John Wayne's most frequent costars
Excellent performers and the very best friends of the Duke, John Wayne, were his frequent costars
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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
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- 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
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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
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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
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- 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
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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
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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
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- 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
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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
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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).