A voice perfect for talkies: Tom Tyler in “West of Cheyenne”

Tom Tyler in "West of Cheyenne" 1931

Once Tom Tyler’s silent film career finally wound down by the end of 1930 – his last one being “Canyon of Missing Men” for Syndicate Pictures –  he had to adjust to the brand-new invention known as synchronized sound film, better known as talkies in order to keep his career going. By 1930, most cinemas made the transition to sound pictures but Tom was not quite ready for it. He held out on the new sound pictures for as long as he could, reportedly due to his foreign accent, according to his friend and screenwriter Oliver Drake, as mentioned in “The Tom Tyler Story” by Mike Chapman. Even though Tom Tyler was born in America (his birth name was Vincent [Wincenty] Markowski), like many children of recent European immigrants, spoke his native language at home while speaking English outside the family. Cinema patrons who never had the opportunity to meet Tom Tyler in person and listen to him speak could only imagine what his voice sounded like at the height of his silent film career. Tom Tyler was after all the epitome of outdoors virility in Hollywood, should he not also have the perfect voice to match his looks, personality and physical strength?

In fact, Tom Tyler did indeed have a voice that met the above qualifications and made him perfect for talkies. Once he got together with one of Drake’s friends, J. Frank Glendon, taking a series of enunciation lessons in order to lose his accent. As with the horseback riding lessons in order to get that star contract with FBO in 1925, Tom worked hard at his enunciation, and after making one test talkie short for Pathé in 1930, “Half Pint Polly”, was well on his way to successfully transitioning to talkies. “West of Cheyenne” was a milestone in Tom Tyler’s career, probably just as exciting for him as for when he made “Let’s Go Gallagher” in 1925, his first starring role in a silent film. The story was simple enough in Tom’s first talkie, about a young man whose father was framed for murder and held captive in a forbidden town known as Ghost City. Written by Bernard Cohen and Oliver Drake, the movie was produced and directed by Harry S. Webb, who would continue to direct a number of Tom Tyler movies in the 1930’s, sometimes using the name Henri Samuels.

With the release of “West of Cheyenne”, Tom’s voice was stressed in press kits, obviously to encourage fans and cinema patrons in general to attend showings of this movie. Even film reviews like the one in Variety March 4, 1931 which describes the plot in “West of Cheyenne” as somewhat of a routine western, touts Tom Tyler’s voice as being the best part of the movie. It is doubtful that Tom Tyler’s first talkie was a put off for those who have long appreciated and admired his work. Perhaps the most important question was, “How distinct was Tom’s voice?” to those who have never heard him speak on film. In response to that question, the answer is, “very distinct” - distinct enough to pick out on a radio show, had Tom been a radio actor. In the newspapers, cinema ads described Tom’s voice as splendid (The Amarillo Globe-Times, Amarillo, TX, October 9, 1931). For those of us who take sound film for granted, the majority of us having been born during the sound era, it may be hard to imagine the pleasant surprise of hearing Tom Tyler speak for the first time in a movie. Along with the usual treats of action, hard riding, hard fighting, and moments of tenderness with his leading lady Josephine Hill, Tom Tyler never disappoints.