decades longer. Thus, the young Harry Carey, Jr., grew up among cattle and horses at the ranch. Because of a large group of Navajo Indians who worked on his parents' ranch, he learned to speak the Navajo language at the same time that he was learning to speak English.
During World War II, Carey enlisted in the U.S. Navy, and he served in the Pacific Theater first as a Navy medical corpsman. However, he was transferred back to the United States (against his wishes) to serve under his father's good friend, the director John Ford, in making movies for the Navy (training films)and the O.S.S. (propaganda films).
After World War II ended, Carey tried to make a career in singing, but he was not successful at this. Hence, he moved into acting, and after a couple of small acting parts, he was given a chance to work in a motion picture with his father, the John Wayne film Red River (1948). (However, the father and the son did not have any scenes with one another). After the death of Harry Carey, Sr., in 1946, Mr. Ford gave the younger Carey a leading role in the movie that Ford dedicated to the memory of Harry Carey, Sr., in 1948, 3 Godfathers (1948).
As a full-fledged member of the noted John Ford Stock Company, Carey, Jr., appeared in many of Mr. Ford's epic Westerns during the following two decades. Carey also starred in a series-within-a-series on TV, The Adventures of Spin and Marty (1955), which was shown as a part of The Mickey Mouse Club (1955). Very boyish looks characterized Carey's early years, but he matured into a strong and familiar character actor over the following four decades, and he acted in scores of films and TV programs in his long career. Carey, Jr., is married to Marilyn Fix Carey, the daughter of the actor Paul Fix.- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Stunts
Ralph Volkie was born on 7 July 1910 in Arizona, USA. He was an actor, known for Leather Gloves (1948), East of the River (1940) and 4 for Texas (1963). He died on 6 March 1987 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Stunts
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Jerry Gatlin was born on 15 November 1933 in Colorado Springs, Colorado, USA. He was an actor and assistant director, known for Pale Rider (1985), Bite the Bullet (1975) and Silverado (1985). He was married to Polly Burson, Marie Mass, Gatlin and Jean Gatlin. He died on 4 March 2021 in Sheridan, Wyoming, USA.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Olin Howland had a career in movies which stretched from the 20s, up through the time he passed away, in the late 50s. After a few attempts at films in the silent era, Olin began to appear regularly in the sound pictures of the 1930s. His roles were usually in mysteries and dramas, and he became a western character actor in the 'horse operas' put out by Republic in the 1940s. One of his most memorable roles was also one of his last; he appeared in First Stop (1955), as the owner of a broken down motel in the middle of nowhere, which the Ricardo's and Mertz's are forced to stay at for the night (and which the can't leave because the car's steering wheel was mysteriously *stolen*.- American actor who had a brief flirtation with stardom before settling into character roles and bit parts. Born in rural South Dakota (according to government records, though some sources say Walsh County, North Dakota) as Robert C. Oakes, the son of a horse rancher, he moved with his family to Culbertson, Montana (not his birthplace as some sources have it), where he grew up. The family moved again and he graduated from high school in Helena. A brief attendance at Montana Wesleyan College was interrupted by the offer of a job driving a tour bus in Yellowstone National Park.
Drifting down to Los Angeles in the early 1920s, he got work as an auto mechanic, but his ranch-honed cowboy skills got him bit parts in pictures at Paramount when director John Waters offered him work in a series of Westerns. Paramount recognized possibilities in the tall, rugged, handsome cowboy and put him (with a new name, Lane Chandler) into leading roles, first in Westerns, then in contemporary films opposite some of the biggest star actresses of the time, Clara Bow, Greta Garbo, Betty Bronson, and Esther Ralston. As silent films were phased out, Chandler found his stock slipping at Paramount, which had begun to overtly favor Gary Cooper in his place. He began appearing in lower-budgeted Westerns, first in leads, then as second leads to stars such as John Wayne and Jack Hoxie. During this period he free-lanced at Big 4, Syndicate Pictures and Kent (see Willis Kent) Pictures, all a far cry from his days under contract with Adolph Zukor. Despite the relatively poor production values, several of his early talkies (The Hurricane Horseman (1931) and The Cheyenne Cyclone (1931)) rise above similar fare in entertainment value. Unfortunately, Chandler was also forced to work on other lesser productions helmed by hack directors such as J.P. McGowan who cared more about quickly earning a paycheck than the product itself. His association with Kent ended in 1930s and Chandler drifted to another independent outfit called Empire Pictures which promised to produce 6 films, although only 2 were ultimately shot, the entertaining quickies The Lone Bandit (1935) and The Outlaw Tamer (1935). Now in his mid-30's Chandler found his career in irreversible decline and settled into supporting roles. A favorite of director Cecil B. DeMille, Chandler worked in many DeMille films, often in tiny bit parts, though he claimed these were his favorite parts. Eventually Chandler no longer commanded roles of any substance and he spent the remaining 35 years of his career in progressively smaller supporting parts, playing in hundreds of films, often uncredited. A stalwart of television Westerns of the 1950s, he was a familiar face to movie fans for nearly fifty years. An astute businessman with industrial and property holdings, he died in Los Angeles in 1971 at 73. - Actor
- Producer
- Additional Crew
American leading man famed as the star of one of the longest-running shows in U.S. television history, Gunsmoke (1955). Born of Norwegian heritage (the family name, Aurness, had formerly been Aursness) in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Rolf and Ruth Duesler Aurness. His father was a traveling salesman of medical supplies and his mother later became a newspaper columnist. James attended West High School in Minneapolis. Although he appeared in school plays, he had no interest in performing, and dreamed instead of going to sea. After high school, he attended one semester at Beloit College before receiving his draft notice in 1943. He entered the army and trained at Camp Wheeler, Georgia, before shipping out for North Africa. At Casablanca, Arness joined the 3rd Infantry Division in time for the invasion of Anzio. Ten days after the invasion, Arness was severely wounded in the leg and foot by German machine-gun fire. His wounds, which plagued him the rest of his life, resulted in his medical discharge from the army.
While recuperating in a hospital in Clinton, Iowa, Arness was visited by his younger brother Peter (later to gain fame as actor Peter Graves), who suggested he take a radio course at the University of Minnesota. James did so, and a teacher recommended him for a job as an announcer at a Minneapolis radio station. Though seemingly headed for success in radio, he followed a boyhood friend's suggestion and went with the friend to Hollywood to find work as a film extra. Arness studied at the Bliss-Hayden Theatre School under actor Harry Hayden, and while appearing in a play there was spotted by agent Leon Lance. Lance got the actor a role as Loretta Young's brother in The Farmer's Daughter (1947). The director of that film, H.C. Potter, recommended that he drop the "u" from his last name and soon thereafter the actor was officially known as James Arness.
Little work followed this break, and Arness became sort of beach bum, living on the shore at San Onofre and spending his days surfing. He began taking his acting career more seriously when he began to receive fan mail following the release of the Young picture. He appeared in a production of "Candida" at the Pasadena Community Playhouse, and married his leading lady, Virginia Chapman. She pressed him to study acting and to work harder in pursuit of a career, but Arness has been consistent in ascribing his success to luck. He began to act small roles with frequency, often due to his size, and mostly villainous characters. Most notable among these was that of the space alien in The Thing from Another World (1951).
While playing a Greek warrior in a play, Arness was spotted by agent Charles K. Feldman, who represented John Wayne. Feldman introduced Arness to Wayne, who put the self-described 6', 6" actor under personal contract. Arness played several roles over the next few years for and with Wayne, whom he considered a mentor. In 1955, Wayne recommended Arness for the lead role of Matt Dillon in the TV series Gunsmoke (1955). (Contrary to urban legend, Wayne himself was never offered the role.) Arness at first declined, thinking a TV series could derail his growing film career, but Wayne argued for the show, and Arness accepted. His portrayal of stalwart Marshal Dillon became an iconic figure in American television and the series, aired for 20 seasons, is, as of 2008, the longest-running dramatic series in U.S. television history. Arness became world-famous and years later reprized the character in a series of TV movies.
After the surprising cancellation of "Gunsmoke" in 1975, Arness jumped immediately into another successful (though much shorter-lived) Western project, a TV-movie-miniseries-series combination known as "How The West Was Won." A brief modern police drama, McClain's Law (1981), followed, and Arness played his mentor John Wayne's role in Red River (1988), a remake of the Wayne classic.
Following the aforementioned "Gunsmoke" TV movies (the last in 1994, when Arness was 71), Arness basically retired. His marriage to Virginia Chapman ended in divorce in 1960. They had three children, one of whom, Jenny Lee, committed suicide in 1975. Arness subsequently married Janet Surtrees in 1978.- Actor
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Considering the kind of scruffy, backwoods, uneducated, Deep-South hillbilly types he played, many people would be surprised to hear that Ken Curtis wasn't actually born in the south but in the small town of Las Animas, Colorado, the son of the town sheriff. They would probably be even more surprised to learn that he began his show business career as a singer in the big-band era, and was a vocalist in the legendary Tommy Dorsey orchestra. He entered films in the late 1940s at the tail-end of the singing-cowboy period in a series of low-budget Westerns for Columbia Pictures. When that genre died out, Curtis turned to straight dramatic and comedy parts and became a regular in the films of director John Ford (who was his father-in-law). Curtis branched out into film production in the 1950s with two extremely low-budget monster films, The Killer Shrews (1959) and The Giant Gila Monster (1959), but he is best known for his long-running role as Festus Hagen, the scruffy, cantankerous deputy in the long-running TV series Gunsmoke (1955).- Actor
- Director
- Art Director
Fielden Edward Faulkner II was born on leap day (February 29), 1932, in Lexington, Kentucky, where his father owned and operated a prominent building supply company. His mother was a retired piano and music teacher. He was the second of two children; his sister (now deceased) was nearly 19 years old when he was born.
As a youth he was very creative with woodworking as well as mechanical drawing and other artistic skills. His affinity for performing began to appear when he became fascinated with the art of magic at the age of 11. He enjoyed showing his skills at this new hobby to friends and family, and by the time he was nearly 13 he was performing a full-fledged magic show for childrens birthday parties, service clubs and other gatherings. He eventually engaged the services of a local talent agent, who increased the fees for his act, which he continued to do through college.
He matriculated through the Lexington public school system and, when he entered high school, teamed up with a friend for a vaudeville-like comedy song-and-dance routine, billed as "Faulkner & Seeley--The Sunshine Twins." They performed at numerous high school events and service organizations in Lexington for two years.
During his high school junior year he became very aware of a tall, slender, extremely pretty brunette classmate named Barbara Baldwin who had transferred from her high school in western Kentucky. Fortunately for Ed, they were cast as Emily and George, the leads in their senior class play "Our Town". Ed and Barbara were married in real life after they graduated from the University of Kentucky in June 1954.
Prior to earning a B.S. degree in the Business College at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, he attended the University of Virginia for two years, majoring in Civil Engineering. While attending the University of Kentucky, his acting abilities were further stimulated by three leading roles in the University's outstanding Guignol Theater: "The Dover Road," "Born Yesterday" (as Harry Brock) and "Detective Story" (as the detective); in the latter, Barbara portrayed the detective's wife. No thoughts of becoming a professional actor occurred to him, since service in the US Air Force was required after being commissioned as a second lieutenant on completion of Reserve Officer Training Corps at the University of Kentucky and he was awarded his wings as a single-engine jet fighter pilot.
After two years Air Force service Ed returned to civilian life to fulfill his family obligation of managing the building supply business (because of age and serious health problems, his father could no longer actively participate in the business). After his father's death in 1957, Ed discovered that two former employees had caused severe damage to the business, so much so that the company had to be dissolved. It was at this juncture that the idea of becoming a professional actor became an option. After several discussions with the professor of the Drama Department at the University of Kentucky about the feasibility of going to Hollywood, he was encouraged to "give it a go." In the spring of 1958, and with the full support of his wife, Barbara, they and their daughter moved to Beverly Hills to test the unknown waters of Hollywood.
Through friends, Ed had the good fortune to be introduced to Andrew V. McLaglen, son of Academy Award-winning character actor Victor McLaglen. At that time Andrew was a CBS staff director, helming such notable western TV series such as Have Gun - Will Travel (1957), Gunsmoke (1955) and Rawhide (1959). McLaglen was aware of "Have Gun - Will Travel" star Richard Boone's interest in cultivating young unknown actors, and introduced Ed to the star. Faulkner was 6'3", 185 pounds and had knowledge of horsemanship, all pluses in those days when westerns dominated the TV landscape; Boone became a coach and mentor (along with McLaglen) and Ed was cast in an episode of the show within a month of arrival in California.
Over the next 18+ years he became a journeyman actor, appearing in over 250 TV programs and some 30 theatrical films and made-for-TV movies. He is perhaps best remembered for his appearance in top featured roles in six films with John Wayne, two with Elvis Presley and for working with such prominent actors as James Stewart, Jack Lemmon, Dean Martin, Maureen O'Hara, Doris Day, Jean Arthur, Brian Keith, Rock Hudson, Jim Hutton, Vera Miles and Katharine Ross.
In 1975 Ed took a sabbatical from the film industry and entered the business world by joining Sea Containers Inc., a publicly held company whose primary activity was the ownership and leasing of marine cargo containers to the marine transportation industry worldwide. He became president of the subsidiary office in San Francisco for five years, then became Director of Sales (western US and Canada) for the company's leisure division, world-renowned for the restoration and operation of the Orient Express--known today as The Venice Simplon-Orient Express--and owners of over 40 luxury hotels worldwide, including the Hotel Cipriani in Venice. He retired from the Sea Containers Group in 1987.
He occasionally does voice-overs and guest appearances on TV and in October 2008 did a two-hour interview for Turner Classic Movies Archive Files, which will air at appropriate times on TCM and TNT. Since 2004 he has been a guest at numerous film festivals across the United States (primarily Western-themed) and was recently honored at the 2007 Western Legends Round-Up in Kanab, Utah, with a plaque on their Little Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Ed and Barbara Faulkner reside in Palm Desert, California. They have three daughters, a son and five grandchildren.- Actor
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
One of the best and most familiar character actors of the first four decades of sound films, although few who knew his face also knew his name, John Qualen was born in Canada to Norwegian parents. His father was a minister. The family moved to the United States and Qualen (whose real name was Kvalen) grew up in Elgin, Illinois. He won an oratory contest and was given a scholarship to Northwestern University. His interest in acting was piqued there, and he began appearing in tent shows on the Lyceum-Chautauqua circuit and in stock. He went to New York in 1929 and got his big break as the Swedish janitor in Elmer Rice's Street Scene. He repeated the role two years later in the film version. That same year he first worked for director John Ford in Arrowsmith (1931). He became a member of Ford's famed stock company and had prominent roles for Ford for the next thirty-five years. He became a most familiar character player, specializing in Scandinavians of various nationalities, but frequently playing a wide variety of other ethnicities. Perhaps his greatest work among many memorable roles was as the pitiful Muley, who recounts the destruction of his farm by the bank in Ford's masterpiece The Grapes of Wrath (1940). Although plagued in his later years by failing eyesight, he continued to work steadily into his final years. He was treasurer of The Authors Club and historian of The Masquers, Hollywood's famed social group for actors. He had three children, Elizabeth, Kathleen, and Meredith. Qualen died in 1987.- Actor
- Soundtrack
In many ways the most successful and familiar character actor of American sound films and the only actor to date to win three Oscars for Best Supporting Actor, Walter Brennan attended college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, studying engineering. While in school he became interested in acting and performed in school plays. He worked some in vaudeville and also in various jobs such as clerking in a bank and as a lumberjack. He toured in small musical comedy companies before entering the military in 1917. After his war service he went to Guatemala and raised pineapples, then migrated to Los Angeles, where he speculated in real estate. A few jobs as a film extra came his way beginning in 1923, then some work as a stuntman. He eventually achieved speaking roles, going from bit parts to substantial supporting parts in scores of features and short subjects between 1927 and 1938. In 1936 his role in Come and Get It (1936) won him the very first Best Supporting Actor Academy Award. He would win it twice more in the decade, and be nominated for a fourth. His range was enormous. He could play sophisticated businessmen, con artists, local yokels, cowhands and military officers with apparent equal ease. An accident in 1932 cost him most of his teeth, and he most often was seen in eccentric rural parts, often playing characters much older than his actual age. His career never really declined, and in the 1950s he became an even more endearing and familiar figure in several television series, most famously The Real McCoys (1957). He died in 1974 of emphysema, a beloved figure in movies and TV, the target of countless comic impressionists, and one of the best and most prolific actors of his time.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Rotund comic character actor of American films. Born Andrew Vabre Devine in Flagstaff, Arizona, he was raised in nearby Kingman, Arizona, the son of an Irish-American hotel operator Thomas Devine and his wife Amy. Devine was an able athlete as a student and actually played semi-pro football under a phony name (Jeremiah Schwartz, often erroneously presumed to be his real name). Devine used the false name in order to remain eligible for college football. A successful football player at St. Mary & St. Benedict College, Arizona State Teacher's College, and Santa Clara University, Devine went to Hollywood with dreams of becoming an actor. After a number of small roles in silent films, he was given a good part in the talkie The Spirit of Notre Dame (1931) in part due to his fine record as a football player. His sound-film career seemed at risk due to his severely raspy voice, the result of a childhood injury. His voice, however, soon became his trademark, and he spent the next forty-five years becoming an increasingly popular and beloved comic figure in a wide variety of films. In the 1950s, his fame grew enormously with his co-starring role as Jingles P. Jones opposite Guy Madison's Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok (1951), on television and radio simultaneously. In 1955, before the Hickok series ended, Devine took over the hosting job on a children's show retitled Andy's Gang (1955), in which he gained new fans among the very young. He continued active in films until his death in 1977. He was survived by his wife and two sons.- Actor
- Writer
- Soundtrack
The son of a rancher-turned-politician, Guinn Williams was given the nickname "Big Boy" (and he was, too - 6' 2" of mostly solid muscle from years of working on ranches and playing semi-pro and pro baseball) by Will Rogers, with whom he made one of his first films, in 1919. Although his father wanted him to attend West Point (he had been an officer in the Army during World War I), Williams had always wanted to act and made his way to Hollywood in 1919. His experience as a cowboy and rodeo rider got him work as a stuntman, and he gradually worked his way up to acting. He became friends with Rogers and together they made around 15 films. Additionally,in a film that has recently received critical acclaim, he appeared alongside Charles Farrell and Janet Gaynor in the silent film Lucky Star (1929), playing a brute vying for the affections of Janet Gaynor in competition with a returning war veteran, played by Charles Farrell. He then easily made the transition from silents to talkies. Although he also starred in a series of low-budget westerns in the early and mid-1930s, he really came into his own as a supporting player in the late 1930s and early 1940s, especially at Warner Bros., where he appeared in such resoundingly successful westerns as Dodge City (1939) and Santa Fe Trail (1940) with his friends Errol Flynn and Alan Hale. Williams specialized in the somewhat dim and quick-tempered but basically decent sidekick, a role he would play for the next 20 years or so. He also made sound films other than westerns, and was in, for example, A Star Is Born (1937). Late in his career, he won the hearts of TV viewers in a regular role as Pete, the comedic roadie in Circus Boy (1956). In the early 1960s Williams' health began to deteriorate, which was noticeable in his last film, The Comancheros (1961), in which he had a small part and, sadly, did not look well at all. He died of uremic poisoning shortly afterwards.- Actor
- Additional Crew
With an intimidating face like craggy granite and a towering 6'5" solid frame, Mike Mazurki (born Mikhail Mazuruski or Mikhail Mazurkiewicz) was one of cinema's first serial thugs and specialized in playing strongarm men, gangsters and bullies for over 50 years on screen. Nearly always portrayed as a lowbrow muscle, in real life Mazurski was highly intelligent, very well read and a witty conversationalist. He was also an accomplished sportsman, having been a football player and a professional wrestler. He first appeared onscreen in uncredited roles in films such as Gentleman Jim (1942) and About Face (1942); however, his daunting bruiser looks were soon noticed and he became phenomenally busy in the 1940s, appearing in nearly 50 movies during the decade, including his well remembered performance as ex-con "Moose Malloy" in the film noir thriller Murder, My Sweet (1944) and as the gruesome "Splitface" in Dick Tracy (1945).
He continued his menacing onscreen presence throughout the 1950s and 1960s, often showing he could be quite adept at deadpan comedy in films including Bud Abbott and Lou Costello in Hollywood (1945), It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (1963), Donovan's Reef (1963) and The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin (1967). Demand for his talents slowed down in the late 1970s and most of the 1980s, as younger villains came to the fore; however, he still turned up in support roles and was still acting at the age of 83 when he passed away in December, 1990.- Actor
- Additional Crew
Tall and gaunt American character actor prominent in a number of classic American films. A native of Cincinnati, Ohio, he attended Brown University and subsequently went to work as an economist for the United States Department of State. In 1941, he joined the American Red Cross and served in Great Britain during the war. There he met director John Huston, who took a liking to Dierkes and recommended that he try Hollywood after the war. Instead, Dierkes went to work for the U.S. Treasury Department, which, coincidentally, sent him to Hollywood to function as technical adviser on the film To the Ends of the Earth (1948). 'Orson Welles' cast him as Ross in his adaptation of Macbeth (1948). Dierkes returned to the Treasury Department, but two years later, Huston called on him to play The Tall Soldier in The Red Badge of Courage (1951). Dierkes took a leave of absence from his job, a leave which lasted for the rest of Dierkes's life. His quiet dignity and distinctive appearance led him to dozens of roles in film and on television. In John Wayne's The Alamo (1960), Dierkes plays a Scot, "Jocko Robertson", named after Dierkes's own maternal grandfather. He died in 1975, and was survived by his wife, two sons, and two daughters.- Actor
- Writer
- Soundtrack
American Western star and character actor whose career spanned six decades. The son of director Robert N. Bradbury, he appeared in vaudeville with his parents and with his twin brother Bill Bradbury appeared as a child in a series of 16 semi- documentary short films directed by their father, The Adventures of Bob and Bill. As Bob Bradbury Jr., he played juvenile roles in silent films, then took the stage name Bob Steele in 1927. He appeared in scores of films during the Thirties, rising to B-Western stardom and an apparently solid position as one of Republic Studios' top draws. Occasionally he made an appearance in more prominent films, as in his role as Curly in Of Mice and Men (1939). But he remained primarily a figure in Westerns. His stardom diminished by the mid-40s, and he spent the next quarter-century in character roles, some highly visible, such as his part in The Big Sleep (1946). But he also eventually turned up as a virtual extra in pictures like Shenandoah (1965). He appeared often on television and regained some fame in his role as Trooper Duffy in F Troop (1965). He died at St. Joseph's Hospital in Burbank, California, following a long illness.- Stunts
- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Cliff Lyons was an American actor, stuntman and second-unit director, primarily of Westerns, particularly the films of John Ford and John Wayne.
Lyons, the son of Garrett Thomas Lyons and Wilhamena Johnson Lyons, was raised on a South Dakota farm, though his family lived for a time in Memphis, TN, where he attended business school. An expert horseman, he gave up the notion of a business career and opted for the rodeo arena instead, touring the country and eventually reaching Los Angeles at the age of 21. With accomplished cowboys in great demand, Lyons quickly became involved in movies, working both as a stuntman and actor. After only a couple of bit parts, he was signed by low-budget producer Bud Barsky to do seven inexpensive Westerns directed by Paul Hurst, with Lyons and Al Hoxie alternating as the hero and the heavy. Lyons and Hoxie alternated in another Western series produced by Morris R. Schlank, and, as Cliff "Tex" Lyons, he seemed headed for minor stardom as a B-Western lead.
Unfortunately, Lyons' voice was not well-suited for sound and the talkie revolution confined him to small roles. As his small shot at stardom faded, however, his career as a stunt double for stars big and small was on the rise. He doubled such cowboy stars as Tom Mix, Ken Maynard, Buck Jones and Johnny Mack Brown. In 1936 he worked with John Wayne for the first and struck up a personal and business relationship that would remain strong for three decades. Wayne was influential in getting Lyons his first work as a second-unit director and in introducing Lyons to John Ford, for whom Lyons would do some of his finest work. Lyons' reputation as a stunt coordinator is comparable to that of acknowledged master Yakima Canutt, with whom Lyons partnered on numerous occasions. Perhaps Lyons' most impressive work was the massive and dynamic battle sequences of Wayne's The Alamo (1960).
He was married from 1938-55 to actress Beth Marion, with whom he had two sons. Cliff Lyons died in 1974 at 72, not long after coordinating stunts for Wayne's The Train Robbers (1973).- Actor
- Stunts
- Additional Crew
Frank McGrath was born on 2 February 1903 in Mound City, Missouri, USA. He was an actor, known for The Reluctant Astronaut (1967), Wagon Train (1957) and Tammy and the Millionaire (1967). He was married to Libby Quay Buschlen. He died on 13 May 1967 in Hollywood, California, USA.- Actor
- Stunts
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
American stuntman who also played minor roles in scores of movies. Son of Allie W. and Jannie Hamm Roberson. Raised on cattle ranches in Shannon, Texas, and Roswell, New Mexico, he left school at 13 to become a cowhand and oilfield roughneck. He married and took his wife and daughter to California, where he joined the Culver City Police Department and guarded the gate at MGM studios. Following army service in World War II, he returned to the police force. During duty at Warner Bros. studios during a labor strike, he met stuntman Fred Kennedy, who alerted him to a stunt job at Republic Pictures. Roberson got the job, due both to his expert horsemanship and his resemblance to John Carroll, whom Roberson doubled in his first picture, Wyoming (1947). His close physical resemblance to John Wayne led to nearly 30 years as Wayne's stunt double. He often played small roles and stunted in other roles in the same film, which frequently resulted in his "shooting" himself once the picture was cut together. He graduated to larger supporting roles in westerns for Wayne and John Ford, and to a parallel career as a second-unit director. At the time of his death, he was one of the most respected stunt men in Hollywood.- Actor
- Stunts
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
American stuntman, long associated with John Wayne, who doubled for most of the great Western and action stars of the 1950s-1980s. His parents, Bert and Hazel Hayward, were cattle ranchers on a farm near Hyannis, Nebraska, about sixty miles east of Hayward's birthplace in Alliance. He spent his early youth working cattle, then, at 16, left home to join the rodeo circuit as a bronc rider and horse trainer. In 1947, he arrived in Los Angeles and sought work as a wrangler. He began doing stunts in 1949 on The Fighting Kentuckian (1949), doubling John Wayne. The two became pals and Hayward subsequently stunted and doubled Wayne on nearly two dozen of the latter's films. Excelling at all sorts of horseback stunts, Hayward doubled most stars of the period who found themselves in Westerns or otherwise astride a horse, including Marlon Brando, Yul Brynner, Steve McQueen, and Gregory Peck. He graduated into stunt coordination, arranging the stunts on films such as The Deadly Companions (1961) and the TV series The Rat Patrol (1966). He played small roles in numerous films and TV shows, and his appearance often served as an accurate predictor of an upcoming fight scene. He retired from stuntwork in 1981, and from acting in 1989. Hayward was a member of the unofficial "John Ford Stock Company," a lifetime member of the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures and an inductee into the Stuntmen's Hall of Fame. He died from Hodgkin's Disease at his home in North Hollywood, California, in 1998.- Stunts
- Actor
- Additional Crew
Dean Smith was raised in Eliasville, Texas, and later lived in Breckenridge, Texas, where he raised horses and longhorn cattle. He attended the University of Texas at Austin where he competed in track and football. He won an Olympic gold medal for the 400-meter relay in the 1952 Helsinki games and finished fourth in the 100-dash in the closest race in Olympic history. He was the lead-off man on the University of Texas world record relay team, 1954-55, and AAU national champion in the 100-meter dash. He played with the Los Angeles Rams during exhibition season and was traded to the Pittsburg Steelers at which time he decided to enter the movie business. He also won amateur rodeo championships for bareback bronco riding and calf roping.
He was an honorary member of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, was inducted into the Texas Rodeo Cowboy Hall of Fame (2006), the Texas Sports Hall of Fame (1985), Stuntman's Hall of Fame (1980), and the University of Texas Hall of Fame (1980). He was awarded the American Culture Award for Western Movies and Television (2000), the Golden Boot Award in 1998, the Ben Johnson Award in 1993, the All American Cowboy Award in 1997, and the Head of the Class Alvin Davis Award in 2002.
In 2002, he organized the Dean Smith Celebrity Rodeo benefiting the Cowboy Cancer Crusade tribute to Ben Johnson, the Dean Smith Celebrity Rodeo benefiting the John Wayne Cancer Institute honoring John Wayne and, in 2006, the Dean Smith Celebrity Rodeo benefiting the John Wayne Cancer Institute honoring The Singing Cowboys in Abilene, Texas, the third weekend in October. On April 8, 2006, the John Wayne Cancer Institute honored him with the "Duke Award" for his contributions to cancer research.
In 2023, Dean Smith died of cancer, aged 91, in Breckenridge, Texas.- Actress
- Writer
Olive Carey was born Olive Fuller Golden on January 31, 1896. Olive was 18 when she appeared in her first motion picture, a silent entitled, Tess of the Storm Country (1914). After she made A Knight of the Range (1916), she retired from films. In 1916, she married actor Harry Carey who was eighteen years older. They had two children, one of whom was Harry Carey Jr. who was a very good actor in his own right. Olive briefly returned to the screen in 1931 in a film called Trader Horn (1931). After 1935's Naughty Marietta (1935) Olive again stepped away from the cameras. But in 1947, her husband passed away, and she, once more, stepped into films. This time her stay was a bit longer. Her first film following Harry's death was Air Hostess (1949). She continued to act in films off and on until age 70 when she appeared for the last time in 1966's Billy the Kid Versus Dracula (1966). On March 13, 1988, Olive died in Carpinteria, California, at the age of 92.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Harry Woods was born on 5 May 1889 in Cleveland, Ohio, USA. He was an actor, known for The Viking (1928), Monkey Business (1931) and Colorado Territory (1949). He was married to Helen P. Hookenberry. He died on 28 December 1968 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Appeared in over 200 films. He had worked as a salesman and newspaper reporter before breaking into movies near the end of the silent era. Tall and tough, his starring roles in major pictures soon gave way to supporting parts, mainly as a villain, in B movies and serials. His elopement to Yuma, Arizona, in 1930 with a 17-year-old Loretta Young was widely reported. From 1940 on, he took numerous supporting roles, working until his suicide in 1959.- Actor
- Writer
- Soundtrack
American character actor, the most famous of Western-movie sidekicks of the 1930s and 1940s. He was born May 7, 1885, the third of seven children, in the Hayes Hotel (owned by his father) in the tiny hamlet of Stannards, New York, on the outskirts of Wellsville, New York. Hayes was the son of hotelier and oil-production manager Clark Hayes, and grew up in Stannards. As a young man, George Hayes worked in a circus and played semi-pro baseball while a teenager. He ran away from home at 17, in 1902, and joined a touring stock company. He married Olive Ireland in 1914 and the pair became quite successful on the vaudeville circuit. Retired in his 40s, he lost much of his money in the 1929 stock market crash and was forced to return to work. Although he had made his film debut in a single appearance prior to the crash, it was not until his wife convinced him to move to California and he met producer Trem Carr that he began working steadily in the medium. He played scores of roles in Westerns and non-Westerns alike, finally in the mid-1930s settling in to an almost exclusively Western career. He gained fame as Hopalong Cassidy's sidekick Windy Halliday in many films between 1936-39. Leaving the Cassidy films in a salary dispute, he was legally precluded from using the "Windy" nickname, and so took on the sobriquet "Gabby", and was so billed from about 1940. One of the few sidekicks to land on the annual list of Top Ten Western Boxoffice Stars, he did so repeatedly. In his early films, he alternated between whiskered comic-relief sidekicks and clean-shaven bad guys, but by the later 1930s, he worked almost exclusively as a Western sidekick to stars such as John Wayne, Roy Rogers, and Randolph Scott. After his last film, in 1950, he starred as the host of a network television show devoted to stories of the Old West for children, The Gabby Hayes Show (1950). Offstage an elegant and well-appointed connoisseur and man-about-town, Hayes devoted the final years of his life to his investments. He died of cardiovascular disease in Burbank, California, on February 9, 1969.- Actor
- Soundtrack
First came to notice as a contestant on Groucho Marx's quiz show, You Bet Your Life (1950). His highly amusing personality won him bit parts in films, and he continued to work as a minor supporting player for years. He is the brother of Jose Gonzales-Gonzales. His most famous role was on John Wayne's movie Rio Bravo (1959).- Actor
- Stunts
- Additional Crew
Baseball gave burly Fred Graham his start in motion pictures. In 1928 he was working for the MGM sound department and also playing semi-pro baseball on the side. The studio was making a murder mystery called Death on the Diamond (1934), starring Robert Young and Nat Pendleton. Graham was hired to tutor Young and Pendleton in the fine points of the game, and doubled Pendleton in the catching scenes. This started him on a more than 40-year career as a stuntman and actor. While at the studio he doubled Clark Gable, Nelson Eddy and Charles Bickford. He went over to Warner Bros. in 1938, and his initial assignment was to double Basil Rathbone in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). In 1941 he moved to Republic Pictures and worked on the studio's famed westerns and serials, and was a major part of the team of stunt experts, including such aces as David Sharpe and Tom Steele, responsible for the reputation that Republic enjoyed as having the best stunt department in the business. Graham met John Wayne there and stunted for him in many of the films Wayne made at the studio. He also appeared in many films as an actor, usually playing truck drivers, cops, soldiers, crooks, etc. In 1968 he went to work for Arizona's Department of Economic Planning and Development of Motion Pictures, and had more to do with bringing filming to the state of Arizona than anyone else. In Arizona they have the "Carefree at Southwest Studios", which was formerly known as "The Graham Studio". In 1978 "Slugger", a nickname he got in his Republic days, passed away.- Norwegian by heritage and a San Franciscan by birth, brown-haired, brown-eyed Gregg Palmer (born Palmer Lee) broke into show biz as a radio announcer. After an early '50s stint as a contract player at Universal, he turned to freelancing, closing out the decade by starring and co-starring in a number of detective, Western and sci-fi adventures. In the '60s, Palmer drifted into supporting roles and much TV work, and reinforced his growing rep with Western fans by becoming a regular member of John Wayne's latter-day stock company.
- Make-Up Department
- Actor
Web Overlander was born on 20 February 1902 in Connecticut, USA. He was an actor, known for The Searchers (1956), The High and the Mighty (1954) and The Horse Soldiers (1959). He died on 23 May 1975 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Mae Marsh's father was an auditor for the railroad who died when she was four. Her family moved to San Francisco, where her stepfather was killed in the 1906 earthquake. Her great-aunt then took Mae and her sister to Los Angeles. With her show business background, Mae's aunt took them to the various movie studios for work as extras. Mae was a little freckle-faced girl, who came to work one day as an extra at Biograph to substitute for her sick sister. She had blue eyes and her hair color was indeterminate, but she had definite screen presence. She began her film career working for Mack Sennett and D.W. Griffith. Her first leading role was as the bare-legged prehistoric girl in Man's Genesis (1912). By 1913 Mae was being groomed as the successor to Mary Pickford. Most of her film roles were dramatic or tragic, or a combination of both. She appeared in Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915) and Intolerance (1916). After that film, Samuel Goldwyn signed her to a contract at $2500 per week - far exceeding the $35 per week she got in 1915. Goldwyn was at his best when it came to publicity. It was he who gave Mae the title "The Whim Girl". Other than the publicity, her film career with Goldwyn was a disappointment and she retired on the eve of her marriage in 1918. During the 1920s Mae did a few movies in Hollywood and England, but stayed retired for the most part. It was not until the Wall Street "crash" in 1929 that began the Great Depression that she returned full-time to the screen, as she, like many others, was wiped out financially. After her financial situation improved, she returned to films sporadically, usually out of boredom. She worked in a dozen movies during the 1930s and took a number of roles in the 1940s and 1950s. She was a favorite of director John Ford and appeared in many of his films, such as The Grapes of Wrath (1940), How Green Was My Valley (1941), My Darling Clementine (1946) and The Quiet Man (1952), and she had a role in A Star Is Born (1954).
- Actress
- Soundtrack
The daughter of a clergyman, Anna Lee was born Joan Boniface Winnifrith and encouraged to pursue an acting career by her father. After training at London's Royal Albert Hall, she took to the boards and later began appearing in English films, first as an extra, then working her way up to featured roles and finally earning the unofficial title "The Queen of the Quota Quickies". Lee and her husband, director Robert Stevenson, relocated to Hollywood in the late 1930s, and Lee began starring in stateside productions as well as becoming a fixture of the John Ford stock company (she appeared in How Green Was My Valley (1941), Fort Apache (1948) and a half-dozen others). In 1970, she became the seventh wife of novelist, poet and playwright Robert Nathan (Portrait of Jennie (1948), The Bishop's Wife (1947)); they married three months after they met. Now widowed, Lee continued despite adversity, regularly playing wealthy Lila Quartermaine on the soap opera General Hospital (1963). She was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire at the 1982 Queen's Birthday Honours for her services to drama. On May 14, 2004, Anna Lee passed away from pneumonia at age 91 at her home in Beverly Hills, California.- Actress
- Soundtrack
Claire Trevor was born Claire Wemlinger in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn, New York, the only child of Fifth Avenue merchant-tailor Noel Wemlinger, an immigrant Frenchman from Paris who lost his business during the Depression, and his Belfast-born wife, Benjamina, known as "Betty". Young Claire's interest in acting began when she was 11 years old. She attended high school in Mamaroneck, Westchester County, New York. After starting classes at Columbia University, she spent six months at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, also in New York. Her adult acting experience began in the late 1920s in several stock productions; she appeared with Robert Henderson's Repertory Players in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1930. That same year, aged 20, she signed with Warner Bros. Not too far from her home haunts was Vitagraph Studios in Brooklyn, the last and best of the early sound process studios, which had been acquired by Warner Bros. in 1925 to become Vitaphone. Trevor appeared in several of the nearly 2000 shorts cranked out by the studio between 1926 and 1930. Then she was sent west to do ten weeks of stock productions with other contract players in St. Louis. In 1931 she did summer stock with the Hampton Players in Southampton, Long Island. Finally, she debuted on Broadway in 1932 in "Whistling in the Dark".
Trevor moved to the silver screen, debuting in the western Life in the Raw (1933). There would be three more films (one more western) that year and six or more through the 1930s. Although she had been typed playing gun molls and hard-case women of the world, she displayed her already considerable versatility in these early films, often playing competent, take-charge professional women as well as "shady" ladies. There was a disappointed-pout-vulnerability in her face and that famous slightly New York-burred voice that cracked with a little cry when heightened by emotion that quickly revealed an unusual and sensitive performer. Many of her early films were "B" potboilers, but she worked with Spencer Tracy on several occasions, notably Dante's Inferno (1935).
Hollywood finally took notice of her talents by nominating her for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her standout performance as a slum girl forced by poverty into prostitution in Dead End (1937), opposite Humphrey Bogart. That same year she did the radio drama "Big Town" with Edward G. Robinson, then teamed with he and Bogart again for the slightly hokey but entertaining The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938). Director John Ford tapped her for his first big sound Western film, Stagecoach (1939), the film that made a star of John Wayne. All her abilities to bring complexity to a character showed in her kicked-around dance hall girl "Dallas", one of the great early female roles. She and Wayne were electric, and they were paired in three more films during their careers.
In the 1940s, Trevor began appearing in the genre that brought her to true stardom: "film noir". She started in a big way as killer Ruth Dillon in Street of Chance (1942) with Burgess Meredith. She was equally convincing as the more complex but nonetheless two-faced Mrs. Grayle in the Philip Marlowe vehicle Murder, My Sweet (1944). However, she was something very different and quite extraordinary as washed-up, hopelessly alcoholic former nightclub singer and moll Gaye Dawn in Key Largo (1948), for which she won an Academy Award as Best Supporting Actress, again working with Bogart and Robinson. Her pitiful rendition of the torch song "Moanin' Low", which her character was forced to sing, humiliatingly, for the sadistic crime boss played by Robinson (to whom she is, figuratively speaking, permanently tethered) in exchange for a desperately needed drink. There were more quality movies and an additional Academy nomination (The High and the Mighty (1954)) into the 1950s,, but she also was doing work on stage and in television.
She was enthusiastic about live TV and appeared on several famous shows by the mid-1950s. She won an Emmy for Best Live Television Performance by an Actress as the flighty wife of Fredric March in NBC's Dodsworth (1956). She alternated her career among film, stage and TV roles. As she aged she easily transitioned into "distinguished matron" and mother roles, one of her most unusual ones being the murderous Ma Barker in Ma Barker and Her Boys (1959). Her final film role was as Sally Field's mother in Kiss Me Goodbye (1982).
Trevor and her third husband, producer Milton H. Bren, had long been residents of tony Newport Beach, California, to which they returned when she finally retired from screen work. However, she did maintain an active interest in stage work, and became associated with the University of California-Irvine's School of Arts. She and her husband contributed some $10 million to further its development for the visual and performing arts (that included three endowed professorships). After her passing in April 2000 at 90 years of age, the University renamed the school The Claire Trevor School of the Arts. Her presence on the UCI campus is in more than spirit alone. She donated her Oscar and her Emmy to UCI; both are on display in the arts plaza at the campus theatre that bears her name.- Willis Bouchey appeared in almost 150 movies and television shows over a 30-year period from 1951 to 1979. He was one of those wonderful character actors who would be a crooked judge in one film and a humorous cavalry officer in another. He appeared in many of John Ford's movies as well as James Stewart's films. His longevity resulted, in part, due to his professionalism and acting ability. He always provided a fine performance no matter how small or insignificant the role.
- Actor
- Director
Lafe McKee began working in Hollywood around 1913. He usually played the likeable father of the heroine, the distressed businessman, or the ranch owner on the verge of losing his homestead or cattle to the villains. The majority of his films were westerns and he supported such actors as Gary Cooper, John Wayne, Gene Autry, Tim McCoy, Tom Tyler, and others.- Earl Dwire was born on 3 October 1883 in Missouri, USA. He was an actor, known for Randy Rides Alone (1934), Radio Patrol (1937) and The Lawless Frontier (1934). He was married to Elizabeth Alice Maddeaux and Ruth Lechler, nee Castle. He died on 16 January 1940 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Rambunctious British leading man (contrary to popular belief, he was of Scottish ancestry, not Irish) and later character actor primarily in American films, Victor McLaglen was a vital presence in a number of great motion pictures, especially those of director John Ford. McLaglen (pronounced Muh-clog-len, not Mack-loff-len) was the son of the Right Reverend Andrew McLaglen, a Protestant clergyman who was at one time Bishop of Claremont in South Africa. The young McLaglen, eldest of eight brothers, attempted to serve in the Boer War by joining the Life Guards, though his father secured his release. The adventuresome young man traveled to Canada where he did farm labor and then directed his pugnacious nature into professional prizefighting. He toured in circuses, vaudeville shows, and Wild West shows, often as a fighter challenging all comers. His tours took him to the US, Australia (where he joined in the gold rush) and South Africa. In 1909 he was the first fighter to box newly-crowned heavyweight champion Jack Johnson, whom he fought in a six-round exhibition match in Vancouver (as an exhibition fight, it had no decision). When the First World War broke out, McLaglen joined the Irish Fusiliers and soldiered in the Middle East, eventually serving as Provost Marshal (head of Military Police) for the city of Baghdad. After the war he attempted to resume a boxing career, but was given a substantial acting role in The Call of the Road (1920) and was well received. He became a popular leading man in British silent films, and within a few years was offered the lead in an American film, The Beloved Brute (1924). He quickly became a most popular star of dramas as well as action films, playing tough or suave with equal ease. With the coming of sound, his ability to be persuasively debonair diminished by reason of his native speech patterns, but his popularity increased, particularly when cast by Ford as the tragic Gypo Nolan in The Informer (1935), for which McLaglen won the Best Actor Oscar. He continued to play heroes, villains and simple-minded thugs into the 1940s, when Ford gave his career a new impetus with a number of lovably roguish Irish parts in such films as She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949) and The Quiet Man (1952). The latter film won McLaglen another Oscar nomination, the first time a Best Actor winner had been nominated subsequently in the Supporting category. McLaglen formed a semi-militaristic riding and polo club, the Light Horse Brigade, and a similarly arrayed precision motorcycle team, the Victor McLaglen Motorcycle Corps, both of which led to conclusions that he had fascist sympathies and was forming his own private army. McLaglen denied espousing the far right-wing sentiments that were often attributed to him. He continued to act in films into his 70s and died, from congestive heart failure, not long after appearing in a film directed by his son, Andrew V. McLaglen.- An American character actor who specialized in "average joes", often timid or down-on-their-luck, Louis Jean Heydt was born in Montclair, New Jersey, and educated at Worcester Academy and Dartmouth College. He intended a career in journalism and worked as a reporter for the old New York World, but developed an interest in acting and landed a number of roles on the New York stage (active there from 1927-48). In the mid-'30s he traveled to Hollywood and quickly established himself as a reliable supporting player. He played dozens of roles in many fine films including Gone with the Wind (1939), They Were Expendable (1945) and The Big Sleep (1946), and although his face is exceptionally familiar to viewers of that period's films, his name never quite broke through. He remained a pleasant presence in scores of films of the 1940s and 1950s while continuing to work on the stage and on television. He died backstage at the Colonial Theatre in Boston during an out-of-town try-out performance of the play "There Was a Little Girl" in 1960.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
John Newman Mitchum was the September child of a Norwegian mother and an Irish/Blackfoot father whom he never knew, as he was killed in a tragic train yard accident in 1919. His two-years-older brother Robert filled the role as best as he could, while their older sister Annette studied the lively arts and eventually joined a traveling vaudeville team. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the young family moved to Rising Sun, Delaware, where farm life didn't agree with the young boys. Scarce opportunities took them to New York City, where the streets of Hell's kitchen taught the brothers to fight, a skill they developed so well they earned the moniker 'them ornery Mitchum boys'. Eventually, when the Great Depression deepened, the family was forced to separate with the intention of meeting up with sister Annette, who had married a sailor and moved to California, changing her name to Julie. The teenage boys set out with little more than clean handkerchiefs to find their way across the country by the only means they could: hitchhiking and riding the rails. Their somewhat aimless journey took them to places they had never been; where their Eastern accents were not welcome, so they quickly learned that accurately mimicking the local dialect would keep them out of trouble--some of the time! While brother Robert fairly quickly discovered his place in Hollywood legend, John sought his destiny on the high seas, professionally boxing, or conducting a choir. When the opportunity for acting came along John found his perfect niche as a character actor, mostly playing heavies since he was an imposing figure of a man. John's roles had him playing alongside a wide range of celebrities, from Humphrey Bogart in "Knock On Any Door" (1949) to Gladys Knight in "Pipe Dreams" (1976), Clint Eastwood of "Dirty Harry" (1971) to John Wayne in "Chisum" (1970), appearing in 58 films overall. It was during production of "Chisum" that John Wayne offered his voice for an anthology of John's poetry that seeks to uplift US culture, "America, Why I Love Her", a recording for which Mitchum was nominated for a Grammy in 1973. John was a consummate storyteller (as was his brother Robert), and with his fascination with US history in particular he was ever-ready to regale anyone with a thoughtful, interesting, and insightful anecdote, especially if a guitar was available. It was the wedding of music and history that brought him to create the recording "Our Land, Our Heritage" with Dan Blocker; big "Hoss" from "Bonanza", in 1964. Mitchum had some recurring roles throughout his television career; such as "Pickalong" from "Riverboat", or "Hoffenmueller" from "F-Troop", over 150 appearances in all during the span of a half-century career. The brothers Mitchum legacy has been well-preserved in his often hilarious autobiography, "Them Ornery Mitchum Boys", published in 1989. The subjects range from brother Robert escaping a Georgia chain-gang to his "poontang" interview; from John surviving an attacking whale on a three-masted schooner to his adventures riding the rails, developing a great love and respect for the people of the United States.- American character actor noted for his deep, rich voice. Young made his Broadway debut in the early 1930s, appearing in such plays as "Page Pygmalion", "The Man Who Reclaimed His Head", "Late Wisdom" and "Yesterday's Orchids". Moving to Hollywood in 1936, he began getting small film roles and soon graduated to frequent appearances in B-Westerns and serials, occasionally as a supporting lead, but most often as a heavy. He was Dick Tracy's brother in Dick Tracy (1937) and was a familiar face in many oaters and serials at Republic, where he was a contract player, occasionally working under the stage name Gordon Robert. In 1941, Young returned to Broadway to star in "Cuckoos On the Hearth" by Parker Fennelly. Back in Hollywood, he made Westerns throughout the Forties, then began appearing in better roles in better films, becoming a late favorite of John Ford. His line in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), "This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend", has become synonymous with Ford. Young retired in 1970 and died in 1994, at the age of 89. He is often confused with Carleton G. Young, a radio performer who made a few films and who was the father of actor Tony Young.
- Actor
- Music Department
John Agar was born in Chicago, the eldest of four children. In World War II, Sgt. John Agar was a United States Army Air Force physical instructor. His 1945 marriage at the Wilshire Memorial Church to "America's Sweetheart" Shirley Temple put him in the public eye for the first time, and a movie contract with independent producer David O. Selznick quickly ensued.
Agar debuted opposite John Wayne, Henry Fonda and Temple in John Ford's Fort Apache (1948), initial film in the famed director's "Cavalry Trilogy".
His marriage to Shirley Temple ended in 1949, while his movie career continued.
Popular with fans of Westerns and sci-fi flicks, Agar was a staple at film conventions and autograph shows.- Actor
- Stunts
- Production Manager
Actor and stuntman Terry Wilson was born on September 3, 1923 in Huntington Park, California. A football star during his high school days, Wilson originally planned on becoming a veterinarian and attended California Polytechnic School on a football scholarship. Terry enlisted and served in the Marine Corps from 1943 to 1946. Following his tour of duty, Wilson was chosen by Warner Brothers from amongst a group of athletes to be trained for the stunt profession with his initial specialties being fistfights and work with horses. Among the notable actors that Terry doubled are John Wayne, Ward Bond, and Forrest Tucker. Terry's career as both an actor and stuntman in Westerns spanned several decades. Outside of his work in film and television, Wilson and his fellow stuntman friend Frank McGrath were big hits together on the rodeo circuit (they also appeared at many prison rodeos). Moreover, Terry in the wake of retiring from the film business went on to run a location ranch in Simi Valley, California and was the vice president of a construction firm in Southern California. Wilson died at age 75 on March 30, 1999. He was survived by his wife Mary Ann Wilson and three children.- Actor
- Soundtrack
John Carradine, the son of a reporter/artist and a surgeon, grew up in Poughkeepsie, New York. He attended Christ Church School and Graphic Art School, studying sculpture, and afterward roamed the South selling sketches. He made his acting debut in "Camille" in a New Orleans theatre in 1925. Arriving in Los Angeles in 1927, he worked in local theatre. He applied for a job as as scenic designer to Cecil B. DeMille, who rejected his designs but gave him voice work in several films. His on-screen debut was in Tol'able David (1930), billed as Peter Richmond. A protégé and close friend of John Barrymore, Carradine was an extremely prolific film character actor while simultaneously maintaining a stage career in classic leading roles such as Hamlet and Malvolio. In his later years he was typed as a horror star, putting in appearances in many low- and ultra-low-budget horror films. He was a member of the group of actors often used by director John Ford that became known as "The John Ford Stock Company". John Carradine died at age 82 of natural causes on November 27, 1988.- Balding, narrow-eyed American character player, a former vaudevillian and radio actor from 1929. Acted in early silent films on the East Coast. Regularly on screen after 1937, he was seen in innumerable small roles as clerks, bartenders and shopkeepers. Most familiar for his recurring role as the telegrapher Barney on TV's Gunsmoke (1955) and as newsman Mr. Krinkie in Dennis the Menace (1959).
- Actor
- Music Department
American small-part player, a member of John Ford's stock company. The younger brother of director Frank Borzage and the older brother of assistant director Lew Borzage, he became a beloved figure on film sets, not so much for his acting as for his personality and his musicianship. An accomplished accordionist, he was a staple on Ford's sets, where he provided mood music before and sometimes during scenes. He played the accordion at Ford's funeral. A native of Utah, he died in 1976 and was survived by his wife Melba and their son Donald.- Actor
- Additional Crew
Sam Harris was born on 11 January 1877 in Sydney, Australia. He was an actor, known for The Charge of the Light Brigade (1936), Safari (1940) and I Cover the War! (1937). He was married to Constance M.K. Harris . He died on 22 October 1969 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actress
- Soundtrack
A disarming character lady quite capable of scene-stealing, Mildred Natwick was a well-rounded talent with distinctively dowdy features and idiosyncratic tendencies who, over a six-decade period, assembled together a number of unforgettable matrons on stage and (eventually) film and TV. Whimsical, feisty, loony, stern, impish, shrewish, quizzical, scheming -- she greatly enhanced both comedies and dramas and, thankfully, her off-centered greatness was captured perfectly on occasion by such film directors as John Ford, Alfred Hitchcock and Neil Simon.
A short, plumpish, oval-eyed figure with a unique flowery, honey-glazed voice, Natwick was born on June 19, 1905 (some sources list 1908) to Joseph (a businessman) and and Mildred Marion Dawes Natwick. The Baltimore native graduated from both the Bryn Mawr School (in Baltimore) and also from Bennett College in Dutchess County, N.Y., where she majored in drama. Breaking into the professional field touring on stage, Miss Natwick joined the Vagabonds in the late 1920s, a non-professional group from Baltimore. She later became part of the renowned University Players at Cape Cod, Massachusetts, whose rising performers at the time included Henry Fonda, Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart.
Natwick made her Broadway bow in the 1932 melodrama "Carry Nation," directed by Blanche Yurka with Esther Dale in the title role. In the cast was Joshua Logan, whom she befriended and later collaborated with when he turned director. She then continued her momentum on 1930s Broadway with "Amourette" (1933), "Spring in Autumn" (1933), "The Wind and the Rain" (1934), "The Distaff Side" (1934) "End of Summer" (1936), "Love from a Stranger" (1936), "The Star-Wagon" (1937), "Missouri Legend" (1938), "Stars in Your Eyes" (1939) (directed by Logan), and "Christmas Eve" (1939).
Natwick did not come to films until middle age (35) with the John Ford classic The Long Voyage Home (1940), in which she played a Cockney floozie. Despite her fine work in this minor part, she did not make another film until her landlady role five years later in The Enchanted Cottage (1945) supporting Dorothy McGuire and Robert Young. Not a great beauty by Hollywood standards, Natwick learned quickly in Hollywood that if she were to succeed, it would be as a character performer. Ford himself picked up on her versatility and used her repeatedly in several of his post-war classics -- 3 Godfathers (1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), and The Quiet Man (1952).
Never abandoning the theater for long, Natwick excelled as Miss Garnett in George Bernard Shaw's "Candida" and as the buoyant medium in Noël Coward's "Blithe Spirit". As for the big screen, she was sporadically seen in such films as Yolanda and the Thief (1945), The Late George Apley (1947), A Woman's Vengeance (1948), The Kissing Bandit (1948), Cheaper by the Dozen (1950) and Against All Flags (1952). Making use of even the tiniest of roles, none of them did much to improve her stature in Hollywood. With her delicious turn, however, in Hitchcock's eccentric black comedy The Trouble with Harry (1955), which starred Shirley MacLaine (in her film debut), John Forsythe, Kris Kringle's Edmund Gwenn, little Jerry Mathers (of "Leave It to Beaver"), and another famous Mildred, Mildred Dunnock, Natwick enjoyed one of her best roles ever on film. This was followed by her scheming and furtive sorceress in the Danny Kaye vehicle The Court Jester (1955) in which she, Kaye and Glynis Johns participate in the memorable tongue-twisting "The pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle..." comedy routine. This, in turn, led to a couple of more, albeit lesser, films, including Teenage Rebel (1956) and Tammy and the Bachelor (1957).
Preferring the theatre to movies, MIldred received her first Tony nomination for her sharp, astute work in Jean Anouilh's "Waltz of the Toredors" in 1957 and recreated her character in a TV special. She seemed to move effortlessly from the classics ("Medea," "Coriolanus") to chic comedy ("Ladies in Retirement," "The Importance of Being Earnest"). Receiving great applause as the beleaguered, overly-winded mother in Neil Simon's "Barefoot in the Park" on Broadway in 1963, she transferred the role to film four years later. The cinematic Barefoot in the Park (1967) earned Mildred a well-deserved Oscar nomination for "best supporting actress". She switched things up again with Harold Pinter's theatrical "Landscape," and then again in 1971 when she made her debut in a singing role in the John Kander-Fred Ebb musical, "70, Girls, 70" (1971) in which she earned a second Tony nomination. Her last Broadway show came as a replacement in "Bedroom Farce" in 1979.
With only the slightest of gesture, look or tone of voice, Mildred's characters could speak volumes and she became an essential character player during the 1970s as an offbeat friend, relative or elderly on TV and film. She was awarded the Emmy for her playing of one of The Snoop Sisters (1972)_ alongside the equally delightful Helen Hayes in the short-lived TV series. Both played impish Jessica Fletcher-type mystery writers who solve real crimes on the sly. She also played Rock Hudson's quirky mother in McMillan & Wife (1971) and a notable dying grandmother in a guest appearance of the critically-lauded TV series drama Family (1976). Her final film came with a small regal role as Madame de Rosemonde in Dangerous Liaisons (1988) with Glenn Close, John Malkovich and Michelle Pfeiffer.
Never married, Mildred was called "Milly" by close friends and family and was the first cousin of Myron 'Grim' Natwick, the creator of Betty Boop for the Max Fleischer cartoon studio and prime animator for Disney's Snow White character. She died of cancer at age 89 in New York City.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Robert Donner was born in New York City and grew up in New Jersey, Michigan and Texas. Robert joined the Navy after he graduated from high school and served almost 4 years. After he left the Navy he stayed on the West Coast and worked as a shipping clerk, salesman, bartender, commercial artist, gardener, and insurance investigator. Robert attended San Fernando Valley State College (now California State University, Northridge), at nights taking courses in Art History, Psychology and speech. During this time, Robert Donner lived in Studio City and became friends with actor Clint Eastwood who lived in his apartment building. Clint urged Robert to study drama, telling him he was humorous and had a good face. When Robert was not acting he was active in athletics, and was known as one of Hollywood's most enthusiastic golfers. He was a member of the former "Hollywood Hackers" and carried a seven handicap and was the leader of a group of entertainment industry professionals known as Don Porter's Thursday Golf Group as well as joining others at many of the Celebrity Golf Tournaments who raise money for various charities around the world. Robert also played in many tennis tournaments and was frequently called upon during "Celebrity Nights" in which he performed stand-up comedy and promised not to sing. His reputation in this area also led him to become known as one of Hollywood's "in demand" Corporate Speakers.- Tall, rangy Jim Davis spent much of his early career in westerns mainly at Republic Pictures. The Missouri-born and -raised Davis' relaxed, easygoing manner and Southern drawl easily fit most moviegoers' image of the cowboy and Republic put him in a ton of them over the years (the fact that, unlike a lot of movie cowboys, he looked right at home on a horse didn't hurt, either). He alternated between good-guy and villain roles, one of his better ones being that of the devious, murderous fur trapper working for Kirk Douglas' competition in The Big Sky (1952). He is best known, however, for his role as Ewing family patriarch Jock in the long-running TV series Dallas (1978).
- Actor
- Soundtrack
At the age of seven, he and his family moved to Oregon. After studying at the University of Oregon, he followed in his father's footsteps and became a dentist, graduating from North Pacific Dental College. From 1929 to 1937, he practiced oral surgery in Eugene, Oregon. He then moved his practice to Altadena, CA. There he joined the Pasadena Community Playhouse, eventually giving up dentistry at the age of 36 to become an actor. He made his film debut in 1939. His chubby face and gravelly voice were featured in over 100 films, but he is perhaps best known for TV roles in Hopalong Cassidy (1952), Judge Roy Bean (1955), Petticoat Junction (1963), and Cade's County (1971).